Final Evaluation (FMP)

 

For my Final Major Project I created a 2D and 3D animation about a secret mysterious door appearing in an office. I started with some research on how to mix 2D and 3D aspects in Adobe Premiere and how to model objects and locations in Blender for the 3D environment. Throughout the Project I came across some mistakes and problems when both animating and editing. Most of these problems occurred with Blender such as dropping the frame rate and also in Premiere when the effect settings kept resetting.

 

When lockdown came it did not impact my work towards my project because thankfully I had most of the technology I needed at home. During the Cyber Attack at college it did impact me slightly due to no receiving emails and having to ask questions about the wix website.

 

I chose mixing 2D and 3D animation to create my short film because I wanted to set myself more of a challenging task than just creating one type of animation style. I was happy with the choice because I could create different characters and explore a range of visuals and animation techniques in Blender. In hindsight I would have just worked on creating a 3D animation because throughout the project I mainly worked on the 3D animation side of my project. My finished FMP matches with the original Idea quite well. I think I could have worked on the 2D aspects a bit more, so it feels more like a mix of both 2D and 3D animation. This is my second time animating 3D in Blender, I am more confident and getting used to 3D animating and hopefully I can keep using this in future projects. I would not change much if I started my animation again, but if I could change the exterior design of all the buildings it would be more realistic. The intended audience for my project is about 10 years and up because of the use of humour and the unusual characters. The finished product of my FMP would appeal to this age group because my animation is slightly weird and has an electronic soundtrack. If I had more time, I think I would extend the story so it has more depth, and I would also improve the visual aspects of the project. I decided to focus my genre of the story as both Retro and Mystery because I made the animation seem like old video game cutscenes. I have realised it is quite difficult to create suspense and mystery in a story and I will think twice about trying to do this again but I think that the theme of my product which is mystery containing some humour would still be recognisable for my target audience. I decided to add a VHS filter to make it glitchy like an old retro videogame I thought this would blend in with the animation, in hindsight I thought it was too distracting and so I decided to clean up the filter to make the appearance more appealing.

 

 

 

The research methods I used throughout this project were tutorials on Blender and composing music because these were the main focus of my project. The most helpful research source was visiting my dad’s office because it gave me an image of what a real-life office looks like and what I should base my 3D location on. I should have research more about tracking 2D aspects onto the 3D scenes because in my project some 2D aspects did not track as well as I had hoped.

 

 

I think that the plan for my characters and 3D location modelling in Blender went well, but I think I could have improved on the visual storyboard so I could visualise how some scenes were going to look. I think that I was successful in creating my characters because they were wacky especially the boss who I designed as a briefcase. I received some feedback on my project which helped me understand what I needed to work on and what did not need improvement. Most of the feedback was about 2D aspects and the timing of scenes.

 

The areas which I have successfully improved in throughout this project were the rendering of animation in Blender and the conversion of files along with the 2D characters animation in some scenes to make them seem more lifelike. I did a variety of research and I found that from my survey people strongly agree that Character Development is most important in a short story and when creating a character their Personality is important. I used this information when I created my character the boss. The plugins I researched helped me create the music for my project, by using these I listened to different synths to try and get a melody played that will match the genre of my project. I think my planning has sightly improved, it was helpful to make a list of all the techniques I needed to research and I have realised how important having a thorough plan is to create a successful project. I realised that when planning my Final Major Project I was organised but time scale was a problem because my Final Major Project was too complicated to create in the time given so I decided to shorten the story. My confidence has grown when trying out new software. Throughout this project I feel like I have adapted really well to online working because I have all the technology I need to create an animation.

 

I found creating my wix website quite time consuming because of all the different categories to complete but it was also very useful to reflect back on. The GANTT Chart was helpful because it showed all of my tasks that I needed to complete and when I aimed to finish them by. My storyboard helped me build my animation and I can see how it was going to turn out. My dad's office photos also helped me visualise what my 3D office location was going to look like and which objects signifies the different rooms. The Music plugins helped me in my project because I had researched a collection of different instruments and how they would improve the sound aspects of my project. My production diary helped me the most because it shows how much I have  progressed from the start of my Final Major Project. Lastly my weekly reflection helped me reflect back on the weeks and what I managed to achieve and what I wanted to improve on.

 

I feel like my understanding of rigging and animating in Blender have developed throughout this project because the animation in 3D was the main part of the project. I was really pleased with the creation of the main characters computer loading the Windows XP desktop, I feel this was a success. The two biggest challenges of my project were tracking the 2D characters so that they were smooth and also composing the music for the project. I also found the effect of the mysterious door challenging to create because it was difficult to line up and create a perfect glowing effect. The skills that I need to develop further are animating the walk cycle of the 2D characters and creating and rigging in some more 3D characters which would bring more life to the office. The new skills and knowledge I have learnt would help with my future projects because I want to try and further my animation in the future and gain new skills. Overall, I think my project came out well apart from some of the 2D elements which I feel needed more work. If I had an opportunity to start again, I think I would just have focused on the 3D side of animation instead of combining 2D and 3D animation which is much more complex.