felixcolgrave

Large Cephalopod

Hello everyone, and welcome to June! It's great to have you here, in this month that we are all in, and thanks so much for your support!
Be it new or ongoing or about to end, I'm really lucky to have your help.

As usual, here's one of my Pen Pal drawings from this month, which I've coloured in-- only THIS time I've "coloured it in" with 3D models, that conform exactly to the lines that I drew!

I recorded the whole process, so I'll put together a... time lapse? Speed paint? A ...

DONKS Soundtrack: Pipes and Wires

This is the third track I've extended for the Donks soundtrack, but the first track in the chronology of Donks.

This is a shorter one, built around a brief section of audio near the start, where the donks all travel through an electrical cable into a wall. So, I guess this is the sound of the donks' electrical journey, from the digital world to the physical. And I guess it's also the intro to t...

Little Dancing Man (work in progress)

Look, drawings!

All these recent 3D experiments have been fun, and will probably be VERY useful for my practice once I have a context for them- but so far none of the 3D stuff I've learnt has presented a starting point into a new project.

I'd like to make some actual "finished stuff" though, so I've just started doing some redrawn animation of this little dancing man.

What this little man is FOR I don't entirely know, but just jumping in and doing lots of drawings felt like ...

Fish Ride

Hello to all cool friends!!!

Thanks so much to everyone for your support this month, or any other months in the past, and/or future!!

For Pen Pals- your drawings are done, but won't be sent off for a couple more days, because I am in Berlin for Pictoplasma 2023!!! (and did not bring the drawings with me.)

Here's a photo of one of them though, which I digitally coloured during my 20 hours of being on...

Flower & Friends (who are flowers)

Another animation test! Further exploring some of the "2D cutout in 3D space" stuff I did with the wobbly ball arms. But rather than using 3D to animate a flat picture to put back in a 2D scene, this time it's a fully 3D scene, made of 2D bits.

I've tried to word that several times without just saying 2D 3D 2D 3D and it's sounding a lot more convoluted than it actually is.

Here is a 3D ...

Wobbly Ball Arms: an accidental video essay

I hope you liked that two second loop that I made, because here's me talking about it for 7 and a half minutes.

Like with other recent test animations, I wanted to edit together a "making of" video, but I mistakenly thought it'd be easier to just talk about it with my mouth.

Now instead of just explaining what I'm doing, I talk about animation history, how what I'm doing fits into my b...

Mechanical Murphy's Frustrating Maze

Can you escape the diabolical maze of Murphy? The answer is no, you cannot. The rules dictate that you have to stay in the maze, and constantly reassure Murphy that it's actually really difficult.

This is another 2D/3D hybrid experiment- and one that I think blends really naturally with my usual 2D work, and opens up a lot of possibilities!

I'm going to quickly edit together a little process video, like with the other 3D tests. You can watch it as soon as you get out of the maze...

Shoe's Lament (Donk Music)

The singing shoe seems like a key musical moment in Donks, where everything falls silent as an oddly sincere solo vocalist changes the soundtrack to an intentional performance. But that only lasts for a few seconds as an introduction to the next scene, where the music changes tone again and the "shoe vocals" get buried in the mix.

This is a shoe with a song in her heart, so I've taken her intro...

Gold Star

Hello beautiful friends! Thanks for your support this April, and for your support generally!

Here's an illustration of, um, I suppose a cyclist, with a star in his head. I'm not sure if the star is compelling him to ride somewhere, or if the star is a manifestation of his feelings about cycling. Either way, he's having a good time!

If you're a Pen Pal, then the original line art for either this drawing, or a different one, will be on its way to you in the next day or two....

100 More Drawings

Hi!

So as you may know, every month I send of a bunch of ink drawings to "Pen Pals". They don't know what what they're getting until they get it, which is a lot less stressful than doing specific commissions. Some months I do a paper animation and give out the frames, and one month I did a comic, but a lot of the time it's a comple...

Another Keymesh thing: 3D patterns on 2D fabric

I did another experiment with Keymesh! (First one here)

One of the possibilities that I was most excited about with this tool, is for patterned clothes! Clothes are floppy and change shape constantly, and in 2D animation that's great, IF there's no details.
But I love textiles! And I want to make characters that wear patterns.

In fact, Double King was actually going to wear a paisley ...

Barkimboldo (Extended Donks Music)

Hello! As I mentioned before, I'm extending some of the musical fragments from Donks into full tracks. Here's the first finished one!

You can download the track below 👇👇👇

Crab catching some little guys

Hello hello and thank you to patrons new and old for your support this month!!!

To recap: February marked the release of DONKS, and since then I've been exploring other avenues of combining 3D with 2D animation in novel ways. On the side, I've also been extending the music from DONKS into a full soundtrack, like I did with Double King!
Looking forward to progressing with both of those projects this month!

DONKS was also the first film released under the banner of 2023-03-03 05:23:57 +0000 UTC View Post

2D to 3D (experimenting with Keymesh)

Hello! Here's a little animation test, with a bit of behind-the-scenes footage for context. And here's me typing some words for even more context! Too much context maybe (sorry).

So- more 3D!
For those who might be wondering, my intention when learning 3D for Donks was never to pivot away from 2D animation- rather just to find ways I can add the tools of 3D to what I already do.
Donks was a very specific exercise with set rules, where the bits were all 3D, and the animation was a...

Donk Music (so far)

Hello everyone!
I've been spinning around in a circle for the last several days working out what I should focus on now that Donks is finished.

A lot of people have expressed interest in a release of the Donks music, so I've been considering doing an extended soundtrack where I flesh out some of the little snippets of music into full sized tracks, like...

DONKS DOWNLOAD LONKS

WELL!

Donks is now out on YouTube for the world to see, but YOU don't need to stream it, all squashed and compressed, because here is a link to the actual video file:

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DONKS ⚠️ DONKS ⚠️ DONKS ⚠️ DONKS ⚠️ DONKS ⚠️ DONKS ⚠️
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Bubble Bug

HELLO EVERYONE!

Many of you will already know this, but to anyone who missed it, DONKS was released publicly a few days ago! ---> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4gvSYEqOMn8

An enormous big huge THANK YOU to everyone's support while making DONKS, there's no way I would've been able to make it without your insane generosity and patience!!!

And of course, an enormous big huge THANK YOU an...

DONKS

DONKS!!! It's here, it's done, and you can watch it right now!

What is this film? How do I describe it?? I was thinking about ocean plastic, bottom feeders, and animals adapting to living with humans, even though they're as far away from humans as possible. So I guess it's about that- as a musical extravaganza!

There's a bunch of other influences and themes and motivations behind this, but I've been staring at it for too long to tell what kind of film the final product is. So I'll...

Frantic Scuttling

Here I am, hello and bye bye off I go right now to animate the LAST SHOT

Metal Melter

I'm in the last couple of shots now- in fact the one I'm working on right now is either the second last or the third last! Trying my best to avoid spoiling the ending with these last few WIP posts- so, here is an animated* background, of some metal falling apart like lasagna.

*I say "animated", but it's evidently only 4 frames. I think it works when you see it in the context of the film though, and hopefully you will too!

what if I cry you TWO rivers?

Happy 2023 all you wonderful people!!! Thank you for your support, be it ongoing or if you just signed up!

I believe in December I said I was on track to finish animating DONKS either "this month or next month". It is now next month, so I better go keep animating and try to prove myself right!!!!

First though, here is a mountain whose snow cap is either melting into rivers, or they are having a cry. Or both!

The original line art for this illustration is one of the ink dr...

making a wobbling blob

A little bit of redrawn animation, in amongst all this 3D/2D photo cutout nonsense!
It's only an amorphous, nondescript blob, BUT I thought I'd show you how it was put together.

This shot might look a little abstract out of context (also I've taken out some stuff to avoid spoilers), but never mind what it's meant to be, we're just here for the blob.

The shadows and light in the blob are made of flat drawings, even though the shadow especially is blurred to the point that it b...

Unimpressed Submarine

(The periscope is coming from the top of the frame because the submarine is upside down)

Out for a drive to clear his head

Hello everyone, and THANK YOU for your support this December and throughout 2022!!!

As many of you might know, my main focus on here this past year has been a new short film called DONKS. I haven't got a release date for you, but production is ALMOST finished- I would say either this month or next month!!!
I've been making the animation, music, sound and compositing all in tandem, chunk by chunk. So when I finish that last shot, there won't be a whole lot of post-production to be wo...

Pain Face

Not all configurations of donks result in a successful critter. This one is attempting forward motion, and it's not going great!

Waiter, there's a submarine in my big drip

I turned my back on my big drip for 2 seconds and when I looked back an entire submarine had nestled inside it, like a massive caterpillar in a wet cocoon

Concept Sketches!!! Submarine

Hello!

So the thing about DONKS is, because all the characters are collaged together out of a limited library of little building blocks, I haven't had any concept art to post on here! There's been virtually no sketching or visual brainstorming- rather, all the creative decisions have been made while dragging little pieces around and seeing what works.

BUT! A new character (object?) has entered the film who is NOT made of donks! Here is them, along with all my scrappy little subm...

Paint Roller

Hello you wonderfuls! Big thanks to patrons old and new for your support this month, and for any past and future months!

I'm pleased to report that DONKS is getting pretty close to being finished!!

In previous months, my paper illustrations for "Pen Pal" patrons have doubled as frames for little paper animations- but now as I focus on the home stretch of completing DONKS, I've gone back to doing individual sketches for Pen Pals.

So! Here's one of the pen drawings that I'v...

Exquisite Corpse

Hello! Here is a long critter. Different sections of the body occupy three different shots in the film, but you never see the whole thing. Nor does a continuous "whole thing" exist outside these three vignettes sewn together with Movie Magic™ (see: whip pan).

So! I thought it'd be fun to put the three shots on top of each other, so we could get a better look at the implied body. However it turns out that this is actually MORE disorienting, and I still have no idea w...

Curly Stomper

Hello! I have been animating someone spinning around.

So far "someone" is just legs though, because they are too long to fit on screen, and are subsequently tying themself in knots.
I also tied myself in knots animating these 2D images of 3D objects in 2D space, to fake the most basic 3D- but I like how it turned out!

Guess I'm going to go animate a torso now. Bye!