Mitch's Animation Anxiety Attacks

Gunther

2010-09-30T08:02:00.000-07:00

Jeez I haven't been on here in ages. I should upload my next project here :)

Anyways I just thought I'd wish all the 2010 2nd years good luck :)

ALSO I MADE YOU ALL A PICTURE!

An old Project.

2010-02-15T14:01:00.000-08:00

Gather 'round children! Let me tell you a tale about a teenager fresh out of highschool. (well, he left highschool early to chase his dream of art and cartoons)... STILL, He was convinced that no matter how good you were at drawing or how good you were at writing stories, everyone out there has amazing potential hidden within their imagination. So he spent a few weeks interviewing many people, Friends and Family alike, and asked them about their (dream) alternative personas.
Some answered straight away, and went on about fantastic super heroes, each with imaginative powers, each with their own dash of unique flavour to them. Others he interviewed, took longer to answer, or were too serious to answer, but eventually came up with amazing stories. The longer they talked about it, the more enthusiastic they seemed towards his question. Fantasies were re-opened from their childhoods, and as the teenage boy was writing all this down in his book he realised a unique and priceless treasure was forming together.

He spent weeks looking over everyones dreams, something so surreal and inspiring, and eventually saw a circle of purpose behind these notes. They had collectively created an ecosystem of magic. So he started to write a story, inspired by this collection of dreams.

4 years later and I'm still slaving away over this idea... lol :(
But the more I think about it, the deeper the story becomes, so I'm determined to stick with it.

I'm putting together some character design concepts, and I'll keep everyone updated on my Blog.

Lee and Archie by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

Do you Wanna Know?

2010-02-12T04:42:00.000-08:00

Do you wanna know by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

Something I made in celebration of my new Cintiq.

GOD its nice to finally make something in my spare time. I love working at Krome, but it certainly doesn't allow much time for my own endeavors.

-Just got smacked over the head with the Reality-Hammer-

Games Cosmic Showreel Egg

2009-11-04T14:05:00.000-08:00

I have much, much more work to do on this little child of mine, but for now this will have to do.

I would like to add both run and walk cycles, and the old 'lifting the heavy object'

Also, I'm considering converting the Robin Hood Dialogue into 3D

anyways enjoy!

Games Showreel unfinished from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

Games part 1 - propping shield

2009-10-25T01:51:00.000-07:00

A very short animation of a guy warming up to a battle stance. I had fun making the sword and shield :D

katana kid from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

I'm working on 3 stages of sword swings at the moment, so you'll be seeing some more from me by the end of the week :)

MASTER ROBIN and some nostalgia

2009-10-13T04:56:00.000-07:00

So I've finally finished my dialogue piece as far as I can at the moment without losing track of other assignments.

but ultimately its unfinished and I'd like to work more on it in the future.
Maybe even make it 3D in the near future.

MASTER ROBIN by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

Also, GOD I miss the Animaniacs... Nice snappy animation to music

You've got an experimental friend in me

2009-10-12T02:02:00.000-07:00

This is a perfect example of economic animating... OR a combination and laziness that resulted in me having to cut down on complicated scenes... either way you look at it, this is my experimental

I'll probably work on it some more afterwards but more assignments are yelling at me to finish them!

Also for those who haven't seen it yet, I've got a youtube link to a NEW proper trailer of Toy Story 3

I'd have put the embedded version onto my blog but it isn't allowed for some annoying reason

Progression Reels and Bewbies

2009-09-04T04:15:00.000-07:00

Robin grew some nice boobs from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

I'd really like some feed back on my robin hood animation here before I continue on only to find that I've got to go back and delete like 50 frames :P Also I'd like to point out for SOME annoying reason the sound seems SLIGHTLY out of sync... this is not the case, I don't know what vimeo did to my file.

aaand this is a nice collection of my work so far

progression show reel from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

Loading... and Art

2009-08-20T03:28:00.000-07:00

Loading part 1 by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

Ever wondered what emotions a game character would be going through while the computer was trying to load him?

in other news here is some Fan Art as a hats off to those wonderful creators behind the Meet The Spy animation.

Am I Blind?

2009-08-17T07:18:00.000-07:00

I can see by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

Blame this flash on kuru for making me feel insecure about my disability. -hides in shame-

Nar I'm quite happy with who I am and this is a nice little attempt at explaining why :)

what IS gadoosh?

2009-08-10T06:28:00.000-07:00

Nathan and I had an effing great time making this ad. I hope you guys enjoy watching it as much as we enjoyed making it :D

Laundry Day

2009-08-05T05:40:00.000-07:00

The girls showed me this one at tafe the other day and its far too good to NOT post it on my blog.

and to all the girls out there, when you find sex toys in your guys pants, remember, it can always be worse... WAY worse.

DA Portfolio

2009-07-30T08:14:00.000-07:00

Hey just thought I'd give a shout out to anyone who isn't aware of it already. But Deviant Art has just introduced to the world their new PortFolio system which keeps all your artwork and animation in a profession manner without all clients having to look at all your artwork and having to put up with all the other silly myspace-esque crepe "thats french for crap" that you see on deviant art all the time.

It's completely free, user friendly and you can hold up to 100 of your best work which is a sweet deal for a free internet space. It also has a spot for you to upload your resume for interested employers who know how to use the interbutts... I'd say its the best free online portfolio system I've come across... well I've only come across the one but thats besides the point.

this is a link here that will help you find your way

http://news.deviantart.com/article/86515/

PS I'VE GOT A BUTTON/LINK TOP RIGHT OF THE SCREEN FOR MY PORTFOLIO.

Now let me sleep everyone GOSH!

A good visual start to the second half year

2009-07-22T08:03:00.000-07:00

Once in an every so occuring part of my life I drop my flash and maya for a bit of old pacer and art pad for some good old fasion drawing. Looking around for some inspiration my eyes find the two most dedicated illustrators in the room. With their permission I drew up a little scene with their favourite OCs 'Original Characters' in action.

I'd like to think I pushed myself a little more than usual to see how things could look and I'm happy with the outcome.

Also on the animation side of things I'm teaming up with Nathan to work on a piece of advertising, trying to sell gym membership to couch potatoes. Hilarity WILL be a factor in this equasion.

Animation frames to dead brain cells ratio count...

2009-07-19T00:43:00.000-07:00

It's time to say goodbye to another fantastic months worth of holidays of partying and animation... and just going back to plain old animation for the next 4 months or so. The Mitch in me is saying I had an awesome time, but the Mian "mitch/ian hibrid" in me is saying I could have done a turd load more animation.

Having said that, I regret nothing, EAPS were made, friends held hands and were merry. Maya add ons were explored and some people found love, and simulataneously some cried, but HEY what are parties for?

looking forward to coming back to tafe :)

Here's to hang overs that continue to last for more than 2 days :)

Tween Machine

2009-06-25T22:21:00.000-07:00

Click to Bounce

And this is a work in progress for my second EAP using the TweenMachine add on

Click to play

Working on some animations using a new tool for maya Ian showed me called Tween Machine, it can me found here :)

Its just a little ball I made in maya, jumping for joy.

Will be updating this post with more animations later on.

Greencross Extream Weather Heroes and the birth of Flash n Burn

2009-06-03T00:52:00.000-07:00

Many many many many hours went into this ad. I hope greencross is very happy with it.

After a quick meeting this morning we came up with the name Flash n Burn studios to represent us. Perhaps a little wanky in its approach, but that is the majority of our group anyway. For anyone who wants to download a high definition version of this video, you'll need a deviant art login, and you'll find it in my dA gallery

It was all written down for me, in a script

2009-05-31T05:06:00.000-07:00

I couldn't help but put this on my blog as a possible great source of audio to animate to later on, it just has SO much potential for action. I was reading a post on animation mentor about getting out of the seat, and acting your scenes standing up. NOW, Sir Ian Mckellen sold that entire performance sitting, I can only imagine what it would look like if he were standing... and a tad more "3D animated"
Sir Ian, Sir Ian, Sir Ian, ACTION, WIZARD! YOU SHALL NOT PASS, cut, Sir Ian, Sir Ian, Sir Ian.

Rough EAP - 02

2009-05-25T05:58:00.000-07:00

Hey all, Just posting a rough of the first part of my Dua EAPS 02 and 03 of both throwing and catching a ball.

Open for change.

Click to play

Animation Check List

2009-05-24T04:38:00.000-07:00

The holidays are coming up as everyone would be aware of. so I've stolen Ian's student challenge and turned it into a giant image to keep on your computer desktop at home as a checklist to keep everyone occupied over the holidays. and by stolen I really mean giving Ian a second voice in making sure people get the idea in their heads.

I know alot of us are doing naratives for our end of year assignment but lets be honest when I say it wont land us a job compaired to handing in a show-reel with some of these small potential animation scenes.

If one could manage to cover all of these by this time next year, they would have greater odds landing this job.

I hope everyone considers this.

peace.

EAP - The best punch lines are the ones you don't see coming

2009-05-21T12:26:00.000-07:00

To fully understand this scene taken out of my animated short "Pandora's Charades" there is an inivisble heavy weight boxer in this scene which will become abundantly clear.

Now Youtube as it seems, tends to kill a fair few fps in my animations so I've god a download button top left of my blog for those who want to really have a good look at my EAP

Pandora's Charades is coming... sometime

2009-05-12T06:48:00.001-07:00

Well I haven't posted much recently. Thats all my bad really, I've been rather swamped with ALOT of greencross work and little time for the more interesting things in life like my end of year assignment. It's coming along nicely and I've almost finished the animatic. For now you'll just have to enjoy an image I put together of my chosen character design for the animation.

peace out Animators!

Monsters Vs Aliens Vs Mitch

2009-04-02T05:21:00.000-07:00

WARNING CONTAINS SPOILERS

I'm a little iffy all round about this movie.

The jokes were hilarious granted, but the visual look of the movie conflicted with my expectations of the film. A lot of the rigs looked like stereotyped charicatures of famous people, but unfortunately with them being fictional characters, the joke of the charicature style was lost. I found I was a little creaped out by the extreme amount of detail that had gone into skin textures of the humans, like dreamworks was trying to prove a point to the world.

As far as the characters go, without Bob, Dr. Cockroach Ph D, and the President, the movie would have been made up completely of very boring characters. Ontop of that, apart from Ginormica and The Missing Link, everyone else were complete 2 dimentional characters. Bob was "although hilarious" very stupid throughout the entire film, he was remained the same right till the very end, every other character was the same "unchanging". Link didn't even NEED to be interesting and yet they showed a rather sad and exposed side to his usual macho visage when he realises he's not as tough as he thought he was. Perhaps these character stereotypes are becoming THAT stereotyped that you don't even need to give them depth anymore. I noticed this with the antagonist, Gallaxhar, At the beggining he was evil for no reason and I was thinking "here we go, generic evil character no. 999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999,999" but then dreamworks surprised me with his wonderful and perhas even deliberately vague and constantly interrupted monologue explaining why he was evil to make fun of the stereotype. I think Dreamworks took us for a ride with this movie, threw in a bunch of stereotypes, some big names to make the fans happy, put in some good laughs, AND some cheap ones "close encounters of the 3rd kind parody, merging with a stolen joke from Space Chimps", and make it a 3D experience.

The movie was hilarious, but the story had the emotion and depth of a rich 13 year old emo's song lyrics.

and now I've got that out of my system, I wanna talk about the animation.
Yeah, it was alright, but I don't think they thought about it enough. Susan is supposed to be HUGE. You'd think with your body becoming larger, the earth would seem ultimately smaller, thus giving you the illusion that there is less gravity. A scene with her being chased by a giant robot through the city, you watch her jump from roof top to roof top, and she seems to jump like a normal person. my understanding is that the bigger something is, the slower it "seems" to fall from a distance. Galileo was probably rolling over in his grave when they were animating this scene. The story has close to no depth but they have a perfect opportunity to make up for that with some well thought out animation and they put together what looks like a normal person running through a miniature city "which may have been deliberate but I doubt it".

Something that seems to be a pattern in dreamworks movies, animals and monsters etc always seem to be rigged and animated much more entertainingly that humans. They squash and stretch more, and they move more convincingly. "eg, mega-susan moved like a normal human being and yet Insectosaurus was moving like a snail, despite sharing the same trait of being massive characters"

All in all very hit and miss. BUT being a biased fan of comedy I'll still probably enjoy it over and over again despite its downfalls.

Or have I missed the point somewhere?

A perspective of Jess' "Castle in the sky" narrative.

2009-03-28T21:09:00.000-07:00

I know this does not fall under animation but once in a while I find its nice to shake things up a little bit. This originally started out as a 3D reference for Jess' end of year narrative, which I kindly put together for her, and then it turned into an experimental journey into the creative side of Maya.

Sky Pirate from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

It is SOOO FREAKING hard to make spheres look like bubbles. Thats right, Jess' sky pirate ships have a bubble exhaust system

Perhaps this developing skill will serve me well with my own end of year narrative ^_^

Snowboarding

2009-03-24T22:51:00.000-07:00

Infusing Jason Ryans Tutorial on easing in and easing out with Franks direction towards snowboarding, our beans battle it out to see who's the best snowboarder amongst the rest.

R Jeremy Snowboarder from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

I couldn't help but make R Jeremy jiggle at the end.

The Irony of Standards

2009-03-13T20:43:00.000-07:00

So. I was the opening piece to a 4-men-1-woman oral presentation. So I thought I'd give people a bit of a show. Sell my idea of great standards in animation to the fellow students of my class. And what better way of elaborating on that then a display of pictures of high standards and quality. But when I show them a whole bunch of slides which looked like they were drawn with my left testicle, I was applauded. Sure I'll take any compliment thrown at me. But I feel like after all the planning of sweet irony, the joke was on me. Should have my intentions been a little more clear? I feel its patronising to explain intellectual humour. I feel alot like Jim Carrey from 'Man on the Moon'

Red

2009-03-12T21:33:00.000-07:00

It's Red... It bounces... and it will tear your room a new one if you take it home. will you adopt him today?

Red by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

Moom's Charades

2009-03-12T19:45:00.000-07:00

as I play around with different 3D rigs in maya I think to myself how I'm going to plan out my end of year narrative. I've decided to go with moom, he just looks right for my idea. I'm sure alot of hardcore animatiors will argue that it doesn't matter what the rig looks like so long as the animation is good, but I've been thinking and its not just an animation. It's a short story. And since my story has a fair bit of slap-stick humour involved I thought it would be appropriate to use a cartoony looking character.

Imagine if you will, a game of charades that goes out of control. you draw a card, it tells you to act out a scene, but as you begin to express to the others what your trying to act out, it becomes an invisable reality. You lose control of the situation but it most certainly puts the message across. whether that message is juggling chain-saws, stepping in the ring with a heavy weight boxer, or even tap-dancing through a mine field. But just like any looney-tunes-esque short cartoon, the characters will be a-ok by the end of the film no matter how many times they blow up.

but the story is still a work in progress.

Embrace The Machine - finished

2009-02-22T07:23:00.000-08:00

Embrace The Machine by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

my latest illustrative piece.
done all on graphics tablet.

Bean there, done that, went to make it in Maya

2009-02-21T20:47:00.000-08:00

So we're working on creating our first 3D character in Maya. Bean shaped on the exterior, with a heart of gold on the inside. Will be awesome once its all finished, I'm hoping to be able to render this guy with some fur. Hopefully frank can show me how to do that.

Looking forward to this guy bouncing about in the future...

I would also like to work on my good ol' ninja as a 3D project in the future. He's simple enough to create.

y'all have a good one and I'll be sure to keep you all up to date on my workings as an animator/artist in the future

11 Second Club February 2009

2009-02-16T02:36:00.000-08:00

Jack Black... a personal favourite of mine... God status really. and now I get to animate him... excellent ^_^

This is the rough keys for my 2009 feb 11secondclub animation. enjoy guys :D

GOALS!

2009-02-15T02:26:00.000-08:00

I started this course with a clean slate. I thought I knew what it was about... and with a good 4 months of Ian drilling it into my mind I eventually figured it out. I didn't know how to use flash, I didn't know how to use maya, I didn't know how to traditionally animate. I never really thought about how something moved, I was just more impressed with how cool they looked with their spikey blonde hair and kamehameha waves. from day dot at tafe, I was learning something completely new. I didn't want to own up to the fact that I knew nothing about it, mainly I guess because it scared me a little. I decided I was going to do animation for the rest of my life... and then to find out that I knew nothing about it, it made me feel very VERY small in comparison to everything else.

So the first year was all about me learning these bizzar and specifically non-idiot proof pieces of software. So I'd been thinking to myself, "ok, I'm a big bad 2nd year now, watch me roar" and then it dawns on me like an ice cube down your coin slot. I'm back to square one. So when setting my goals I think of what kind of job I want as an animator. The games industy is big in brisbane, but I don't want to keep closed minded. I've decided to work on a narrative for end of year, working with the main focus being a 3D character with simple props to play around with, but I want 2.5D flash characters occasionally interacting with him to show both sides of my skills, one as an animator, and one as an illustrator.
So with my narrative, I'll not only be able to show this to a games studio saying "look at my awsum three-dee skillz"
but I could wander into somewhere like liquid, and say, I can draw, I can animate, I can create a story structure and use more than one piece of animation software.

what I need to do now "because I've realised how complicated these processes can be" is polish up the script and animatic as promptly as possible so I can get to work early in the game on animating my narrative piece. once I finish writing it up

I need to learn how to use the graph editor in maya properly because that will surely be my achilies heel in all of this.

I'll need to install maya "somehow" on my computer so I can work on it at home.

look after Bill "my EAT"

Also I really think its important that I work more on animation with emotion and dialogue. Its something I personally believe I wont be perfecting any time soon, so the more I work on it the better I can be at it. "me thinks the 11second club is the place to be for that"

Ontop of that, I've got my 30 seconds worth of animation to your dialogue thing going on, on my deviant art website
I'm working on a strange UNO joke that a friend sent me... things like this could keep me animating and not playing around with games and watching cartoons.
not sure if its a good idea doing this and my narrative piece at the same time.

after all of that, I'd like to get a little better at my illustrations, but I'm aware animation comes first.

So without talking about other goals to do with outside my life as an animator, it sounds like I've got a long year ahead of me.

Where's Linus?

2009-02-15T02:08:00.001-08:00

BALL IS ON THE LOOSE! SQUARE FACED MAN YET TO APPEAR IN COURT!

late thursday afternoon, a one Linus 'ping pong' Mcreevy went on a rampage in TeleTubby land. "He snuggled up in my lap even after I told him not to... I feel violated" said an emotionally, and sexually scarred Tinky Winky. "He was very disrespectful and he reaked of Irish Whiskey", said Laa-Laa. "He laughed at my hand bag" Said Po. "I'm used to balls, but he went too far", cried Dipsy.
Mr. Daniel Goodman, owner of Linus ergo ultimately responcible for the balls actions refuses to say anything on the matter at this point and time. More news on the Linus case tomorrow at 7.

balls, balls, and more balls.

2009-02-11T06:22:00.000-08:00

You'd think 2nd year animation teachers were trying to tell us something about the importance of balls with all the ball animation thrown at us.

Its good being a ball by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

So far being back at tafe has been good... I'm missing Ian's psychic ability to know when I'm doing something wrong, but I'm sure frank will do a good job at keeping me in line.

y'all have a good one.

3D - Stereoscopic Animation

2008-12-20T03:59:00.000-08:00

Why think ouside the box when you can think outside the screen. Thats right I'm talking about 3D eye popping animation. well to be more precise I'm talking about Stereoscopic Animation.

Remember those crazy magic eye pictures you used to look at that created a 3D image for you... THIS ISN'T THE SAME THING.
what I need you to do is go cross-eyed "if you can't go cross-eyed then its game over for you already"
only go cross-eyed subtly untill the 2 moving images create a 3rd image in the middle. Try and focus on that image.

if you can't get it straight away don't give up hope... it took me about 5 minutes to figure out how to look at my first stereoscopic image.

Stereoscopic - 3D flash boy by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

For all those who could see the 3D image.. I hope you enjoyed it :)

Imagination is so much more interesting when there are more minds behind it

2008-12-10T11:52:00.000-08:00

I came up with this fantastic idea the other day to get people through deviant art to send me 30 second audio clips that they create and I animate over the top of. Nothing too fancy with the animation but enough to still be constructive for me and entertaining for them. I really hope it gets off the ground. This is an Ad for it here :) I'm also getting some of the southbank students in on it too.

Your Dialogue - My Animation by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

stayed up all night and some of the morning finishing this one off :)

More Animootion

2008-12-03T08:44:00.001-08:00

Well, with ian back out on the animation battlefield, us kids probably wont be using blogger much more to upload our stuff, unless I can pursuade them otherwise. But because I just can't let go of The Rusty Spoon, I gotta keep my fellow listeners "0" and upload some animation I've recently done

Leap and Swing by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

Sword Animation by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

just little animation practises. Nothing too huge, but you know, thats what its all about. Always coming up with something new, and putting it into action :D

peace out everyone

Smooth Casualties

2008-11-18T05:34:00.000-08:00

for anyone who wanted to see the 25 fps version of my end of year maya piece, here it is :) enjoy

Smooth casualties from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

hahah I also noticed that my guy in the thumbnail looks like someone from the 1950's expressing a pose of mild annoyance...

Margery! Those children are stealing my head piece from my window-wil again! Douw! *shakes fists*

Some end of year assignments

2008-11-17T20:54:00.000-08:00

Animating in 3D by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

Think out side the Box by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

TransFORM by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

Enjoy people

Civillian Casualties are my Speciality

2008-09-29T01:26:00.000-07:00

Civillian Casualties FTW by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

Just a nice little link for those who wanted to check out where I am with my end-of-year-assignment. Y'all have a good one.

Oriental Dusk

2008-09-28T00:49:00.001-07:00

Oriental Dusk by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

Well, just when you though all bad things happen in 3, of course more crap has to happen in my life, so finally I manage to get home saturday evening after not being able to sleep ONE whole damn night in my bed all holidays since tafe finished and I've been slaving over assignments japanese cram style. Who ever bothers to read this blog, I hope you enjoy it :)

Move to the beat

2008-08-28T02:07:00.000-07:00

Dancing to music by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

Walk will be uploaded later "Need to redraw it in flash because I've run out of paper to draw it the traditional way"

I'm sick of these mother-Hubbard assessments on this mother-Hubbard webpage

2008-07-23T15:24:00.000-07:00

YARG!

2008-07-22T16:26:00.000-07:00

Holidays.

2008-07-20T21:18:00.000-07:00

Hey all. I just thought I'd upload some of my animation I've been working on at home during the holidays. These are all links to DeviantArt. Enjoy!

Aqua by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

The Fly by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

Jarred T3h Bunneh by ~Ludichrist on deviant ART

I'm looking forward to seeing all you guys tomorrow :) have a good one.

Ninja - Episode 1

2008-05-28T15:22:00.001-07:00

From a classroom cliche' to an internet time waster. Enjoy the Ninja, I'll be uploading the version with sound soon.

Jackie-Boy

2008-05-06T07:48:00.000-07:00

Having a bad night so I thought I'd work on my poses. Still not great at it so I guess I'll keep working at it. I like the guys attitude though so I thought I'd upload it anyway :) I rushed the picture and then noticed how nice it looked as an effect. anyways here it is. Feel free to stone it to the ground.

I'll probably turn him into one of my little offside characters for my cartoon.

Are We alone

2008-04-30T20:12:00.000-07:00

For all those who are interested, this is my walk cycle for Jane and Terry's Classes. i know, I kinda went over the top, but this is the one I've made for Deviant Art because they don't allow anything under 10 seconds. so I thought I'd dress it up.

Anyways, catch you all later.

Maynard James Keenan - A Perfect Circle

2008-04-27T01:17:00.000-07:00

I thought I'd just let everyone know that I'm an A Perfect Circle fan. And being the fan that I am, I had to share with you, the greatness that is Maynard James Keenan.

think he's not great... PROVE IT. I'm sure Ian will back me up on this one.

anyways enjoy guys, see you on Monday.

GhostFight-BOS-Part1 Review

2008-04-24T16:28:00.000-07:00

Hey all, (and especially Nathan) Just strolling the interbuttz this morning and I came across this little gem.
I'm sure we've all heard of stick fighting. It was either invented by bored kids with a vague understanding of flash with no animation talent. Or just some lazy animators. Either way, This animator seems to have taken out two birds with one stone. A first for professional Stick Fighting animation.

Not only that, but ontop of it all he made this animation very intereactive (in the flash version) allowing his audience to take controll of the side scrolling camera (along with the help of the occasional scripted screen shake and cusion effects written into the camera system, which really brings his audience into the action) Ian keeps talking about how young animation. People are coming up with new ways to make this profession more entertaining for the masses, personally I think (for this genre of animation) this is a step in the right direction

This is the Youtube version for those too lazy to venture over to Newgrounds.

For those interested in seeing what you can do with the camera control, and higher Frame Rate (for those with decent computers) here's the Newgrounds link

http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/430990

It's nice to see proper decent animators on newgrounds who give a shit about the profession from time to time.

What do you guys think?

I Am Satan

2008-04-22T06:14:00.000-07:00

Nothing too new, I just thought I'd share with some people some stop motion animation I just stumbled across. don't pay attention to it's name, I doubt it was a banned children cartoon, but its still cool.

11secondclub - Health Problem

2008-04-16T01:13:00.000-07:00

Wo0o0o, my first 11 second club entry. took me 9 hours to do, and I'm not too happy with it, but with so much else on my plate I think I might leave this one how it is. All you guys should give it a go. Anyways here it is. Enjoy.

11secondclub - Health Problem from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

Concept Art For Projects & Other News

2008-04-07T01:38:00.000-07:00

Ooooo, I thought you'd all like to see some new stuff of mine. This is one of the forest scenes for my cartoon that I'll be making sometime this year hopefully. Oh course I'll be putting all of this into a 3D environment using aftereffects etc. It'll be way cool, but for now, I only have happy 2D picture... well I say happy I really mean scarey. It's spose to be almost a thriller scene. Oh well I hope you guys like it.

In other news I hired out Tekkonkinkreet tonight so I'll be able to check that out, I'll post up some stuff about it later for you guys to check out. Hopefully I'll find this baby at a JB hi-fi sometime soon, if anyone finds a copy, give me a yell. cya later guys

Animation Favourites and RANTZ

2008-04-04T23:59:00.000-07:00

So, another poll closed. This one about which animation software people liked the most. What scares me is that the poll says people enjoy using frosted buttz more than using adobe after effects and maya. Hmmmm, but on a lighter note, it seems that flash was most popular with traditional animation lurking up behind him... Gay unconcentual abuse of the sexual kind? or Ninja?

But yeah seriously. I can see that people are ejnjoying flash alot so I can understand that. But TRADITIONAL ANIMATION?!?! No offence everyone. But you don't exactly seem like the hard working, day in and day out, no life, about the pull out the shot gun from underneath your lightbox because of all the built up stress type... (apart from Ian. And thats why he's epic) lol but yeah. MAYBE I'm wrong, but I don't see too many people uploading anything onto their blogs unless its nessissary (apart from some people, which is REALLY good). I'm not having a go at anyone. It's just hard to link people who like traditional animation with people who only go for the minimal requirements in work.

Personally I find it a personal enrichment. Instead of playing the latest Wii game, reading the latest Death Note Manga, or even watching the digitally remastered version of AKIRA, I'll pick up the ol' Graphics Tablet and start experimenting. Using my imagination with Ian's, Jane's, and Terry's techniques to start creating my mark on the giant wall amongst all the other animators creativity.

If we're out of school and we've landed ourselves in tafe, the majority of us are around 2 years behind everyone else who's gone straight into Uni, of course we can fight that argument till the cows come home, but lets face it, a Bachellor's Degree in screen: animation sounds sooo much better than a Diploma of screen: animation, and if you're in this course, you've either found yourself in a financial pickle, OR you've missed the mark in landing yourself a position in the Bachellor's Degree.
Maybe it's just me, but I want to put in as much work as possible so I can catch up with the rest of life. I know it's a harsh veiw on life, but is it too far from the truth? I'm aware that this course has what others don't offer, like constant feedback from teachers and a healthier work environment, but it still wont give you the Degree. So instead I have a proposition for all those who actually bother reading my stuff.

***Compensate for the lack of a Bachellor's Degree and the years of work they throw at you at Uni, with the ability to kick animation ass. So every bit of effort counts guys. The Harder we try, the better the chances we have of being the best.***

Yes...No...Maybe? ... Frosted Butts?

Old Gregg - Man or Fish?

2008-04-04T19:08:00.000-07:00

Well, being a whole week behind with this piece I managed to make it as nice as possible in one freaken lesson. I hope you guys like it as much as I tried not to fail with it. if that makes any sence.

Old Gregg - Man Or Fish? from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

Maya have another sir?

2008-03-31T05:54:00.001-07:00

ANOTHER?!?!?! *Richard Nixon mumble noise*

It's that time of the week again where Mitchell posts up yet another experimental piece of artwork. Although you will find that he is talking, there is no sound. I will give a prise to the first person who can tell me what he's saying "so long as I already haven't told you in person"

What am I saying? from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

Peace out folks.

Steppin' On My Turf - Part II

2008-03-27T08:23:00.000-07:00

It's extreamly bloody late, and I should be sleeping BUT, I felt like I needed to post this NOW! because I just finished it like 20 minutes ago. This is part II of the "Steppin' On My Turf" episode. I hope you guys enjoy it. I tried to not make the footage soo crappy this time.

Steppin' On My Turf - Part II from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

EEEee GASP! What will happen next?... WHO KNOWS?!?!

We are all DOOMED

2008-03-21T06:46:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone happy easter and all that funky jazz. To celebrate this wonderous non-christian occasion, I'd like to give you all a treat.

The first of many to come "MITCHELL SHORT FILMS!" This is the part one installment of a three part cartoon episode called "Steppin' on my turf!"
Hope you guys like it.

Mitch's Shorts - Steppin' on my tuff! (Part One) from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

For all those who want to know what tools I used. Adobe flash CS3 with the Bamboo WACOM tablet, and then finished up with Adobe After Effects. And yes, this was rushed (4 hours), and once I've finished all three parts I'll run over them all again to make things look a little more nice.

Fan Art Conclusion And an Armless Man With a Love For Jumping

2008-03-19T01:21:00.000-07:00

I'd like to thank those who where nice enough to answer my Fan Art question "what is Fan Art". I'd like to reserve a special thanx to those five, who gave a proper answer too :). The figures say that the majority of people who voted on my poll agree that Fan Art is the physical manifestation of Sparta. I'd love to believe that as well, but alas, acid died out in the mid 90's so this can't be the case. So there we have it, Fan Art is a love for a specific type of artwork.

In other news, Crazed mad men without arms have been terrorising various computers at southbank. I've managed to capture one of them reaking havok on film.

Some scenes may frighten some small children and sexually inadequate teens. Viewer discretion is advised.

Disabled High Jump from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

Project: This Means Business & uN

2008-03-18T02:57:00.000-07:00

For all those who are unfortunate enough to be out of the loop, Dan and I have come up with an idea for a strangly funny series of animated skits based in the office environment. The unofficial name of the show will be called "This Means Business" and will be loosly based on the morbid imagination of two great minds combined.

Also ontop of this I'll be working on a personal project by myself hopefully with the voice talents of the same people who will be helping us out with This Means Business. This ones called The uberNaturals, or just uN for short. This project I've been working on for about 6 months so far. I've been turning alot of my friends into cartoon characters one by one (at their expense mind you) and I have been writing amazingly long intertwining stories for them all. Which I'm still working on.
If all goes well, it should be one hell of a cartoon. Here are some concept art designs for some of my friends. ENJOY!

Rogue Balls

2008-03-15T09:11:00.000-07:00

Nothing new. Just using old techniques with new software and very very bored. For the record this is over 500 frames. 500 frames of crap, but still 500 frames non the less. I guess what this personal excersize was about trying to push movement to it's fastest. Ian wanted us to try and make something so fast that we would lose sight of its movement. I think at about frame 382 it did it for me. What do you guys think?

Well it's 2:30 so I best be off to bed. I'll see all my wonderful animation class mates on monday. Apparently it's the important (must attend) class... Like I miss any of Ian's classes anyway. sheesh.

Rogue Balls from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

Horton Hears A what?

2008-03-15T04:03:00.000-07:00

I managed to go see horton hears a who today using my young nephew as an excuse for not looking like such a panzy.

and in the great words of Prince Habibu "It is simply awesome!"

Snappy scenes and a good example of pushing movements to their limits and then beyond. And ontop of it all. If someone could make a joke out of every freaken object in a room, it'd be the guys who made this film. And of course there HAD to be a musical number at the end, which I'm sure the animators would have had a fun time playing around with.

and what kind of movie would it be without a 2 minute sequence of horton and morton paying the crap out of anime through the medium of an enraged ninja elephant and a pikachu-esque lightning mouse.

I highly recommend everyone in my class to check this one out. IMMEDIATLY!

Reply to Ian's post about Anime.

2008-03-11T04:21:00.001-07:00

Hahaha my reply to Ian's post on Anime was so long I decided to make it into my own post ^_^ I hope you don't mind Ian.

******************

Wow you've really thought about this long and hard, and I've got to admit, it's different hearing this from the teachers point of view. But a good different.

And through the few weeks I've been in this course I've been judging cartoons more on their movement rather than their looks.

Having said that, theres nothing wrong with having both happy pretty icing with a nice portion of cake in the center.

"Blame Ian for the cake reference, if you don't get it, ask him ^_^"

Which is why I still stand by my earlier stance of defiance by using both quantity AND quality ^_^. There's nothing wrong with giving yourself extra work, so long as you are willing to put in the same amout of effort in the more important details, which in my case at the moment is movement. I'm aware that its unnessisary, and so is the human appendix, but there it is all the same.

And I guess in a way, Anime is helping teenagers not look so much like losers. Haha, bare with me because I know this sounds rediculous. There is nothing cool "to the majority" about using "around the world with Timon and Pumba" as a conversation starter. Let's be honest, you don't come across as an intellectual. But more mature cartoon's are coming out and are becoming more and more socially acceptable. Evangelion has probably one of the biggest philisophical story lines easily accessable to my generation of cartoon lovers. And let's be honest, I'd rather see Alucard from Hellsing devour his next prey than watch Roadrunner slap Mr. Coyote with another dose of ANVIL IN THE FACE.
Slapstick will always be close to my heart, but seeing drama and suspence in cartoons creates more of a sympathy factor for me.

But yes, you do have a very good point about watching a still picture of Yugi on the screen at 7:30 in the morning whilst he goes through about half the season's plot in his head. Every now and then they put masses of streaming lines and colours behind these still faces to make their thoughts more intence.

I guess we're looking at a new era of animation. Scientists say that the first possible evolution of man was distinguished by his ability to find humour by watching other's hurt themselves in a minor fasion. Maybe we're just evolving into wanting a little bit more out of life than just slapstick humour.

I personally believe that Anime is alive today because real people are just too boring to look at.

The Little Happy Worm That Could

2008-03-11T03:08:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone. I know whats your thinking. whats that underneath Mitch's arm, and is he going to share it with the rest of the class? I will answer both right now.

The Happy Little Worm from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

and yes.

Bully's on Deviant Art. Unfortunatly for them, We Hit Harder.

2008-03-04T16:57:00.000-08:00

For those in the loop, you would already be aware of the fight Ryan, some of his other friends, and I have found myself in. Theres this douche bag on deviant art who thought he would do the righteous thing and preach us (fan artists and cartoon lovers) in the depressing ways of horrible sculptures and Military Buttsecks. Of course I couldn't sit back and allow him to just mow over this poor girl trying to bring happiness into this world with her colourful art, so I faught back along with the others to teach this guy a lesson in Deviant Art PAIN! ><

Aaaaanyways, He was claiming that FanArt is illegal. Which was his first mistake and I quite happy to inform him of his aweful misunderstanding of the law. And he was also claiming that FanArt is the worst kind of cartoon Art.

This got me thinking. When a company makes a cartoon. There's someone making up the characters, and then about 50 other people copying this character over and over again to breathe life into him. So essentially what he thought was an original cartoon, was in reality ONE person's imagination and 1,000,000's of fan art pictures crammed together. Which when you put it that way sounds horrible, and when you look deep inside your cartoon soul you know this not to be true. There is nothing wrong with FanArt, and in some cases, people put alot more time and effort into FanArt than some of the original drawings. It's essentially an essence of creativity and wonderful imagination coming together from the minds and hearts of 100's of people to create a world away from reality. Where anything is possible. Of course, creating your own characters is much more fun and adventurous.

So the question I leave you all with today is. What are your thoughts on FanArt and what are your thoughts on Longun

The Early Bird Gets The Worm

2008-03-03T23:00:00.000-08:00

The Early Bird does indeed get the Worm. But who the fuck wants a worm for breakfast. It'd be like a thick stream of snot that had been living in the dirt all of his life, pondering over the one great question I'd only imagine worms would ponder, "Which end's my head, and which end's my anus?"

I guess Ian's new saying should be "Having your worm and eating it too"

So here we go people. This ones coloured in photoshop with a strangly large amount of layers.

Falling Tree

2008-03-03T22:50:00.000-08:00

Ok so my pride was shot with this one. Ian was like... MAKE A TREE FALL. DON'T WORRY ABOUT TRYING TOO HARD BECAUSE YOU'RE NOT GOING TO GET IT RIGHT THE FIRST TIME... Yes thats right... he yelled it, with extream capital letters. Anyways, I took this as a personal challenge to prove him wrong. Long story short, I kinda finished about an hour after everyone else was finished. Afterwards Ian took me aside and told me, it is not the tree that I must make fall... but it is me... I must find my inner Tree. Well not exactly in those words, but if you are reading this Ian you will probably agree with me that it's a pretty good analogy for what you said.

So without further adu. The Falling Tree. *curtains open*

Falling Tree from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

CRAB BATTLE! ><

2008-03-03T01:42:00.000-08:00

HELLO people of my animations class and all others young and old. small and tall.. fat and fit.... Psychic and Swedish! I come baring gifts of greatness

I know what you're thinking... "Holy crab battle! It's christmas already?" And I'd like to say yes. I really would like to. But alas, it's only March. Shovanistic Saddistic March. Like the alcoholic uncle who makes you wear his dead wife's dressing gown, luring you to his rocking-chair with smarties and other various sweets.

Also, Gen, in all her wonderously inspiring ways, sparked an idea in me little ticker in the wee hours of the noon. We must create street-fighter-esque battle sprites of ourselves for the greatest fighting game in exsistance. All those who like this idea... Send me a reply with a picture of a kitten. But the kind you'd find on 4chan. Now fly fly my minions. Times a wastin'.

Mr. Ball

2008-02-26T17:05:00.001-08:00

welcome to the life of Mr. Ball.

In this episode of Mr. Ball, Mr. Ball comes across a wall. Hilarity ensues when Mr. Ball attempts to climb over this "wall" only to find that it is indeed a trap of magnanimus porportions.

Mr. Ball from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

One Bad Ass Mother Ducker

2008-02-26T00:46:00.000-08:00

So everyones gone home for the day at Southbank, so I thought I'd kick back my feet and do some old fasion drawing... WITH A TWIST! A twist you might ask? YES INDEED my friend, for this was all drawn with a mouse in Flash

Update into Mitch's Crazy Head

2008-02-25T01:54:00.000-08:00

So, as you can all see, I've been experimenting with different types of animation. Well by experimenting... My teachers been forcing it into my brain like mind rape. But I'm not exactly saying no... does that make me a whore?

Anyways so far it's been a wild ride, even though it's only been 2 weeks and a day. Not once have I felt the need to gaze dreamily out the window. I guess that's because the computer screen is my new window because the amount of possibilities I've been handed is nil to endless. Kinda like Courtney's 'Ya Mum' jokes.

I've also got a whole bunch of awesome idea's for cartoon's that I'm itching to havea go at once I'm a little better at this whole 'animation' stuff. If anyone wants in on one of my crazy projects, you know who to call.

Anyways, I've had enough to Blogging tonight so I'll leave it at Dan's obssession with Schindler's Lift.

Peace out Love Children.

Epileptic Fish-Ball

2008-02-24T22:53:00.000-08:00

There's nothing more sexy than treating yourself to the eye candy that is Fish-Ball...

Half Ball and half Fish, some say it's a 70/30 mix, either way He's one fishy Bastard

Epileptic Fish-Ball from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

2001 ROFL Odyssey

2008-02-21T22:51:00.000-08:00

Wo0o0o we're finally getting to use flash now. Things are getting very exciting indeed :)

hi five everyone

2001 ROFL Odyssey from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

Punch Buggies Spoilt Whores and Birdies

2008-02-20T00:58:00.001-08:00

guess what people... you've just been hit with a TRIPLE COMBO

Death of a Spoilt Coke Whore from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

Buggy In Natural Habitat from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

King Of The Sky from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

The Black Sun

2008-02-19T03:20:00.001-08:00

This is me mucking around for the first time with the 3D aspect of Adobe After Effects.

As you can see. I put great detail into making sure the moon was in fact flat and not spherical. Ok, so it's shit... but I promise great things to come from me :D

The Black Sun from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

I Would Do Anything For love

2008-02-18T22:08:00.000-08:00

But I wont make a video about Meatloafs head exploding... Wait... Never mind.. Mitch Delivers.

I Would Do Anything For Love from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

The Mother-Flippin' Bull-flip

2008-02-14T21:13:00.000-08:00

This one's for all you wrestling fans out there.. I call this move.. the Bull-Flip

Bull Flip from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

Mitch's Ball - HARDCORE

2008-02-14T05:20:00.001-08:00

so I thought I'd be an animator n00b and post my first ever frame by fram animated 5 second circle of chaos and destruction.

Flying Ball from Mitchell Druce on Vimeo.

CONSPIRICY THEORY!

2008-02-14T04:17:00.000-08:00

I can feel myself being sucked into another craze. *looks around and taps foot lightly on the ground to inspect the sturdiness of the floor* Damn you blogger.com you seem almost too comfortable to be a part of... This is probably all a part of Ian's (my animations teacher) evil master plan to turn myself and serveral other budding animators like me into inbetweener drones for his secret mind controlloing cartoon. I'm dead serious. I was going through his laptop the other day (pretending to go through my emails) when I saw a file marked "pr0n" naturally out of curiousity I checked out it's contents only to find incriminating evidence towards mind-conrolling means. Manipulative tactics and suspicious documents called crazy things like "The_Idiot's_Guide_To_Becoming_An_Evil_Animator.pdf" and "Class_Prayer_ Printouts.doc" I clicked on the class prayers one and I found this.

"This is my pencil. There are many like it but this one is mine. My pencil is my best friend. It is my life. I must master it as I must master my life. Without me, my pencil is useless. Without my pencil I am useless."

I'm on to you Ian. You think you can get inside my head, *Put's on helmet made out of Aluminium Foil" well think again.