Spring 2007 week 10: evening—03/26 morning—03/28

hello students,
we are getting to the end of the semester. the blog entry that you will see below is for last week's classes, the 10 week of class for this term. that means there are only four weeks remaining, only four more classes to go before the final animation is due.
    for those of you who haven't completed much of your animation, you are seriously behind, but you still have time. you'll just have to put in some serious effort to complete it over the next few weeks. you should try to get me and others, the tutors in the labs for example, to help you complete it. make sure you go through the tutorials here each week to help answer any questions you might have. good luck. carter-

1. TOPICS:
   
   1. Review:
      1. LINK   —Stacking order of Layers;
      2. LINK   —Panning down and Panning right;
         
      
      
   2. Introduce:
      1. LINK   —Pushing-in to a shot;
         
      2. LINK   —Cutting from one shot to another shot;
         
      
      
   
   
2. HOMEWORK:Following this week's demonstration and blog entry, you should continue work on your animation and complete at least the push in camera motion of frame 8 in the storyboard.
   
   
3. STORYBOARD: below you will find links to each of the pages of the storyboard containing 3-frames each.
   
   • LINK   Frames 1-3
     
   • LINK   Frames 4-6
     
   • LINK   Frames 7-9
     
   • LINK   Frames 10-12
     
   • LINK   Frames 13-15
     
   • LINK   Frames 16-18
     
   • LINK   Frames 19-21
     
   • LINK   Frames 22-24
     
   • LINK   Frames 25-27
     
   • LINK   Frames 28-30
     
   
    
   
4. REVIEW: we begin this week's lesson where we left off the week before, but before we start let us review what we did in class last week first.
   
   1. Stacking Order:

      	Let's first observe the layer stacking order: fade title tree_near dog cat fence fence_shadow cow ground moon stars

      
      
       
      
   2. Panning Motions:
      
      

      	There are two camera movements that we must complete: pan down from the sky to the ground; and pan right from the dog to the cat. Since the stage is stationary, we cannot pan (move) the camera, so everything must pass across the stage.     To pan down from the sky above down to the ground below we must slide everything, the entire landscape, from below up onto the stage.     Hopefully you know by now that since we have to make everything move, that we must first make everything a SYMBOL.
      	The stage is the smaller grey rectangle in the upper left. Notice how everything in the scene is placed below the it. Also, notice how the elements that set the scene, the tree, the ground, fence, etc., together all are more than 2 times as wide as the stage. This is so as to allow for the pan right movement as well.
      1.	Pan Down—Starting at the point where the title fades out, frame 80 according to our last class demonstration, but it could be any frame depending on your animation, we will begin the panning motion.     The title fades out by frame 80, so we will begin the pan down after this, say at frame 85. Therefore, we will need to put a keyframe in all the layers that contain elements fromt the scene: tree_near, dog, cow, cat, fence, shadows, tree_far, ground, moon, and stars. The movement begins in frame 85, so the easiest way to place a keyframe there in each layer is to first select frame 85 in the tree_near layer. We do not need to concern ourselves with the fade or title layers because they will not be panning down.
      	a. Then, hold down on the shift key and click in frame 85 in the bottom layer (this should be the stars layer.
      	This should select frame 85 in all the layers.
      	b. Once selected, then add a keyframe (F6)
      	c. Now, similarly, we need to add another keyframe to mark the end of the pan down motion. We'll give the movement about 70 frames, which would put us in frame 150. So, click in frame 150 in the tree_near layer, hold down on the shift key, and click in frame 150 of the bottom layer, the stars layer. This should select frame 150 in all the layers. Then add another keyframe (F6). ***Careful NOT to deselect anything at this point.***
      	d. When you zoom out (do not deselect), you should see that everything below is selected. This is what we want. It will help us move everything together. To do this, hold down on the shift (to move things faster) while you click on the up arrow key. Do so until the ground and all is on top of the stage.
      	e. Then add a motion tween. This will cause everything that was below the stage to move gradually upwards until it is on the stage.
      2.	Pan Up—Now that we have completed the pan down camera movement, we have to work on the pan right. One clue as to how to do this is to notice that the ground and fence and entire scene that we drew is more than 2 times the width of the stage. This means that we will push everything to the left in our motion tween this time to simulate the pan right motion of the camera.     This time, we will give this movement about 75 frames; so, in the tree_near layer, click in frame 225, hold down the shift key, and click in frame 225 of the ground layer, and add a keyframe (F6). This time, do NOT include the moon and the stars.
      	a. Once again make sure you do NOT deselect anything. Just hold down on the shift key and use the left arrow key to move everything selected to the left until the right edge of the ground is just offstage.
      	b. Add the motion tweens to each layer as before.
      	c. Finally, click in frame 225 of the moon and the stars layers and extend the duration (F5).

      
      
   
   
    
   
5. INTRODUCE:
   
   1. Pushing-in to a shot:

      1.	Now that we have reached the cat, according to our storyboard we must push-in, or, in other words , get closer to the cat. To push-in simply means to push the camera closer to the object of interest. In this case, it is the cat. We have already passed all of the characters and we have already seen the landscape, or setting, of our story. When we reach the cat, we will truly begin telling the story.     The sequence of movements we are completing now, the pan and push-in, is known as the establishing sequence. It is called this because it establishes, or sets up the beginning of the animation, and tells us all of the most important information about the setting and the main characters. In the nursery rhyme, Hey, Diddle, Diddle!, our script, and our storyboard, the beginning starts with the cat. Therefore, when we reach the cat, we will begin telling our story.     Now that we have reached the cat, we can begin telling our story, so we push-in, or, we get a little closer so as to get a better look, to pay closer attention to what we will see. This is what the "camera" does for us when it gets closer.
      2.	We will start where we left off at frame 225. But let us first analyze the scene: if we look at the stage, we see that all that is left there are the cat, the fence, the house, the ground, the moon, the stars, and the shadow from the fence. The cow, the dog, the tree, etc, all have already passed across the stage and left the area. They are no longer part of the current shot. That is limited to the cat and the house behind, for the most part. As a result, when we push-in to the cat, we do not need to deal with those things that are off-stage, only what is on-stage.     We will first lock and hide those layers we do not currently need: tree_near, dog, cow, shadow, and tree_far. Furthermore, since we will not be making the moon and stars larger, we will also lock those layers.
      3.	Next, we want to scroll over to determine where we want the next keyframe to be. We'll give ourselves about 50 more frames to complete the next camera action, the push-in. So, we need keyframes in frame 275.     Click in frame 275 in the top layer we are working with, the cat layer, and add a keyframe (F6). Repeat this for the fence, shadow, house, and ground layers.
      4.	Next, we need to select those new keyframes. To do this, click in frame 275 of the cat layer, hold down on the shift key, and then click in frame 275 of the ground layer. This should select the keyframes in all those layers, and highlights them. If it does not do this, then try again. you should also notice that it selects everything on the stage. This is what we want.
      5.	Now, turn on the outlines for all the layers except the cat layer. This will allow us to see everything, but also see through them. It will help us when we make everything larger.
      6.	Then select the free transform tool (Q), hold down on the shift key, and grab one of the corners and make the selection much larger.
      7.	If you are not sure about the size, whether it is big enough or whether it is too big, then move move everything at once not just the cat so that it is on top of the stage. Make certain that the cat is almost the same height as the stage. If it is still not big enough, then repeat the above action: hold on the shift key and grab the corner to make it even larger.
      8.	When it is the correct size, make sure the cat is on the stage and that you can see its entire body within the confines of the stage.
      9.	Now, add a motion tween to all of those layers between the keyframes.
      10.	Extend the duration (F5) of the stars and moon layers to frame 275.
      11.	So that the viewer can see the cat at this point, enlarged like this to what we call a medium shot for a moment, we must increase the number of frames. If we look at the timeline right now, we see that the motion tweens end at frame 275, and that's it. Everything is this large for only that one frame. In order for it to last longer we should extend the duration for a few frames, say 20 or 25 more frames, out to frame 300.     To do this, click in frame 300 of the cat layer and select F5. Repeat this for the fence, shadow, house, ground, moon, and stars layers.

      
      
       
      
   2. Cutting from one shot to another:

      1.	The most common transition from one shot to another is what we call a cut, and, in fact, it is not really a transition at all. The word cut comes from film terminology in which a piece of film was actually cut with a blade and then taped together to another piece of film. This did not produce a seamless smooth transition from one image to another, but rather a very abrupt change from one image, one shot, to another. This is the most common form of editing. Think of music videos in which the images are rapidly changing from one shot to another. Shots are often even less than a second long before the film is cut to show another image.     If we look at the storyboard, we see that in frame 9 we must cut to a close shot of the fiddle. This simply means we must change the view on the stage to show a much larger fiddle instead of the whole cat. The cat will be there, but it will be cut off by the edge of the stage to show only the fiddle in the middle.     To do this, we need only add keyframes. We do NOT require motion tweens.
      2.	Therefore, click in frame 300 of the cat layer and add a keyframe (F6). Repeat this for the fence, shadow, house, and ground layers.
      3.	Now select all these keyframes at once—emember to do this you must hold down on the shift key—and choose the free-transform tool (Q).
      4.	Hold down on the shift key again, grab the corner and make the selection larger. Remember, we want to do a close shot of the fiddle, so make everything large enough so that the fiddle is about the same size as the stage.
      5.	Next, if we look at the storyboard again, this time in frame 10, we see that we have to do another cut. We cut to a close shot of the cat's face. In this case, there's no reason to make things any larger, since we have already made things very big to get a close shot of the fiddle. All we have to do is move things up some so that the cat's face is centered on the stage. But first we have to add keyframes.     Therefore, click in frame 320 of the cat layer and add a keyframe (F6). Repeat this for the fence, shadow, house, and ground layers.
      6.	Now, Select all these keyframes at once, and move everything downwards so that the cat's face is within the frame of the stage.
      7.	Finally, all that we have left to do is to extend the duration so that we can see the cat's face here for a moment. So, click in frame 340 of the cat layer and extend the duration F5. Repeat this for the fence, shadow, house, ground, moon, and stars layers. Then test the movie ctrl-enter.