I thought I'd take the opportunity to show off our team's work in progress on 'Devils Angels & Dating'. We're a growing team of passionate artists working together to make this CG Short Animated Film, and we're looking for more talent.
Current opportunities include:
Character Rigging (Maya)
Texture Artists
Storyboard Artists
Sound Effects Designer/Engineer
Compositors (Digital Fusion or After Effects)
Technical Directors
Prop Designer
3D Modelers
2D Animator
Death was designed by me, modeled by Arthur Baranov and Iskander Mellakh, with textures also by Iskander.
These are my sketches for Cupid, we're currently looking for a modeler for him.
The current animatic
If you want to see the latest work check out our development website at:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/
I like the model
Thanks, I'm sure Arthur and Iskander are proud. Devil is looking good too. We're playing with tail flame effects at the moment.
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/photo/devil_surface-1?context=album&albumId=2892810:Album:31
We've continued to gather speed, and we're up to 66 members on our own little social network discussing and developing the film. Two of our riggers recently got jobs though and will be a bit too busy to do our character rigs. If there are any experienced riggers out there that would like to take on Devil or Death or help with other rigging challenges please check out our website and see what we're up to. We'd love to hear from you.
http://DevilsAngelsAndDating.com
I saw the rest of the imgage you should open up the bottom of the dress
I would change the dress but then that would go against the overall design of the film. There isn't a floor, just cloud. So no-one needs legs, and since they're all ghostly after-life characters it suites them all better to just tapper off at the bottom. All the sets props and characters do the same in their own themed and unique ways.
This is a sneak peak at a cool effect on the Devil character we're playing with (thanks to Andy for this one).
I just uploaded Episode 1 of our Podcast 'Animation in Progress'. You can subscribe in iTunes or with any other RSS feed reader at:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/AnimationInProgress
Really cool stuff :)
I especially like the character designs.
My Portfolio
Thanks Ralph.
We have lots of cool new work being done on the project all the time. Here's a couple of cool videos:
The chair rigging:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/chair-seat-squash
The Hologram Sphere:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/vsphere_maya-1
The rigging for the Cloud tail for Cupid:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/cupid-tail-idea-v02
Storyboards:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/photo/albums/storyboard-1
We're looking for some strong talented artists. Mostly Texture artists and Character Riggers.
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/page/2892810:Page:1232
We have a Facebook Fan page now. If you become a fan you'll get regular updates in your home page feed, or you can just use it to follow our progress.
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Devils-Angels-Dating/124683406303
There's also a new version of the animatic with lots of new storyboard panels:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PH1OMP2S9a0
I just did this cloud flyby render... what do you think?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfVvTqc_c5I
We're looking for riggers and texture artists for two of our characters if anyone is interested in getting involved.
www.DevilsAngelsAndDating.com
Keith Lango is now a Supporter of our film production. He'll be donating training videos to our strongest contributors as we go along. Check this out for details: http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/forum/topics/gifts-for-the-team-official
Episode 4 of the podcast is online now. In this one I talk to, team member, Iskander Mellakh and then go over a quick Filmography of my work before a status update of our short animated film ‘Devils Angels and Dating’.
Blog Entry
Direct
Episode 6 of the 'Animation in Progress' Podcast is out, and in this episode I talk to Director, Lucas Martell about making animated short films and his labor of love Pigeon Impossible.
Podcast
We've had an exciting year with most of the asset creation out of the way we're currently in the early stages of animation, debugging rigs and looking for any other issues that we might trip us up going forward. I'm currently planning to roll out Animation on a larger scale early in 2010, so that we can have our 30 second teaser trailer ready in the first few months. I'm going to start working on a poster which should also be a good test case to get a 'close to final' look for our characters.
While Devil and Death are having some more advanced functionality added to their rigs, Cupid is nearing an animation ready state. Devil and Death are already being animated in their first shots with only a few challenges, that our team members have gallantly concurred.
We've had some support from Keith Lango, and Digicel's Flipbook which has been a nice touch. We have over 240 videos and 540 images to look through, with over 140 members on the website. All very exciting but I just want to say a huge thank you to our regulars who have made the project what it is today. Have a wonderful holiday period.
In the mean time here's a few recent highlights:
Render tests:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/sh0420dvltesting-2
Holograms and Peeps:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/couplemeetlovev01ms-1
Animation in progress:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/sh0460deathfakelovespliningv00-2
Colour Script in progress:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/photo/colorscript01-1?context=latest
Animatic:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/animatic-v35
Don't forget you can follow our progress on Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Devils-Angels-Dating/124683406303
And you can subscribe to most of our videos on YouTube as well:
http://www.youtube.com/user/michaelcawood
Merry Christmas!
Here's our plan for the teaser trailer. Thanks to Stoyan for the Music.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B0YnvkwRNH8
Here's our new Video intro that tells you almost everything you need to know about the project to get you started:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/page/2892810:Page:1232
Here's a set of Dailies for the 31st January 2010
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NmEBMIDQcWI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3n9OrdxBXRo
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oxyQZnPvgzg
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPiUsLotN2A
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjd1LStBy4g
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQnVZHAltBY
Just a quick update. We're in pretty good shape for animation with over 20% in the can.
We're on the lookout for strong animators to join the team. Check out the Animator's Handbook for a guide to what you need, and come prepared with some idea of what types of shots you'd like.
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/forum/topics/animators-handbook
Shane Davis has recently started as a Production Coordinator. He'll be helping me to sort through the progress of all the tasks and keeping everything moving forward.
If you're interested in doing any shader or rigging work please get in touch as we've got a couple of assets to finish off and any help would be greatly appreciated. We have some colour script images done, as you can see by the edit, but if anyone else would like to lend a hand and do some I'd really love to get some more done to flesh out the timeline.
I'd just like to say the team is doing amazing things and it's incredible to see it coming together like this. I think we're well on track for completing the teaser trailer animation in the next few months and the rest of the film by early 2011, if not sooner.
We've been doing incredibly well for an online team with no budget. I can't stress how impressive it is, and I'm in a huge debt to such an amazing community of artists persisting to perfect their craft.
We're now 30% through the animation process, which only started animating back in January this year. You'd expect the first few months to have teething troubles while we worked out the kinks in the pipeline and the rigs, but we've moved into a decent routine pretty quickly and the process is very stable now. I've talked to a lot of other short film directors and they've all stressed how hard it was to get animators, so what we've achieved here is very unique.
We're on the approach to getting the teaser trailer done. Most of the animation is done with just a few shots still in progress. I'll be spending the next month picking up the scraps and helping with the lighting and rendering setup. Then we can expect a large chunk of rendering and compositing time. If we have any team members with strong Maya Mental Ray experience we'd love to hear from you to assist. Hopefully we'll have it all done in time for Siggraph in LA, which I'll also be attending. Here's the latest Teaser Trailer edit:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/teaser-trailer-animatic-v54
If you know any Austin, Texas based generalists with strong Maya skills please send them our way as we can certainly use the extra on-site help over the next couple of months to get the teaser trailer done, while we're juggling the rest of the production.
The latest full film animatic is here:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/animatic-v54
Thanks to everyone that's made the project what it is today!
The "Pigeon Impossible" guy is in Austin, try his web site.
Cool trailer, I like the animation, nice to see it coming together.
websiteEzromation blog/doodlesDeranged Scratchings
Cool character designs!
Dismas and GrissyG
www.GrisDismation.com
http://www.facebook.com/pages/GrisDismation/116130281813
http://www.youtube.com/user/GrisDismation
We've had a lot of different types of activity over the last month surrounding Siggraph including getting the first few decent rendered shots out, and they look great... even without being quite finished. Check out the shots in the teaser trailer:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/teaser-trailer-v58
We have a new Animatic with lots of new content:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/animatic-v60
I'll be working on the remaining 31% of the Layout that needs to be done soon in order to prepare for a push in the animation department. Part of that push is to re-assign some flagging shots and we've already been contacting animators to check on their progress.
The color panels have really been making progress and we have samples of the color palettes for most of the time-line now. A big thanks to Danielle and Alex for their hard work on those. We'll try to bring them into a consistent colour script soon.
I'll try to make some sort of lighting guide, either written or possibly a video tutorial. We are close to being able to distribute lighting tasks to other team mates but there's a lot of notes to communicate in order to make the process easy and consistent for everyone. This may not happen until I'm done with Layout though, and...
... we have a number of remaining assets that need their final shaders refined. It's become a bit of a bottleneck so we need Shader Artists with experience that can help us out. Let us know you know anyone that would be interested. The list of assets is at the bottom of this tracker table:
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/1289261/DevilsAngelsAndDating_Asset_Tracker.htm
If anyone is looking for a task to work on we maintain a list of available tasks here:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/page/2892810:Page:1232
Episodes 11 and 12 of the Podcast are available - Animating and Modelling with Ryan Hagen
http://feeds.feedburner.com/AnimationInProgress
Episode 11 - Michael Cawood talks to Ryan Hagen about his long time involvement with the film including modeling the Devil character and how he got involved in the first place. This is the first part of a two part discussion. This episode also includes a project update.
Episode 12 - Michael Cawood talks to Ryan Hagen about animating the Devil. They go into detail into the thought processes behind the performances and the challenges of working on the film. This is part two of this discussion.
You can play the Podcast or subscribe with iTunes, RSS or your favourite feed reader. I'd like to thank Larissa Ness and Andrea Perry for the Music. Enjoy the Podcast. Please leave a comment with your feedback and don't forget to leave a review in iTunes to show your support.
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/profiles/blogs/episodes-11-and-12-of-the
The film is moving along nicely as usual. I posted an updated animatic last night with all the latest shots bringing us to 46% through the animation process.
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/animatic-v65
Interestingly we've been maintaining a steady pace on the animation that I explained alongside the last animatic update, but I've noticed that now we have more animation done we obviously have more incomplete shots that have to be started from scratch as well. This can artificially bloat the percentages and they can even go backwards as new people take over old shots and start from scratch. So this number always has to be taken with a pinch of salt and I may need to consider running a number that reflects only the shot's I am confident will not need to go back to the beginning. It's normal for a production like this and it will mean that the rise in the percentage will inevitably appear to slow down despite just as much animation activity. All we can hope is that we get better at completing shots while avoiding assigning tasks that are too much for some team members.
I had a chance to talk about the production with the ReAnimator's on their Podcast. You can listen to it here:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/profiles/blogs/mike-on-the-reanimators
With so much animation work going on it's been hard to put time aside to get the lighting and rendering going. But I finally put together a guide and reached out to our community to kick start the process. We took on seven new lighting artists who are all in the early stages of working out how we do things on the film and starting to help us solve our remaining shader issues. There will be a hump initially as we work out the kinks but then it should be possible to take on more challenging shots and ideally finish off the teaser trailer.
thanks for all the sharing info...:)
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Great animation though a bit of development on the storyline will make it more interesting.
I'd just like to say the team is doing amazing things and it's incredible to see it coming together like this. I think we're well on track for completing the teaser trailer animation in the next few months and the rest of the film by early 2011, if not sooner.
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Internet marketing
WANTED - Maya 2011 Shader Artists, Lighters, Render experts and After Effects Compositors.
We're making an online colaborative CG Short Film and we're recruiting for talent.
Teaser trailer video:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/teaser-trailer-v66
We're looking for some more lighting talent on the team. We've got some solid people already but I don't want to stretch our current talent too thin and there's a lot of shots to do. So if you're looking to get some new material in your reel and you're a strong lighter and compositor please sign up on the website at:
DevilsAngelsAndDating.com
We also maintain a thread for the short film on CG Society here:
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?f=73&t=749944
Progression Reel Video:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/deaths-undecided-flirt
Progression Reel Video:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/devil-rise-animation
It's hard to nail down all the highlights there's been so much going on so I'll do my best. Firstly I made some big cuts and changed the ending of the story.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dhNj037jsNA
Some new renders:
Lighting by Andy and Kurt, animation by Raf Sousa.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPl3DqhCbSM
Lighting by Edith and Kurt, animation by Amanda.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LPUlZRplwkI
Lighting by Eduardo and Kurt
Our latest storyreel animatic:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qb8DLCESM6o
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/storyreel-v77
...with this new and complex WIP rendered shot.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyYOSD3X4p0
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/sh0040dthhuff-render-wip-v01
64% Complete!
It's been a while since the last update. I've been busy on some paid work, but now that's done I'm back home and working full time on Devils again. I expect I'll be pretty focused on the film for at least the next couple of months, if not beyond that.
I've been working on lighting a complex scene but we've also had lighting, rendering and effects done by numerous other team mates, check it out:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/sh0200cpdsmack-lighting-and
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/sh0110duckhalohaseebv6bmov-1
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/sh0760dthblastpullout-effects-1
In fact rendering has been the fastest moving area of development recently as you can see by our progress chart:
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/profiles/blogs/progress-over-time
With me back in the saddle full time I should be able to pick up the slack in a few areas and pick up the pace of production across the board. I have to say a huge thank you to the team members that stuck with us through the last couple of months while things have gotten a bit quieter than usual. It's a sign of the dedication on show here that we're still going strong. But a project like this lives on the support of it's members and supporters so take a moment to 'Like' our Facebook page:
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Devils-Angels-Dating/124683406303?v=wall
... and then invite your friends.
Mike
A teaser trailer update:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2EL4O6x30A
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/teaser-trailer-v77
Here's a bunch of rendered stills from various shots
There is now a new full screen loading page for www.DevilsAngelsAndDating.com . Give it a go, try scaling the browser window to see what it does. It definitely prefers a big monitor (and a fast internet connection) as it's aimed at high end users, but it should cope fairly well with smaller monitors. It's better in a 16:9 aspect ratio but will adjust for vertical layouts, it just won't look as good. Let me know if you come across any serious issues and give details about what browser you're using and what computer platform.
Eventually we'll need a mobile version of the page which should be fairly easy, but the trick is how to detect it's being loaded on a smaller device and make the switch.
My next most immediate task is to make the next, and hopefully last version of the teaser trailer. All the shots in it are in a good state. If not completely finished they at least look strong enough to use in a trailer.
That was nice.
Here's the final Teaser Trailer. Enjoy!
http://youtu.be/HELfCnKmWtM
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/trailer
Official Website:
http://DevilsAngelsAndDating.com
Storyreel
A lot of things have come together over the past week in order to screen the film to an audience of 3D Animation Artists in Austin Texas. The goal was to get feedback from a large group, and while we wait for the results to be compiled, feel free to check out the latest version of the film.
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/storyreel-v106-76
http://youtu.be/15zRi-sD17o
The animators have really been pulling their weight lately as a lot of shots have been upgraded and we're making steady but solid progress almost entirely across the board.
I switched the animatic to full HD and 24fps (it was 23.975 drop frame before), while adding new voice over work from Justin Barrett and lots of new animated material. Aside from a very brief beam shot, there's now no more storyboard panels left that haven't been replaced by at least blocked in animation. But most of it is animated in some form.
Progress
At 76% complete, we're actually tracking the whole film's progress now including the sound departments and the effects (we were only tracking visuals before).
WANTED
The main area we're looking for talent now is in After Effects artists. Ideally people that can light, render and add a few custom 3D Maya effects as well, so that they can take ownership of an entire shot. But mostly we need 2D effects work and compositing experience to speed things up and spread the workload.
Calendar
There's a new calendar section so that you can see some of our key goals, events, festivals, and anything else that has a date attached to it.
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/events
I know you wont volunteers but how are you planning to release you work?
I am asking because there is a Finland team that is also asking for funding for their, with a theatrical release planned for next year.
It will be released in a variety of ways... very similar to any other short film. But of course it depends on what opportunities we manage to get.
Here's an updated Storyreel.
http://devilsangelsanddating.ning.com/video/storyreel-v113-94
We've also started a Campaign to help us fund the back end of the project including the festival run. If you're interested in seeing behind the scenes videos, getting signed artwork or your name in the credits check this out.
http://www.indiegogo.com/devils
Keep an eye out for the opportunity to pre-order our 'Art and Making of' eBook soon.
Just four days to go until the release of the film online. Which also means that there's only four days to go to claim a Producer Credit on the film by helping us fund our festival run. Please take a moment to check out the perks available.
http://igg.me/p/51211?a=11744
The film is finished and online...
http://DevilsAngelsAndDating.com - Main Website
http://kck.st/tWsc6H - 'The Art & Making of Devils Angels & Dating' - eBook
http://www.IndieGoGo.com/Devils - Exclusive Behind the Scenes Videos
Devil wants Cupid's job, but a battle for Death's affections has cosmic ramifications below the Heavens.
Directed by Michael Cawood, this computer animated short film is the work of a worldwide team of Artists and Animators. Entirely developed in the public eye online, it has also become a fantastic resource for Animation students and professionals alike.
More information and expanded credits on the Director's website:
http://MichaelCawood.com/CGShort.htm
michaelcawood i like the model your sketches are nice
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