Explainer Video Blades Animation

Here is the new advert for Blades Animation. I am going to produce a making of blog to accompany how the video was made. Though for now I am going to post the video please let me know what you think.

Richard :)

          

What I'm doing!

Hi so first a couple of quick recommendations go and watch both the Lego movie and Dallas Buyers club, I watched them last week and they are both great. If you can only see one then watch the Lego movie, a great piece of animation! 

This week has been fairly productive I am finally nearly finished with the new advert for my website the only element to complete is the voice over recording. It currently has a scratch track of me reading the script. A process I totally hated even though I was the only person in the studio I still felt very self conscious about recording my voice. Once the voice over has been added I will do a final cut of the advert hopefully shaving about 10 seconds. Then it will be uploaded to the website. The advert is likely to be online March 21st. On the same day the website is due to have a minor facelift. Mostly just an updating of the banner and a few of the other photos in use.

I have additionally began working on a second video for the website that will help explain the price of animation. Its not uncommon for me to be asked how much for some animation like its a packet of crisps. I've regularly been asked how much for some animation a bit like toy story but a couple of minutes long. Unfortunately it is not that easy to give an answer to that. For those wondering things to consider when pricing up an animation I work out how long it will take me to complete, this is affected by how complicated the animation is, materials, how long the finished product will be, style, do I need additional people ie actors, musicians etc. Lots to consider so the more specific someone is when asking the more accurate the quote will be, Its actually better to say how big your budget is then I can work out a project that will fall within it. 

Part of the process of making a piece of animation is scripting, story boarding and sound. Although these have different titles they are all part of the same process. When coming up with an idea I work through a sketch book making notes and thumb nails, from here I'll make a list of things that will happen then go between scripting and story boarding. Normally story boarding before scripting but the process goes back and fourth between these parts. When writing the script I might think of a better idea and will then update the story board, so lots changes at this stage. I story board on post-it notes and then lay them all out on the wall to begin to get an idea of how it will look. At this stage its really easy to change parts around by rearranging the pictures. 

Once I am happy with these parts I record a scratch track of the script. This is me standing with my microphone recording all the voices. As noted earlier this isn't my most favourite part but its essential. During this stage the script is likely to change again. I record every part as written though whats written doesnt always sound as good when spoken so lots of changes will occur at this stage. When recording I can see the script and the story board so have a good idea of what Im doing. 

Once recorded I scan the story board and import all the sound into final cut to edit together an animatic. This is the story board and sound cut together to allow me to see the timings and get a better idea of how the finished short will look with out having to animate. It is the best opportunity to look at it and decide if it is any good and wether or not it is even worth making. 

Yesterday I finished the animatic and felt reasonably happy with it, then when watching it again this morning changed my mind. Today has seen me reworking the whole thing, its been completely re story boarded, the sound that I recored previously is fine though I've trimmed chunks off. The problem was visually it was just flat and slow. Below is the completed storyboard. I plan on animating it in the last couple of weeks of March, aiming to get it online by the middle of April. 

Finally below is a photo said i'd add ages ago of a set and puppet I've made although forgot about. The puppet is complete to how I'd like him though there still some work to do on the set. I'm still a long way off animating this as its not a priority project its just a bit of fun on the side.

Okay thats enough!

Rich

Birmingham Screen Image Network and Networking

This is actually a big answer I gave to some questions regarding the Birmingham Screen Image Network that I attend once a month at Millennium Point. It took me a while to write it but hopefully it will be useful and interesting.

Here are the questions-

What makes a good network?

Why do you go?

And what do you want from a network?

And here is my Answer-

I've attended all sorts of different networking sessions for both creatives and business people, in lots of different venues. I enjoy the BSIN sessions as they are regular, the venue is good and it is easy to find out who is there, what they do and then I can decide who I want to talk to. Rather than the scatter gun approach which occasionally happens at larger sessions.

I think the venue is very important, the worst venues for myself have been bars and pubs. I find the main problem with these is they are to noisy due to loud music and are often being shared with members of the public making them unnecessarily crowded. I found that people end up getting hammered and it just seems pointless talking to some of them as they're totally incoherent.

A venue should have features that provide opportunities for conversation. A drinks station is always good. If I run out of people to talk to and cant see any open groups then I normally get a glass of water and engage the next person to come over to the drinks table. When food is provided finger food works best especially with tall tables that you have to stand at. As you can remain mobile and easily start up a conversation with a new group/table. I think it would be good to put spikes on the walls as it can be to easy for attendees to hide at the side and this would force them into the middle of the room.

Recently I've been attending sessions that have art, interactives, prototypes, puzzles and other assorted conversation props that are great for facilitating networking.

Another style of networking I've enjoyed is speed networking. You all sit in two rows facing one another and have about 60 seconds each to talk, swap cards and move on when the whistle blows. When the speed networking has finished everyone carries on with regular networking but now you know who everyone is and can carry on promising conversations.

Finally the most important thing for me is the people. I preferably want a good mix of creatives, animators, film makers, artists, sound people, writers, photographers, actors etc and preferably some business people, different entrepreneurs who are interested in the skills on offer by the creatives. Most importantly the attendees have to have a good attitude ie polite, friendly and be prepared to try to make conversation.

I go to BSIN each month for a variety of reasons. I enjoy the structure, each person introduces themselves, who they are, then news is shared and interesting debates normally arise. Although the attendances are low there is normally a couple of new faces each month. I have made some useful contacts, I get to hear of news, events and different opportunities coming up.

I think it would be good bring the Screen and Music networks into the same room for the last 20mins to further share news, info, leads etc

When paired with the free dinner and creative networks events after its a really enjoyable and useful way to spend an afternoon.

I also go to support the network and hopefully support the creative scene in Birmingham by attending. Attendances are low which is disappointing, although I wouldn't want the groups to have massive, if it could get up to 15/20 each week that would be great. The only way the group will grow is by people continuing to attend, talking and promoting the meet ups.

Hi

Yesterday I finally finished and uploaded the an animated logo for Blades Animation to stick in front of our films. I intended to finish it much sooner but its been so hot in the studio over the summer that the shoot repeatedly got delayed. Check it out below!

I have already began working on our next project a short explainer video to show off the benefits of using animation and the services we offer.

Richard :)

Update

Hi

This is quick update on what I've been up to.

Most recently I've been updating the Blades Animation showreel, the ancient Cwmbran animation has been added and there is a new piece of animation at both the start and end of the showreel using the Blades Animation Mascot (who is still nameless so if you have any suggestions please leave it in the comments). Please check it out below.

This afternoon I began work on a new armature that I aim to be animating with during July. The puppet is the main character for the multi platform series we have been developing for the last few years. The actual series is still a long way off from being ready but I am keen to experiment with some ideas for the character. I figure it will be a good way to try out some new armature ideas and begin establishing the character and world he inhabits.

Here is something I have been consistently going to since the start of the year its really good. The Birmingham Screen image network is on the last thursday of each month and is normally followed by creative networks all at Millennium point. The first half is a networking event for film makers and sound people. Then there is a free diner and it finishes with some kind of talk of visiting speaker. During the summer months it is just going to be the networking but it is still a must attend for any one out there interested in a career in film or animation.

Here are some things to check out. Number one is this cool scifi/philosophy blog cleverly titled Sci-Phi I've been reading by the talented writer Sarah Brown who you can follow on twitter

Number two is the new project by John-Lynton Bryan the creator of The Collector, a short I animated on a couple of years ago. It is a comic/film called Dream Staite heres the link http://www.dreamstaite-movie.com/.

Thats it for now!

Rich

Organisation the key to success!

So this new blog is all about Organisation and how its really important! I've even taken lots of photos to demonstrate how I keep myself organised. I've always been into having a diary to keep track of what I'm up to and like to make lists of things to do. Over the years I've expanded and altered how I organise myself. In this blog I'm going to cover how I organise myself, projects, the studio and my work.

I try to always carry my diary with me for a mix of reasons. For keeping notes, collecting numbers reminders and planning my time. Obviously I have a mobile which I know can do all these things. I prefer using a diary as I can see all the days neatly laid out with my notes on, it is also a bit more significant writing something down I'm more likely to remember if I write it down rather than just putting a note on my phone.

Although a diary is very handy my most useful tool is my year long planner. This is great as I can see the whole up coming year and plan my time out well in advance. It helps to keep me motivated as well as I can clearly see whats coming up and get excited about what I'm going to be doing. I use a August to August rather than start till the end of the year chart. This is mostly as I decided to start using a year planner during the summer last year so this was better value for money than a planner I could only use for a few months. I use the coloured dots to mark specific times holidays, days off etc. I write directly on to the planner for things that are going to last for a couple of days i.e. animating. Then if theres a couple of jobs to do I write the notes on a post-it note and attach it to the appropriate day. Before the wall chart I would plan out animation projects in Numbers but have found this to be far more versatile and simply easier to look at.

Next up we have all my to do lists. These relate directly to my wall chart and help me plan the chart and what I do on my days. Each sheet attached to the note board is its own category theres business, marketing, creative, learning and S&S (the series I'm developing). I then list all the things I have to do under the appropriate title. Business covers business things like updating my business plan or sorting receipts. Marketing covers mostly social media reminders, updating the marketing strategy, taking photos of what I'm up to blog ideas etc. Creative days are days set aside for making, animating, painting etc. Then I have learning days for learning different software or maybe reading a book. Im currently learning, Game Stencyl, Motion, Word-press and improving my Final Cut skills. The idea is I can just note down that I want to have a day set aside for one of these lists then pick and choose what I want to do off them. Finally have a priority list of things to do that are particularly pressing and often take priority. As tasks are completed I simply cross them out. 

Just below my notice board on my desk I have this cool desk mat. It has a clear cover on that lifts up to allow me to store all sorts of stuff under. As can been seen on the left I dump all my receipts for organising at the end of the month. Then on the right I've got bills and letters that I need to keep a track of. As well as being a handy place to stick notes it creates a very comfy surface to lean on. 

I have a filing cabinet this is pretty self explanatory so I wont elaborate.

   

                        

Next Im going to cover how I organise projects. Each time I start a new project I have a new sketch book to work in, to make notes, drawings, ideas etc to keep it all together. I label each sketchbook to so its easy to find. These cool label stickers were from WHSmiths and look way better than boring plain white labels.

                        

As well as having a new sketch book for each project I have a storage box to put everything into. This can be a hard copy of a production bible, original story board, sketchbook, receipts, invoices, letters etc. Again this keeps everything together, the same goes for on the computer. I have a designated folder for each project, then back it up on an external hard drive. 

I believe organisation really is very important, from planning out a project, being able to find things and just keeping everything tidy. 

Intro to the All New Blades Animation Blog

Hello so Ive been reading friend of Blades Animation the talented live action director Malcolm Kennedys recently started blog. Below is Malcolm's logo please click on the link to be taken to his website. (don't do it yet till you've read this blog though)

www.malcolmkennedy.co.uk

Malcolm's first entry is an introduction to who he is and what he's about. I thought "umm did I do this?", No I did not. I had a look over my old post to double check as I couldn't really remember but No definitely didn't. So what follows is finally an introduction and welcome to the Blades Animation Blog.

I am actively trying to be more proactive with Blogging, tweeting and facebooking so this entry is all part of this new marketing blitz. Im aiming to blog about once every other week, tweet about once a day and put something on facebook once a week.

When I first started this blog it was just going to be updates of what I was doing, which I guess it had been. I decided that this was in-fact boring so out the window with that and from now on its the all New Blades Animation Blog. I based its boringness on the repetitive titles of the blogs they are all just variants of the word update. My favourite blog post is the networking one, I re-read it the other day and I just thought "THIS IS BLOG GOLD!" Anyway so this made me think from now I'm going to try to put in more useful blogs that are hopefully more interesting. I've got lots of draft blogs I've been compiling for a couple of months now, most of them are just titles with a few notes. I've even got the blogger app so am totally committed to getting these posts done and online.

Right so things Im going to cover going forward are still some updates of projects and what Im up to but less of these. The next puppet I make I intend to document the full process and stick it up on here as a sort of puppet making tutorial. Im planning a day trip to london to buy some studio lights which is going up on here. At the end of September Im going to be walking Hadrian's Wall as research for a project I'm working on which will probably be a mix of smaller posts. I've got lots of creative businesses posts I want to put up, this covers, my work process, marketing advice, scheduling, pricing, how to keep costs low, book reviews, all sorts of stuff and some fun blogs like favourite films etc. If readers have requests then please message me and I can probably do requested blogs or answer questions as well, cos Im nice.

So I think that works as a indication of what this Blog is about from now on. I want to avoid doing any really long blogs and keep them nice and digestible, so I shall stop now. I will try to follow this post up with some history on how I began on my journey into animation, where I started, the routes I took and so on.

Thanks for reading, please like the facebook page to stay up to date on whats going on.

Rich

Update

Got lots of stuff coming up.

I'll be starting the next commission a week Wednesday currently just getting everything ready for that. Its not a massive project so will only last for about a month, possibly slightly longer. I posted another clue on twitter today as to what it is.

Been busy today working on a short film thats scheduled to come out in time for Christmas this year. Currently at the scripting/storyboarding stage. This part can sometimes take ages as theres no point making a film if the scripts rubbish so its very important for this part to be perfect before moving onto anything else. I've done some character designs but these wont be finalised until after the script/storyboard is set and Im ready to start making things. This film is currently going by the title HNY until I think of something good.

The second major project I'm working on is currently called S&S this is ongoing as its a series idea rather than a short so wont be ready any time soon. A large portion of the character designs are complete and Im finishing off the character profiles. The series is a road movie, adventure across Britain. Im  figuring out the plot and the route the characters are going to take. Then at some point this year I plan to spend time traveling the route to help the writing of the plot/script.

During the next week Im going to film a short video tour of the studio so you can all see what it looks like. Though I wouldn't hold your breaths as if you check back through my previous blogs you will see I say all sorts of stuff and don't do it.

So like me on facebook, follow me on twitter, leave a comment or suggestion and i'll see you soon!

Rich

Networking

Today I attended the Business growth show hosted at Drayton Manor hotel in Tamworth Birmingham. Please read on for my experience and maybe tips on networking. 

I had been tempted to attend one of these networking events for a while though had been putting it off as networking isn't the most fun. All my previous networking has been pretty much animation industry specific. Previous networking i've done has been at a variety of festivals and animation events in mostly Wales and a little in Birmingham. The festivals have been the most fun to network at. Annecy especially as just getting into the events is hard enough though definitely worth pursuing as there's lots of famous industry people and free food and drinks. The Networking at Annecy wasn't necessarily successful as it didn't lead to much in the way of work but was fun floundering in the Grand Hotel having climbed over the fence to attend. So I wasn't sure how a pile of business people would react to an animation business at an event like this. 

As it happens it all went really well. I arrived a little before nine and received a warm welcome from  Becky and Jo who allowed me to sign up for the speed networking and the two seminars. The event took place in a large hall divided into two, half for stands for various businesses and the other half reserved for speed networking. 

The speed networking began around nine. I was a little reluctant about doing this as I wasn't sure if this was the right audience for Blades Animation. I'd come prepared with a stack of showreels and some businesses cards. I didn't decided to attend the event until the day before (monday) so was a little rusty on my elevator pitch. Being the professional I am I knocked up a new one on the bus ride over. Fortunately I've done lots of pitching before so it was more of a personal refresher. I went with Frank Boyds structure for elevator pitching.  As follows:

Introduce yourself

What your project is

Who it is for

Why it is important

What you want.

This was obviously supported with the famous Richard Blades charm :). This structure was adapted on the fly depending on who I was talking to and how they were reacting etc. If anyone is wondering what I was wearing I decided against going with a suit as its not the industry I work in and thought it would be misleading if I went with a shirt and tie. It was important to me that I don't miss represent myself as some one that works in an office. I went with comfy shoes, trousers, white t-shirt under a blue v-neck jumper and a smart atticus jacket cos Im a punk :).

The actual speed networking was excellent and a genuinely great way to get chatting to people I would recommend it to anyone. The first couple of people I blundered through a little until my pitch was all set in my head. Fortunately all the people I spoke to were really interesting from a wide variety of backgrounds and businesses. By the time the speed networking had finished it was annoyingly obvious that I hadn’t brought enough business cards. I'd enough for the rest of the day but not enough for any more speed networking which was a shame. 

Next up I checked out the different stands and followed on some of the conversations started during the networking. Part of my reluctance for coming to events of this kind is this type of networking that relies on cold approaches. Again everyone was really friendly and was unlike some previous events i've been to where people stand in closed groups. There were loads of open groups of people who were chatty and eager to meet others. If I ran out of people to talk to I headed for the water point as its really easy to strike up a conversation while people are getting drinks. My main opener was to simply say "hey hello" and "ask if they were having a good time". During these periods I handed out most of my remaining business cards. As mentioned before I spoke to a huge variety of business people from a magician, website designers, event planners, copywriters the list really goes on. 

A lunch buffet was provided which was a nice bonus, consisting of pizzas, sandwiches and sausage rolls. Either side of lunch was a seminar held in a separate room. The Morning session was with Shiv Ahluwalia entitled Sales Communication for Hungry Entrepreneurs who was excellent. A great mix of audience involvement, humour and sales education delivered in a relaxed manner.

The Afternoon was hosted by Jo Simpson and entitled Better Decision Making For The Business Owners. I had covered similar subjects to this Seminar in the Nesta work shop I attended as part of the Transform@lab. It was about identify business values to help inform the businesses decision making which I believe is really important and another valuable seminar and message. 

Unfortunately I didn't stay for the whole day as I ran out of business cards and I was feeling particularly worn out. (I ran the Eden Marathon on Sunday and am still recovering) I headed off about an hour before the events end. On the whole a great day out that I believe yielded some potential leads and loads of useful contacts. I look forward to the next Business Growth Show!

Richard

Production update

Been busy finalising how the puppet for the Ancient Cwmbran project is going to be made. Production on the puppet starts tomorrow. The St Derfel puppet will be a aluminium wire armature with replacable parts. Found a very useful tutorial today http://bit.ly/blii5n not sure if our puppet will be made in this manner but liked the way the hands were made. I'll try to upload a couple of pictures tomorrow charting the progress.

In other news we attended the Digital Birmingham event last week. This was a two day event happening at both the Custard factory and ICC. It was really good there was a minor celebrity there the american businesses person form the online version of dragons den who gave an ace talk about online business. The best talk we attended was about online social networking and marketing. So get your strat on!!! http://bit.ly/cOUEWz my new strat guru!!