We made a video about our workflow for Red Giant Software.
Check it out…!
Red Giant TV
In this episode, the team at Tiny Inventions shares their unique workflow for mixing real-world models with computer animation. They’ve used these techniques for music videos, advertising, and their new short film: ‘Something Left, Something Taken.’
Jason and his assistant Eric filmed the “making of” without any AC on due to the sound recording.
Thank you for working so hard in the hottest studio, and also the beautiful footage!
While we were in San Francisco, we contacted a friend of ours who is a wonderful animator at Pixar.
He was super generous enough to give us a 3 hour tour!!!
Storyboards, concept illustrations and clay maquettes were displayed nicely on the 2nd floor. Some of this pre-production work is never displayed in front of the public eye, so it’s exciting to see the development art getting the attention it deserves.
The most amazing part of the studio was “the ghetto” also known as the animation department.
It felt like… disney land / junkyard / backyard all put together in the most creative way possible. Mixed with rooms, there were little playhouses used as cubicles. Each animator decorated her/his house or room in a very unique way that was inspiring. One animator built a roof deck on top of his playhouse, and our friend Don built a treadmill in the floor so he can exercise while he animates. How cool is that!?
That place is magical, and all the talented animators are wizards.
Thank you so much Don for a very intensive, inspiring, educational tour.
From 7/22 (thurs) to 29 (thurs) we had an exhibition for “Something Left, Something Taken” at Kokoro Studio in San Francisco.
Keiko, the owner of Kokoro Studio was extremely generous to offer her space for 1 week to exhibit sets, props, puppets and stills from the movie. We also had a screening & workshop of the film.
We had about 1 full day to put the show together. Max ran around the city trying to get various supplies while Keiko and I put everything up neatly.
What an experience to display miniature San Francisco sets in San Francisco!
I always make these sets and props to be in a film, not to be displayed and looked by people.
So I was overwhelmed with happiness that people were looking closely at the sets & props.
This is when the gallery opened… people were already waiting outside. By the time we screened our movie, it was PACKED! We were all sweating in the gallery when the weather outside was freezing.
Thank you so much for everybody who came to the opening.
Last day of our exhibit, we held a workshop. We talked through our process step by step and the audience was enthusiastic to ask us questions. Again, thank you so much for coming to the workshop!
Thank you Keiko & Ray for a wonderful hospitality. San Francisco is filled with generous and strange people. <3
Andy is a great friend of ours who is extremely talented. (I bet everybody can agree after watching this movie)
I have a very personal connection to this animation because we all started working on our independent films around the same time and also finished around the same time. It was nice to have a great friend who lives near by who could share work-in-progress and motivate each other. I am so proud of Andy and this movie is going to bring lots of success and happiness to his life!
We first started the design process by listing our flaws—both physical and character. We had been doing so many cute designs at the time that we wanted to make uglier characters.
Another challenge was to make characters out of large, iconic shapes. The scientists were based off of pills and capsules shapes.
CONCEPT ART
We also used loose watercolor studies to explore mood and atmosphere. Though these color sketches were done very quickly, most of the core design ideas were kept in tact in the final frames from the film.
STORYBOARD
Early on, we were interested in the idea of writing the movie with storyboard thumbnails. In fact, there was never a formal screenplay for the film and the dialog was more or less improvised in recording sessions. Keeping a big piece of foam core in our studio, allowed us to change, add, or subtract, but maintain the big picture.
We kept panels loose and sketchy so it was easy to make revisions.
CHARACTERS
Final characters were constructed from fabric, rope, clay, ping pong balls, erasers and soy milk carton. Then they were photographed and assembled in After Effects.
We tried to challenge the limitation of 2D flat characters by creating many replacement parts.
100 hand positions
These hands were Ru’s hand with a padded glove.
All close up shots were pixilation.
50 mouth shapes made out of rope and erasers.
Max rig in After Effects. * VIDEO DEMO w/ audio
This is a glimpse of our character file and the ideas behind. Warning: This is not a tutorial and all the technical steps are not included in the demo.
Artie rig in After Effects.
Artie rig is set up the same way as Max rig. But what makes this rig unique is the back of Artie mirrors the front. This allowed the character and the reflection in the rear view mirror to be animated together.
*Help from Sean Mcbride.
PROPS
All props were first constructed with cardboard and then painted with acrylics.
They were photographed from all angles to be reconstructed digitally in 3D space.
More organic shapes were photographed 360 degrees and used as replacement parts.
MINIATURES
—–airport—–
One of the biggest design challenges was to create a large scale sets in our tiny studio. Part of the process was figuring out how the sets will be deconstructed and stored.
If you look closely, you’ll find our pig friend in the door way. She acts as a stand-in for lighting and shadow.
—–highway—–
—–cliff—–
All the parts were planned as modules so each scene could be easily assembled and stored away. Also by reusing parts & fabric for the landscapes, we saved a lot of materials and space.
Rocks were created with styrofoam, which was also photograph 360 degrees.
This set was used to make the cliff sequence below.
—–forensic lab—–
Forensic laboratory was the most detailed set in the movie. (a whole month to create everything)
Even though the scene is about 10 seconds, and the props go by very quickly, if they weren’t there, the scene would have felt off.
Cousin Miho who is a nurse helped us understand human anatomy and internal organs.
—–San Francisco street view—–
A wide shot like the San Francisco street needed more thinking before construction because of limited space. To give the illusion of depth, we used forced perspective. The houses got smaller and smaller as it got further.
This helped with storage because we could stack them like Russian dolls and saved a lot of space.
STOPMOTION
A great deal of the animation had stop motion elements integrated with digital animation.
Here is an example of how we combined the two.
EXPERIMENTS
—–jello—–
We really wanted to have fun and experiment with materials.
Jello was used for water scenes.
Although the idea was simple, it took quite some time to get it right.
In the end, we ended up using 15 boxes of jello and filming with an HD video camera.
This aerial view of San Francisco was then composited with the jello.
Clouds were sculpted out of cotton.
—–puppet—–
This segment of hand puppets made us respect puppeteers a lot more.
To get the 8 seconds of footage, we filmed for 2 days.
—–rain—–
The rain on the glass of the car was a video footage of water dripping down on a piece of glass. The glass was held up by Ru’s comic books which got wet.
Then the video footage was later composited to the cardboard car.
COMPOSITING
This is one of the examples of a typical composite breakdown.
1.We plotted timing in animatic which was drawn in flash, based on the storyboard thumbnails.
We created a background with modular bushes and trees. Max held the light up at 24 different increments to create the sun rising and setting.
Stop motion element of moss gradually growing on rocks.
Ru created 3 stages of body decomposition.
We dissolved between the 3 puppets.
Added shadows, composited all elements together and that is how we create 1 scene!
—– color correction & depth of field —–
After we finalized animation, we rendered out TIFF sequences for multiple layers.
This allowed us to make color changes and to create subtle lighting to the flattened images.
This is the image before color correction.
Using the TIFF sequences, we generated depth mattes for the scenes.
It was very flexible to make depth of field changes as a final touch.
This is how it looks at the end.
Here is the example of layers in After Effects.
FINAL NOTES
It took us 2 years and 4 months to create this movie in between commercial jobs and it was not always fun, but in the end, we cannot be happier with the final piece.
We learned a lot about discipline, commitment, and we fell in love with animation all over again.
We hope you enjoyed the making of “Something Left, Something Taken” .
Feel free to contact us if you want to know more about the production.
May 16th, 2010 (sun)
@ Kellen auditorium, Parsons the New School for Design
“Something Left, Something Taken” screening, workshop & exhibition
7pm~
Thank you so much for those who came to the show. It was great to have such a wonderful and supportive audience, and we really enjoyed every second of it.
I will never ever forget this day!
screening
photo by Sachiko Sekiguchi
workshop
photos by Nina Frenkel
Photo taken by Aharon Rabinowitz with Plastic Bullet for iPhone
30 minutes workshop from how we created characters, character rigging, prop making, digital photography, miniature sets, experiments, and compositing.
exhibition
photos by Wendy Popp, Susie Porter, Nina Frenkel
We displayed some of our favorite sets that we could transport to Parsons.
As animators, we never get to show our props as much as the final animation.
There are many details that gets lost in the film so we were happy to show those props and sets as art work.
reception
Photos by Susie Porter & Nina Frenkel
We had prepared 70 rice balls, 60 inari, 5 bags of rice crackers.
They were all gone in 10 minutes.
Special Thanks to…
Thank you Sean for helping us transport all the sets!
Thank you Sophie & Chris for serving tea, rice balls and rice crackers!
So many people helped us with “Something Left, Something Taken.”
We are so grateful to have wonderful friends.
They deserve a crime scene evidence gift bag!
(crime scene evidence bag & tape purchased at crime scene store )
We just want to take this opportunity to thank each one of them…
Yesterday was the annual award ceremony for ASIFA-East.
Congratulations to all animators who won prizes and also for those who finished personal projects!!!
Besides the Asifa judging, it was the first time “Something Left, Something Taken” was seen by the public. (Also first time screening in a big auditorium)
I must say I am extremely relieved to finally show our film, we worked on it for 2 years and 4 months. It was such a long journey with many ups and downs. Without encouragement and support from friends and family, we would not have finished this film.
Especially Greg Sextro from East West Audio who worked on the sound design, recording and sound mix for “Something Left, Something Taken” really helped us shape the film. We cannot be happier with his patience, dedication and professionalism.
We’ll slowly post more making of blogs and thoughts that went in working on this film.
ASIFA is such a great place to catch up with old friends and meet more talented animators.
We are so lucky to be part of an amazing community.
Thank you!
