Animation - Rubert Da Koopa

Brilliant short animation, it's clever because it takes the well known Super Mario games but you see it from the perspective as one of the creatures (A Koopa). I believe that animation was done in Adobe Flash and isn't that difficult just once again probably time consuming.

The animator who goes by name of RicePirate has quite an established channel on both Newgrounds and YouTube, his work follows the same animation style giving it a memorable feel, I encourage you to check out some more of his stuff.

YouTube Channel

Newgrounds Channel

Animation - Animator vs Animation

This is an old animation but never the less very original, it's created by Alan Becker from ABS (Albino Black Sheep). The whole animation was created using a screen record and adobe flash, I don't think the animation it's self would of been difficult just time consuming. 

At the time I was using flash also, so I instantly took interest to the piece and attempted to create animations in my spare time. The way I accomplished it was by using the onion option so I could see the each frame as I drew them out, slow but effective.

Animation - Dragon Ball Z

A childhood favourite of mine which I watched from a very young age is Dragonball Z the series sequel to Dragonball and prequel to Dragonball GT but by far the best in my opinion is DBZ. As I like the animation so much I thought I would take some time in finding out the process of creating the episodes.

It would usually go from pre-production which would be the producers or the comic. Next it would go to scripting and scenario writing, story boarders, concept designers and colour designers would take over at this point. Then we have in-production which consists of the actual animators doing their part from layout design to key animators, in-between animators and people to clear up the finished product. Finally you have post-production which of course involves voice recording, sound effects and dubbing. If the animation is modern there may also be 3D effects added in to the animation.

Animation - Corpse Bride

Another animation I very much like is Tim Burtons "Corpse Bride", all though I think it it just Tim Burtons style of film is what draws me towards his works so much, with the combination of characters, scenery and music he creates beautiful pieces. The actually animator for the piece as far as I'm aware is Phil Dale.

Stop motion work to me is a grind, with that said the feeling you have after you completed x amount of snaps and spending hours in the same spot is awesome. Creating a story out of puppets that can be played back on a screen is so strange as we're used to either seeing a string or hand attached the puppet, this is why I find Tim Burtons pieces so captivating he is just so unique.

Animation - Shrek

One of mine and I can pretty much guarantee alot of other peoples favourite animation is Shrek (2001) all though out of the series I enjoy Shrek Forever After (2004). As well as great animation the story is brilliant.

Shrek is a originally derives from a book but was adapted by Dreamworks and created into an animation. I like this type of animation again as it is something different from what we would expect normal, talking ogres, cats and donkeys and seeing these creatures become animated rather than a standard human is great to see. I also love the process they took creating these CGI characters. First with a skeletal and join structure they would add muscle, fat and skin to the underlying structure and of course clothing was then adding. Both PDI proprietary and Maya was used in the creation of this, I have a small amount of experience using Maya from when I was younger, it's such a great program!

Character Designer - Toni Repna

Here is another awesome character designer I like, Toni Repna. I like this unfinished style of drawing and concept sketches. I think it's linked to the fact I always want to start another project and get bored of project quite quickly if it takes alot of time. Her blog is filled just rough character sketches like below.

All her sketches also feature the character in some kind of pose which I think is a great practice you can gain some good experience plus you'll never be stuck for stance ideas when doing new sketches.

Link to her work.

Character Designer - Tim Burton

Tim Burton is very well known character designer/film director with films that range from the "Corpse Bride" to "The Nightmare before Christmas". He is by far one of my favourite character designers, there is just something about his designs that make them so memorable.

They all appear to share the same physical attributes, usually not in proportion and augmented and many different ways. The main characters more than others seem to be the most normal. that's most likely because we as humans like to see what is considered normal which allows us to focus on that person easier. However I do think the fact that he creates such abnormal and strange designs is why I am so curious about his work, I also think the scenery plays a huge part in this but I'll talk about that in another blog post.