Save the Children balance sheet: my latest work in Moho

[stex]

Hi everybody,

here's my latest work for Save the CHildren - Italy.
Everything is done in Moho with a slight compositing in After effects.

Hope you like it!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fdQv92T7UOM

Stefano

[slowtiger]

Excellent work!

Amazing how you indicated the sky behind the falling objects without deriving from the whte background too much. I came to avoid a complete white BG for this reason: many movements need a context to really work. Just a single stroke of colour would do, or an overall texture instead of a plain colour.

I only have some minor quibbles. Some elements are visible too short, IMO. Extending their screen life would prevent the viewers attention to be distracted. Also some objects/people were cut off a bit, which in this combination of line art and white BG looks like an error. The white waves on the floating images shouldn't go outside the image area because the straight image border (to white) again makes it look like a kinnk in the wave line.

But these are all in the 5% range which can get done only if you have time and budget enough. Would you mind to tell ho many artists were involved for how long?

[kooobus]

Wow! Good job man

I am really impressed with final effect. Animation is solid and very fluid, so here is my question. How much of your work is made by FBF and with bones?
It would be cool if you could share some "behind the scenes" look at your work flow. Currently I am working on my own animation and find bones a little limiting in terms of more complex movements or smears. That is why I will try to combine both techniques to get satisfying results,I wonder how did you menage to do that in that piece ;D

Cheers!

[stex]

Wow, Slowtiger, thanks for your deep analisys!

you're right for everything.
It's hard to say how long it took to develop it because it happened in an extremely busy period where I had to take care of another complex work.

Anyway the short was written by my work mate Claudio Morici.

The rest has been shared between me (character design, direction, videoboard, rig and animation) and another person (compositing, additional effects, sound design).

The whole production covered a period of 2 months, but I think it would have been around 1 month by working only for it, once the client approved the script and the basic layout.

Ciao!
Stefano

[slowtiger]

Stuff like this is always lots of work. There's so much content to be included that you end up having very small scenes for each bit. You're lucky if the briefing/concept by the client is prepared well enough and not too far from what's possible to realise in time and budget, or animation in general.

With a content like this, I feel a bit overwhelmed by being shown the figures one by one, one after another, but not showing some sum in the end, or a comparison side by side.

I very much like how you gave the characters additional life with small gestures. This, and the overall smooth movments, really make such a topic enjoyable. Again, very good work.

(I did something in this direction recently, but have to wait another month or two before I can show.)

[stex]

Wow! Good job man

I am really impressed with final effect. Animation is solid and very fluid, so here is my question. How much of your work is made by FBF and with bones?
It would be cool if you could share some "behind the scenes" look at your work flow. Currently I am working on my own animation and find bones a little limiting in terms of more complex movements or smears. That is why I will try to combine both techniques to get satisfying results,I wonder how did you menage to do that in that piece ;D

Cheers!

Hi Kooobus, thanks for your comment!

Concerning my work flow ...

1 - Basically I try to resolve potential problems in the directing phase, trying to figure out which character motions can work better with a basic rig.

2 - I draw a videoboard with sample audio and very rough animation, but very sharp for framing and time. Once the client approved it, this would be the bible for the entire production.

2 - I work shot by shot, every shot a different moho file, following strictly the videoboard.

3 - Then I usually make a blocking in step and check it out in a temporary editing. Then I get back to the shot and refine in smooth curves

4 - In the end I refine again with overlaps or adjustments by working on the vector points directly, so the final animation is a mix between bones and points, just like you said

In this case I adjusted very little, almost everything is done with the rig for the main characters, the book for example are animated only with points.

I then added the tremor of the lines directly in moho and exported at half frame rate to achieve a more hand drawn effect.

Ciao
steX

[stex]

Stuff like this is always lots of work. There's so much content to be included that you end up having very small scenes for each bit. You're lucky if the briefing/concept by the client is prepared well enough and not too far from what's possible to realise in time and budget, or animation in general.

With a content like this, I feel a bit overwhelmed by being shown the figures one by one, one after another, but not showing some sum in the end, or a comparison side by side.

I very much like how you gave the characters additional life with small gestures. This, and the overall smooth movments, really make such a topic enjoyable. Again, very good work.

(I did something in this direction recently, but have to wait another month or two before I can show.)

... so ... I'll wait to see it I'm constantly searching for good artists who use Moho to help me. It's not easy since the most used software is still toonboom. But I think that toonboom is a bit complicated and oversized for small, single productions.

[slowtiger]

I think that toonboom is a bit complicated and oversized for small, single productions.

Definitely. Moho can be extremely fast, once you've figured out how it works and have some experience. My workflow is pretty much defined now, so I can reliably estimate how long a job will need to be done.

Some pans did stagger a bit, did you do them in half frame rate as well?

[stex]

Some pans did stagger a bit, did you do them in half frame rate as well?[/quote]

Yes I did, was too complicated to separate them and handle in AE.

[Little Yamori]

Beautifully done, I love to see this level of work. Very inspirational

I'm sure you'll be very successful with this accomplishment of talent.

[stex]

Beautifully done, I love to see this level of work. Very inspirational

I'm sure you'll be very successful with this accomplishment of talent.

Thank you very much! I'm glad you liked it that much!

[cynthia]

Excellent!

[stex]

Thank you!