Currently I'm animating the expression changes of the characters for the close up shots, I have 2 expression changes done (with out color) and 2 to go, I've found the second expression I did looked a lot better than the first so hopefully I can expect the last 2 to look look great. It took me 1 day per expression to get it fully complete in B+W which means I should be done and ready for color after the w/e.
If each shot with body movement in it takes aprox 1 day per shot to complete then time will be tight but I should have enough to color and do special effects, focus pulls, etc.
I had a quick look into rotoscoping the explosion shot last night, the style does not fully suit the flash tweening that I have used for the face expressions. I'l rotoscope it if needed but I'm going to have a quick attempt to see if I can animate it using tweens instead.
I began animating the backgrounds in after effects, I've hit 3 unforeseen problems.
1) The composition of the shot looks fine in photoshop but having moved the clouds and cloud shadows across the ground the comp changes into something less desirable. This is not a major problem but I would like to find a solution
2) Moving the cloud shadows across the ground and keeping the shape in realistic perspective is harder than i thought.
3) I wanted to have the cloud shadows movement subtle but defiantly noticeable, its been hard to find the right balance for this. I've been experimenting with raising/lower the opacity of the clouds and the speed which they move at.
I think I will end up doing the character color in flash, I would have preferred to color them with a lot more detail in photoshop but that would have been a very lengthy process. The up side of this however is I kind of like the solid colors for characters, detailed backgrounds combination to pull focus to the characters and help them stand out in each shot.
Running out of internet for the month has been a major hassle for quickly looking up tutorials on the net to over come smalls problems and speed up some of my processes. Also not having the latest version of flash and after effects has become a major hassle. I can not work on my running comp at home at all and I can not work on the flash files once I have worked on them at uni.
Overall the project has grown different to my vision leading me to be less motivated and I do not enjoy the work as much as I might've hoped however despite being nervous about the time frame and potential set backs I am very relieved to be able to see myself finishing the project with it looking decent and on time. I predict once the project is completed and I can no longer work on it I will look at it in a different light and hopfully like it more.
