Monday!

4 hours of sleep, then more work on the fly for my project.  got a base model finished, though the model isn't yet complete or rigged.  Dave and Rich came over to work on the script with me.  Then we took a project dinner to the Thai place down the street.  Then finally we recorded temp scratch audio for the short.  Three different people doing voices, I did voices for the mother twice.  with the revamped script I think we are heading down the right path.  And after listening to some of the voices I think this will be pretty funny.  still a lot more to do, but I just finished the base maggot model and rig, now I'm going to bed.  Tomorrow starts the animation after I rig the fly.  Just got some more instant coffee so I'm ready to run a few long long days of animation coming up...
took a walk to get some stamps at cvs and noticed this ironic turn of events.

oh Panda express why do you taunt me at midnight?  
-eD

Forced to drink ibc root beer for the good of the project. Why is life so cruel? -eD

Animation Contest...

Our theme was Aging, Character A Mother, Object A Bottle.

We came up with a short called "Pupal" about a mother fly imparting all of her knowledge that she has learned in her long 20 day life to her many maggot children, before they themselves take their journey of maturing to become a fly.  The short will take place inside of a broken root beer bottle on the side of the road.  We have an outline with a few ideas, I have concept art for the maggot, and will have more stuff completed before I go to bed, which will either be late night, or sometime Saturday, or even some time Sunday.  We are going for a relatively stylized look but with cool textures.

What is most amusing to me is that it was one of the first ideas that I had for our short, and it may have been influenced by the little fruit fly that landed on my touchscreen monitor totally confusing me for a few moments.

Strange...
-eD

Whoops

When we went to six flags there was a novelty cup that you could bring back for 99 cent refills until the end of the season.  since i knew we would be coming back i figured what the heck, why not.  My roommate Les did the same.  the other day while I was cleaning all of the pots and pans (that I didn't even use) in the kitchen to make it at least look somewhat clean I tossed them in the dishwasher.  I did not happen to see the wash by hand lettering on the top of the cup...
I found out today while emptying the dishwasher.  the cups shrunk and squished.  they look pretty disturbing but at least the caps still fit on them.  I am hoping that they will let me replace them at the park the next time we for my stupidity, but I seriously doubt it.  which means next time we go I owe Les a Six Flags refillable novelty cup.
Great...
In other news the short is tarting pretty strong.  Ben is modeling parts of the environment, and I am working on script and concept art.  start modeling soon.  I will post more about it later.  I just didn't want to forget this stupid moment of realization in my day.
-eD

Animation Contest Started...

Theme: Aging
Character: Mother
Object: Bottle
I imagine most people will automatically go for Mother and baby with bottle but I'm still brainstorming ideas.  Ruthie is coming over tonight to help us nail down an idea and possibly start writing a script with dialogue.  Once our final idea is figured out I will let y'all know.

Though I did just find out that if a fruit fly lands on my touchscreen it will register and if it crawls over the buttons to maximize a window it will maximize that window.  that was an annoying realization...
-eD

Pretty awesome last few days...

My buddy Javier came to visit from Reno, he use to live with us and I've known him for years since Florida when I was TA.  Then Les' friend Marcus came to visit from San Diego.  So we had a full house of 5 dudes, all willing to play rock band, no one wanting to sing, which meant my vocal chords were a bit hoarse for a bit.  We also had a rap battle on Def Jam Rapstar, I'm not sure if I won or not cause I did get beat 3 times, though I won way more...  Stopped around 4 in the morning.
Saturday we all went to Six Flags.  Luckily the one day pass was basically a season pass, so we can go back whenever we want until Dec 2012.  This was a good thing because even though we were there for about 8 hours we were only able to ride 4 things.  One ride we waiting for a while but it kept shutting down so we said "whatever" and left.  Then when we tried to ride Green Lantern First Flight (or whatever) it kept being shut down and delayed.  about 6 times I think but most of us were able to ride, Les was too tall.  It was a fun night, then more rock band until about 3.
Sunday was a bit video game day, we also watched some movies went to 5 Guys Burgers & Fries.  Just hung out and caught up on some rest.  Monday was Javiers last day, so we crammed in a bit more Twisted Metal and then went to Meat (Manna) Korean BBQ and ate meats that we cooked at the table for what was probably too long.  I think we were there the longest besides the workers...  But it was glorious!
Today I started the day working on the script with some changes and edits I've been mulling over with some help from opinions I get from everybody and a lot of ideas that Dave threw my way.  Then I got to see John Carter of Mars, a special screening because Les worked on it and he could bring a guest.  We didn't see it in 3D, I imagine that would be amazing.  It looked stunning and the aliens were amazingly realistic.  I liked them better than those blue guys in Avatar.  It was a pretty good movie.  I'm definitely interested if there's a sequel.
Now I have one more day before the Animation Contest starts.  12 days of attempted nonstop work now that I have a computer downstairs where I can work while "man-socializing (sitting in a room together)" and watching tv.  Can't wait to get into this contest, anxious to learn at least the theme!
-eD

Since the Weekend...

My new computer is pretty awesome.  And the fact that it is downstairs near the tv/projector is even better.  I hooked up my PS3 to it Sunday and I was able to play games and semi pay attention to the tv to catch up on a few shows I wasn't too invested in.  I spent most of the last few days installing programs, transferring files on my new computer, and then once that was done I reformatted my desktop PC in the office and re-installed new programs and files on there as well.  Not too much Overcast updates from me, but I did work on some thoughts for details on some objects, made massive lists of props that we need made, and oversaw some more work on the city...
I was able to get a lot done, even though little of it was Project related.  Though I did take some pics with my phone...

Warning if you put a magazine with an amusing cover, especially if he's pointing it will be moved into a funny position...
"You've been very very good this year" creepy...

I finally put all my change together into rolls, and took it to the bank to cash them.  I walked out of the bank with $97.  7 Rolls of quarters, 4 rolls of dimes, 3 rolls of nickels, and 2 rolls of pennies.  At least i think that's what it was.  a lot of change.  I took that cash and was able to get Twisted Metal for PS3 which came out yesterday, lunch at 5 guys burgers and fries, and some drinks and snacks from the grocery store down the street, all cash.  Though at the end of the day I end up with...

The change that I ended up with from using cash all day.  

Two seperate trips, emptying pockets after each trip. I keep my change in the same pocket as my keys so I forget if I am carrying change considering my keys and wallet chain jingle like pocket change would.
Now I have the rest of the week to feel happy with the amount I have accomplished because we will be having guests this weekend.  Javier is coming from Reno and Marcus is coming from San Diego.  I believe a trip to Six Flags is in the schedule but I'm not totally sure.  As long as this cold is over and it doesn't rain it should be a fun weekend.
-eD

Woo!

Started the day off by finally changing the comics I had on the 2 fridges in the kitchen.  I use to change them every once in a while, but I just haven't gotten around it in such a long time.  So I cut out a bunch of comics this morning and put 8 fresh strips on the fridges.  Think I will change them each week until I am caught up, or at least closer to caught up.
Also a little after noon, my new computer arrived.  I am so excited to open it up and start installing programs, but first I wanted to be a little more productive.  Like maybe clean my room for the first time in ever.  Prob need to clean off my Desk and my bedside table for optimal new computer fun...
-eD

Rendered Updates...

Got some quick updates for y'all...  All tests, nothing final...

Quick glimpse at (super) low poly city with some untextured drop ships swarming around...  Started with an uncomfortably long "Who's on first" conversation where ben was asking if the sky was cloudy and overcast, and I thought he was asking if the title of the series was overcast.  it was kind of funny, but I imagine it would be funnier if you would have been watchin the confused looks on each of our faces.

Seeker Aerial - not changed too much (lower # of polys than before)

Seeker Drone - Reworked Tentacles, lowered polys, and made openings in body for tentacles to retract if needed.

These are all far from being finished.  The Drop Ship progress has been great, some cool details have already been added but no textures yet.  The city has been coming together nicely.  A lot of trial and error, and then adding more area to the map to make the space larger for any massively high crane shots over "ThaCity".  So once it's ready expect another (more detailed) map.

Need to step out from behind the pen and get back into the cg stuff, should have the Seeker ready soon.  I'll be adding details and textures next week.  Prob need to model a brain for it too huh?  Eh, gonna try to step away from the project this weekend and relax.  Wish me luck...
-eD

Drunk and Sleepy?

Turns Out Being Drunk and Sleepy Can Do Wonders for Your Creativity

hah this was an awesome article.  guess when i drank a 40 last night and worked until 5 am it was a good thing then...

-eD

Totally Forgot...

I have been looking around at laptops and such for a while since mine crapped out on me.  As much as I wanted another apple laptop, 1) they are too expensive and 2) a lot of programs that I use will not work on a mac.  I ended up getting a HP Touchsmart computer, which is an all in one computer monitor that has touch screen capabilities.  I ended up ordering it from HP after doing research for a few weeks.  I was able to get it for roughly the same price as a medium to high end laptop and it will be even more powerful than the work PC that I have now.
The greatest thing about this new computer besides all the awesomeness I have already mentioned, since it is all in one, I will be able to move it from my room to downstairs so I can work on anything I want while watching television!  So now I will have 2 work computers, one dual monitor in the office that I will have for mainly modeling/animation and a quasi portable PC for modeling/animation/rendering/and editing.  I can also hook up my PS3 to it so we can do multi-player stuff on 2 different systems though still in the same room!  Oh I can't wait!  I received an email today claiming that it was ready to ship so I should see it in about 5-7 business days!  oh yeah!
Now I will have even less of an excuse why I'm not producing work, though I've been runnin myself pretty ragged recently.  Gonna start taking time away from "Overcast" on the weekends and maybe a full day off before the animation contest begins on the 23rd...
-eD

Start of Logo

Here is what I have right now for the Pizza Place logo.

There's a few places I want to refine (mainly the teeth and arms) and I will probably recolor it at some point too. Was probably going to scale down the outer circle to have the top of his hat and finger of his hand to extend out beyond the oval. Then once a final name for the pizza place has been decided I will add the text.
-eD

Updates...

I ended up pulling an all-nighter last Thursday night, to finish up the script for the short, which I have now begun calling "Overcast" and the pilot episode (episode 1) is called "Bein' Cheezy".  Been spending most of my time in the behind the scenes of pre-production - writing scripts, backgrounds & descriptions of characters, as well as concept art & designs for characters, the city, and helping Ben with his design of the DropShip.  It feels nice and invigorating to be this involved in a project of my own design and will eventually be able to see this thing come to life, though the scale of it (considering how many artists we have working on it now) makes it a bit intimidating.

I just finished a map detailing the locations of events and the path of our hero on his journey.

This is "ThaCity" where all the action takes place.  We will see most of it from the aerial shots, and some of the establishing shots, with the detailed buildings being the ones surrounding the path our hero travels.

Yesterday afternoon I had a meeting with my buddy Turner who agreed to help us out with some character design work, and eventually some storyboarding for the short.  I showed him what we have for designs and what we have started on, and since he had already read the script he had a good idea of where we wanted to take it.  He quickly sketched up some mock-ups for the main character and the two police officers which I was able to approve the look of right there on the spot.  I can't wait to see the finished designs!  I will post some of sketches up here once I get a chance.

I've also been working on the Pizza Place logo.  I'm liking it so far, just have to finish the hat and teeth, revise the tummy, and color it.  I am going to leave the name out of it for now, considering I'm not completely happy with "Pizza Place" as the name for the pizza joint where our hero works. Eh, if it wasn't a rainy morning I could go lay out on the hammock and think about it, but i'm not laying on a wet hammock. that's ridiculous...
-eD

Animated Short Updates (Plural)

So first off here are the update for the designs I have already shown...

Revised concept of this guy, now with hair and hat (holy crap!)

Initial Seeker models, the Aerial Version and the Drone Version (will be reworking the tendril/tentacles)

Still working on the script, almost ready to be released to the collaborators and anyone who expressed enthusiastic interest in helping out.

The second bit of Animated Short news is actually new to the blog I believe.  I have entered a 12 day Animation Contest with my friends Ben, Rich, & Ruthie.  The contest is creating an 3.5 minute animated short based on unreleased criteria (Theme, Character, Object) to be released at the start of the contest.  We are "TeamBERR", more news to come.  This thing starts Feb23rd and lasts until March 6th so I may not be doing much socializing those 2 weeks.  I say 2 weeks cause most likely the 7th and 8th will be used to catch up on sleep.  Even if I happen to start work before then I may be able to get at least something accomplished on the weekends to at least make an attempt.

I think I am going to spend this weekend away from too much "Stuffy Universe" stuff and go all out and make a logo for my team, trust me I've got an awesome idea for a tag he he he.
-eD