The Little Robot - Swamp and Spore Attack

Our heroes of The Little Robot encounter a number of dangers on their adventure, including an attack by spore-like creatures to a journey through a treacherous swamp

These concepts will be the basis of the three final still images we wish to pursue.

The Little Robot - Environment Concepts

With the The Little Robot project, we've begun to research and explore early concepts between the three poster style images.

The first image is designed to 'set the scene' so to speak, introducing the predominant environment and main characters. The use of bold colours and saturated tones is just one of the styles we may intend to pursue.

The soldier and robot find themselves having to journey through a treacherous swamp in the story, which we feel is a great opportunity to show the darker side of The Little Robot. Here are some initial concepts of the swamp environment in the works.

More to come.

New Project - The Little Robot

With our last post, we announce the beginning of a new project, this new project is a screenplay adaptation of the Book The Little Robot by Amy Mccartney.

While we are starting to think of scriptwriting and how effectively adapt the story.  Firstly we are presenting 3 posters for our pitch presentation, these 3 posters will demonstrate the characters and the environments modeled, the art direction we will choose, as well as any colour schemes, athmosphere and scale comparison.

So stay tuned on that end!!

Therefore, in the beginning of each project, one of the first steps is to research the style you want to employ to your animation. On our meeting we decided to have a variety of ideas on art direction, where each member would come with their own ideas. In this case this is my opinion ( Ruben) on the art direction and style we could take on this project. Here my influence map.

 

 I would love to see how the rest takes on this. 

The Beginning of a New Studio

With Final Chapter arriving to a closure, a few expected and unexpected things happen to Atom Pancakes as a studio.

To give you all the latest gossip at first hand, I will present a list with the headlines and then explain in detail, all the brand new things happening to the studio as well as the future projects.


Headlines: 

1. Expansion of the studio from 3 members to 5. 
2. Atom Pancakes Purpose
3. Features in Magazines, etc. 
4. Going Professional- one step further!
5. New Features.
6. Next Project.

Expansion of the studio from 3 members to 5.

The first and most important headline is that Atom Pancakes is getting bigger, after talks with the original members Jordan Buckner, Ethan Shilling and I. we all decided that would be best for all if we could bring more people in with different set of skills. Therefore, we invited and welcomed fellow CG Artists Leo Tsang and Sam Hayes, to our studio.  This addition will only benefit not only the studio but each individual as with a better and skilled team the work produce will be of a higher standard.

Atom Pancakes Purpose 

Our objective slightly changed from when we formed the studio, while at the beginning Atom pancakes served as a fictional studio created as part of our course minor project, nowadays the studio will work as a small community of 5 fellow artists who seek to find jobs in the industry by perfecting their skills, with the help of one another. Therefore Atom Pancakes is officially classified as a studio. 

 Features in Magazines and Events

Lately, Atom Pancakes attempted to publish the studio, by entering to events and festivals. Final Chapter was featured in New Designers 2012, and showcased throughout all the event where hundreds of people, appreciated the work put in it. However, not all is good news, Final Chapter was also submitted to Canterbury Anifest, however it wasn't shortlisted and won't be screened on the festival.
Individually, members of the studio were approached by magazines, and tried to once again give some extra exposure to the studio.
For example, I ( Ruben Martins) was featured at Digital Arts magazine September Issue, where The Final Chapter was indeed a big sensation. Meanwhile other online magazine, Ceiga was interested to feature the Final Chapter on their blog.

 

Going Professional- one step further! 

After a few meetings, at Atom pancakes we decided it was time to go one step further, and instead of having a fictional studio, we should seek to give professional service to possible employers. For this purpose, a few things undergone, first we are slightly changing the logo to upgrade our level of professionalism, we are creating business cards, with the individual names in order to present ourselves as a studio.  We are researching into funding, and other possible ways to get the studio going. And last but not least, we are looking for people who seek our services. 

Thus exciting yet stressful times approach but all is part of the experience. Wish us luck!! 

New Features 

To add extra professionalism to our studio we revamped this blog, with a new and cleaner layout design, in this blog we pretend to share some of the work produce for our projects, as well as have creative discussions where everybody is welcome to offer their feedback. Alongside the blog, our website also suffered a major update, in there you can find all the information about the studio as well as the last project we worked on, any future projects and the latest news about the studio. 

So take a look at www.atompancakes.blogspot.com

Next Project

While at New Designers, we made contact with a few fellow illustrators and graphic designers. Therefore our next project is the product of a  few talks with illustrator Amy Mccartney, to whom we proposed to adapt her children's book Little Robot, to a short animation. With the permission and enthusiasm of the illustrator, we are all set to begin the new project. Firstly, in 10 weeks time we will present a pitch presentation with 3 scenes of the story, expressing our art direction and style. Then with the agreement of the illustrator/storyteller Amy we will proceed to the animation.

So fasten your seat belts, while Atom Pancakes will take you behind the scenes of creating an animated short.



Ruben Martins

The Final Chapter - The Final Post

Well it's finally here! The post that closes one project, to make way for something new.

Since The Final Chapters first release, it has undergone quite a few changes.
It has endured many cuts, but also welcomed some brand new scenes, and all to prepare itself for New Designers 2012, which has been and gone... it went rather well!

The Final Chapter isn't the only thing undergoing some tweaks. Very soon Atom Pancakes should be releasing an updated logo and brand new ident, also hopefully giving both the studio website banner and the blogs banner their own similar, but distinctive look... and we might actually get some business cards designed and printed! No idea how we overlooked that!
So after the success of New Designers 2012, this officially marks the end of The Final Chapter.

It's a goodbye from Arthur Winters and a warm welcome for...

... well, I think I'll let Ruben properly introduce the next project!


Ethan Shilling

Final Chapter- and the Murderer was....

More updates will land on here very soon! 

Keep Tuned!

P.S: Character pose by Ethan Shilling

Animation and rendering is going well at Atom pancakes, we almost done with all the scenes to animate however, is still a few bits to tweak.

Here are the scenes I (ruben) have been working on:

Tension Playblast Edit

After Credits Scene- Blocking

                                                              After Credits Scene- Final

Dream Detective- Blocking

Prepare Scene- Blocking

Also there is the idea butler scene which is not featured on here, but it is all animated. 

Butler Reveal Scene II

So animation continues at Atom Pancakes,Ruben Here!!! I decided to carry on tweaking the Butler Scene, and I have to say it is almost ready for rendering, It still needs some secondary animation.

Butler Reveal Scene Animation Progress 8 (Close-up)

Butler Reveal Scene Animation Progress 8

I have also began blocking the Investigation Scene, and I will post a playblast soon.

On a side note, I am also in charge of getting the dream sequence environment ready for rendering, so today I took some time to to set it up with lighting and also playing around with the background.

We opted to go for a simpler set up where we will have the character fully lit, and the body, laying on the floor under the spotlight.  

For the space not look so empty, we will add a few effects, in this case some particle travelling between the character and the black space. they will be the pattern of the room.

Just like shown on this render.

More Animation in Progress

A Flock of Pixels has been animating. So far I've been blocking out three of the scenes which have been assigned to me.
I started with the maid dream sequence, focusing on the walk cycle mostly.



I have also decided upon this camera angle. It shows the walk cycle from the best angle and also (after he has turned a corner) shows the swinging of the dagger in the clearest way. (note - the legs do break in this clip, but that issue has be addressed since this playblast was taken)

The next scene I've been working on is the part where the pencil is stuck in the pencil sharpener. It may look like he is floating, but he will be on a chair. That'll be animated once everything else in the scene is finalised. (note - final camera angles not decided)



The latest scene I've been working on is the one where the typewriter jams. I did have to quickly rig the typewriter for this scene, and since I was rigging the sliding mechanism, it seemed a good idea to do the keys too even though they are not needed in this scene. If I'm not mistaken, Ruben is in charge of the scene where we see him typing. (note - final camera angles not decided)



So I will continue to get everything blocked out before refining anything so that we can see how everything is going to act out early on. One day I will get round to fixing the last few issues with the skinning on the rig!

A Flock of Pixels

Character Props and other Props Update

Last week, the task was primarily model the character and lay out its Uvs, with that finished my task for the past week was to model the character props, a set of props that will be close and parented to the character, and that going to be animated.

Although I may post some repetitions this are the props i have been working on.

Butler's Tie Bow

Butler's Tray

Magnifying Glass

Chef's Rolling Pin with Breakable Rigged Extra

Burnt Moustache

Chef's Hat

Monocle

On this prop I have also created a video showing the whole system of the string working, as we move the monocle glass the string will follow. 

This week, i have been working on finishing the props that were missing from the environment, that features a furious pencil sharpener, which is ready to eat a lot of pencils, and a plant that will be burnt. 

note that most of these props were already started by my colleague Ethan, So i tweaked them and laid out the UVS. 

Cup Trophy

Cup Trophy UVs

Pencil Sharpener

Pencil Sharpener UVs

Pot Plant (Dynamics Simulation Still to come)

Shield Trophy

Shield Trophy UVs

With this left the last prop needed is the burnt hair on our character, that will need to be modelled and then sculpted.