Final Crit Feedback

        Viewing everyone's animations for the first time in the final crit, it was striking and inspiring to see the variety of animations which had been created using the same. There was a great diversity of tone and style, from comedic to unnerving, some using minimal yet nuanced and effective movement, and others with big, bold performances. Considering we had all begun this year with no experience of Maya, I was in awe of what everyone had managed to achieve.

        In terms of my own work, due to the aforementioned problems with the 'tweening' of my keyframes, I chose to show this playblast: 

        I felt that this was a far better representation of my work to date than the glitchy, flat tangent play blast. I am proud of the poses that I have created, and believe that they express the range of emotions that Moom experiences, from confusion, through panic, frustration and relief. 

        Despite my animation not being finished, I was pleased by the generally positive reaction to my work. The group were supportive, giving helpful feedback, as well as highlighting aspects that they had enjoyed, such as Moom's melodramatic attitude, how his eyes open at the end, and the dramatic, dynamic poses, which make use of most of the controllers.

        However, it was suggested that the extreme change Maya had to perform between these poses could be causing some of the problems with the flattened tangents. I will need to revisit some of the keyframes and create additional in-between poses, to give Maya greater guidance in how Moom should be moving.

        There are a few aesthetic factors I need to resolve before the submission deadline. While some of my classmates had constructed impressive environments for their animations (walls, window views and even background characters) I had always intended to keep my set fairly simple. I need to add in a floor, shaded to look like wooden floorboards, and a spotlight, to help mimic the warm, intimate atmosphere of a romantic bistro.

        I also found it useful to take into account the feedback given to my peers whose animations were more developed than my own, and hopefully incorporate these suggestions into my own work. A common theme seemed to be the use of overlapping action and follow through, to make the characters' movement seem looser, more flowing and natural. We had experimented with this technique in the segmented pendulum study task.

        Although I will try to incorporate this important principle of animation into my work, I am quickly running out of time, and am afraid I may only be able to achieve an animation in which Moom moves smoothly, without any unwanted back flips. I had ambitious hopes and expectations of how I hoped my animation would look, but now realise that I need to set realistic goals for what I can achieve in the time remaining. After all, Maya is a huge and complex piece of software, and we have only just begun our learning journey. No one can become an expert in a matter of months.