Group BLEAH Project Blog ``

Thursday, March 26, 2009 { 12:45 AM }

Yes it's me. I'm the one to write the closing for the blog. I'm honored, really.

Anyways, I've gotta say it's been a pretty hard, long battle. Lots of problems were faced, and fortunately were overcome. Things had been lost, things had been learnt, and there are some things we really wouldn't want to forget. A lot of effort and time had been spent on this project and though some of us may think it's a crappy piece of work, at least I'm still pleased, satisfied and proud of it. Though I think I'm going to curl in a corner and hide my face once our video is shown on the big screen...

Well it just shows me how much work we will be doing in the future; this is just a mere taster to what more that is to come in the next two years we'd be facing in MOI. Good luck to us all...

Lastly, I'd like to thank my group members. Seriously THANK YOU! You guys did a great job. Hana especially, good lord, whatever would I do without you? Hahas, as I've said in the earlier post she deserves 70% of all the credit among us as she was the one who did almost all the video editing, and salvaged and pieced together all the work, so yes, thank you Hana~~

Thanks to all the lecturers who helped us and taught us the needed stuff, especially Amanda for guiding us on our P1 project. Thanks to those who gave us moral and back-up support too! Like Kaya, Brian and Bryan, Jovi, etc...

Thanks thanks thanks... That's what this post is about... Thank yous :D

- Kaz

Labels: Kaz

Saturday, March 21, 2009 { 12:58 AM }

Good news: we're approximately 70 - 80% done, or even more!
Bad news: I'm sick... Eh that isn't really bad news...

But anyways, so glad things are progressing quite smoothly... All that's left is more video editing, adding of the sounds and music, rendering/exporting, and the paperwork. I think that's all? Hope so.

From what I've seen our video looks alright. I'm satisfied with it.

............Nothing else for me to say. I just had a lot of problem tryingto finish the animation because of my sickness that made me want to curl up in a corner and die. Ahh, now that the ordeal is over I can relax a bit, focus on my H&C and help Hana out with the rest of the work. She's done a lot and did a great job on the video editing, so most of the credit should go to her.

Cheers!

Time for me to get my rest and hopefully be up and running in good condition by Monday.

Labels: Kaz

Sunday, March 15, 2009 { 11:22 PM }

Oops sorry for the lack of updates. I have been dropping dead on my bed for the past week now.

Gotta admit that I have been slacking though, haha.

Hana want to redo a couple of scenes. Hope there's enough time. Time is running now... Usually it's walking, but when you need it most, it runs away as if the devil were on its heels.

We wanted to finish filming the scenes we were to redo today, but because someone was extremely late and had the rain catch up on us, we couldn't. Joy.

Managed to only do a coupl of shots before it got dark due to the overbearing clouds. The storm that later came on was kinda scary...

Ah hopefully we'd complete video filming by this coming wednesday. Interim Two makes me nervous, because I think our video is around just average level...

Still got lotsa animation to do... Man, I am so not keen to showing my animation on the big screen... ldfjglkjdfgkld!

- Kaz

Labels: Kaz

Monday, March 9, 2009 { 6:37 PM }

We are almost done with filmiiiiing. I am so full of joy. Or anger. Or frustration. Or just feeling prissy. I don't know. Stupid female hormones.

Anyway, I do know there's some joy due to the finishing of filming, BUT I still have animation and DesH&C to do. Great combination. The only thing left to film is the VidFun part. And the time lapse. And the goodbye scene. Yaaaaaaaaaaay.

Oh boy. A week before Interim 2, and I am still behind on my animation. Effin' A, Kaz, effin' A. So screwed, but if I rush like crazy for one day without being distracted at all (which is highly unlikely), I might be able to complete a part or two of the animation.

Mind over matter...

Yeah we can do this. I'm sure Hana and Jocelyn can do their part. I'd help out as much as I can, guys.

- Kaz

Labels: Kaz

Thursday, March 5, 2009 { 12:58 AM }

Sorry I didn't post anything yesterday... Been falling asleep on my laptop for the past couple of days... I would have to warn it'd be rather full of complaints, but I really wanna voice it out.

I don't know if it's because of Design H&C or the production period, but I do admit it's been kind of hectic lately, especially with production & shooting of video started and the projects already set by DesH&C.

I think I can cope.

I do would like to voice my... displeasure at the timetable set for me, since I only had one module (P1) last block and had all the time in the world, and now when time is most needed, I am given a busy, and seemingly mentally tedious subject.

MOIP1 = physically draining + time-consuming
DesH&C = rather mentally straining
Living at Jurong West = time-consuming, rather physically draining with the stuff I carry and all

So... yes, I'm pretty tired, but I should really shut up now. I'm definitely not the only one drained from this or whatever.

So anyways, I'll report about Tuesday and today.

Tuesday was supposedly the first day of our production. Jocelyn was ill so she didn't join us, and hence, we didn't really get much done... But even if she did come, I don't think there was so much for us to do... Did manage to shoot the introduction scene though, and I started my animation.

Today we did stop-motion for one of the introductions as well. It took quite a lot of time? And we tried shooting my scene at the 2dAniLab, where we hoped there wouldn't be anyone around at nightfall but unfortunately we were wrong, and the crowd was still so alive with sound despite them being quiet.

*sigh*

Not to mention the school's video cams crapped up or something... Something about all the firewires being down... Pfft. So much joy in a day. Hopefully our personal digital cameras would do the job... I'm worried about the sound quality...

Ah, the animation. The animation for our video would be crappy, unfortunately... Well, depending on how you see it, but I'd have to insist that it's our chosen 'style'. Or something. It's... It's... *facepalm*

Oh, and Brian had pointed out some things to me about our storyboard in the presentation on Monday. He said that there are some special effects I wanted to use that is actually so difficult, even he or Bryan, with After Effects experience, wouldn't be able to pull it off.

Frankly... I thought I could do it, but after he said that and scared the living crap out of me, my morale has gone down. Really down. I don't think I can rely on my groupmates, as I'm the one who came up with ideas of those transitions so I'm responsible in making them happen.

...I really need some tea right now. And do my H&C...

Note to self: Add five extra teaspoons of sugar...

- Kaz, the ever-anxious yet seemingly relaxed & slacked one

Labels: Kaz

Friday, February 27, 2009 { 12:14 AM }

Heya mates.

There isn't much to blog about today since our group didn't meet up for a discussion. We will be doing so tomorrow and probably again in the next day or so to finish up everything for our Interim One. I hope it all goes well. I'm starting to have panic attacks again and no chocolate or tea (my happy foods) can cure it.

I'm still working on the storyboards (it's so late hoooo shites, but we've done the full layout of the whole story on stickmen-storyboards... I just need to draw it properly on the proper storyboard template) and I feel like breaking my fingers or shooting myself up with drugs just to make myself work. [Don't worry people, I'm not a junkie nor a masochist, despite how unconvincing that may sound, but I'm just saying.] I enjoy drawing, I really do, but I don't like to draw... boring things... So right now I'm trying my best to finish these last few pages up and I'd most likely have to pen it if I need to scan it up so that they can be pasted onto the presentation.

Speaking of which, we are going to complete, hopefully and minus the storyboards, by tomorrow. I think our group have pretty much completed the needed stuff for Interim One (except for the goddarned storyboards, yes I know).

After I do complete it, I seriously have to drag/kick/push/force/threaten/bribe my lazy butt to the 2DAnimation room and start on the animation. Seriously. We. Have. No. Time. Or it's just me being time-anxious again, but it's never too bad to be cautious. I hope I can get some way to have Adobe Flash at home so that I can work on the animation at home too... Aaaaahhhh....!

Kaz is not a happy camper. I think I'll go make myself some tea to calm myself down...

Labels: Kaz

Tuesday, February 24, 2009 { 12:33 AM }

Right, finally we started on some work.

Basically all we did today was discuss, write, and doodle. We're actually working on our storyboards, yay! Ah, but just the draft. That would be because of me; I'm a really careful, almost paranoid person who'd do drafts first before doing the real thing... So yeah, I'm gonna draft out everything first before I really draw it properly. Some may call it wasting time, but I just like to play safe.

Anyways, that means I'm in charge of storyboards, Hana's on moodboards, and Jocelyn on the proposal.

So today we've done Part One of our story on our storyboards (still draft though...), and a summarised draft (yet again) of our proposal. We have yet to come up with the script and the schedule chart... Oh boy...

While we were discussing on the video storyboard, we were constantly reminded and limited because of the time constraint. Especially me, the ever-time-anxious one. It drove me nuts worrying about the time limit, so I decided, or all of us, rather just figured we'd cut some scenes from the storyboards out if we find that we don't have enough time. Hopefully we don't have to do that.

Well, we're still developing out story, as we go on in the storyboards, trying to confirm and seriously solidify how exactly we are going to have the video look like. Story is done, just the shots, effects, humor scenes, the style of camera play, etc...

So uh, I feel like sharing a music video, if you don't mind. This music video is a mix of animated effects and live-action video, though there's no interaction between them. But what I like most of the music video is the shaky camera effect... Well just see how it looks like :D

By the way, it's a Japanese heavy rock song, with some low screaming... Just a 'warning' for those who can't take this type of music. It's called 'Adore' by Lynch.

- Kaz

Labels: Kaz

Wednesday, February 18, 2009 { 9:56 PM }

Hey hey looks like it's my turn to blog. I would have loved to blogged yesterday, in fact, I don't mind blogging everyday, if I could, about Group Bleah's progress. But then, it wouldn't be a nice idea, because the posts would probably be full of rambling.

Anyway.

My individual presentation yesterday didn't turn out so good. I have stage fright, so do pardon me. Being quite unsure about my own ideas are most likely the factor of my stuttery and panic. I had to admit, just like Alvin had commented, my ideas were very similar. One's going into the world of MOI, while the other's popped out of an alternate world, but still gets led into MOI.

How very creative of me.

Which is why having teammates help tremendously. Having Hana's and Jocelyn's idea put together in the same pile of ideas under the same group helps a lot. Integrating the ideas would definitely come up with something original.

Just like rojak:

Now doesn't that make you hungry?

Though admittedly I am not a fan of the dish, I still think the Indian rojak is a very interesting dish; you mix what seems like randomly selected fruits and vegetables (some rojak have fruits, FYI) and mix them together yet put them under the same sauce and it becomes one dish.

Quite similarly like how we came up with our idea today.

We met up rather early (Hana was late though) and we discussed - first sharing the full story of our two ideas and then choose which would be good to mix them together, and add more things to make it a group idea with improvement.

In the end, we mixed mine and Hana's, using mostly mine as a basis for the concept. You guys should be able to tell we're pretty animation-orientated, though I'm not so sure if the other two are going to animation. I have to apologise to Jocelyn though; we couldn't think of how we could integrate her idea into ours, as the storyline of her idea was too distant and strong independantly from our more documentary-based storyline. I hope Jocelyn would contribute a little more ideas in the future 'cause we definitely need it.

So, after a couple of hours of discussion, we have already came up with a pretty rough storyline that we'd be telling Amanda and asking her opinion about it tomorrow. Hopefully it would be a good response. As usual, my only worry is our process of doing it. Gotta rush rush rush.

I'll give a few hints to what our video might be like:

- definitely a mix of animation and video (duh)

- humor would be thrown in most definitely (everyone loves a few laughs, though it's hard to call me a humorous person so I'd pretty much have to rely on the other two on that...)

- look out for interaction between animation and live-footage!

- unusual camera angles, probably

Yeah, that's all I'm sharing - might be too much or too little, I don't really care since we're gonna be showcasing the video at the end of the module anyway.

Sorry for the rambling. I enjoy writing long posts with failed humor.

- Kaz

Labels: Kaz

Saturday, February 14, 2009 { 1:37 PM }

Oops I didn't post yesterday. I got home at about 8pm and was knocked out the moment I fell on my bed. Was that tired.

Well there isn't much to post about anyway, since there were no lessons on Thursday and Friday.

On Thursday, we did get more examples of what was expected of us by the end of the module though. A couple of them were extremely good, especially the most talked about one with the concept of some medieval quest. Really really cool stuff.

Brian said he could do that. I'm looking forward to seeing that.

I guess I've got some ideas from the videos, but frankly, I'm just really scared of the problems that I (we) would face in the process of doing it. What can I say? I'm a pessimist and a nervous wreck.

For some reason though, I thought of making a machinima. That would be totally awesome, but I don't have the skills to do that, unfortunately. Would be great if someone else did.

As for my individual assignment, I'm still thinking, but all I can say is that it'd definitely be a mix of animation and video (like duh, almost everyone should be doing that). Just probably more of animation? Oh you guys know how much I love to draw, hurr hurr. Maya would be pain to use, but so would Flash. So I am really in a fix right now, with me being in my not-so-creative period.

I am looking forward to the presentation on Monday! Gotta rush on mine too...

-Kaz

Labels: Kaz

Wednesday, February 11, 2009 { 1:00 AM }

Though today was both pretty slacked and rushed for me, I think it had been a rather fruitful day. It was slacked because I didn't have much to do after our group discussion for the presentation tomorrow. But we had to finish up everything by today so there was a little bit of rushing in that part. The only problem we had was difficulty trying to choose which of our three ideas would be our chosen two. The three of them all looked good to us, so it got us in a snitch.

The three are:
- Factory tour (frankly I think it's fine, as long as it's not a fishball factory haha)
- Puzzle carnival (I wouldn't mind getting involved in this, but carnivals are too common)
- Soup kitchen (free soup!!)

But thankfully, after much deliberation, looking over the data and asking of opinions from a third party, we managed. It took quite a while and a lot of our brain juices, so that proves that we have a problem of indecisiveness.

So after hours of wasting hours away at school in an attempt to calm myself from getting too panicky about tomorrow's presentation, I got home, propped myself in front of the computer aaaand -

rushed, rushed, ruuuushed.

When I'm nervous, I get real panicky. It's probably some sort of disorder, because I can get all paranoid and jittery and stuff, but by some miracle I somehow get things done. I think. But I rush. A lot.

So I gathered all the data we needed to print and hand in as research, which I think is... I'm not sure if it's a lot or if it's relevant, but I worry about anything and everything, so no worries?
We don't know whether we need to hand in a hard copy of our presentation, so Hana suggested we just print it just in case. I think I'll just print it at school... My printer will suffer if I print the slides at home.

But now I think after all the rushing in trying to get the presentation slides right and look nice (yay I have pretty pictures... let's just hope none of them would be used by another group as well), I'm pretty relieved.

I think I did a good job.

A decent one. Or alright. Or average.

I think.

Ahhh I'm getting a panic attack again. I'm going to freak out in tomorrow's presentation, I'm sure. Good luck to everyone tomorrow...

-Kaz

Labels: Kaz

Friday, February 6, 2009 { 12:15 AM }

Today was our consultation day with Amanda on our Group Exercise. Before it was our turn, we met up early so that we could further discuss on our ideas for the exercise. By then we already had confirm on the first idea, and truthfully, we were struggling to think of a good one on the second. We tried getting ideas from the surveys we conducted with the elderly, and since their answers were quite vague, we had trouble thinking up of a good one.

During our meeting, we thought up of 7 other ideas, crossing out 2 from it via votes and the other 5 were thought out further.

When it was our turn, we told Amanda our ideas, and she said that it feels like our ideas seem rather strenuous for the elderly, so she told us to make it less so. For the rest of the ideas, she pretty much suggested that we should take them further, to make it more interesting so as to really attract both the youngsters and the elderly.

Both Amanda and the group did have an interest in one of our ideas for the second programme, and we decided to tackle it - a Soup Kitchen programme.

For now we are racking our brains to make the idea even more appealing. We will be conducting more surveys, and need to get more research and facts to back-up on what we already know.

- Kaz

Labels: Kaz

Monday, February 2, 2009 { 11:18 PM }

This is Group 'Bleah' and our members are:

-Jocelyn
-Hana
-Kaz

We got briefed on what to do for our assignment and will update on the progress of our work when we officially start our discussions tomorrow.

[post by Kaz]

Labels: Kaz