Project Collaboration: Reflective Statement

This project proved to be a big challenge, as we were required to work with others who may have different art styles. For me it was scary to know that other's were depending on my work, as this time I was not making it by myself, but with two other people.

Our start as a group was difficult due to very different visions about what our group name, logo and theme should be. Furthermore, there were major differences while choosing a topic for our animation, and designing the characters. Overall we had a lot of differences and difficulties at the beginning, but as soon as we got a bit of help and finally started to produce the animation, everything seemed to call  down and we were able to work as a team. We have wasted lots of time at the beginning that proved to be unimportant or not major parts of the animation and final production, such as the name of the group. Also, we had lots of differences about the idea of the animation, as we kept agreeing on something and got approved on them, then going on to changing it, sometimes coming up with completely different ones. But after a talk with Dan we settled on the final idea and were able to move on to the next stage.

The part of the project that proved to be the most difficult was the modelling and texturing, since (although enjoying modelling) sometimes I was unsure how to do thing and have forgotten others from last year. It also was difficult to adapt to some changes since last year. When it came to the animation part, I was a bit worried, since I had little experience in actual animation from last year (where I could not finish my animation, due to Maya and the modelling that took way too long). However, this year I was able to finish my part of the animation to a standard I think it is acceptable. Even though I was worried about it, at the end I came to really enjoy it. Overall, I clearly see what still needs to improve in my animation, such as timing, but I was trying to focus on smaller details such as shoulder movement.

(In my animation part the characters can be seen with a pink circle behind their heads and one around their chest, this was because when trying to play-blast it from render view one of the characters was invisible; and when just simply play-blasting it, I could not hide those two controls.)

Furthermore, we were set a few roles at the beginning of our project, but due to some complication, we ended up switching or sharing some. For example, I and Graeme was set up to do texturing, but at the end Karolina finished my part. Or at the end of the project Karolina started the editing, but I finished it. In the end I think (what actually caused us some tension at the start) the roles were not that important, and kept changing.

Overall, I partly enjoyed this project, where I learned what its like to work with a group. We had a difficult starts, but at the end we did manage to put on screen what we wanted, a whole (almost) 2 minutes animation, finished and (not rendered, but) play-blasted. I think it was readable what was happening and we also managed to make the comedy work, so I am happy with the final animation. I am also very pleased with my two group members and I think they did a fantastic job with their parts.