27 and Counting...

I meant to update earlier, but lazing around the house doing nothing, and I mean nothing got in the way. This is my birthday update where i tell you about all the things I got up to on and around July 4th.

First let me start by saying, if you didn't already know that Italy won the World Cup this year. They are now officially
'Campioni del Mondo'
beeep tooot bwong!! These are the sound effects from the mayhem that ensues every time you mention it. Somehow, 72% of Italians are now hiding under their t-shirts and in their shorts bullhorns, flags and greasepaint in the colours red, white and green... just in case a moment arrives to celebrate. To see the best of the mayhem that ensued photos visit:
Fabri's World Cup Photos Slideshow

No more pencils, no more books...

That's right... school's out for summer!!! Yaya!! I haven't updated for a while so there might be a few posts in the near future. Here goes:

This is the final image from my XSI exam. In the end I wasn't too too proud of it cause I think I let myself down on the rendering. It's missing a kick. I know school's all about learning and stuff but I have such high expectations of myself that sometimes that happens. I do get frustrated.

The good news is that the file was so organised and well planned out technically that I think I'll still get a decent grade. But enough of that!!! No more school... now I can have a life again. Yipeeeeeeee!!!

The XSI Challenge

Here's my final image after 24 hours locked in a basement and the topic 'The Achievement Reached'. My criticism? The food was bad and they promised motivational prizes and they didn't give us any.

Regardless, I didn't win, but I am pretty chuffed with myself. She's cute! And I learnt loads that I wouldn't have without this opportunity!

Yay!

Be Yourself, No Matter What They Say.

Well, the Sting concert was fantastic. He's truly someone to admire. Okay, yeah, just a musician and that, but you didn't see how happy he looked. We were right in the second row up against the rails and singing our hearts out.

This is a terrible photo I took of the screen we were standing next to. Sting's looking old... but not acting it. I should follow his example.

Saturday started with promise of fun and adventure as the event 'Milano Live' was underway because of the Notte Bianco (which is the night, twice a year that things are supposed to be open all night). Fabri and I went into the centre to catch the train that takes you around to all the different fun things that are going on. They were liars. There was no train... okay, so we were on foot. On foot, in the searing sunshine we made ur way through to Parco Sempione and went up in their tower. It's 45 stories of iron and steel and from the viewing deck at the top you can see most of Milan. We were then meant to go see bellydancers in the stock market square, but when we got there there were none (more lies!). So we head home.

Not a moment too soon. A storm broke out and with the heat, ( 36?) we had had all the wondows open. We went to go look out from out balcony and saw that LOTS opf water came into the house. I started mopping and int he end, after about 30 minutes of serious moping and moving of carpets and furniture and the like, the bucket was full of 8 pints of water. 8 PINTS!! At least it cooled things down for a bit... like 4 hours.

It's hot again now. I'm still working on my exam for XSI, but I've lost my concentration and I have to go over things again to figure out where to restart. I have little over a week left.

And then I realized...

I got old. Someday, I guess when I wasn't paying much attention, I just turned into an adult! Like a scene out of the Sims or something, last night I was in bed reading (hint #1) and I realized that the book I'm reading now has no story. But really... None at all. It's a book about Canada.

Whaaaaaattt?? A book about Canada? There's history and facts and talk of native peoples. There's polar bears. Okay, so it's not a bad book... But, there's no way you could get me to even have a look at it 10 years ago. And then I realized... I got old. Incidentally the book is called Beauty Tips from Moose Jaw by Will Ferguson and I reccomend it. Makes you kind of want to visit Churchill Winnapeg.

Tonight I'm going to a concert/festival in Piazza Duomo. Sting is the headliner and it's free... Yay! Sting!! Yaaaaaayyyy!! ... but it's 35 degrees out and I'm frightened. Last night I set up a fan in 30 seconds flat in the pitch blackness of the night. It's hot hot hot. Did I mention it was hot?

Went to a party last night. It was hot there too and we had to leave because of the bugs, but they served large salad and parmigiana and had a new xbox or playstation or something with fighting games in one room, oh, and a characture artist. I look nothing like me.

I might go sit in the bathtub for a while now. I got some more textures for my scene done.

Why I'm not a computer geek.

I know it seems all I do is work, cause that's practically all I do... But sometimes, I finish working before sundown and I even get to take photos like this from my bedroom window.

Or like tonight... I'm going to a party. I'm even ready to leave the house already!


And then, as if you needed another example to see how full and exciting my life is, just this weekend Fabri and I escaped and drove up to Valle d'Aosta. It's more than just winter, like the advert says. We saw a fort and rode in 4 glass elevators. And Fabri had Zuppa (soup) which wasn't soup at all! It was cake!

In other news, it's hot here. Really, really, really hot. Like, I can't breathe hot. I'm sleeping with an ice-pack (much to the dismay of Italians everywhere). However, this year my battle with the mosquitoes (zanzare) is going better but I'm not so attractive covered in bug spray all the time and closing myself in the house surrounded by nets.

Ooops, I should get going. See, I'm interesting, I'm not a geek... I swear!

Oh, but get this: I may be accepted to the XSI challenge afterall 24 hours of solid modelling and materials 'woo hoo'!!!

Working on Materials

There are some things I'm obviously aware of, like the lime green panel on the record player, and her crazy pink shoes. And the doily, which is obviously now reacting to the lighting setup as it should. I'm keen on her hair colour, but then, this isn't a self-portrait, so I might Ashley Judd it up a bit (ie, remove some of the auburn).

I'm a little nervous about the newspaper, cause I think you'll actually be able to read the thing over her shoulder, which means I have to get into her personality and figure out what exactly would she be reading (I wish my Aunt Ethel was still alive, she'd know about these things).

It will be in english (the language, not the culture... oh and I'm not actually American or English by the way).

Pearls! Any ideas on the best way to approach it's shader? Are the tulips too frightening? Is this post annoying you yet?

Lights, Camera... Well, Just Lights and Camera Really.

I've been playing with textures, lights and the camera angle all morning. I think I'm starting to get close to the mood I'm after with this shot. The record player, flowers, compact case and woman all have to be lit seperately, but this is a nice start.

I'm going to work a bit more on scene textures and then do some research for 1950's makeup and work on her facial features and skin tone.

Woke Up Late

I got up at 10:30 today. Bit of a sore throat and general sleepiness, but other than that, no excuse really for the lie-in.

At least I've got my first decisions for the inquadratura (composition) done already for the XSI project. Now I can go about perfecting everything you see in this shot for this exact layout and I don't have to spend hours on things like ears or deciding exactly what shade of blue or green or brown her eyes have to be. Now I know you won't see it anyways.

I'm about to make a list of all the changes I have to make based upon self-critique of this image and then systematically go through and correct every error I find. The first thing that's bugging me is that it doesn't really FEEL like she's reading that newspaper... maybe it's cause there's nothing written... or maybe it's her blank gaze into space.

LATER THAT DAY...

I got alot done on the model of the woman and modeled a new, more 1950's chair for the scene. Now I'm waiting to see if pelting works on the mesh. It takes forever. Here's a shot of what I0m watching on my screen. I'm waiting for all the circles to be flat.

Porceline Skin

9:00am
I've decided to start this post this morning and finish it later this afternoon. This is where I am so far with the redo of my 'model' in my setting for the 1940's/50's XSI exam. I think the skin tone is coming out well though there's still a million things I want to do with it and I have to find a way to get her undergarments to look less like plastic and more like satin. I think a change of colour will be appropriate here.

Yesterday I spent alot of time on her facial features and trying to smooth her out, She's looking a little less scary and I think the best way to move forward now is to work on the hair (cause baldness is sooooo scary afterall). I also have to think about pelting her entire body and face to make adding the fine details to her skin easier, not to mention that the exam is counting on it.

I'm still trying to decide between blonde and brunette, but I guess that'll be a decision based upon the final composition and what I end up deciding for that.

BTW: Check out my new link to Erwin Olaf's photography. I really like the quality he's deriving from his subjects and will be using that as inspiration on this project




11:20am
The basis for the hair is finished. It looks as if she might be a brunette afterall. I think I'll have fun playing with the contrast between the hair and skin tone anyhow. I can go alot redder with the skin on a brunette. But the 1940's and 50's were so, well, blonde, weren't they?

1:20pm
I have just spent the past 2 hours perfecting facial hair and an ear that won't actually be seen in the final renderingd AND... I don't even think that they're all that perfect yet. Hmmmm... I'm a die-hard time waster. Anyhow, she's alot more feminine with eyelashes and I'm happy about how things are going. I'll work one more hour before heading off back into the real world and doing something relatively normal like go to the gym.

Sitting in a Motion Graphic Exam

I'm not sure what this exam is for or what I'm doing here... but I'm almost certain that it's not helping me become a better animator, nor is it useful on my path to 3D film direction.

People are playing football behind me and the teacher has asked us to 'explain' our work. Good news is that it'll all be over in an hour or so... just have to make sure I don't go crazy before then.

Ooops, too late.

Re-doing XSI

I still haven't managed to recover anything from Lacie (curse her, curse her!) and so I've had to restart alot of the work I did for XSI. I'm int he process of modelling the woman again and it's going well cause now I know how to do it faster. I started her out from bodywoman and in the default pose.

Her face is based on a sculpture that France did of Laetitia Casta as the new Marianne. I'm glad I had an opportunity to redo that part cause the old (lost) verson had a dog face. I think her lack of beauty took away from the overall composition.

Anyhow, then I posed her with the high heels in the shoes on the mirror pose and now I'm shifting around fat and edge loops and trying to make sure she doesn't look completely plastic for the submission on the 19th.

Oh, and I have the animation exam today.

I Don't Remember Watching Annie

The sun will come out, tomorrow.(You can)bet your bottom dollar that tomorrow they'll be sun. Just thinkin' about tomorrow, clears away the cobwebs and the sorrow, 'till there's none.

When I'm stuck with a day, that's greay and lonely, I just stick up my chin, and grin and say...

O...

The sun'll come out tomorrow, so you gotta hang on 'till tomorrow, come what may. Tomorrow, tomorrow, I love 'ya, tomorrow, you're only a day away.

Epi didn't fix the drive, but he's still wokring on it so I might write him a haiku instead of a full poem at the end of the week. A thank-you Haiku. I have to look up the format again 'cause it has to be at least several years since my last haiku... in fact, I can't even remember what the occasion might have been.

Incidentally I found a file with Gretel's mesh on the desktop with which I have been able to go ahead with the Annie muscial animation. It's going well and I like animating. It's much better thaìn modelling cause you can see the character come to life. I gave her a pig/bear thing to play with, but she's so busy being inspirational that she' doesn't pay it much attention. I still ahven0t decided if I'm going to cut her off at the bridge or take her into the full reprise (with dancing). Emotionally, I'm thinking reprise, logically, one verse is all she needs. Let's be honest though... It's Wednsday and the exam is Monday.

I should get back to her.

Lacie has Betrayed Me!

Alas, the time has come for that fateful day when my external hard drive finally tells me to piss off and just stopps running. I'm a firm believer that every computer has a life of about 2 years before it starts to betray its owner and I guess I should have thought the same for an external hard-drive no? Lacie won't run. We went to school today and she didn't show up on my desktop so I took her back home and no joy here either. I have no back ups.

Let me make a list of what is lost, both for you ti see how foolish I am and for me to learn even more from my haorrible mistake:

- Chud
- Sal
- Gretel
- The Tassi Americani (Raccoons Playing Poker)
- Cheech's film (at least the working files)
- Lofty Pines Motel Room
- Sky Fishing
- Surrealistic Silver Girl
- Everything from my portfolio before IED
- XSI Exam (yes, the whole exam a.k.a. 125 hours of work)
- Work for Matt in London (eeeesh! Che pale!)
- Character Animation Exam

Now I know you're asking yourself.-.. why didn't she have copies? Yes, indeed... why didn't I have copies.

Today I learn once again to never ever trust a computer (they're all whores, whores I tell you!!) and at the sme time... never to trust myself.

Let's see if Epi can fix it. If he does, I'll take an hour out of my dat tomorrow to write him a poem. An ode to Episcopo. Stay tuned.

Corruptions, Losses and bits of Coloured Paper

I lost Chud. Chud is lost. Turns out some time last week while working and getting a usual error followed by a swift shut-down of XSI, his file was corrupted permanently. Instead of learning then what I know now, I repeatedly reopened the file, worked a bit more (till the next crash) and saved the progressive files. Little did I know however (cause I'm stupid) that the file itself was growing and cultivating an error, which, a week later would allow me to reach a point in my work where Chud was almost complete, but where the file would refuse to save, rotate in viewports and remain open for more than 3 minutes. I reinstalled the software 3 times in a vain hope that in fact it was some other problem, but alas, no. Chud is gone.

Ah, learning is fun!

Sal, on the other hand, having been abandoned from my workload before the forementioned error was salvageable. I'm still trying to decide whether to take him further for my final presentation for Progettazione (and we all know about that) or to drop him, as well as Chud (they were after all a team) and drag Gretel into another project. I just think it's such a cop out though... to just abandon everything. I'm pretty sure regardless of what I choose I'll get the same grade as they're pretty much arbitrary, but I now have to decide whether doing more work is worth it. The exam is Tuesday.

Coloured paper you ask? This is the other exam in the next few weeks. Motion Graphic. It's meant to teach us (I think) about the relation between music and images, but it's really just teaching me to be angry, and wound-up. Alice and I are working in a team and that seems to be going well. She came by on Friday and we spend 3 hours of out lives stop-motion animating bits of paper making different images and moving around the screen. The project is for a track by this electronic musician named Gak Sato and our 5 seconds or so is quite country, so at least I'm happy about that. Really though... I don't think I'll be knocking this one into my portfolio any time soon. Oh, and did I mention that the teacher just didn't bother to turn up for class last week? Really slick.

Chud Has a Little Elton John Going On

.
Now it's just getting silly. I'm trying to get Chud and Sal ready for rendering and I just keep adding weirdness. These are Chud's new Goggles. I think he has issues.

This morning I got up early 6am to go renew my Permesso di Soggiorno (like a visa). There were about 100 people ahead of me in line at via Montenapoleone and by 730 I found out that I was in the wrong place... apparently they don't do the PDS for Canadians there anymore. Luck had it that Roni was also out and about at the break of dawn trying to do hers and correctly directed to the same one I was now on my way to. We got appointments to actually do the paperwork at the end of June. She leaves the country 10 days afterwards.

I'm going to egt my hair cut later.

Where are we going? To GARDAAAAAA!!!!

Yesterday we got up at stupid AM after the 70's party at Frida. We piled into a very small caravan and head out to GARDAAAAA!!! Apparently, after all this time Andrea suddenly thinks to mention that his parents have an apartment on the beautiful and also famous lake in Northern Italy, and that he has a set of keys. Epi, Denise, Carolina, Ricardo, Fabri and I were off.

We stopped for lunch upon hitting the lake then went for a stroll in Sirmione. It's a penninsula that juts out into the lake (well, an island really, connected to the mainland by a castle) and boasts the home of Maria Callas and giant hotels hidden by trees as well as thermal baths, pebble beaches and an impressive and frightening Gelato (ice-cream) district. I had Mela and Lampone.

After Sirmione we drove past Gardaland (Italy's #1 theme park), Movieland (Italy's #18 theme park) and finally arrived at Andrea's apartment on the water. It was overcast, but we still headed down to the pebble beach and all got our legs in the water. It was 17degrees, but I reckon I could have had a swim if I had thought to change into my bathing suit. We practiced skipping stones and had fun throwing pebbles at Ricardo while he slept on the dock. It was about 15 minutes before he woke up. In all this time Michele was "trying" to get to come meet us and we finally realised he was actually on the west side of the lake as opposed to the east side where we were enjoying the sunset and the horrible neighbor's' leaf burning. We decided it was best to meet him in Cola'.

At Cola' we debated for a long time whether or not to spend the 18euros to enter the Thermal park. In the end, Fabri and I grabbed a pizza with the others then our bathing suits and decided to try it out. It was amazing. They've built a false lake over the thermal spring with pebble bottom, grotto,waterfalls and massage point. Really, it was the most fantastic 'pool' I've ever been to. Did I mention that it's around 34degrees? Oh, and that within the lake there are 2 hottubs, one at 37degress and the other at 39?? It was WONDERFUL. I'm so going back there. Check it out here: www.parcotermaledelgarda.it If I can managae to organise it maybe I'll force everyone to go back there for my birthday in July.

Chud and Sal look to the future.

Y'know, I might just put these two in a musical while I'm at it.

Chud's a redhead now and not quite as bald as he was in his debut feature. Also, he stopped wearing the blue coloured contacts cause I convinced him his natural, deep brown eyes were worth showing off.

What exactly am I doing? This is my final project for progettazione. I haven't really learnt how to Proggetare (plan) anything in the class, but I recently got a book on the subject of planning towards short film production... here I come.

My idea for the thesis is coming along well. As things go, in the next year I have to study biped as well as quadruped motion. Yes, we're talking four-legged friends here. The main idea comes from a story that Max told us at the bar one night (that's Max the friend, not the 3d software or my nephew). Ah, dogs are so cute and troublesome.

I'm hoping to get started on Gretel's recital in the next few days. The only think is she's all rigged nice and clean in Maya and I don't feel like pulling her out for a re-rig in XSI, which after the experiment with the gymnast seems to be my strongest animation program.

Ha ha ha... I imagine this blog seems pretty weird now. So, for something normal: Today I will go to the gym for a swim.

Sal

This is Sal. He's Chud's best friend. He's kind of like a sidekick. He has problems with personal hygene.

The Many Faces of Gretel

This is probably the work I'm most proud of this year. I haven't any time to elaborate, but I'm going to try to get a short animation of Gretel done to a song from the hit off-broadway musical 'You're a Good Man Charlie Brown'. Gretel will be playing the role of Lucy.