Final Thoughts: Characterisation & Performance

This unit has without doubt been the hardest work for me on this course. Although an enjoyable process in terms of getting into a character's mindset or the physicality of acting out a movement the actual execution is something more infinitely difficult than I first imagined. Technical problems were rife from day one and it did seem at points to be impossible, particularly the acting piece. In terms of end results I can now see that much more planning was needed in all areas, but mainly the acting shot. Which although shorter than the assault course, was by far the most difficult, mainly due to the subtlety needed and the requirement for naturalistic movements as opposed to the grand physical gestures of the assault course. If I were to start this unit again I would allow much more time for the acting piece, as the time needed was grossly underestimated. In all honesty I have not enjoyed the past month of this project, both interest and enthusiasm having dried up long before the hand-in. Mainly due to a rig which seemed to enjoy changing the way it worked on and almost daily basis and a set of IK switches determined to mentally break me. In saying this the start of the project when filming reference materials, planning out shots and blocking in movements were most enjoyable and I feel it will be something I will continue in my spare time, hopefully learning to master the details along the way.

Planning: Round 2

On reassessment I went back to posing with a much simpler set of requirements. The characters was standing, ready to lift the barrel but still casual and relaxed, as though work had only momentarily halted to chat. The character then double takes on the barrel, realising he is at work and lifts the barrel, coming slightly off balance and catching himself on the back foot. This felt like a much more natural way in which to conduct a conversation and was definitely a step in the right direction.

Planning: Round 1

My intial plan for the acting piece was to have the character at work (due to the lifting sound) talking informally to the camera as though it were a colleague about what he would do if guests were coming over. As the audio also features the twittering of birds throughout I realised the setting would need to be somewhat rural, coupled with the talk of hospitality the setting could be no other place than a southern whiskey distillery. Once again Jim Beam was required. My original plan had the character casually leaning on a barrel chatting informally, he then got up, continued to talk, walked around the barrel and performed a lift. This, I was informed, was far too much movement for an acting shot of this type and in hindsight it is embarrasingly obvious that I had indeed over- animated my piece even in the planning stages, here are some leftovers from the original plan and also a list of the beats I was to hit in terms of actions within the piece.

Performance Piece: The Set-Up

The third and final (praises be) task in the assignment was an acting shot based around a prepared piece of audio. For my audio I selected and excerpt from the MF Doom album 'MM..Food.' The interlude is about an elderly sounding man discussing his plans when people come for dinner, which for some reason I found quietly amusing. It also contained a grunt of some form, which I perceived to be a lift, and therefore meant I could get a little more action into the shot than just static talking. In terms of breaking the shot down I started with breaking the audio down into individual words and sound accompanied by some basic ideas on how the character may be standing/gesturing.

Planning: The Podium

The final stop on the assault course was the podium, in keeping with the previous pieces I decided to have our cocky friend bound up each step in a stream of constant motion. I focused a lot on the curve of the spine on this particular section as I have found over the course of this project it is without doubt the best way to achieve a dramatic pose. As a twist on the end and to attempt to add a touch of humour to the piece I decided the character was to catch his ankle on the final podium, thus falling on his face and denying him the chance of a Rocky Balboa-esque celebration. Because life loves to kick you when you're riding the winning horse people...

Planning: Wall Vault

The penultimate step in the assault course was a good old fashioned wall vault. For this I looked to the hip, trendy, down with the kids baggy trousers sport of Parkour (or free-running) for ideas. The basic ethos of the sport is to make movement look as effortless and graceful as possible and also to be as efficient as possible. It was primarily developed in 'Nam by the Vietcong as a means of traveling quickly though jungle regions when in combat. But don't hold that against it. It really did help in making my character flow over the wall whilst looking graceful and was also extremely useful for referencing arm positions.

Planning: Jump 'N' Slide

The next piece of the course was admittedly done slightly more on the fly, it required the character to slide down a ramp and push off a wall at the bottom. I decided at this stage that my character should have a slightly cocky air about him, so I therefore made him swan dive down the ramp, tucking into a cannonball shape then using his momentum to carry him past the wall and round the corner almost effortlessly. The swan dive idea came from the fact I was listening to Led Zeppelin whilst planning, their logo of course being a swan diving man/angel. A key to capturing the cocky feel of the pose was a sweeping arc in the curve of the spine and an arrogantly puffed out chest with arms swung back as if to say; 'Do let's get it on'

Planning: Monkeys Bars

The monkey bars were the next port of call on the course and were without doubt the toughest obstacle to get my head round. After trawling countless dull home made movies of people on monkey bars on the oracle of a website that is YouTube and began to get my head round the constant weight shifting and inertia found in the technique used on them and similar objects. I also managed to find a Taliban Training video showing some of the popular terrorist faction on monkey bars and I'll be honest I'm surprised they've managed to cause as much hassle as they have over the years. Alas I digress...

Here are again a brief selection of thumbnails used to help imagine the poses:

Planning: Balance Beam

The first obstacle for my man on the ground to tackle was the balance beam, in research for this I looked into such acts as tight rope walking and the balance practices used in martial arts training (I actually just watch Drunken Master with Jackie Chan a few time but nonetheless.)

The main features I picked up in balance based scenarios was the need to be as quick as possible due to the fact you have less time to come off balance, and the fact that the arms must always be tense to form a straight line through the shoulders.

I also in these sketches looked into the possibility of have an S shaped curve within the spine to give the piece a slightly more characterised look, but I didn't feel the effect worked too well as it did not convey the tension the body creates when attempting to balance.

Below are some of the thumbnails I used for posing in the blocking stage:





















Again I have been unable to upload any reference video due to their size, you can however buy Drunken Master from all good video stockists.

Assault Course Planning

Our second task was a somewhat mammoth one, the assault course. Planning for this was obviously going to be a lot more in depth, as many more complex actions would need to be executed correctly. The moments which I felt would give the most opportunity to create interesting & varied performance were the ones I focused on, as the simple running & walking between obstacles was more straightforward after completing the previous task of a walk cycle. The main obstacles for my character were a balance beam, monkey bars, a slide, a brick wall & a series of pillars leading up to a podium.

Below is the mighty beast in all her low-res glory!

Final Thoughts: Walk With Character

Overall I was quite pleased with how my final walk came out, it wasn't as smooth as I would have liked, and the first step still felt a bit spongy, although it has improved with tweaking. Another problem, although I am fully aware of the old mantra "a bad workman always blames his tools" was that I did find the rig I was using to be a particularly temperamental one. However it's not all bad, I was rather pleased with the feeling of the hip and knee drop when the character stepped the weight off his bad leg, I felt it did look both painful & awkward mainly through the sharpness of the motion, and the jerky arm movement shortly afterward.

Planning The Walk With Character

After recording the walk at the sports science labs I took the edited footage and broke it down into individual frames, from this I was then able to thumbnail out both poses and timing, also making any other notes which may be useful when animating the final walk (for instance whether or not to exaggerate particular aspects of the walk to give it slightly more stylisation) I did not stick exactly to the frame rate of the live-action walk, as I felt this would be too close to rotoscoping, instead choosing to make it slightly quicker as the source one seemed in my opinion slightly too leisurely.

Below are my thumbnails and rough notes. I apologise for the chicken scratch handwriting and basic stickmen in advance.

Shooting The Walk With Character

Our first assignment within the Characterisation & Performance unit was to create a walk with a specific style or detail. After deciding on the style of walk we wanted we then went to the sports science facilities where we recorded ourselves performing our chosen walks from both front & side simultaneously to help give us a better idea of the timing and style. The simple application of 3 strips of reasonably priced masking tape was also a great help, as it instantly shows hip & shoulder positioning along with the curvature of the spine (if any). Below are some stills from the footage of my walk (unfortunately the video was too big to fit on this meager blog space.)















For my walk I tried to create a somewhat painful walk, like that of an old man with a damaged hip, therefore my weight would generally shift more to one side than the other, as it would be painful to exert too much on the bad leg. I also put a very soft twist on my left angle, to give the whole movement a much more awkward feel.