The Music Spotting Session; Effects Animation with Trevor Davies

THE ART OF THE MUSIC SPOTTING SESSION

In two weeks the U of T musicians will be visiting us, with their purpose in mind being specifically to work out the details of the musical score for your film. This important meeting between film-maker  and composer is traditionally known as the the "Music Spotting Session."

To help you prepare for this meeting, Wednesday's Lecture and Workshop are both oriented to an explanation of the Music Spotting Session.

(You might want to also read this recent blog posting  by Mark Kennedy, Disney's Head of Story.  He talks about the importance of spotting temp music while working on the Leica reel, links to some interesting examples of the use of musical score. Thanks to ames Caswell for pointing out this blog to me.)


LECTURE
A while ago I wrote the music for Chris Walsh's stop-motion film,  True Family Story.  We recognized our collaboration as a "teachable moment", so I saved the files I created as the score developed. These files now make an  effective demonstration of the collaborative process between a film-maker and a composer.

This year I'm supplementing the talk with examples from a more recent project, Save Our Bees, a Public Service Announcement animation, with music in the style of the Warner Bros classics.

During the lecture (11 am, S235) I'll walk you through the three stages of the Music Spotting process as it took place in recent work, and play for you some famous and not-so-famous historical examples of "Temp Music" and musical scores.

WORKSHOP - EFFECTS ANIMATION

Do you have fire, rain,  snow or water in your film? How about fog, glows or sparkles? Come talk to Trevor about the best software techniques to use in animating these various effects challenges. A151 at 2 pm. 

Visual FX and Character Animation in The Force Awakens (WIRED)

Short video documentary on how Maz and other characters were animated in The Force Wakens.

http://www.wired.com/2016/01/design-fx-force-awakens/

Wednesday January 20, 2016 - Lecture

As I  mentioned last week, due to the change of scheduling for our lecture class we've had to cancel tomorrow's planned introduction to managing an Animation-oriented small business by Jim Caswell.

Instead we'll take advantage of the time slot to view your Animatic reels on S235's fabulous Christie projector and Surround Sound system.  Please note that due to time constraints we will not be able to view all the films.

As you may know, this projector is an $80,000 industrial monster and  it is a real privilege to be able to screen our work on it. It is an excellent way to test the colour and brightness of your film image. And because it's the same system that will be used on Industry Day you can be sure that you'll be seeing exactly what our Industry guests will see on the day. The room's sound system is also an excellent reality check on the levels and clarity of your soundtrack.

Sheridan graduate Melody Wang wins People's Choice award for "The Casebook of Nips and Porkington"

excerpted from the site:  http://www.filmfestivals.com/blog/editor/my_internship_in_canada_has_been_voted_winner_of_the_canada_s_top_ten_film_festival_people_s_choice_award 

Student Film Awards

The Canada’s Top Ten Film Festival spotlights student shorts in its annual lineup, presenting the top student shorts from colleges and universities across the country. In a ceremony held on January 15 at TIFF Bell Lightbox, prizes were awarded to student films in the live action and animation categories.

The winners were selected by the Canada’s Top Ten Film Festival shorts panel of filmmakers and industry professionals, including: filmmaker and writer Sarah Goodman (Army of One, Porch Stories, National Parks Project); TIFF Senior Canadian Programming Associate Lisa Haller; producer Aeschylus Poulos (Sleeping Giant, The Book of Negroes); artist and filmmaker Nicholas Pye; and filmmaker Albert Shin (In Her Place, Point Traverse).

...

Best Film (Animation)

The prize for Best Animated Student Film goes to The Casebook of Nips & Porkington, directed by Melody Wang (Sheridan College), a delightfully imaginative animation with clues and characters literally jumping off the page as two policemen investigate a mysterious crime.

The award comes with: a DCP output of the film courtesy of Technicolor; $1,000 courtesy of the Directors Guild of Canada; two tickets to the Directors Guild of Canada Awards, and a Sales & Industry Pass to the 2016 Toronto International Film Festival.

Welcome Back to the Senior Film Project!

WHAT TO EXPECT
The coming semester is naturally devoted to your film’s production but it has a secondary purpose- to prepare you for the business realities of life outside the College. Lectures and workshops will address not only production issues but also other concerns such as small business management, legal considerations for artists, development insights for animation projects, and panel discussions with recent grads to gain perspectives into what lies ahead. Keep an eye on the Lecture schedule page on this blog for details as they become available.

MILESTONES

Regarding the Production Milestones, you can take a look at the outline for the semester here (pdf) ((also available on SLATE.) It lays out the production and post-production timeline for the coming semester.  Especially important is Milestone 2, the Scene Workflow Test, which is due in Week 2. (I'll explain this one in our lecture on Wednesday.)

LECTURES AND WORKSHOPS
You can also take a look at the Lecture and Workshop schedule here. Please note that some of the bookings are still tentative and subject to change.

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Back to SCAET!

After last semester's epic failure when attempting to screen the Animatic reels in J102, I'm happy to announce that we've been able to move our lecture series back into S235 for the remainder of the school year.  This means that we'll be able to use the excellent Christie Projector and sound system for our remaining screenings coming up in March and April.

A small side effect of the move back to SCAET is that we've had to shift our Lecture start time to 12 noon.  The workshop remains unchanged from 2-4 pm, in A151.

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ADVANCED COLOUR DESIGN FOR 4th YEAR FILMS

This week's lecture and workshop feature our own Michael Hitchcox on the topic of Advanced Colour Design. The lecture begins at 12 noon in S235 and the workshop follows in A151 at 2 pm.

Mike requests that you send him some background artwork for his lecture demonstration. You can reach him at michael.hitchcox@sheridancollege.ca

Composer - Animator Partnerships (as of January 2016)

Here is a listing of the pairings between students in Sheridan 4th Year Animation and U of T Film Composition classes. This list shows the pairings as understood by the U of T students as of their last class before the Christmas break, and is obviously incomplete and subject to confirmation.

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Afif, Ian
TBA  

Bidner, Lora
   Stefanie C "Missing"
   Arthur Banes "Sushi",
   Crystal's "Rotten Love"
   and possibly Keely Prop's "Home Hunting"

Chiu, Vicky
   (dropped out)

Coe, Henrique
   Ashley Kozbial (otter in a whirlpool)  

Denenberg, Joshua
David Du, "Dung Fu"

De Niverville, Abigail
   Soo Kim "Jella Fantasia",
   Sara Mota "Batty",
   Allen Yu "Untitled",
   Valerie Garnace "Cotton Candy"

Hamilton, Blake
Aya Akl (to be confirmed)
Anna Starkkova (to be confirmed)


Hammell, Evan
   Meghan Taylor "Bone Mail",
   SooHyun Kim "(Untitled Wizard Shop short)",
   Andres Derakhshani "Crocodile Dentist",
   Carly Dziob "Guard Duty"  

Jager, David
   Eric Bourdages "Sky Pirates"
   Keith Vaz 

Michalski, Caleb

McIntire, Matthias
Salome Yeung "Untitled"
Joshua Wald "Tea Time with Dragons"
Jason McLean "Blue"

Orlando, Stephanie
   Kit Kee "Dr. Narren's Lab"
   Katharina Brzezinska "I love my doggie"
   Sean Cornish "Monster Hunt"  

Petkovski, Katharine
   Rebecca Murrell (Little Red Riding Hood)
   Brendan Lindsay
   Julie Eum  

Pylypczak, Greta
   Robin Blake "Release",
   Terence Ng "Mia and Mr. Philips",
   Mary Tacuyan "In the Blank",
   Paprika "Untitled Alien Mockumentary"  

Steinwall, Jack TBA

Thompson, Jacob
   NightFall- Ricky Chen
   Crow's Keep - Katherine de Vries