Week 2
We spent this week doing a few things, but we focused on streamlining our story. We got lots of friends involved in lunch discussions that were incredibly helpful. Just to bounce our ideas around and get some fresh perspectives was invaluable. One thing we've maintained when thinking about our project is that we want to keep everyone we know involved in the process, and give them the opportunity to critique our work at any point. We also worked through the dialogue and did some temporary recordings, and got some storyboards going. A preliminary schedule was a bit of an eye opener…, it will be very tight - but doable. Some story changes and dropping unnecessary characters has reinforced our belief that we can get through it all….. just.

Week 3
Our animatic took shape during this week. We want to get the story as polished as possible at this point while we're working with only storyboards and stand in dialogue. It was really enlightening to learn the true value of this process, as I didn't fully appreciate it until now. This is the time to experiment with all the different possibilities for camera angles, cuts, timing, pacing, expressions…. heaps of stuff. Even though Cane toads is going to be a constantly evolving film, I want to get all these elements as advanced as possible at this point. Then when it comes time to create the 3d, it will be simple execution to a known goal. All our focus can then go on getting the visual feel of the thing. Can't wait. But for now, we want a tidy little unit that works on the strength of it's story…. one that can be carried by stick figures alone.

Week 4
We started the translation of our idea into 3d. This meant modelling low-res props and sets, as well as a first run through of our two characters - Bazza and Dazza. We also spent time refining our story and cut out a scene that wasn't really adding to the whole. Looked at some books of australian photography for reference.

Week 5
No Entry

Week 6
No Entry

Week 7
Holiday

Week 8
Holiday

Week 9
No Entry

Week 10
Professional voice recording! Our guy was really funny, and I spent most of the 2 hr session laughing heartily. The end result was great, and we have lots of choices with which to construct our own version of the narrative. We got some ad lib stuff that will hopefully add to the feel of the film. Katrina helped us out there, and did a great job too, Thanks!
This week I also started working on some props and rigging the characters.

Week 11
We spent most of this week rigging up Baz and Daz. I learned a lot of new things this week, as we took our time and tried some new techniques to improve the usability and complexity of the rig. We used expressions to link morph targets to certain bone positions, which really improves the deformation of the characters. We also constructed a pretty cool arm rig with anatomically correct wrist and shoulder rotations.
We also transferred our professional dialogue into the layout edit, and made some timing and slight story adjustments, I really feel as though we're getting the most out of our story! Got some good laughs from some "fresh" people.

Week 12
Well this week was a big one. The first few days I allocated to building Dazza's dog bowl scene. We feel that we need this to be at an advanced level before we start animating so that we can compose the shots with confidence. I went out with our mate Glen's classy digital camera and took some reference of concrete, wood, leaves, grass and whatever else. There's a great old and decrepid house nearrby that I took lots of photos of! Reference material just makes the modelling, layout and texturing of a scene so much easier. So the dogbowl scene got done and then we sat down and scheduled out the high res animation. We're going to be working pretty hard!

Week 13
Animating Dazza is great fun, we're trying to get the most out of the dialogue without going overboard with it. Picking the subtleties in the voice is hard, but when you get a gesture or motion in there that not only looks realistic, but matches the voice…. it's magic baby! This is the first real time I've done character animation to dialogue in an acting format… it's challenging stuff. We got some good feedback from some fellow animators - good to get some fresh perspectives. Luckily, we are a bit ahead of schedule, so I'm looking forward to going back over the animation and making some improvements.

Dave didn't finish this log... that slack bastard!! :o)