15 Second Animation Peer feedback sesion (OUAN403)

Our year group, giving feedback (dramatisation)

Today's feedback session on our animations was really successful. It was also really cool to see what everyone else had produced and how diverse everything was. There were really cool art styles and concepts being thrown around that I wouldn't have thought up myself, but I can now take inspiration from (BRAZENLY RIP OFF). Not to toot my own horn, but I was pleased with the reaction that my piece got. I was hoping it would be funny, and it was.

Here are some of the negative comments I recieved:

My sense of gravity could be a little askew, one guy told me. When the boys run up to the tree, the square headed one floated a little too much between strides.

 Also he said that the speed at which the boy's arm throws the rock at the tree isn't fast enough to justify the speed of the flying rock. The arm moved too slowly and the rock moved too quickly.

This guy also gave me no positive feedback. Just negatives as he dropped those two bombshells on me and went to wreak havoc elsewhere on other people's ART. OI MATE, ever heard of a compliment sandwich?

My grandfather used to say to me "never leave the bread out of a compliment sandwich, or you will get figurative mayonnaise on your hands"

 There is validity to his points, though, and I had to redraw both the running sequence and the stone throwing sequence because of pacing issues. The updated ones are definitely better than the original ones and I was very careful with my keyframing, but were I to redo this piece I would change the speed of the boy's arm when he throws the rock.

Another criticism I got was to do with the lack of varying camera angles. I've addressed this in a previous post and I agree that I should've put in a close up shot to show the scheming boys picking up the rock, but time constraints and my lack of imagination meant that I didn't think of it until it was recommended to me very late in the game. I had the opportunity to push the boat out more than usual with this project by adding more variety to my shots, and I didn't take it which I regret.

On the positive side, I was praised for my simple and memorable character design and the way that my background made one classmate feel very "relaxed" and "peaceful". I got a lot of compliments about the background, regarding the simple lines that implied a rolling hillside moving off into the distance and the style of the clouds.

I was also commended on the humour. I'm glad that I deviated from my original concept and went for something more outlandish. People seemed to be impressed by how well timed it was considering the fifteen second long criteria. Also, the voice acting. Now, I don't consider myself to be a great actor.

Oh, wait a second. I DO consider myself to be a great actor. Perhaps the greatest of all actors. And my bear sounds I recorded were oft eulogised by my peers. It gave the animation more of a handmade feel and while I'm all for downloading sound effects (I got a bunch of them myself for this project) I prefer to do the voice acting myself for the uniqueness it gives the animation, as well as the fact that I love the sound of my own voice.