desn512-reneesimpson

[desn512-reneesimpson]

Here is my final Digital Kinetic Type Video!

[desn512-reneesimpson]

Final Submission

Now that everything is finished and ready to export I added my design to Media Encoder and did the final export. I was quite confident in doing this since I had done a test export earlier in week 12. Then I got my type specimen booklet and made sure everything was ready to upload.

Overall I am very happy with the final outcome of this design. I have really enjoyed the learning process and feel like I have learnt many new valuable skills to carry with me into any future projects that I may work on.  

In terms of the design itself, I am extremely proud of my final product considering 6 weeks ago I had never even opened Adobe After Effects. I feel much more confident playing around with this now than I did when I first started. I included many variations of the same effects, transitions, animations and colours throughout the entire design so that the beginning, middle and end felt cohesive with each other. As well as this I believe it is a clear visual display of my Pepeha and what is important to me. Each design element was well thought out to showcase my Pepeha in a way that is meaningful to me. An example of this is the stroke feature that I added towards the end of this process. There are 3 main colours that I used for the stroke lines which represents my 3 oceans. I was born in London, raised in NZ and the culture that I whakapapa to is Samoa. Using the different stroke colours was a way for me to show this visually as the typographic elements were displayed by the words in my pepeha in the Baskerville typeface.

I also made sure that I represented my typeface well. An example of this was how I used the & sign as a key feature in the beginning of my video. The reason for this is that I feel as if this is a unique character within the typeface due to its beautiful curve design. I was extremely intrigued by this after using it in my Type Specimen Booklet and I wanted to use this more when it came to the Digital Kinetic Type project.

In terms of the design, I took an hourglass feature that I used in my type specimen booklet and added this to the design too in order to tie my two projects together.

Overall each detail was thoughtfully considered to create my final design and I am very happy with how it turned out.

[desn512-reneesimpson]

Cleaning Up Layers

Something that I struggled with at first was my layers. Initially they were all over the place and it was difficult for me to tell what each layer was:

But eventually I got them to look much more organised by precomposing certain effects with multiple layers involved and correctly naming the rest of them:

This made things much easier to understand and I didn’t feel as overwhelmed or confused by my After Effects file while I was making my video.

[desn512-reneesimpson]

Finishing Touches

Since the general layout of my design is now finished all that I have left to do with the making process of the design is to add in any final transitions. To start I finished editing the parts of my design that I wanted to make changes to bas4ed on the text export that I did  in week 12.

Once this was done I learnt a stroke effect through a YouTube tutorial and added this to my design. Initially I wanted to add a water drop effect however after testing I found that I really liked the effect that the stroke added to each page. I feel like this really added to my video and I was able to link each page together easier now so that it all feels more connected. Now that this is done I am happy with my final video and my next step is to get everything ready to export.

[desn512-reneesimpson]

Week 13 Update

It is now the final few days before hand in and as we can see from the video in my last post there are still a few things for me to work on. I now have the general video and have added in my end credits. However, there are a few more things for me to consider in the lead up to hand in. 

My next steps are to finish the transitions, effects and animations of my project as well as cleaning up little details including my layers and more. There are a few layers which didn’t transfer over correctly from my home device to the uni computers. I need to go through and fix a few of the fonts and make sure the photoshop images are linked. As well as this I have some transitions to finish.

 I am feeling confident with exporting everything so I mainly just need to work on the video itself. One thing that I need to consider is that after adding in my end credits my video is now 34 seconds and I may need to look into cutting it down. Worst case scenario I am happy to cut out the first few frames as this does take up a bit of time and isn't needed in my final video. Other than that if it is still too long I may just have to speed up some transitions to make sure that the final project is within the correct time frame. If I have time I will look at adding in sound but that is not my top priority at the moment. I would definitely like to do this but it depends on how I go in terms of time.

Overall I am feeling on track with this assessment but definitely have a few more things to go over before the final hand in.

[desn512-reneesimpson]

SDL - Media Encoder Test Run

With my design so far I decided that I wanted to practise exporting my project to Media Encoder so that I knew what I was doing leading up to the final hand in. This process went very smoothly as I followed the instructions on Canvas super closely. It is definitely helpful for me to know how this process works as I am coming close to the end of semester. I was also able to check my file size to make sure that it wasn't too big of a file and I was well under the limit which is a relief as it means there is one less thing for me to worry about. 

[desn512-reneesimpson]

SDL - Photoshop

Next I went through and did some sketches which I processed through photoshop to include in my design. This adds a cool design element and helps me to display my Pepeha more clearly through image as well as type.

[desn512-reneesimpson]

SDL - Transitions

Now that I had the general shapes set out I started to animate them using tools such as opacity, scale, position, rotation, radial wipe and more. My process for this was heavily based on my design research. I spent a lot of my time watching YouTube tutorials leading up to this and used these as a reference while executing them in my own design. This was definitely a slow process but the more I played around with it, the more confident I became.

Here are the links for some videos that were useful to me during this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?

v=zACj2_wP3cA\https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hoCSY1MLfKs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=em91RAQCW1M&t=290s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EKMH4ijfWV4

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FUfskcTvjvs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cQrlIHT_LsI&t=240s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iLxb0w7eAxE&t=190s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5tQ0hf2SCeo

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=knYdYn2A3A8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXZ-1cwz_sk

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=msuQhhTvJGU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dUrhIVDaMGM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=531Ae7AWvKs&t=47s

I didn’t use all of these effects but it definitely helped inform my design decisions and gave me a cool insight of what After Effects can do which will help me in future projects. 

[desn512-reneesimpson]

Week 12 Lecture

This weeks class was just a session to continue working on our projects. I spent this session working on transitions and editing what I had so far. Before this class I was finding it hard to execute my ideas but after some trial and error I am feeling excited to continue working on this. I was a bit worried about reaching the deadline but now I feel like I am more on track and have some ideas on where I could take this next.

I have done about 20 seconds worth of my video now so am definitely getting closer to what I want but I have a bit more work to do on this over the coming days.

My next steps are to continue working away at this and figure out some more of the content for my design. I also need to consider the timing of everything as I feel like currently each individual idea is really cool but I'm unsure of how it is all working together. I feel like I should attempt to do some work in Photoshop to add to this design as this could be a cool way of adding some of the details that I am struggling to execute in After Effects.  

Another thing I need to practice this week is exporting the video in Media Encoder. This is important for me to do this week as I don't want to leave it too close to the deadline and realize that it isn't working or I'm not 100% sure how to do it. If I do a test run this week, hopefully it will make the process easier when I come to do it next Wednesday.

[desn512-reneesimpson]

Hand-In: Rationale

Throughout this paper I have learnt many technical skills that will benefit any future projects I work on. I have practiced new skills that I haven’t learnt before and been able to develop the techniques I already knew. Majority of the knowledge I gained was within Adobe programs such as InDesign, Photoshop and Illustrator. However I also realized the importance of documentation by updating my blog with my weekly learning. This helped me have a clear representation of my learning and made it easy for me to go back and look at the work I had done in previous weeks when I was wanting to incorporate something we had learnt in class into my own designs.

After only a month and a half of learning within this course I can confidently say that my knowledge of adobe programs has improved significantly already. At first it would take me a while to be able to digitally create the visions that I had in my head. Whereas now I am confident enough with certain skills to be able to execute these faster. Now that I know the fundamental skills it is easier for me to figure out how to do certain things than it would have been 6 weeks ago and I am excited to continue my learning journey within this course. Not only this, but I have also become more aware of design elements such as typography within everyday life. I have found myself becoming more aware of design techniques that we see in our day to day lives and am becoming more confident in critiquing the positive and negative aspects of these.

This course so far has challenged my design thinking and enabled me to pick up new skills that work for me in my own designs, as well as other people’s designs. If this is what I have learnt in a matter of six weeks, I can’t wait to see where I will be in my design journey at the end of this course.

[desn512-reneesimpson]

Week 11 Update

This week I am beginning to refine and develop my designs based on what I like/don’t like from my experimentation.

From my design process so far I have noted that I like the fast paced effects that direct your eye to a certain part of the screen. I also liked how the different objects looked while they were moving on the page and I have some ideas about how to include this more. I found that tempo and timing became very important for me in this and I didn't like when things seemed out of time in comparison to the rest of the clip. Based on this I have decided to focus on adding in a few faster paced effects whilst also keeping the rest of the design minimalistic enough that it didn't feel like there was too much going on. This is because this would make the viewer unsure of where to look on the page.  

My next step is to consider how I can develop my design to make sure that my Pepeha is displayed well. I feel as if my design so far seems to be more focused on the typeface and I need to make sure that I am considering how these can work together to create my final outcome rather than focusing on one or the other. Maybe I could go back and do some more story boarding to get a better idea of how I can do this but for now I just want to continue playing around.

[desn512-reneesimpson]

Week 11 Lecture

Saving, exporting, rendering:

Render to media encoder:

Remember that your start and end sliders need to be positioned correctly as this is what will be rendered.  

In after effects choose:

File - Export - Add to Adobe Media Encoder Queue

Make sure Media Encoder is downloaded and that the settings are right etc.

It should open Media Encoder automatically but if it doesn't then you can just open it up manually.

Final step is to click the play button for this but go through week 11 presentation for step by step guide

Note - Do this on campus and make sure you don't leave it to the last minute

Note: Try do a test run of Media Encoder in Week 12

After rendering, if your 30 second piece is over 100mb, then you have not followed the guide and something is wrong. The easiest thing to do is try rendering it again, however if this doesn't work, try use HandBrake (On slides).  

Only use HandBrake if your file is over 100mb.

End credits:

Meant for references and credits

I am the publisher, designer, producer, music etc.

If someone else has contributed, give them credit

Set up should include:

Title

By Renee Simpson

Paper code and group number (DESN512 CD (05)

Make sure this is smaller than the title and my name (treat it as a sub-heading)

Other

Any other credits, thanks or references

The end credits should play for about 3-4 seconds at the end of the video. If you're including music this could be a good time to fade it out.

[desn512-reneesimpson]

Week 10 Update

This week I continued working on mocking up story boards and made some changes to my plan. The main point of this week was to play around with what I can do on After Effects in order to inform my final design. I didn't get to do as much work for media this week as I had an assessment due in my other class. However, I have currently done about 10 seconds worth of my digital kinetic type video but it definitely has a lot of work to go.

My next step is to finish mocking up my story boards and start refining and developing. I think I need to figure out a better way to include my Pepeha as well as displaying the typeface in some more creative ways. I also want to start thinking about music as I feel like this could be a really cool way to enhance my design. I play a lot of instruments so I have quite a few ideas for this but my main priority is to focus on the video itself for now.

[desn512-reneesimpson]

Week 9:

This week I started by putting my initial story boards together on After Effects. One problem that I did run into throughout this process was that something went wrong in my settings and some things weren’t showing up in my layers so it was harder for me to make changes to my design. I ended up figuring it out in the end but it definitely made the process a bit slower.

My next step is to continue mocking up my story boards and refining them based on what I want to include in my final outcome.

[desn512-reneesimpson]

Week 8 SDL - Storyboards

Once I had played around with after affects for a while I began to plan out what I wanted to include in my design. It is good to make storyboards and plan out your video before going into After Effects so that you have a general idea of what you will be generating.

Here are the story boards that I have made for my design:

I like the way that these are looking so far, however I need to see how difficult some of these things will actually be to execute. My main focus going forward is to experiment with After Effects and play around so that I can have a better understanding of the research I need to do going forward. I know that these story boards are subject to change but I think what I have so far is a good start and gives me quite a bit of room to play around with depending on how my experimentation goes.

[desn512-reneesimpson]

Week 8 Task

I started by playing around with different features to see what I like and just let it happen on it’s own rather than trying to execute a specific idea. This gave me a good understanding of what I can do and helped me to get a vision of what I could create going forward. It also helped me to get my creative juices flowing by getting a better understanding of what can be done on after affects and I’m excited to research some more about how to do certain things.

This was based on the initial colour scheme of my type specimen booklet.

[desn512-reneesimpson]

Week 8 Lecture

This week was more of a beginners guide to Adobe After Affects which included terminology and use of basic tools. Here are my notes from this:

General information to know:

24-25 frames per second is the recommended frame rate

Types of animation:

Frame by frame

Each frame is drawn individually

Tweening (inbetweening)

Setting key frames where the animation software interpolates between them

Make sure that when taking photos etc. you are keeping consistent lighting and settings etc.

After effects is renowned for its motion graphics tools. It is for special effects. So people could use it to add an effect to a pre-filmed video or they could use it to animate images in a sequence.

The basics:

Make sure your width in 1920 px and height is 1080 px.

Make frame rate 25 and duration 0.05 (5 minutes. Depends on how long your video is)

Make sure that this box is set to the length of your video as anything in this will still be rendered. So if it is longer than your video, it will still be rendered and if it is shorter than your video/there is work outside of the box, it will be cut off.

Remember to save your files and put them into one folder so that they can all be found in the same place.

Note: think about timelapse/hyperlapse. It is the same kind of idea with the frames.

Hyperlapse is very similar to timelapse, but the camera moves.

We now have the opportunity to add sound. Take that opportunity and learn to work with it. Sound isn't required but it is encouraged.

After effects is the combination of different layers. You can also play around with opacity of layers to give it a flickering effect. It is all about timing and choosing when each layer is used.  

By choosing when you want each layer to be on/off you will create your timeline sequence which will be made into an animation.

You can also go through different elements such as placement, scale etc. but one interesting one to look into is effects and presets.

Note: I could take inspiration from my type specimen booklet pages for some parts of my storyboard and animation.