hibajad

[hibajad]

A personal revelation

Lately, I've had the time to relect on my life. I realized that I want my career, art and work to be for the sole purpose of spreading goodness in the world. Being a muslim plays a huge role in this. I want to leave a good print in the world. I want to be able to create content that teaches, spreads awareness and positivity, and entertain children.

All the work I'll do will be with the intention of benevolence.

[hibajad]

Room for improvement

This is a self-evaluation after finishing my grad film.

Self evaluation is critical for skill development, especially for animation. Working on the final film, as well as seeing my classmates’ films, I was able to assess my skills and realize which areas I need to develop in the most.

Visual Styles and Language

For my final, I decided to pick a safe visual style that I knew I could create and finish just in time for the deadline. However, it would’ve been more of a learning experience if I picked a style I’ve never done before. Deciding on a visual style is not one of my strong suits, and I don’t have the courage for experimentation, especially when there is a deadline. But after seeing some of my classmate’s work, I realize how important it is to get out the comfort zone, and try out different art styles for animation. 

2. Perspective 

I believe perspective is an overall hard skill to obtain. And although I do have some scenes that play with perspective in my film, I need to develop my understanding of 3D objects and foreshortening in order to successfully create perspective.

3. Dynamic Scenes

I’ve always been interested in watching dynamic scenes that have a lot of camera movement within them, rather than adding it during post production. It takes quite the skill to play around with characters as if they’re 3D in 2D space. This skill also requires the understanding of shapes and how to draw them in all their angles. 

4. Facial Acting

I love facial acting, and it’s something I want to develop myself in. I find it amusing how character performances can be translated successfully just by facial acting. 

5. Transitions 

I realized I have a lot of “cuts” in my animations. Learning how to create clever and creative transitions will improve my animations. 

6. Storytelling

Storytelling is an important pillar of animation. Based on my final film, I notice that my storytelling skills could be leaning more into the weak side. This is something I need to develop in as well. 

7. Being on Model

My rough animation is always better than my clean ups because I don’t have to worry about being on model as much. For my final film, I think my characters change designs so much, which is why I need to develop in being on model.

[hibajad]

Great.

My last post was literally a year and a week ago. But I do have a good excuse. I was busy finishing my grad film and masters. I spent two years on the course, which I will talk about in a different post, but hopefully for now I'm back.

I do find it hard to keep up with this journal, especially because there isn't much engagement on here. (maybe I should share my journal with people). For now though, I'm keeping it to myself.

[hibajad]

Little reflection #1

Recently, I went to a video game industry event called Develop: Brighton. It was my first time going to something like this, and I was completely alone. Yes, I barely slept that night as I was a nervous wreck

But it turned out pretty awesome, I pushed myself so hard out of my comfort zone and I ended up making some connections, checking studios I'd never heard about, and going to a Cyberpunk 2077 related talk (I low key fangirled)

Nevertheless, that's not the reflection I wanted to talk about. It's the fact that I had an existential crisis after. I've never felt so lost in my life.

Okay one, I always wanted to be a part of the gaming industry. Two, I am now studying 2D character animation, and my skills include motion design as well. Three, I have no idea what to work as if I were to be apart of the gaming industry.

If I wanted to even have a teeny weeny little almost nonexistent chance at AAA games, learning 3D is a must. However, that's not what I see myself into at the moment.

I think for now I'll just improve myself in 2D animation, which is also considered a base, so that'll never be a waste if I were to change to 3D.

Maybe play around with Nomad Sculpt a bit, I tried it and it was fun.

But anyways, I think I need to embrace the change, experiment, try out different opportunities, and always keep learning. And from there, I'll see where I go.

[hibajad]

You know what's sad? I've never once committed to any of my Tumblr accounts that I've made over the years, not even this one that I made this year. But here I am again, updating with a new post. Once every blue moon? Maybe.

It is currently the summer of my first year in the MA Character Animation program at CSM. I started my summer preparing my portfolio, hoping...praying for whatever internship or job comes my way.

Side note: nothing so far...

But that's okay because I came out with a nice little animation of my profile picture. Honestly, I'm happy with it.

Anyways, I wanna share my process so I can get back and check it for future reference:

1. I drew my main keyframes on Procreate with a brief spacing of the timing I want.

2. I imported my keyframes on TV Paint

3. Then I just started inbetweening and cleaning up.

[hibajad]

So! I made a character for the RE universe: here’s Jenna Ford!

Jenna is a special operations agent, and a friend of Jill Valentine

She’s a big friendly and flirty softie, but can kick your face in 0.4 seconds if she needs to

Jenna tends to yell cuss words frantically when fighting off monsters, apparently it helps her aim accuracy

She loves cute stuff so much that even her gun is decorated, she says “cute stuff eases the violence and darkness”

People around beg her to change her broken dagger but her excuse is always “the shards add more damage”

To be honest, i have no idea how this character came to be. i just sat down to draw some body poses today and she emerged out of no where with one idea after the other

[hibajad]

I have realized something, why is it that when I draw with no idea and plan in mind...it turns out better than actual planned illustrations? Is it because I'm tapped into my subconscious mind?

Anyways, even after drawing these, I'm always thinking about how I'm not animating enough. I need to break the resistance and start working.

Damn...my mind is always restless and overthinking.

[hibajad]

I came across a reference on Pinterest that looks like a theatre performance, then I remembered that theatrical acting references are one of the most useful studies for understanding body acting and exaggeration. So, I decided to practice and sketch out whatever idea came to mind. I ended up with this and I'm happy about it, especially because I had to push myself and work spontaneously with my flow of ideas.

[hibajad]

Welcome to my journal folks! My name is Hiba, from Saudi Arabia. I decided to create this blog to document my progress in animation and illustration. During this journey, I experience many feelings, overthinking and self doubt, but pushing myself to work hard and fight this resistance is what I’m aiming for. Being aware of these feelings and writing out my thought process seems to help, so let’s ride this rollercoaster and get the best out of it!