AnimSchool Interview: Animator Cameron Fielding

Thanks you Cameron, for taking the time to answer a some questions for us. One word to describe your reel is: amazing! What was the most difficult shot you accomplished?



It depends what you mean by difficult. I’m discovering that every shot has some element that seems really problematic as you are sitting in the shot working on it. Whether it’s a wide shot, with things interacting, or a 20 frame reaction shot, it seems there’s always a period in the process where I`m thinking “oh man.. this is looking horrible.. another failed shot”. Funny enough, it seems that shots I find especially difficult are usually the ones I ending up liking the best when all is done. It’s a hard question to answer in short.

The shot I was most scared of was in Transformers 2, where BumbleBee rips the arms off a Decepticon then kicks him up towards the camera. They cast me that as my first shot, and I was just thinking “how am I going to be able to do this?”… I wasn’t so worried about the physicality and the staging, but more so because I was used to animating in a very layered way that would be very difficult to present as a complete “blocking” idea early on to the director. So, my fears were mixed with not only what I was going to do, but how to do them on a very fundamental workflow level. I ended up planning it on paper as much as I could (this is not usual for me) then blocking it in very roughly in spline. To make matters worse, I got signed off on the blocking, then I was taken off it to work on another shot for a number of weeks. In the back of my mind I was constantly afraid of going back to that shot and making it actually work to the level of detail and realism that was required. In the end, I just layered through it in a way I was used to, but killed myself over a small 30 frame section in the middle that literally took me about a week to get right!

I usually find the most “difficult” thing is getting what the director wants, and even more difficult is getting the shot to a level that they really like. Working in video games allowed me a lot of creative freedom with respect to animation choices. In feature animation, you have a broad range of freedom, but hitting someone else’s idea is never easy because it’s not imprinted on the fabric of how you think things through, solely because you didn’t think of it yourself. That I think is the biggest challenge – getting the shot to work as best it can for the few seconds it flashes past on the screen, when “as best it can” is defined by someone else. When you do get it, its incredibly satisfying.

Many top animators focus more on physical or acting shots, but you’re great at both. How have you balanced those areas of expertise?

I started off animating physicality and I’m glad I did because it’s the foundation of a believable performance. I don’t think it’s anymore important than the acting choices and ideas you use in the shot, but it’s the first place to start learning animation in my opinion. It’s also usually the most obvious to the audience if something is done incorrectly or even just “not quite right”. Even with a subtle acting shot, I still lock down the blocking of the characters physicality, before I start working on the facial animation.

The most critical tool I think I have is a workflow approach that has evolved from two distinctively different ways of working. As I mentioned before, I used to animate very layered, not using full body poses at all, and starting with the body parts that drive the performance and basically animating them fully before moving onto the next body part. The other approach is thinking more traditionally, like drawings, and creating poses and breakdowns that describe the performance in a lower resolution (usually ending on two’s as the maximum resolution before going to spline). The truth is, it was very difficult to learn how to animate that way after animating layered for so long, but now I use a hybrid of both approaches which I believe is the best mindset. I animate in stepped, creating poses on the full body of the character and keying everything through the main keys of the shot, then instead of progressively breaking down those keys, I work in a layered way in small sections, from start to finish, but keeping everything in stepped and everything keyed on the same frames- but basically still in a layered way. Using this approach, I find I can quickly get down to two’s (if I trust my keys and they work nicely) and can get very clear blocking in front of the director without an insane amount of time. Having a good understanding of both these approaches is great because each “type” of shot has its best approach- a physical shot usually benefits from the layered approach, where an acting shot needs the poses and the clarity to communicate the complexities of the attitude, and to be able to fully control the characters design and appeal.

How do you usually decide on your acting choices?

That’s a pretty easy one to answer. With an acting shot- I always use extensive reference to determine my choices. Before I start reference, I check the shot to clarify more technical things like how far the character has to move, the size of the camera lens and that sort of thing so I understand more of the constraints in which I have to move the character, and what the staging needs to be. As far as the subtext of the shot- I make sure I get that clear during the launch with the director, so then I understand what attitudes I need to act within. After that, its pretty much full on reference time, and depending on the length of the shot, I can record a huge amount of takes until I find what I want. It seems to me to take that long to really get into the character and find what feels natural. The “natural” acting is what I’m looking for… something I would never have thought of just in thumbnails.

I soon learned that I needed video reference myself for acting shots. In fact, if I can use reference for any shot, I will. I find with acting I just can’t make that stuff up in my head, I need to actually see it. I also make sure I get at least three or four “good takes” and then I watch them in continuity with the animated shots around it. Even though I’m looking at myself (and not the character), it can quickly reveal an acting choice or gesture that looks great by itself but somehow doesn’t feel right in the scene.

It’s become a balancing act with how much I use the reference and how much I don’t. Sometimes I get caught up trying to find the “perfect take” only to realize that I simply don’t have the skills to act it. I still look for one continuous take (just so the physicality and the transitions make sense) but I’m teaching myself to combine different takes and figure out transitions manually, and be more creative with how I interpret the reference and change it for the benefit of the shot as I start blocking… but its still very new to me animating these kind of scenes.

That was a great shot in Megamind where he’s facing off against Hal, did you end up shooting video reference and choreographing that sequence?

The beats of the sequence had already been figured out in Layout, so with regards to choreography it was more about figuring out the details of the interactions between Hal and the Megamind robot. On the whole it was a tough sequence because of the size difference between the two characters… I shot reference of myself doing “sword-fighting” moves for the robot- but for Hal I just had to work through the shot in stepped, figuring it out in my head (I did the body and the lamp post first, then the arms and the legs). In the end Hal had to do big broad movements to get the battle to feel like they were really fighting, and he was at least some kind of challenge to the robot. A bi-product of this was that his motion seems somewhat fast, but this further adds to the feeling of miniaturization and helps make the scene a little more funny to watch.

What’s the best way for student animators to strengthen their understanding of body mechanics?
The best way for students to strengthen their understanding of animation is just to animate what they love the best. I would say that every animated shot, even a subtle acting shot are riddled with body mechanics, so you can pretty much animate whatever you like and you’ll end up dealing with physicality in some form. If you just animate that thing in your head you’ve been waiting to animate for so long, it’s almost guaranteed to be good just because it’s driven by your own passions and interests. 


You can animate the ball bounce and box lift and that kind of thing if you like, but I would put much more return on animating something more complex, and studying reference of yourself doing it. My experience tells me that the classic exercises will teach you exactly that- how to animate a very simple and contained set of physical motions, whereas actual production shots require much more complex movements. You could say there are two types of physicality- the really broad stylized motion, and a more realistic natural motion. I would suggest studying how natural physicality works by trying to animate it yourself before going all out and animating abstracted physicality, which in truth takes a lot longer to learn and understand (in my opinion).

How did you find the transition from VFX to animated features? What are the differences and similarities you’ve discovered?
My experience in the VFX field is somewhat marginal. I was lucky to work at ILM for about 4 months, and it was an amazing experience. Something I learned very fast was that the VFX industry can be very tough for a family man like myself… short contracts and gaps in work are not the best combination, even more so if you’re not native to the US and have to deal with immigration issues in tandem. ILM was great, and looked after me very well however.
Concerning the work, at least the one project I worked on at ILM, was more concerned with the broad visual impact and raw entertainment value than any real character driven moments (at least the shots I worked on)… which was really fun, just to concentrate on making it “look cool”. Animated features on the other hand, deal much with story and character, and this is a different skill set that has to be learned- not just how to animate those shots, but even more so to understand what is important about the shot, and how to construct it from a film making perspective. I also find that shots for a feature are much more open to changes and notes from the director, and in general the process of completing the shots seems a lot more iterative.

 
As for similarities, you still have to think about a lot of the same things. Continuity is a big one, and not with respect to just making sure that things don’t appear or disappear and that kind of thing, but more to do with the flow of the shot and the feel that the action is taking place consistently when the camera is not looking at the characters (i.e the world exists and continues even when the camera is not looking). As with all shots- we are still mainly reaching for entertainment. How do we make the shot as entertaining as we can, and that doesn’t change between VFX and feature stuff at all.


It’s a double edged sword. Sometimes I miss the “coolness” of the VFX type shots, and sometimes I’m very happy to animate the intricacies of a feature shot. I can never make up my mind which I like best, and the truth is, I have a drive to animate both types, that swings like a pendulum on steroids!


I very much want to return to VFX in the future. We’re all artists, and need variety and varying challenges to keep us fresh.
You’ve worked in the entertainment industry for the past 10 years. In those years have you ever felt the effects of burn-out, or days when you don’t feel like you’re an animator?
I have to say that almost every day when I come to work, or sit at home, or just play with my kids I feel like I’m “not an animator”. It’s very hard to describe why, and sure I work on shots for my day job and actually spend more time animating than not animating, but creative fulfillment is very hard to come by, and I don’t think I’ve ever really had it… weird hey?
I have times where I feel like my shots are going well, usually during the later parts of blocking where the main shot is roughed in and working…basically when all the hard work is done. Strangely enough however, it’s hard to hold onto that satisfaction you feel from watching your own work, probably because of the sheer amount of times you watch it and you get numb to it. I tell myself this is a symptom of the strive to do my best, and as long as my colleagues and peers are telling me the shot feels great, I can trust their objective opinions. I usually find seeing a shot much later on, after I’ve had time to forget about it, allows me to see it with fresh eyes and appreciate it. This doesn’t always happen, from time to time I have shots I feel work really nicely and I enjoy watching them, but these are the little gems we have to dig for. 
I think the thing we struggle with as artists is that we constantly compare ourselves to others, and vastly over criticize the work we complete ourselves. The reality is that art is an ongoing journey, trying to reach a goal that we constantly shift further away as we get closer to it. This is what makes us strive for better work and improves us. Part of being an artist is learning how to manage these feelings and understanding that anxiety is part of the process.
I strongly believe that a great way to get closer to artistic satisfaction is to work on your own projects at home. I try as hard as I can to do this, but my work and family life leaves very little room, and it’s incredibly tough to complete anything at 11:30 at night when you’re tired and you have another long day in the morning. I’m currently in the very early stages of a “cool” creature sequence I’m working on – just simply for my own education and fun, nothing more.

You made a script, a very random one called the ‘Animfood’. What were you thinking that day?

AnimFood is awesome. I wanted to create something that could inspire me, or make me think about my shot, or a particular problem in a different way.. without having to do much more than press a few buttons a couple of times. The truth is that the actual content for AnimFood (its called “randoFlip” on the website) took a long time to compile and is from numerous sources, so it was fun to research and ultimately is really helpful to me from time to time.



I love building scripts and tools. The beauty of code is that it works or it doesn’t. No inbetweens, it’s not subjective. If I can create tools to help make my animation easier or allow me to experiment more easily, then I do it. I like being able to do two completely different things, but be able to use them together to get me closer to my creative goals.

One thing I’ve taken away from your incredible site was when you said, don’t force animation principles to guide how you construct a scene, or as a checklist to your work. Would you mind elaborating this further for all the new animators who scratch their heads over this.

I think what I meant by this was to try and think of principles after the fact. So, if you had a character that was picking up a ball, you might not want to think like this “ok… so I need an antic, some squash as he bends down, some overlap in the back as he comes back up, and some lead in the head at the start”, I think that approach will allow you to think about principles rather than the story you’re animating. I would like to approach the shot thinking about an interesting way to perform the action, and then use principles to further the communication of the ideas I already have for the shot, and as a tool for clarity (which is really all the principles are about anyway).

Lastly can you tell us what’s next for you? Are we going to see more flip reviews on your blogs, more workflow demonstrations and more possible random scripts?

I desperately try to keep my personal work and the Flip site going as much as I can. The thing with the Flip site is that I still stand by my “mission statement” that I only post stuff on there that feels substantial and has educational purposes for me, and the readers. Unfortunately, I think it might not be obvious to people how long those kind of posts can take to create.. its tough. The video review thing went on hold as soon as I realized that my five year old laptop can’t handle them at all.. so I need to rethink that, as it was pretty fun for the few that I did. I definitely plan to do an updated workflow tutorial that discusses, in useful detail, how to create a shot with my layered and stepped mix. Hopefully I`ll have some new creature animation to show when I get around to completing that too. I know my Flip blog gets rarely updated, but I would like to keep it relevant, and not just post links, or stuff that I don’t feel benefits the community. If people want to drop me an e-mail with questions or topics to discuss that would be cool!

Cameron it’s been a pleasure doing this, I hope we see more awesome stuff come out of http://fliponline.blogspot.com/. If you guys haven’t head over there. Cameron has some great animation tutorials spanning over 10 years in the business. This man’s a genius. Thanks again mate!

Interview by: Andrew Tran

AnimSchool Classtime: Balance and Weight

AnimSchool Instructor and Blue Sky Animator, Thom Roberts, begins to discuss balance and weight for his Introduction to 3D Animation students for their last assignment: turning 90 or 180 degrees.

AnimSchool Webcast: Jeff Gabor, Part 3

Jeff Gabor discusses appeal in characters by going over his Malcolm poses, from his shot in AnimSchool’s “Animation Principles” lecture.

In upcoming Part 4, Jeff goes over smear frames.

To learn how you can download Malcolm for free visit: http://www.animschool.com/DownloadOffer.aspx

AnimSchool Interview: Animator Daniel Zettl


Daniel Zettl Reel 2012 from Daniel Zettl on Vimeo.


We would like to welcome Weta Animator, Daniel Zettl. Thank you Daniel for taking part in this interview. Can you tell us a little bit about your background and when you decided you wanted to be an animator? Did you have any traditional 2D animation background when you started?



I’ve drawn and painted since I was little. When I was around 16, I started to do graphic design and graffiti professionally. At the age of 20, when I finished my secondary school, I had an interesting portfolio to apply for an internship at a 2D animation studio in Munich. For me it was the closest to illustrating comic books I could imagine back then. Waiting for a spot to study communication design, I worked my way up within 6 month from a storyboard assistant, to a prop-location and character designer for an animated TV series called Lilly the Witch. My hand drawn animation skills were very basic; I hadn’t worked in a production as 2D animator yet. I must say 2D animation was somehow inaccessible and very abstract for me to get interested at first. But, once I understood that drawing for animation is the complete opposite of illustration, and I learned about acting and how to bring a character to life over a series of drawings, animation had my heart and soul! 

After various design pitches I had done for the studio, I taught myself 3D as a generalist and I had the fortune to get boosted by several animation veterans there. By then, I wanted to learn everything about 3D and get my hands on modeling, rigging and animation. I was offered my first animation position for the German feature film Hui Buh when I was 21 years old. I was part of the character design for the two CG characters, and I even designed and modeled the second character for the movie, a cartoony ghost designed like a pillow. This was also the first time I learned about FACS based facial blendshape systems and implemented this system for the cartoon character. I had the great luck to get under the wings of Tahsin Özgür, a 50-year-old animation director who brought tremendous knowledge from years of experience at Disney. His sense for appeal and cartoon acting resonated immensely with me. 


I think your shots from CA Scanline, which can be seen on your latest showreel, are amazing with solid acting, great poses and timing. What were some references or materials you drew upon that influenced you on this shot?
 What were some of the questions/thoughts going through your head while working on this shot? 

Lissi, this female character is well known from comedy sketches in German TV. The director of this movie is one of the biggest German comedians. He established the character of this princess over many episodes in his TV show, so I kind of knew already a bit of her story. I’m a huge fan of appeal, and that was my main priority for her. I wanted to portray her as the cutest and most girly character I could imagine. But interestingly enough my only reference was the director acting her out for some shots. I absorbed his gestures and timings, his personality and charm. Because in the TV sketches he plays the princess himself, and everybody knows that it’s him in the dress.

In your past blog posts you really hammer in timing, while staying really rough in your first pass, have you always had this mentality as an animator or did you work differently when you were starting out?

I definitely started out less flexible. In the beginning I was heavily influenced by my 2D upbringing. I animated some of my shots in 2D before I stepped to the computer. I would thumbnail and film myself or I dug through film reference so much that when I did my first blocking in 3D, I knew each pose and timing already and I went mostly with my first idea. I drew lots of reference from Disney and Dreamworks movies back then. But, this was for productions that had extremely short schedules and didn’t leave room for lots of iterations. I still do a ton of reference shoots and drawings today and would pitch these, but now it’s more important to react quickly to new ideas about a performance until we found the perfect one. Good timing is the baseline for any concept though, so this still accompanies me. 

You spoke very highly of Shamus Culhane’s book “From Script to Screen”, what were some of the things you extracted from his book and how did it affect your creative process?

By no means am I a Shamus Culhane expert, I’m just an insanely big fan of his work. I my eyes Culhane found, through several specific exercises, a way to tap into your unconscious. One of these exercises teaches how to switch your creative or logical brain half on and off at will and go wild with ideas, or be as analytic as possible. He provides 3 characters of different designs, brothers I think. You pic one emotion or a specific action, say joy, or anger or shopping- whatever. And once a day you sit down for one hour with a timer and do 1 drawing per minute. That is at least 60 drawings per hour, soon you’ll be doing heaps more and in a quality you thought you could only do with a model. After a few weeks or a month, you’re a completely different craftsman. It’s indescribable. You literally can span pages full of poses of one specific topic within a set amount of time in a crazy quality. Along these lines I want to recommend Kimon Nicolaides “The Natural Way To Draw” and Constantin Stanislavki’s books about method acting. The first one teaches you to put your thinking aside and draw only what you see by not looking at your paper while drawing. And Stanislavski teaches how to immerse yourself fully into a character by creating the emotions inside of you and basing them on real experience memory.




In your personal blog, you encourage animators to be comfortable with deleting their work if it’s not working out. Can you share with us any personal experiences where you put in a lot of effort on a shot, then scratched it, and had a better outcome? 

This can happen on every second shot I work on. I pitch a good solid idea, interesting and nice texture but once I hit the polishing phase or once the prior/next shot falls into place and I notice there’s one beat to much or the distance the character covers is too long and the shot is too long or too short and the cut doesn’t flow as good, I need to make big changes or delete maybe already polished beats. The cut and flow of the story is really what dictates a change of the performance. In general, when I work really intensely on a shot and want to get it perfect, the best thing is a couple of fresh eyes, who are entirely detached from the shot. Since I started out, and every day again, I try to acquire this “always objective eye” towards my work. I try and preserve this first impression of a shot. This usually leads to the right intuitive decisions, but it can often mean to do big changes.


Well thanks for being apart of this latest AnimSchool interview. 

To view more of Daniel’s work and current reel check out his website:

 Interview by: Andrew Tran

 

AnimSchool General Review: Camilo Guaman by Tony Bonilla

Tony Bonilla, reviews Camilo Guaman’s animation from his Animating Characters class. In this assignment students focus on interacting with a heavy object.

AnimSchool has these General Reviews every week for students who can’t attend their normal class review, or for those who want an extra critique.

AnimSchool Classtime: Adding Smear Frames, Part 2

AnimSchool Instructor, Tony Bonilla, continues his smear frame lecture by showing how to deform the arm, to help show anticipation while creating fluid arcs.

AnimSchool Webcast: Jeff Gabor, Part 2

Jeff Gabor uses his reference video from AnimSchool’s Animation Principles Lecture, to show his process and what tools he uses, when creating his reference for animating.

In upcoming Part 3, Jeff goes over making poses appealing.

AnimSchool Interview: Peter Nagy, Part 2

We welcome back Peter Nagy! Thank you Peter, for taking the time to answer more of our questions. In your winning 11 Second Club entry entitled “Mother Earth,” what were some of the most challenging parts of these shots?

After a sudden movement, I polished the settling elements of the head and face further than it was necessary. However, the most difficult part was not connected to the movement but the closing pose and facial expression of the street musician. This was the most sensitive part of the shot- the reaction itself. How the character reacts after a negative attack. What is the character like- somebody who feels hurt after this and attacks back, or a calmer self-confident and wiser character? I wanted a mixed face expression here, showing pride, and a bit of anger at the same time. When I finished the animation, I wasn’t content with this part, but now I got used to the closing.

Can you talk about your process, from the planning to animation, on your “Mother Earth” piece?

Once I got the idea and prepared the scenes (location/characters), I made a reference shot of the movements. After that, I chose from the test scenes I most preferred, and then started the animation. At the beginning, I literally followed the reference scene and then, when the main movements were on the 3D characters, I stopped using the video and finalized the movement according to the rules of animation (arcs, stretching etc.)

When starting a dialogue or acting piece, what method or process do you use to get into the mind of the character?

Resetting of the correct lip sync is always based on the original film. For the movement of the character I always consider his personality, who he is in reality (where he is from, where he is heading etc.) According to my story, they are brothers. It’s their story, so there’s an unbreakable bond between them. Therefore, both of their reactions are moderate. During the shots I try to get every prop that appears in the final 3D scene. So, if there’s a turban on the character’s head, I put on a cap. If the character smokes, I lite a cigarette – or at least I put a cigarette in the corner of my mouth. One never knows, it might happen that when I talk, I might blink more or set my eyebrows differently. I might snap at my head to scratch my forehead, or to adjust my cap. You never know what tiny gestures come during it. These are the unpredictable small bits that make the character and the shot alive, so it is worth nipping them. Props are always a big problem for me. For example, I needed a sitar. Since I neither had a sitar, nor a guitar at home, I suddenly grabbed a broom which was suitable. It’s very important to be in contact with similar object as my characters when playing them.

Do you bring any of your methodologies of traditional 2D animation across to your 3D animation and vice versa? And if so, how do you think they inform each other? Can you provide us with any past experiences where these methodologies really pushed your shot?

2D has an effect on everything, every workflow of every animation technique, it is in the background. When I start the animation of the 3D scenes, I draw one or two sketches unaware, searching for the poses of the character. I’m probably not saying anything new, but today 3D animation is more alive, the lumpiness and stiffness which was characteristic at the beginning has ceased, and now any ancient 2D trick can be done with the characters (squash & stretch, or even multiples). So, if I keep these traditional basic rules in mind, I would say this work of mine was more successful than some previous ones because I could handle/treat the limbs more freely and I could make certain bends and stretches I didn’t have a possibility to do before. I just loved tinkering with these settings, and in the meantime, I had some nostalgia over the memories of old times.


You obviously have experience with how the competition is handled on 11 Second Club, with your entries always being in the top 10s, 20s and 50s. What do you think it is about your shots compared to the rest that make the audiences vote for your animations? What advice and tips can you provide to new animators who want to take part in this monthly tradition?

This is a complex thing and quite unpredictable because if a new character appears, whom we haven’t seen before, it can help the competitor to success. For me, the most important thing is always the idea, the story, how the actions react to the dialogue, how much they exploit its possibilities, and also the quality of the animation. These are my main aspects at the evaluation. The problem with my first two works is definitely their topic not being that popular – besides the weaknesses of the animation. Only after that, I realized I have to handle the topic not just to amuse myself with the result, but everybody should understand what I was trying to say. With 3D work the appearance is also important (if we aim the top positions). If I handed a view-port animation in January there couldn’t have been smoke in it either, the character would not have smoked and without the present environment it is questionable whether the closing and most important information would have been understandable. The most vital, they should not want to win with a render because the audience will appreciate it. It can also be an aspect whether the competitor enters his work on the forum because with a promising animation he can already find some supporters. Many, many tiny aspects. How up-to-date you are (I mean, do you react to the actual season, holiday?) I think the thumbnail is also important. Another crucial issue is that it should be easy to identify. It should be specific. It should have a distinctive feature, it can be anything (beside the beautiful animation). It can be the character’s appearance or an object from the shot. If you talk about the works with your colleagues at lunch after voting, all of you must think of the same: Ah, that Pinocchio one? Or: Ah, that nice stop-motion animation? Or: The one where the dishes fly off and slow down in the air? The one with the priest? The one with the split-screen? The one with the subtitle? And so on and so on.

The most important: concentrate on the animation and the idea! Or, simply just think of your own eCritique! Be critical about your own work and ask the question: does the character move enough in my scene? Is there enough movement? Is that amount of movement necessary? Are there any subtle details to temp the viewer back to see it again? Aspire that your work be a good base material for a winner critique.

 And lastly, what can we expect from you next?

 With my ex-colleague, Peter Hostyanszki, we’re trying to finish my previous competition-work, the King the Talking Lion. As soon as we manage to overcome the difficulties from the fur simulation (we haven’t done this before) we will check in, but this makes finishing a bit uncertain. After that, I’ll probably compile a demo reel, partly because I like editing, and on the other hand, it’s been a while since I’ve come out with a new one, so this year it’s due. After that, I’m planning to have a rest. 🙂

Interview by: Andrew Tran

AnimSchool Classtime: Drawing With “Force”

AnimSchool welcomes Mike Mattesi to the team. In his first class, Mike explains his new role at AnimSchool and dives right into drawing over students’ work to show “force” in a pose.

All AnimSchool students are welcome to be a part of Mike Mattesi’s class and have their drawings and animations reviewed.

AnimSchool Interview: Rigger Sabine Heller

Thank you Sabine, for taking the time to answer a few questions for us. Can you tell us a little about your background, what schools you’ve attended and why you decided to become a rigger?

Everything started with my studies in Media System Design at the University of Applied Sciences in Darmstadt, Germany, in the year 2000. At that time, 3D animation had not yet been integrated into the program, and instead, my classes were a mix of design, economics and information technology. After I discovered that I was mainly interested in design and programming, I decided to do a summer internship at IBM: Java programming. Somehow, I realized that this was too dry of a subject for me and I tried to find a field that combined technology and creativity. Since I was fascinated by the early 3D animated movies and short films, I found it in 3D animation! More precisely, in 3D Studio Max which I was learning at home besides my studies.

Excited by this medium, I decided to put all my efforts in getting an internship in Hollywood, which I though would be the best place to start. Of course, I didn’t have any connections nor idea which companies where out there, so I looked up a whole bunch of effects companies in the internet and sent over 100 application letters via email. I was lucky and Gentle Giant Studios offered me an internship in 3D scanning.

Afterwards, everything went straight towards a career in animation. I returned to Germany, to finish my studies in Media System Design. After my graduation, I decided that I wanted to deepen my knowledge in 3D animation even further and moved to New York to study towards my Master’s degree in Computer Art at the School of Visual Arts on a Fulbright scholarship. After I received my degree in 2006, I returned once again to Germany and worked there for three years as Technical Director at Spans & Partner, an advertising studio in Hamburg. My responsibilities included the development of pipeline tools, special effects, set supervision and also character rigging. Funny enough, even though I always wanted to be an Effects TD, it turned out that rigging was actually what I enjoyed most of all my responsibilities! So, I decided to apply for a Character TD position at Blue Sky Studios when they had an opening in 2009 and voilà, I was lucky and got accepted.

You’ve worked in commercials and now film. What are some differences you’ve experienced in the two industries?

One of the major differences is the duration of a project. At a commercial studio for example, you might have a month or even a couple of weeks to finish a project. Also, the commercials are extremely short and whatever character you rig only has to hold up for this short amount of time. At a film studio, it’s possible that you work for more than a year on one movie. (By the way, this also means that after three years of working at a film studio you might only have one project to add to your demo reel.) The movies are normally 90 minutes long,  so whatever you do, your character better hold up for a large number of shots.  The quality of your rigs in film has to be much higher than in commercials. Summarizing, working in commercials has the advantage of being able to work on many different projects within a short time. However, the commercial industry is definitely faster paced with less time for detail, and can be quite exhausting.
You started your career working in Germany and currently you’re working in the United States. Did you experience any differences with working for an European company vs US company? Were there any programs you had to learn and how hard was it to make the transition?
It is hard to answer this question since there are many cultural differences not only between Europe and the United States, but also within Europe, between Germany and France or the U.K., for example. Taking those out of the the equation, I think it mainly comes down to the difference in size. Most of the studios in Germany are small, especially compared to the enormous companies like Blue Sky, Pixar and Dreamworks. Working in a small company is definitely quite different. Normally, one has to be more of a generalist with a specialization to be able to take over other tasks when needed. Often, the responsibility of one single person is much larger than in a company where you are one of a thousand since the hierarchies are much smaller. This is just to name a few…
For me personally, the difference between Blue Sky and my work in Germany was all of the above plus the transition from a commercial to a film studio. At first, I was a little nervous about being able to fulfill the expectations, especially, since I had to switch from XSI to Maya within a week. But luckily, it turned out to be not such a big deal at all.

Congratulations on recently being promoted to Creative Lead for Faces. What new responsibilities come with this role?

Thank you! I am very excited that I have been given this new responsibility. The role of a ‘lead’ in the rigging department is alternating for every show. Normally, we have four leads, each one responsible for a certain area. The creative face lead, together with the technical face lead and the character development supervisor, determines the standards for all the face rigs on a movie. This basically means, that all the basic controls and functionalities of the face rig are laid out before the actual character rigging starts. This is often done by developing a prototype. The work on the prototype also helps to define the rigging workflow. In addition, the creative face lead creates and updates all the documentation necessary for the rigging workflow. Once this is done, the face lead supports and accompanies every rigger in the rigging process of their character.

In Rio you rigged Marcel and in the upcoming release of Ice Age 4, you rigged Shira, a Saber Toothed Tiger. Are there any different challenges that come with rigging a bipedal vs a quadrupedal character?


Yes, one of the main differences is that quadrupedal characters have another leg setup. For Shira, the main difficulties were her front shoulders and upper arms. Shoulders are generally not an easy area in rigging and Shira required very special attention, because of the way the shoulder blades move under the skin when tigers, for example, walk. Since Shira is a girl, she had to look elegant and female. Still, she is a tiger and needed to be strong. This turned out to be especially tricky, not only in her shoulder, but also in the face. For example, she needed to be able to show anger, but at the same time you didn’t want to loose her femininity. This resulted in a lot of subtle back and forth until it felt right.

Lastly, what is your favorite type of character to Rig and why?

My favorite characters are the ones which provide a challenge. For example, this could be a technical challenge caused by the design which requires some out-of-the-box rigging approach. I have a particular liking for villains or the funny, odd characters. Most of the time, you can give the face a much more extreme range than when rigging a ‘good’, more ‘normal’ character.

In AnimSchool’s Introduction to Rigging class, Sabine explains the difference between IK and FK.

To view more of Sabine’s work visit:
www.sabine-heller.com/ 

Interview by: Amber Dempsey Shikuma

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