Study Task 2 - Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

I recently just watched Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, and it is a stunning piece of animation. It has a beautiful art style, integrating 2D and 3D together seamlessly, and still getting that comic book feel.

One thing that particularly stood out to me was the colour-bleed-depth effect, which I later found out was called chromatic aberation. I attempted to recreate this in a small study piece of fan art.

Spiderman: Into the Spider-Verse has no doubt turned a lot of heads, and this made me realise that animation can be very powerful not just in the animation world, but in the broader film industry too. In the future, I might look at animating feature films and/or animated films as part of a studio (or as a freelance animator if I'm big enough!)

Before chromatic aberation

After chromatic aberation

Study Task 7 - Social Media Pro

My current social media for art-related stuff:

• Instagram - @prathik_art
• Newgrounds - produde123
• Twitter - ProDude_123
• Tumblr - prathik-art

I use these as an online portfolio/ art log book, to track my progress and interact with artists with similar interests. Also for self-validation...

 I usually post illustrations of things that interest me, with the occasional animation (since they take longer to make). Sometimes I will document my process too, with work in progresses and/or timelapses.  

I plan to restrict my Instagram account into a more professional account, to reach out to potential clients. This will meaning unfollowing all the meme accounts and making a separate private account. 

Twitter is really receptive to work in progress animations, this could be the platform that I post more regularly on, while Instagram will be my polished portfolio type social media platform. 

Newgrounds will be the art platform to post art that doesn't fit in either. 

I plan to post at least 2 work in progresses per week, with finished pieces sprinkled in between. When I have more free time (like during Easter and Summer) I plan to bump this up to 2 finished pieces per week.

I want to try to narrow down my focus on what type of animation I produce, but for now it is a tie between looping animations and/or tradigital hand drawn animation.

Study Task 2 - Special effects

I am an avid fan of Rebecca Sugar's Steven Universe series. So much so, that I obsess over the smallest details - especially the special effects.

I love the bubbly aesthetic, with child-like wonder in the show, I even tried to implement that into my Character and Narrative story, which is why I volunteered to do the special effects in our group.

Steven Universe special effects slowed down

By going through an episode, frame by frame, I managed to replicate some of the sparkles, energy and intensity, in the Sally's invitation scene;

What went well: 

•  Special effects usually enhance visuals but they are rarely, consciously noticed. Actually studying special effects helped me animate them better.

What could be improved:

• I could experiment with different types of 2D special effects, such as steam, smoke, fire and water,
• I need to know the rules and limits, have I used too many sparkles?

Study Task 5 - Copyshop

I've been posting my art online since late 2015, but I've only recently seriously invested time and energy to making my brand. 

My main internet art place is Instagram, where I've been posting quite a lot. Although there are a few, personal, unprofessional aspects, such as the highlights, I don't mean to monetize this account yet. 

 

I use my Instagram as a documentation of some sorts, where I experiment and mess around with things I find interesting.  

I even went so far as to make a pie chart of my Instagram posts!

Instagram has standard U.S copyright rules, so I can only post artwork I've created as long as they don't violate Community Guidelines. However, this doesn't stop people from "reposting" artwork or posts... but I don't really find reposting (with credit to me) annoying...

I also occasionally post collaborative artworks with other artists on Instagram, but I make sure to ask for permission and credit them in that post with their social media handles:

I also post artwork on Newgrounds, but I initially used it as a platform to participate in competitions. Newgrounds focuses much more on animations and storytelling, unlike Instagram which is slightly more diluted. 

Newgrounds makes it clear which Creative Commons license you want to use which I find quite helpful. 

I don't really feel the need to watermark my work, as I am not making money off any of it (due to visa restrictions) but I do occasionally sign the bottom-right of my art pieces. 

UPDATE:

I have since updated my Instagram, and made a separate personal account (I also did this with my Twitter):

Study Task 2 - T̶H̶E̶ L̶I̶N̶E̶

The Line is an animation studio that inspires me because of their ratio of quality of work to size of studio. I feel like I'd perform best in a small studio which I why The Line is a great example to take inspriation from. I got the chance to meet Max Taylor and Tim McCourt at Manchester Animation festival this year, and learn a lot about how to put together a successful studio. Their social media presence is also something to remark about.

I managed to meet them at MAF and managed to speak to Max Taylor to ask a few questions; I found out they started off as a group of freelancers, and spent the first 6 months making animations for their showreel and not earning anything. They pursued ideas they enjoyed, or were interested in, and got paid work from studios that saw them. This is a rough template of what I will attempt to do for my brand in the future.

Joyride by the Line

This animation was widely acclaimed and eventually caught the attention of Jamie Hewlett, which landed them the project of animating the music video for Humility, by the Gorillaz