Animation Plan: Reflection

This is the part when I look back on how I planned my work, and see how I could have done better, and what I already did well.

To be brutally honest, my plan was partially perfection, and partially disastrous. On the one hand, I knew exactly what I wanted to do with my animation and why I was using each individual camera shot/action/etc. However at the same time I had absolutely no clue HOW I was going to implement all of these decision into Maya.

The reason I had no clue how to implement my ideas was down to the fact that - due to various life events - I had been completely unable to attend all but one Modelling&Animation lecture in the entirety of the second half of the semester. As such, my knowledge of animating is only what I've learned from reading on the VLE. This means anything I didn't learn from that is a tool I can't use and ultimately, I've been left with the bare minimum of skills to complete a working animation.

A lot of my animation will have to be done in key frames and with Belzier curves. These are two of the few (a.k.a: only) methods I know for animation objects as of this time. during the actual creation of my animation, I might be able to learn another to aid my creation.

I cannot really go into more detail about what I feel I did right with planning then I have already. I know exactly what I want to happen in the animation, I know exactly what camera angles/sizes/movements I want in each segment of the animation and I know why I'm doing it. I even know what music I want to use on the animation and - if my calculations are right - the animation should even sync up with the music! (For reference, It's this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKZKzINMSGk)

I can see my lack of knowledge causing a few problems for my 'vision'. For starters, I cannot figure out how to attach a camera to an object for the life of me. This will inevitably cause problems with panel 3 on my storyboard, where the idea was for the camera to follow the two smaller spaceships at they flew towards the imperial destroyer. However, if there's one thing I know I can do, it's get creative with limited options.

If I could re-do this half of the module all over again, I'd humbly request all outside life problems would NOT be present, so that I could actually attend lectures and be on time to finish my projects, rather than be forced to get an extension and complete all my work without peers around to offer help if I needed it. This was a huge inconvenience to everything and I really hope I don't have to deal with anything like that again for the rest of my life.