Assessment Task #5 (Progression...)

During lunchtime today, we got the opportunity to learn how to upload our animations onto blogger. Mr. Lennon taught and helped some people and they passed on what they knew. We had to download Gimp and save our image there. I will include more on this when I actually upload my animation to my website. I also decided to post my first ever animation before that to see if it worked.

Mr. Lennon also gave us an extension to upload the animation onto our blogs in case we had some issues. We had till about Sunday night to complete this task. Pretty much everyone was relieved because of this as there was much stress over this assessment task. Many people didn't know how to upload their animation and were panicky as they weren't aware of the complete method and as to whether it would work or not.

I hope to upload my dog animation tomorrow and then my assessment animation the same night or so.

Assessment #4 (Problems...)

I was working on my animation toady and experienced a few problems. Everything was going according to plan, my latest idea was working and I was very excited to view the finished product.

Unfortunately Inkscape kept shutting down due to some error and this was really quite irritating as it happened twice. This resulted in me having to re-do what I was up to from my svg image. I was quite frustrated so I gave up for today. I decided to complete the rest of my animation tomorrow when I was fresh as I had finished majority of it. I had completed about 80 frames or so with about 50 more to go.

My original goal was to load it onto my blog tomorrow at lunch, when we would be able to get help from the teacher but this wasn't the case. So I decided to learn how to load it onto my blog tomorrow at lunch and complete the process at home, after I finished all my frames. If I got stuck I would also have the General Help page on our school website, that I could use as a guide. I also decided to do my last blog entry after loading it on so that I could discuss everything and the overall outcome of it.

Assessment Task #3 (Remember...)

Here are a few of the things that I need to remember when creating an animation of Inkscape.

1. Set the background of the canvas to solid - if this is not done, problems may occur later on
2. Set the size of the canvas to 400 times 400 pixels - the animation must be of an appropriate size
3. When saving your beginning image as an svg file so that changes can be made later - this can be done by simply saving
4. When exporting frames from Inkscape be sure to select 'Page'
5. Save all the frames as png files - these can not be changed as they are images
6. Copy and paste the same frame if you want the same image to remain on the screen longer
7. Save your last frame as an svg - this will enable you to make changes to it later
8. Save all your work in one folder - this will make it is organised and easy to access

These are a few tips that I need to refer to and remember so that I do not make a mistake when creating my animation. This will ensure that I don't have to re-do anything in the process.

Assessment Task #2 (About Inkscape and Pencil)

Towards the end of the term, I learnt to use Inkscape and Pencil, two paint programs which I could use for my Animation Assessment. I tried out both the programs and experimented with all the tools.

In Inkscape, I created a dog which twitched its ears and wiggled its tongue. This was a really simple program which I actually liked because it was easy to grasp and use. It took me one lesson to learn all the options and then I was enjoying myself creating some of my own artworks. I also ended up downloading it on my home computer because of my obsession for it. It seemed quite addictive and fun to play with, during my free time.

I also used Pencil, in which I created a ball bouncing on the ground. I did not get very far with this, as I had missed the lesson in which we had been briefed about it, so I was quite lost.I also realised that there were only a few options with Pencil, compared to Inkscape. For instance, it only had a pencil, pen, polygon and spray brush that I could use to create my animation. I did some of my own exploring but I realised that I preferred Inkscape over Pencil. I did try doing my actual animation using Pencil, but I thought that I should use what I was comfortable with.

So in the end, I used Inkscape to create my final animation for my assessment task.

Assessment Task #1

During the past few lessons, I had trouble deciding on what I should include in my animation. My first idea was to have a bee flying accross the screen and paint it yellow. I decided to later improvise on this idea and better it.
My next idea was to move a flying dove accross the screen and have a speech bubble saying "Deeds not Words" and have "CARITAS" appear. Initially I had trouble making the wings collaborate with the dove moving so I gave up on that idea.
I improvised on that and tried to make to does move in from either side holding a banner saying "CARITAS - Deeds not Words". This was not very successful either.
I have also decided to use Inkscape because I know how to use majority of the tools and create simple animations on it.
I am currently trying to get a bee to come in and splash the screen with yellow paint. The words "CARITAS" would then appear on the screen.

Painting Tools

Description of use of tools in Paint:
Free-Form Select - Allows you to cut out any shape of your artwork and extract it.
Select - Draw a box around any image and select it.
Eraser/Colour Eraser - To erase a small or large area in your picture.
Fill with colour - Fill an enclosed area with colour.
Pick Colour - To copy colour from one object or area to another.
Magnifier - Allows you to zoom into an area.
Pencil - Allows you to draw a free form line.
Brush - Allows you to paint with different shaped brushes.
Airbrush - Creates an airbrush effect.
Text - Allows you to draw a text box.
Line - Enables you to draw a straight line.
Curve - Enables you to draw a curve.
Rectangle - Enables you to draw any sized rectangle.
Polygon - Enables you to draw any shape with straight lines.
Ellipse - Enables you to draw any sized circle or oval.
Rounded Rectangle - Enables you to draw any sized rounded rectangle.

Painting Tools

These are the various different tools available on Paint.