Academic Animation

A few months ago I was contacted to make an animation for Leeds Metropolitan University. The video was to be shown at a conference to help explain a complex method of grading/categorising. I only had a week to complete the project so unfortunately there wasn’t much time to make things perfect. I think it fulfils the criteria, a visual aid to help communicate the message to an academic audience.

My new website!

SO I’ve finally come to the idea of building a professional portfolio website to keep all my finished work in one easily accessible place. It’s main purpose is to advertise myself to potential employers and showcase my best work. I really wanted to make it a multi-purpose platform from which I could have many different and diverse categories. For this purpose I have decided to simply call it William Powell Creative. Below is an image I shot and photoshoped for the home screen.

Below are 2 examples of the many photos used to composite the image.

As you can see there were things in the background that I didn’t want in the final image so I had to air brush them out. I also duplicated the left side of the area under the table and mirrored it onto the right to create a better symmetry.

Here is an example of  how I created the floating paper effect.

 

 

Fender Ad

I must admit this wasn’t so much a concept driven piece as a chance to practive some product photography. The below image is the final product for fender guitars.

Product photography uses more photoshop than you would think. This image is in fact 2 seperate shots merged together. The reason for this is simple… to get the best possible shot of the product (everything in sharp focus and lighting perfect). Unfortunately it is very hard to control the lighting enough to get the best product AND background image together. For this I lit the guitar perfectly and took a shot, removed it, then lit the background seperately. I really wanted the product to be in focus and the background blurred. To get the whole guitar in tack sharp focus I had to use an apeture of F8 which meant the background was fairly in focus too – another reason to shoot seperately! I shot the guitar at F8, cropped it out and composited it over the perfect background (which I then added a blur effect to). Below are the 2 seperate images used…

Think Yellow Ad Concept

I recently applied to an advertising course West Herts College. As part of the application I had to create a campaign that would make people eat bananas. Seeing as I was already late to apply I only had a day to create this work and submit, hopefully it turned out ok?

My concept was to create a chairty to gain awareness of the current rise in unjustified banana death through being left to rot. Hopefully the viewer should feel sorry for the banana and choose to eat them instead of letting them go off.

Photoshop

Here are 2 examples of my photoshop retouched images, before and after. If working with human subjects I usually start by defining key areas is the body shape to create a more sculpted look. I then use many layers of filtering to brighten eyes, smooth skin tones, shape lips etc,

Examples of my photography.

At university I developed a keen interest in photography. I had always loved seeing other peoples work but wanted to know how to do it for myself. I then enrolled on a black and white film photography evening course at Leeds College of Art. Anyways, here are some examples of my digital work…

Guido on Vimeo.

Celebrations and John Wright armatures!

With university finally finnished after 4 hard years of academia I am officially free!!! After the struggles of animating the Guido armature, I have decided to treat myself to a professionally built practice armature which I shall use to… well… practice animating! After looking around the internet I stumbled across John Wright model making. John has created a armature, puppet and prop studio that also sells ultra high quality ball and socket joints. He has worked on some fantastic projects including aardmans features ‘The Pirates’ and ‘Wallace and Gromit’. His website can be found HERE

After hearing the prices Mackinnon & Saunders charge per puppet I was worried his armatures would also be waaaaay above my budget. To my surprise… NO! For the modest sum of about £500 I was able to specify exactly what I wanted!!! To anyone out there who thinks “bloody hell, that’s an expensive armature” well… Yes, it is expensive but here’s why it’s worth it.

1. The armature joints are exeptional quality. Not only will they last forever but they will also make animating so much more enjoyable and fluid.

2. To buy the joints/metal/ equipment to make my own would only be £50 cheaper, however the  quality of craftsmanship would not be nearly as accurate.

3. The armature can be taken apart and re-configured… endless possibilities.

4. I want to focus on what I do best… ANIMATING! Having someone else build this for me so the second I get back from holidays I can start animating… priceless 🙂

Here is an image of the puppet he designed to my specifications…

I can’t wait to receive the finnished article! Many thanks to John who has been extremely helpful and accomodated all my design requests without hesitation.

John Wright Model Making can be found HERE

Guido reviewed on animateclay.com!

Hey there!

Thank you all so much for the interest my project has received. I was very surprised to find my recently completed animation ‘Guido’ reviewed on the homepage of animateclay.com. Thanks to Marc Spess interest in Guido has gone crazy!

Thanks again everyone,

Will

GUIDO IS HERE!!!

I’m not going to write much… but all I can say is THANKS!

Thanks to you for reading my blog, thanks to the great people at stopmotionanimtion.com for your support and thanks to my parents who have funded my project without hesitation. So without further a do. My final project.

GUIDO.