Whilst I am doing some animation and getting on with things, I need to make sure that all of the scenes are ready for the 2nd years and any other animators to take and get on with. I made separate files for each scene last week, however I now realise I need to make it absolutely clear to the people I give the scenes to, what needs to be done. So Andy suggested that for each of the scenes I actually set it up completely in animate pro, layout and instructions and key frames all timed out and ready to go, so that the animation comes back looking exactly how it was planned to...hopefully! So today I have been doing a lot more organising, and going through scene by scene, putting backgrounds into scenes and adding key frames and notes. By doing this it is making it easier to also see how the scenes are going to connect and any problems we may have. It also cuts down the animation in places as where some scenes cut, there is a lot less animation needed. I feel a lot more organised having started to do this, and I feel like the actual amount of animation to do is more manageable as once I have gone through them all the key frames are basically there. After doing this, I'm hoping to put the rough animated scenes and some more completed scenes into the animatic. this will replace the drawn stills and it means it will start to look a bit more like an animation and will come together a bit more. It also means I can keep Les, who is creating the music more up to date with how all the scenes will look and the length of them etc.

Below is an example of the way I am laying out the scenes, showing on the the keyframes and some notes to the animator about what is happening or key things that need to be in shot.






I am yet to have the animatic with completed scenes, but hopefully on monday I'll be able to use the program I need to do this. I am hoping to get the first half of the animation all completely sorted out into scene files and animate pro files by monday so that I can start giving them out to 2nd years and happy helpers :) Hopefully I can get a bit more animation done as well, but this weekend my dissertation needs to come first.