redwhite mt

I recently got asked to answer some questions fot REDWHITEmt, a local blog that covers design-related articles.
Click here to read the full article.

New Website Up

Today I decided that it was about time that I purchased my own domain and started working on a crude version of a personal portfolio site, www.meliandrea.com. At the moment all I've uploaded is an interactive research report related to Swiss Design & ITS.

I plan to work on this site during the summer, alongside the other dozen projects I'd like to complete during the holidays.

- Andrea

For the Motherland!

I'm 1/2 done with the artwork for the game I'm working on, codenamed Project: Crayfish, the process is taking way longer than I expected. I guess that's what happens when decided to make a game and produce work for school during the same timeframe.

However, I keep getting more ideas for unnatural characters, weapons and some more twists for the storyline which keeps me motivated to keep working on this project.

Even though I had planned to log my 'drawing sessions' for the game's artwork from day one I tended to draw the characters and items in between 'school-work' sessions and use Project: Crayfish as my 15-30 min break. Yesterday was different, I decided to work for an hour or so without 'breaks' and worked on one of the enemies in the game which I based on Russian Babushkas.

Project: Crayfish - Babushka Speedpaint from Andrea Meli on Vimeo.

I'll keep working on the artwork this week so that Molkman can continue developing the engine. I'll try and make another speed-paint video when I'll work on something interesting.

The Five Senses

Instead of focusing on animation, this week I finished off a part of one of my school assignments related to Communicating with Images. This particular task dealt with coming up with different ways of representing the Five Senses - this is what I came up with.

Apart from other work, I continued developing some artwork for a flash game I'm working on; I'd love to complete the game before the beginning of summer but I doubt that will happen - life's too busy (not that I'm complaining :P)

I might work on another animation this week but I need to get some written work done too, I'll try some more 3D maybe.

- Andrea

[edit: updated 'sight' image]
[edit: updated 'smell' image]

The Crystals

This week I tried out some more 'experimental' 3D animations with morphing sharp-edged objects. I came across this effect by 'mistake' when I was trying out another animation idea I had in mind - some experimental mistakes do turn out right after all :P I played around with some morph effects in After Effects too and applied them to circles to create a sound-wave effect.

This week I'll be finalising my storyboards for my final animation and get working on some more graphics for my flash game.

The Crystal I from Andrea Meli on Vimeo.

The Crystal II from Andrea Meli on Vimeo.

- Andrea

Flynn Lives

After Effects has become pretty addicting now. Even though I'm still getting the hang of animating characters in AE, I took a break from working on the animation I mentioned in my previous post. I decided to make another compositing experiment and animated Tron-stylized text in Cinema 4D and move to aftereffects to add glows, 3d layers, bokeh, etc, with the sound and final export done in Premiere. I worked on this project for about two afternoons and I'm quite pleased with the final result.

I'd like to get some blue/green scree footage and try and blend video with some 3d next, till then I'll keep experimenting.

Bomblu: Revolution from Andrea Meli on Vimeo.

- Andrea

Taking the BP Oil Monster to the next dimension

Now that I'm getting more confident with using After Effects, I decided to produce a short semi-animated short using none other than my Deepwater Horizon illustration. 3D Layers are brilliant for 2.5D (next step, turning a Flash short into a 2.5D animatic) and enabling Motion Blur multiplies the render time by quite a bit (though it was worth the wait, it look way smoother now.) I also tried my hand at using Premiere Pro to add the audio, since After Effects added small pop's to the song in random places.

I also started a very short, slightly abstract animation yesterday evening; I illustrated the scenes in Flash and started to animate it in After Effects, I'll be working on it this weekend.

Deepwater Horizon from Andrea Meli on Vimeo.

- Andrea