The Final Animation Post

       Well, here it is. Although I have had a lot of fun in this class and have done lots of cool things, this will be the last post for animation. I am moving on to bigger things and can no longer be held in this class.

       So for our Final project we had to team up with some friends and make a movie. But not just any movie, a blockbuster smash movie with all kinds of crazy effects. Just kidding, I mean this is high school, come on. Basically we had to make a movie using a green screen at least once and then use all of the types of effects we learned over the year. Which included using one 3D object made in Maya.

       What we first started off with was making an idea for the movie. Our original idea was making a robot fight, but later on it turned into super powers. Next we made this story board with such lovely pictures drawn by yours truly.  After that we went into the filming stage, where we began to film all of our shots. It took about a week to get all of our shots, and even then we still have one missing (we realized this after the movie was already made). The worst part about the filming was the Kansas weather where it was rainy when we started and then about 10 min. after we were done for the day it got nice again.

       Along the way I learned many things, for instance how to shoot mini blue spheres from my hand. Actually I learned that nothing will ever go the way you expect it to. We had to do certain scenes several times just to make sure we have the shot just right. I also learned that I now have more respect for movie makers because there job is stressful and hard to do. I learned that trying to make a fire beam is very hard work. It was also a learning experience when I was taught how to work a green screen.

       If I was to do this project differently I would definitely start with making sure the story is not so cheesy. I will admit that the story is not the greatest, but it's pretty good for high school. I would also make sure there are absolutely no shadows when doing the green screen. You can't really know how bad this is without actually experiencing it, but just trust me it's bad. We just covered it up with a dark image background. That is my friend Madison, the friend who is my sworn enemy in the movie is my other friend Tim. Click on his name to see his blog; Madison didn't want her blog on here.

       Something I would do the same would probably be the fact that it was fun while we were filming. Even though our scenes aren't the greatest, we still had a lot of fun doing it. I think that I will take a lot of the effects that I have learned how to do with me because they could work in a multitude of scenarios.

       All in all I would call this project done with and deserving a spot it all of the theaters of the world. But because i'm feeling nice, i'll let you watch it for free. (Click on watch)

Until I feel like typing again,

This is Jake Smith

The Final Web Post (at least for the year)

It is finally the end of the school year, i'm sure we are all very excited. As a final project we had to update our index page (Which you can see at www.eravensonline.net/students/674jrs22). Throughout all of this we put up some of the highlights of the year including a photo composition website, our own animated GIF's and so much more.











My favorite project would have to be the Real or Hoax site we did somewhere in the middle of the year. I have always loved the stories of myths and legends and read just about every available book there is on them. In this site we had to make pages for several stories and then show them all in a single website.

This summer I plan on going to a retreat called Stubenville. It is a great religious retreat where several churches come together to meet and deepen our faith for God. I also plan to hit the pool if it ever stops raining. Even though I will be doing that stuff I also plan to help out a little bit as well. There is a thing going on at my old elementary school where people can volunteer to make and then serve food for the kids who are unable to afford it during the summer.

Next year I plan to delve farther into Web Design. After taking it for a year i have found it to be very fun and would like to continue to do it. I also see as a small part of it, graphic design, so this way I can kind of learn two things in one class. Sure it isn't the main focus of the class but it is definitely needed when making a website. All in all this has been a pretty great year.

Until I feel like typing again,

This is Jake Smith