… going schizo …

I’m alternating between finishing the “Combat” music video and starting up the next one for the song “No Escape!”.

Combat:

I’ve settled on using the HV-20 footage I shot a few days back for the intro bomber sequence of the video. I have to try and find the right stretch of 5 seconds to fill the scene, and then animate a mask to remove my hand from the shot. I’m lucky that the plane has nice lines to cut along and I shot it against a fairly even blue screen.

I’m also getting some nice cloud results in After Effects CS3 by using the fractal noise generator and layering multiple cloud layers all moving at different speeds. Fun!

No Escape!:

I built up three more sets today; which brings my grand total to about 25 seconds of animation. Completed animation. It’s cruisin’ along at a fast pace due to the sheer simplicity of the style (20×20 pixel graphics with 256 colors).

I need to get into more character design. I have rough sketches for the two leads, and some discarded ideas I can use as background characters … but there is still much to be done. I have to slip into that part of my brain that remembers all the cryptic and ambiguous shapes from old school video games. (what is that brown square with two red dots on its side????)

I’ve also decided to run the music video at 30 fps to better simulate the look of the classic consoles.