Toni Haythornwhite's Blog

Today I have had my first meeting about my Individual Project, and I am happy to say that it went really well... My supervisor really likes the concept of the idea, and is really surprised that I want to start filming this weekend. My very good friend jayde has agreed to be my actress, which I am so happy about as I know she will do a fantastic job :) The only problem he had with the progression of my project is that I need to research how my visual effects will work within my scenes and plan out my scenes in detail. I am happy to say that I managed to complete a walkthrough of my scene/shots which is something to tick off the list. I am also planning this week to complete my HDRs for my scenes. Im just hoping the weather will work in my favour. When I have some more info I will update on here... Other things at uni have evolved.... Tommorow my design for indusrty group are meeting up to come up with a detailed storyboard for our project idea, which is to create a short an...

Finally I can offical say that on tuesday, I presented my pitch for my Individual Project. So I can now share my idea and story on here... I have decided to create a short live action film with added visual effects. I am basing my story on the elements of Time Travel and also Parallel worlds. The story will follow a girl who is walking along a road back to her home, where she closes her eyes and opens them to find she has gone back in time and at the foot of a small country lane. She walks along the lane and see's many strange and unique elements. Continuing on the lane she starts to get scared and tries to run back and then finds herself transported to a dense, dark woods. Again scared and confused she tries to find a way out, when she gets the sense that something or someone is following her. She quickly turns around to find a replica staring at her. With this the girl walks up to her other self with confusen, she startes into her face when the replica brings her hand to her f...

Well today I had my green light pitch meeting for Individual Specialisation, and Im pleased to say that it went well. The only thing I had to change is the title, so my new title is A comparison of techniques for crowd simulation. I am really looking foward to this module, even though most of it is research, I know I will find this interesting and something new to learn and discover. Also today me and my group had our first team meeting for design for indusrty. The project for this is to create an animation piece on how to drive responsible, and present this in a fun and engaging way. For the group we had to assign ourselves roles through the belbin test... and guess what I got... TEAM LEADER... I have to say I am shocked by this because I dont see myself as a team leader, but on the other hand I am happy with this as it gives me a chance to show what skills I have and also give my some experience for working together in groups and showing some leader skills... Tomorrow we ha...

As of next week I will be pitching my ideas for both my Individual Project and Individual Specialisation. Im not going to go into detail on my Individual Project as of yet as I want to keep my idea under wraps until I have presented it... But I am more than happy to share with you my idea for my specialisation project... Basically the course Individual Specialisation consists of me chosing a subject of my choice and researching this in great detail and presenting my findings in a report and video log. Because I am very keen on the VFX industry I am proposing my research on how VFX make the impossible possible or how VFX can save money for the industry. I can not say that I will get to do these topics, as I have to discuss this with my tutor tommorow... but fingers crossed I will be able to pitch one of these ideas for my presentaion next week. When I have presented both these pitches and have been given the green light go ahead I will post these on here for you all to see......

So after nearly four months of me time and some amazing televison and film releases, I am back at university for my final year... dum dum dum! :) I started back on Monday and was allready thrown into the requirements of my final year project. Basicaly the final year project is based on my own ideas to create a short animation piece which is then presented at the end of the year. I have to say that I am really looking foward to this, I have even come up with an idea and have started sketching designs and started on my presentation... fingers crossed my idea can be passed and I can start properly :) *When I have presented my presentation, I will place it on here! I also have another module, Individual Specialization. This module consist of chosing a specialisum and researching in depth and presenting this in a short video. I have over 60 options to choose from or I can do something of my own liking, but it must be approved by my tutor. I am a bit unsure of what I am going...

I know that I left uni like 2 months ago, but now I have decided to do some summer work to improve my knowlage and understanding of the industry. I have decided to concentrate on the field of matchmoving and also the use of nuke. My idea for this is to go and film a short scene and then incorporate a model into this, and hopefully make it look good. I also want to make a breakdown so that the process can be shown in the stages of production and help me with my final project... I have actually come up with many ideas for my final project and is really excited on starting.... not getting to carried away I have started drawing down my character designs and features... I am also going to compose a rough time scale for what I want to do for the project such as filming weeks, animation ect... Hopefully my idea will be accepted and then I can start properly lol.... I will try and keep up to date on my progress on here and hopefully produce some good lookin animation and footage lol :D...

Well 2 day, I can say that I am half way through completing my VFX work... it has tooks some long nights and hours but all of my rendering is complete.... I can also say that I am onto the motionbuilder stages of my motion capture as well... which hopefully if I dont start slacking i could complete this before the deadline... Also I have my presentation on 3rd May which I am not lookin foward to as I had doing presentation in front of a massive audience. I can say that this type of work takes time and comitment which is something I need to put into practise for next year... if I pass lol :P Also would like to make a point that the finale of True Blood season 4 was like totally awsome... cant wait for season 5.... Will write back soon...

With my first week back at uni, I am up to my eyeballs in uni work and I only have two weeks to complete everything.... So as you can imagined I am stressing abit.... I have managed to nearly complete my lighting project which took two days to render which was a right joke... but I have to admit the images and my scene look really well... I have also nearly completed my Motion Capture project as well... just need to imort everything into moton builder and should be completed. The one project that I can be doin with is he animation appreciation module as i find it to be boring and not helpfull in anyway so i will be glad to see the back of it lol :D Just my visual effects work to do and i will have finished my second year at university.... lets just hope I pass everything :D Will write back soon ....

Well today I have been really lazy and not done anything... Yesturday I managed to complete another model for my VFX module and have also made more progress on my lighitng project. Having looked through tutorials over the internet and books, I feel like I might restart my scene because I feel like its not working out and will start with the basics again. I have just remembered that I have also to complete both reports for both my lighting and motion capture module... also need to start the report for my VFX... At the end of the day I have quite a lot to do but I have been distracted with the tv at the moment... what with True Blood and the shocking finalie of ANTM Allstars last night was fab... really pleased that Lisa won and I wish here all the best for her modeling carrer :) For the past half hour I have been experimenting with my lighting scene in maya and I am getting really frustrated. I am happy with the lighting in my scene as it looks dark and creepy and this being ...

Hiya... Today I decided to crack on with my uni work so that I could enjoy the rest of my easter holidays, so I decided to do the one think that I dreaded the most... Tracking (Matchmoving). From my previous experience it was a living hell to complete and following the tutorial I have to say it was going extremely well.... until the dreaded software decided to tell me that I could not complete the task due to my software licence. Because I am a student I can get software from certain companies but it failed to tell me that not all of the features will work.... so you can take it from me I am fumming...... This means that on thursday I was going in to uni to catch up on two subjects now it gone to three... was hoping for a quick days work and now it looks like Im gonna be there for a while...... But luckly I can be cracking on with my texturing. The project I am working on is to texture and track some items into some footage and make it look realsitic. So far I have completed o...

Well I have finally finished uni for 2 weeks... and I am so thrilled lol :) This gives me the oppertunity to gets so me time and also complete so of my work before I go back... My plan of action is to start tomorow on my VFX work as I feel this is the main priority as I have quite a lot to complete. Also the final of ANTM Allstar finishes tomorow so I want to complete some work before hand as I believe this is one not to be missed. I am going back into uni on thursday with sophie so we can complete our motion capture cleanup on vicon blade so then I can work on appling the movement onto my character. Also we are meeting to put together our presentation for animation appreciation. To be truthfull I am not looking foward to the presentation as my presention skills are pants and I am really nervous about speaking infont of an audience. Also I plan on finishing my lighting project and completing the report to follow. Hopefully I will keep to my word and complete these task before I retu...

Again I have not on here for a while... and I have much to talk about... It's nearly the easter weeks off and once again I am piled up with work... but at least this it's work that I am actually enjoying lol, also I am quite surprise that I am managing with my work while the forth series of True Blood is underway and what can I say this just might be the best series yet... lol :) I am currently nearing the end of my second year and I am finallydoing the one module that I have wanted to do from the start... VFX (Visual Effects) I have to say that I am really enjoying this module and can see myself doing this for a carrer, but I know that its not gonna be easy... never knew that the process of this artform was so technical and also presise. But I am willing to work hard and try to out do myself.... just need to put the time and effort in lol. I am also enjoying Mocap and agian never knew that it would envolve so much... like the process are again challenging and quite techn...

Well it has been a while since I wrote on ere, and alot has happened... well for starters I have to say that the module this semester are in a word ... FAB ;D I am really enjoying the work so far and is willing to learn more... First things first... i have fractured and sprained my wrist so they may be a few spelling mistakes lol ... Today I have had the lighting and rendering module and it has been really good and interesting. Never thought off all the different concepts for lighting a scene in maya could be quite technical and time consuming, but the effects look good in the end ( will put images on at a later date...) What I am really looking foward to is the motion capture that I have on wensdays... the idea for my capture is to record the movement of a runway model.... this came to be because of course I am a massive ANTM fan woop... Tyra Banks your awsome :)... the only problem is that I have no runway model friends so I will have to be doing the walking.... lets hope it ...

Well from today I have finished my first week of my second semester... and what can I say I am really enjoying my modules. I am really excited to finaly be doing the special effects and motion capture as I really wanted to do these since I started uni.... but you know what the say... you save the best things to last :D Today I have had the lighting and rendering module and I really think this module is going to be exciting and most of all enjoyable. I need to really decided on what scene I am going to be working on for the project... these modules can be seen on www.3drender.com For motion capture I need to come up with an idea for my project which I kind of have a idea but feel that I can improve, also I need to find some one to act for my idea.... and I dont think many people will voulenter lol For Special effects I need to be looking at the tutorials and reading the book.... with the amount of books I have now for uni I can start my own libary lol Will write back when I ha...