Now that we are moving into production of the animated cut scenes for the Hector: Fat Arse of the Law iApp ‘We Negotiate with Terrorists’ I though that I would give you an exclusive behind the scenes look at how we are animating the fat arse of the law himself.
There is rarely a day that goes by without someone saying to me ‘Straandlooper’s animation is fantastic! Tell me, how do you get the animation to look so realistic?’ Well, if you asked Hector animator Colin McCusker this question he would tell you that it takes years of training and an inherent God given gift to be able to create such realism in a 2D charcater. That, as well as devastating good looks, a silver tounge and a butt that won’t quit. But in actual fact I can now exclusively reveal that Colin is in fact over egging his role significantly.
In what will be quite a shock to the animation world, I can reveal that in a bold move, Straandlooper have decided to produce all of the animation for the Hector iApp using state of the art motion capture techniques.
For the un-initiatied, Motion capture, or mocap, is the term used to describe the process of recording movement and translating that movement onto a digital model. It refers to the recording of human actors actions, and using that information to animate digital character models in 3D animation. But Straandlooper are set to revolutionise the 2D animation industry by being the first company to use the technology for 2D animation.
Early footage is proving to be quite remarkable and I hope to be able to post some animation tests soon so that you can marvel at the results. While the production of the motion capture animation has seen an increase in our animation output, it has been absolute murder working with the actor cast to simulate Hector, Mr Harold Dixon-Balls. After being fired from his recurrent non-talking extra role in the jewel of the BBC’s afternoon programming ‘Doctors‘, for what the BBC are calling ‘artistic differences’, Harry was due to be turning out at the Grand Opera House in Belfast as second understudy to Widow Twankey in the upcoming production of Aladdin. That was until Straandlooper stepped in and offered him a role he couldn’t refuse. But working with Harry has been stretching the patience of every one on the team, not least Hector creator and director, Dean Burke. The usually calm and collected Dean snapped during one heated session when Harry asked for a sixth toilet break, before we had even finished attaching all of the markers to his body. Harry also insisted on having a larger marker for his genital region, despite Dean’s insistence that this was not necessary for the purposes of motion capture. This coupled with his questionable personal hygiene and penchant for large quantities of Amaretto, meant that the sessions were not without their difficulties. But then working with Colin has its difficulties too.
So keep checking back here on the blog for the results of the motion capture session to see how Hector will be looking in the first installment of the ‘Badge of Carnage’ trilogy of iApps.
