IT LOOKS LIKE CHRISTMAS...

Here it is ... Christmas Eve. the stockings are stuffed ... packages are wrapped and I've gained weight. Things are right on track.

While I sit here in a stupor caused from feasting, I want to reflect on my ... I think ... my 8th online Christmas card. It started with a simple picture and playing , "Here Comes Santa Claus" on Yoko's dulcimer. Over the year's I have explored different programs ... different methods. The common element ... at least one of them is the lack of time to do what I really want to do.

This year was no different. I started by being almost finished a month ago. I had Scrooge and the Ghost of Christmas Present flying through London. But I wasn't happy with it. The Street scenes did not merge well enough. So I decided to go another direction.

I took "Aunt Rhodie" and changed the lyrics to a warning about her bringing fruitcake. I made the puppets in Photoshop and recorded the sound track. Then life intervened and I found me short of time and making compromises.



I can only move on and enjoy the successes I enjoyed on this year's card. In some ways it is the slickest of the cards I have done to this point. The background was painted and I animated Rhodie's hat flower. I did not get the snow done or the sophistication and detail of the animation I wanted . But the base is there and people laughed.

My current plan is to renew the push to get the first 3 Dulci-toons done and start next years card. Time will see if I can pull this off.

FELIX WALKS ON

There use to be a price to be paid for me getting them into the Magic Kingdom.

A penny to put in the mutoscope at the Penny Arcade on Mai Street. What is a Mutoscope you ask? It is a mechanized flip book. The frames are printed on stiff paper and attached to a drum. You turn a crank and the the pictures are flipped in front of a slot.

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I fell in love with these things going to a restaurant called Aunt Hattie's. And I remember spending an afternoon at the state fair with a whole tent full of these marvels. The third time around I was watching them frame by frame. I think the barker was glad to see me go,

The one mutoscope that I would spend all those pennies on in Main Street had a Felix the Cat cartoon.



Now this always seemed to be poetic justice ... that in the land of the Mouse that Felix the Mickey of the silent era would be there.

So Felix is my first attempt at a walk using cutouts in Flash. This took me about 3 hours or maybe 4, Lost count, to do about 5 seconds.




It came ok for baby steps. I am 2 frames off. 14 instead 12. 12 will give ma a more musical rhythm beat.Still a learning lesson.

I'VE BEEN A BAAAAAAD BOY

Been working on a character ... a female barbarian named, Conanna. Just something I came up with at work. Been working on a design for some time now. Wanted to see what she would look like in Flash ... with minimal effort.

Geraldine Mc Bong Bong from John Morgan on Vimeo.

So I'm sort of happy with it. 2 hours worth of work involved. Think I'd like to see her in Toon Boom ... or perhaps play around with the rendering process.

One distinct problem is dealing with the color tiles. I have problems picking colors in this program. Yes, I am color blind ... but this goes beyond this. I can navigate other programs. Photoshop ... Painter X ... Toon Boom ...

Maybe I will have to resort to the number codes.

Thank You Big Time ... Sissy!!!

The only thing Della Ashton is besides extremely talented is giving and supportive.

I had the great fortune of meeting Della at the Mount Dora Dulcimer and Autohop Festival.She befriended a lone fellow wandering in a dulci-uphoric haze. She suggested a gathering that became the Jam'N'Que , an acoustic (dulcimer oriented) jam/bar-b-que. I have seen her grow in skill and enrich other's lives mine included.

Della was sweet enough to record "Hail to the Chief" for me. I will use it for the series Dulci-Toons: Presidential Dulcimers. I have the first planned out ... actually I have the first 3 planned ... and tentatively it will be the 4th Dulci-Toon.

Now I have songs by 3 artists ... Stephen Seifert, John Hawk/John Cole and now Della Ashton.

Thanks Della!

40 HOUR WEEK

I think Yoko is still shaking her head.

All this week, I have been working on my Dulci-Toons cartoons. Maybe not hard enough .... But Hey!!! It is vacation.

I have been working on my changes I wanted to ... needed to make to something that was already finished. But there were 3 parts that didn't quite work. The first was a part that was where I yelled into the camera, "I'm crazy!!!" Redid it with a Terry Gilliam styled animation with me as a straight jacketed bobble head. Much better!

The second was the explanation of the work process and the amount of labor. Not wanting to try and match scenes, I did a montage of found footage with my voice over. Mucho Bettero!

Yesterday I started on the first piece I had started to redo. The ending. The scene is a combination of live action and rotoscope. I shot my part in front of a green screen, with the idea of running it through a filter in Photoshop to give it a drawn look. The problem was that I did not think it was strong enough. So using the drawing tablet and Photoshop I am taking every grabbed frame (30 frames per second) and am drawing over them. I'm afraid they will be a little wobbly (there is a learning curve in this ... Hell, there's a learning curve in just using the tablet) but it will just make it look more of a drawing.

Maybe I should of listened to my own montage. The old method of filtering the drawing took appropriately 3 minutes to render. The drawing takes 5 times as long. At 4 an hour, we are looking at 25 hours left of work. In total ... 4o hours for about 4 seconds of footage.

Makes me think ... I want to do quality work ... but it takes so long. And I got some ideas on how to make this work ... I'm just not sure. I've just seen a whole bunch of UPA shorts. Don't know if I ever really saw these ... except for the Magoos. But this style would really work for Flash. but do I want to redesign EVERYTHING again. I need to look at the Snuffy Smiths and get Beany/Cecil and Rocky/Bullwinkle and really study them. The nuts and bolts. Can I use them to get things out in a reasonable time?

Time will tell.

Call it research ... Yeah that's it ...

Okay ... I've been a BAAAAAAD boy!!!

Vacation is half over. The plan was to work on projects. And yes I have been working on such ... Yesterday, I got the cartoon montage done. It belongs to my introduction to Dulcitooons , I had collected my shots. Footage of Windsor McCay, Nina Paely and a Van Beuren cartoon. I had a shot of Walt Disney pointing to a drawing on a story board that I animated. Funny story ... when I told Yoko what I was doing ... I said I was animating "Walt." She thought I meant Walt "Deanovich" ... a dear friend of mine. The Van Beuren cartoon is in public domain. It's subject is the cartoon process. Paley espouses reverse copyrights where you can make a derivative work so I used her "Sita" to illustrate the artist animator.

This I reedited with a narrative I wrote. But the program was a little wonky. Each time I edited a clip the sound track would go bad ... cut. This slowed the process and it took me much longer.

Seems to be SOP (Standard Operating Procedure) ... perhaps I should name the studio "Snail's Pace."

Today I hope to redo the "I'm crazy!!!" part. A whopping 4 secs . Shouldn't take me more than 2 days :)

I have been moving slower because I should be working from morning to night ... but I'm not. I have been watching cartoons and making copies for Mike and Walt. Christmas is right around the corner. Been studying the Terry Toons. Wish Walt was closer to get him to do work for these. I would love to for him to do backgrounds. Am on the last disc of the UPA cartoons. These are the granddaddy of Flash cartoons ... if artfully done. Makes me think about redoing the the cartoons that way.

Hmmmm. I could do a parody ... a "homage" ... Was thinking of doing a "DPA" or "UDA" using the UPA logo with picks.

Could work ...

Could be fun ...

Now if my vacation was only longer ...

I GET BY WITH SOME HELP FROM MY FRIENDS.

Went back and took a look at "Dulcitoons 000" ... I need to redo about 3 sections. The first is where I talk about the time involved and the progress involved. I have a series of clips to insert. The next is where I extoll the one quality to do this project. I have found the clip art/stock photos needed. And lastly, I have to redo the end. This is about half done.

I have vacation coming up in 3 days. I will have 5 days to work on this and to get to work on the other two.

I have a talented friend, Della Ashton, who is being kind enough to record "Hail to the Chief." And this weekend to my surprise, I was contacted by Lauri Cole. She and her husband, John have a recording studio. They recorded John Hawks and his new album. John Hawk is an amazing player. They all saw my posted character Gee Cee the grey cat on Facebook. They kindly offered his newly recorded cut of "Grey Cat on a Tennessee Farm." With the tracks already laid down by Stephen Seifert, I will have some real talent on this project.

Now if only I can show some talent.

PROGRESS

Just thought I'd update my last post. I am at this writing a third done with the animation of the rotoscoping I was planning to do. not bad progress and with a little luck I should have it done by next week as long as we aren't hit by a hurricane or something. I am at the moment very pleased at the results and this is more the effect I was hoping for. The nice thing about rotoscoping in Photoshop is that you can separate the drawing on layers so that you don't have to constantly redo section that stay still.

Am currently working on the design of the character Lil' Liza Jane. I think there too I am making progress . But don't hold me to it.

Mulligan Syndrome

Mulligan in golf

In golf, a mulligan is a retaken shot on the first tee box, usually due to a previously errant one. Traditionally, mulligans are allowed only on the first tee shot (one per round) and are not just taken at any time of the golfer's choosing. It is sometimes called a "Finnegan" when the second shot is worse than the first. Golf tournaments held for charity may even sell mulligans to collect more money for the charity.

I recently have come to the realization that I suffer from yet another malady. Arthritis, colitis, nearsightedness, cataracts, no thyroid and diabetes. And now ... Mulligan Syndrome. This disease causes one to desire to redo things. Correct mistakes. Yoko thinks I should just let things go ... and she's right.

In design work ... I an constantly redesigning. Poor Carl and Danny. I have used them as sound boards, getting their opinions over minor details. I've forgotten how many versions of Old Joe Clark I've done. I've been fussing ... am fussing ... over every detail.

Sometimes I think it stands in the way of getting things done. Sometimes I think it's the only way to get things done.

I took a chance and found what pieces of Dulci-Toon #000. With these I can redo the ending. What I did with the ending was to separate the image from the green screen, run it through filters to make it look like a cartoon. I did every other frame so it came out a little jerky. And the capture devise has to be watched that it doesn't jump frames.

So this time, I'm using a 30 frame a second frame rate. I have carefully extracted each and every frame. and will in Photoshop rotoscope in a more traditional manner. This will make the effect I was looking for in the first place. About 300 drawings worth.

I have another sequence to redo as well that I will try and animate in Flash. The piece it will replace is an example of settling. I have one more section to insert as well.

This will commit me to doing the original cartoon that I had hope to use this as a set up for.

I can do this.

I can finish this.

Really.

Can I rewrite this post?

Turn ... Turn ... Turn ...

The clip below is a test for a section of OJC ... it's for the line "Round and around Old Joe Clark/Round and round it goes/Round and around Old Joe Clark/ Whats old is new again."

Spin 2 from John Morgan on Vimeo.

This was done in Flash by creating a symbol and then 2 copies on different layers different directions and coloring. The top two layers were on a lower alpha unit. When I re do this I will probably want to use a drop shadow filter.

Valentine's Day Card 2011

This is the Valentine's Day card I did for my wife, Yoko. It is very limited digital puppet animation. Did I mention it was limited animation. Done in a very short time, I recorded the musical piece in Audocity. The character are based on our pets, the cats Fergie and Jo Jo and our dog Elvis. They were done in Photoshop and imported in Flash. Considering the time constraints I think it came out well.

valantinecard from John Morgan on Vimeo.

Sweat Box 69 003

Further experimentation with the green screen. This is a little more successful.

Sweat Box 003 from John Morgan on Vimeo.

Sweat Box 69 002

An experiment with green screens. I had problem with the background and could not get it to sync up. Needed to be done at 30 frames per second. It was a failed project, originally a test for commercial for the Gail Knapp Memorial Dulcimer Fund, a charity to help provide dulcimers for those who couldn't afford them themselves. It was determined that this might cause too much a strain on the participants running the charity itself.

Sweatbox 69 Assignment 002 from John Morgan on Vimeo.

Sweat Box 69 001

Here is the new version of my video blog. The first episode is about doing the titles to said blog.

sweatbox001 from John Morgan on Vimeo.

Lost Weekend

I'm sitting here on the couch seeing my weekend ... once again slip away.

My back is out. I am not only tethered on line but to the heating pad. Soooo ... I'm overdue to catch up.

This project has gone one far too long. So long ... even I have lost count. The years and the amount of times I have started from scratch ... yet again. But it's not like I haven't made progress. I actually have a "Dulci-toon" finished ... the problem is that it is not the first one. That one at least the work I had done was all lost as the external hard drive crashed (literally) when it was knocked off the shelf of the coffee table by Fergie, our cat. It is for the best as I will do it better ... but once again I am at square one.

Here is what I have accomplished:

1.) I have created my company banner or titles.

2.) I have created opening titles.

3.) A commercial

4.) End titles

5.) and an ending bumper.

All the above can be re-edited or simply tacked on to new episodes leaving me to just have to work on the content of the cartoon.

6.) I have gotten the help of Stephen Seifert to work on the Old Joe Clark episodes.

7.) I have worked on character designs for the characters Old Joe Clark and Aunt Rhodie.

The real challenge is that I have now developed diabetes and had my thyroid removed. It is imperative for me to loose weight ... so that takes up much of my time. Between that, work , husbandly duties the lawn and practicing my dulcimer and the cigar box guitar and learning new techniques and programs ... there is little time for such a time consuming activity but somehow I find that time.

Oh yeah 3 blogs and a web site ... including this one ... I hope to have time to blog this one too.

Walt ... Not Disney

Miracles do happen.

No I didn't finish an animated cartoons ... No My forces are still pretty scattered. I fussing over my titles. Rethinking the music.

But after 20 years I've been contacted by my good friend Walter Deanovich. Walt and I met in college, in one of my art classes. I think it was Comp I. He invited me to a friend's house. There I met Mike, Martin and Sue. And it was at Mike's, that we would gather to watch movies. No ... not DVDs! Not VHS tapes! Super 8 and 8mm! Mike would project them on a screen that was as big as his bay window. And they were silent.

Once a week we would all gather. We all collected films from Blackhawk. Mike had the biggest disposable income and wow!!! I can't believe what he collected. Walt and Mike were so knowledgeable ... I learned more from them than any of my professors at college. This was my real school.

However, when I left for Disney, we parted company. Mike moved to Ohio ... Martin and Sue left for West Virginia. Walt was left alone in St Pete. Life was not kind . I kept in sort of contact with Mike. But It wasn't until about a month ago we all reconnected with Walt.

Thank God for Facebook!!!

A Grant

Just when things looked bleak ... it seems as if I got a royal grant for improvements to the studio. This means a new computer! I just did a wedding video for a daughter of a friend of Yoko. My valiant little laptop crashed 5 times. It just doesn't have enough chug. I had done my title bumper and while everything seemed okay in test mode it would not render the final product.

Lady Sylvia gave me a budget that was much larger than I was looking ... and words of wisdom. Don't scrimp. Still when I first started looking at buying I was amazed. Dell wanted $3000 for a top of the line computer. Ernie pointed me in the right direction and I decided because of my needs to go with the I7 processor. I found a Dell at Best Buy. And pricing around it was cheaper than all the rest of the compreable models. Even Dell!!! Why is it that the same specs on a Dell computer from THEIR site is $400 dollars more.

The new computer is up but not running. Toon Boom is loaded (something even Ernie couldn't do with the laptop.) I am getting a KVM switch cable to connect my old computer and new to the monitor, mouse and keyboard. And somewhere I need to find a mini jack y splitter with ONE female and TWO males. Sounds dirty ... huh?

The Instructions are in Ancent Aramaric...

One of the things I am trying to do is take the segments, put them in order and publish them. So I went and got out 3 books ... and while they explain what to do ... they don't tell you what to do if you made this and saved it as itself ... on it's own.

So here's what you do.

Open the first film to be your segment. Minimize it. Open the next intended segment. Select ALL the frames and right click. From the directory choose copy frames. Then close the movie. Reopen the first. Open the windows and open segments. Open another segment ... select the first frame and right click. From the menu choose paste frames.

This will create the new segment. You repeat for each scene and then publish.

Some Real Progress

This last weekend, I made some real progress.

Finally.

I redid the ihop commercial . It was basically the same material as I used the first time. But this time it was done tighter. The time bar is much slicker. I am learning.

I did the end titles. I reused and colored the black and white title holder and added the credits. It worked great.

I did the Dulci-Toon cartoon titles. I can't believe I did most of it in Flash. I'm learning to do vector work. Who would of thought it? I came out better than I thought.

I made the web page on the fldulcimer site. I set up Dulcitoons 000 on Vimeo and embedded the video on the web page.

We're getting there. Now I have to do the ACME titles ... the Zen Doodle titles ... and the cartoon itself.

We're getting there.

A STEP FORWARD ...

A step backward.

We have made some progress. I have set up a cafe press site, a Vimeo site and did a header . Settled on a frame rate. (12)Things are moving along ... I even found a program to make kaledioscopes. This should help on not only my De Fine Nations cartoons, but my Old Joe Clark. The step back in a major moonwalk is the loss of my backup drive with all the finished drawings for my cartoon. It went crashing to floor ... and that was the end of that. Tried taking it to Best Buy but no luck. I still have some the paper drawings.

Back to ... well ... square 2.

Guess I need to back up the back up!