Applied Animation: Documentary - Fenrir Colour and Shading

Applied Animation

Documentary - Fenrir Colour and Shading

• This week:
• I worked on the colouring, shading and highlights for one of Fenrirs' scenes. I additionally found ways of improving on aspects I had noted in my previous blog-post.
• What went well:
• The colour process was previously quite tedious, as I had not fully understood the software yet, however I managed to figure out and learn some short-cuts and tricks which helped the colouring and shading process speed up.
• I started by colouring the breath animation and then adding a blur effect to this. This straight away improved the look and appeal of the breath, making it seem more realistic.

• After quickly colouring the flat-colours, I then went on to shading. This was the longest part of the colouring process, previously, however I had found a better way of colouring, using the select by colour tool. This meant that I could select a line of the same colour and delete it. I drew a red line, with the pencil tool, to indicate where I wanted the shading, went back and filled in the shading and then a third time to remove the red line. This made the process a lot faster.

 Flat-colours:

Select by colour tool in Toon Boom assisted with the shading process:

• Then, the highlights were added to keep the same consistency and contrast similarly to the Jormungandr scenes. I made adjustments to the tail animation, so it would occur just after Fenrir turns his head, so it's more noticeable, as I had mentioned that in my previous post.
• Here is the final shot: (the colours are slightly compressed as it is a GIF)

• What could be improved:
• I think that next time I do this it will be much quicker and smoother, as some of the shading lines do wobble a little bit.
• Another thing I wanted to note was the possibility of adding light snow-fall or mist to the scene in post-production, as it would really add more to the atmosphere and illustrate the coldness of the scene. This is something I will keep in mind once the documentary is ready to edit.
• Next week:
• I will be working on the puppet animated scenes for Fenrir.