Monday 18 April 2016

The Sixth Sense (1999) Review.

The Sixth Sense Poster
The Sixth Sense is a 1999 Drama, Thriller with hints of Mystery if you watch it a second time, trying to figure out how you didn't see the ending twist coming. Directed and Written by M Night Shyamalan, this heartfelt story of a boy struggling with society thanks to he's gift and he finds salvation and help by a child Psychologist who is determined to help him through this struggle and in the end he too will find a shocking truth a bit too close to home.

The movie starts off with Dr Malcolm Crowe (Bruce Willis) accomplishing an award to which he later finds, thanks to an ex-client of his, he doesn't deserve it which leads to him being critically injured and that changes his life for pretty much the worst. the movie moves to sometime in the fall where we see Malcolm attempting to connect and befriend a boy called Cole Sear (Hayley Joel Osment) who in his eyes is in need of help even if he doesn't want it. The story is centered around these two characters as they attempt to get back into their lives; Cole trying to be accepted by his fellow peers as well as his mother while trying to live with the fact that he can see people who don't know their dead, and Malcolm trying to find repentance for his failure to help someone in need and tries to help Cole while also trying to save his marriage. But the only thing people will be interested in is the all to obvious twist at the end.
A Happy Marriage
Turns to complications
The story aside, the thing that made this movie successful was the brilliant performance by both Willis and Osment, on their own their characters were well played but together made the scenes all too real, it really showed that this could of been a potential event outside of the movie.
Although in some scenes the acting wasn't really on par with others and in some scenes it will be hard to hear certain dialogues especially for those with muffled hearing, but you really can't blame the movie on these flaws just as this reviewer is;
Another "could-have-been" film, another almost successful compromise, another intelligent flick done in by its misplaced and worn-out star. Dayanna Stetco - Metro Times - August 27 2013.

The one critic that this reviewer will let slide for it's relevance in the story is their being too many Red Hearings that give away the all to obvious twist at the end of the movie.

Why this is a spoiler risk is unbeknownst to this reviewer, the movies been out since 1999, surprised it hasn't been spoiled for you yet but just in case their is someone reading this who hasn't seen the movie (Then why are you reading this?) Here it is.

SPOILER WARNING!

From the start of the movie it is quite obvious how this story is going to play out and that you will be following a Ghost around as he plays one of the two protagonist. From what can be shown, there wasn't really any need for him to get shot at the beginning if he was going to live any way, you could of just had the guy shoot himself and have Malcolm contemplate on that and feel guilty that he couldn't save him and is determined to save others but at the risk of his own marriage, to which this movie was showing, the whole ghost thing is unnecessary unless you plan on having your audience go from a tear fest to a what happened expression. Now the shooting was the only red hearing floating around. If you were to pick up on the fact that he is now a ghost from the beginning and start looking at the movie as a ghost movie (why wouldn't you, it is a horror ghost movie after all) you will start seeing slight hints at what Malcolm can and can't do.
Miraculous Recovery?
Firstly, the fact that he is being upright Ignored by everyone he has encountered apart from the one person who can actually hear and see him. This isn't something to hate on because M N Shamalan did a pretty good job of covering this up with certain scenes, but if your looking for it you'll notice it.
Driver making a hasty get away?
Are there really complications?
Not a single word was exchanged between the two
Secondly, he never changes clothes, again nothing to hate on because it can be explained that he's going through hard times at home and is determined to help this boy that he hasn't had time for hygiene. 

Now credit is given where credit is due, this movie did a superb job at keeping the viewer in suspense and double guessing with it's quick answers to the questions it gives, and once you have watched it once and you go back in a second time you'll hate yourself for not noticing sooner.
Overall, a well put on story with great casting followed by well done acting that will leave those who weren't  looking scratching their heads and those who were a pat on the back for successfully guessing the ending.

Image Bibliogarphy
Image 7;

Image 6;

Image 2;

Poster

Bibliography
Dayanna Stetco - Metro Times - August 27 2013

Maya Tutorials; Skinning Method 1







Friday 8 April 2016

Fantastic Voyage; Orphographs

360 Turnabouts of the characters that was used for modelling.

B-Cell

T-Cell

Plasma Cell

Memory Cell

Macrophage

Thursday 7 April 2016

Fantastic Voyage; Blood Tunnels Texturing

showing the process of the tex for the tunnels, looking good so far, may take a few things out and try something new but it's looking good (from my perspective).





Tuesday 5 April 2016

Fantastic Voyage; Set Design, Blood Tunnels



These are the shots of the non Textured version of the set. They look good how they are so if the texture doesn't work out then they'll look good his way.

One quick thing, does anyone know how to change the size and color of these particles in the particle effects area. I used to be able to know how to do it and used it quite often but that was back in the 2014 version of Maya and that method doesn't seemed to of transferred over. Highly appreciated.


Sunday 3 April 2016

Testing Renderman for Maya

Downloaded Renderman today and started testing it out on one of my scenes I'm working on that's still in progression.


It works pretty well with the Maya I have, still got alot of stuff to look at and work with, but it's different from Mental Ray. It will do.

Friday 1 April 2016

Fantastic Voyage; Wall Set Test

Testing some things out with the set, not sure if I'm liking where this went so I probably try something new, but I'll show it so you know what I'm talking about or if you have an opinion.

Light

No Light

Plane Sky

Spherical Sky

Sunday 27 March 2016

Flash Tutorials; Lip Sync Animation

The Rough Animation is done for the Lip Sync with Characters, It may be a bit fast but I'll be coming back to this eventually when I have more time but this is considered as the final piece. When I do come back to it I'll add color, better lining, and possibly a background, I just wanted to get this out of the way so I can move on to other things.

I would upload on Vimeo but the Processing and all that is literal garbage and takes forever.

Friday 25 March 2016

Fantastic Voyage; Model Test

Testing some modeling for the characters with different shaders on each one, I am planning on having animated textures for the face due to helpful feedback I have been given from various people.

Models are subject to change.






(Left to Right) B-Cell, T-Cell, Memory Cell, Macro-phage, Plasma Cell.

Thursday 17 March 2016

Animation ShowReel

First of I have to apologize for their being no Life Drawing animation or Stubborn Triangle animation in this reel. The fact is, a couple of weeks ago my computer crashed and I had to take it to the repairs, now they told me that none of my files were gone and that's true but recently I have found out that not all the files made it out and some were gone forever including the ones above. so I'm hoping that the files are at Uni and I can make a new reel later the same day but that will go pass the deadline, so instead of posting nothing I'm going to post the reel with the files that were saved and thankfully a lot was recovered. so here it is.


Animation ShowReel from Ben Williams on Vimeo.

Wednesday 16 March 2016

Adobe Flash Tutorials; Smoke Attempts. Shape Tweens/Shape Hints

My attempt at making smoke has had its ups and downs but... It's coming along. Kind of.



There needs to more of them.


Sunday 13 March 2016

Fantastic Voyage Crit Prez





Animatic Part 1 from Ben Williams on Vimeo.

Fantastic Voyage; Animatic Act 1 Skin Waste Land (Audio)


You Know. It is really hard to find and create Mumble like sounds to use for talking.

This is only Act 1 which will be roughly about one minute of the project while Act 2 & 3 will be a minute each.

Thursday 10 March 2016

Fantastic Voyage; Character Designs/Environmental Concepts

 A redo of two Main Cells as well as some test Environments to see how they look with that particular style. Quite like myself.

B-Cell Redesigns

Plasma cell Redesigns

Test Concepts; Skin Waste Land/Blood Cavans
you guys can tel me which one out of the cells look more better or if none of them work.

Wednesday 9 March 2016

Fantastic Voyage; 2D Animatic Part 1, The Skin Waste Land. (Mute)

Animatic for the first act.

Just quick and simple just to get the camera proportions and where things will be.

there is some transitions effects that i wanted to add like a fade in for the cut to the cut being mended but Photoshop doesn't allow it, if it does I haven't found it.

After the cut has been formed to create a giant chasm, the B-cells are the first to the scene acting as guards and scouts protecting the cut while the Skin Cells work to mend the cut. Two B-Cells are ordered to scout the perimeter for any Bacteria activity only to be hunted themselves.

This part will show how B-Cells are infected by Bacteria and how they infiltrate the skin.

Rendered out of PhotoShop.

Tuesday 8 March 2016

Maya; Alpha Testing, Grass/Hair Follicles

Considering that I want the small hairs that is on our skin to play the part of grass I decided to try out the Alpha maps and such.
Still a ways off but I want to be able to make a field of some sort for the bacteria and B cells to run across so I';m going to have to play with the Air Fields or some other Field that can Generate a wind effect to have them sway in the wind.

1

2

3
These are just tests to see if the alpha works, so the color here that I made is just random to see results. hopefully I can get versions where there effected by wind, if not then I have to spend some time with the old Keying tool.