Thoughts, Opinions & Conclusions

Realisation

I am happy with the art style I opted for. I believe that having realistic models with a slightly embellished 'cartoony' colour palate created a warm, friendly look to the scene. I was happy to try this art style as, until this assignment, all my previous assignments have been as photorealistic as I could possibly make them.
I feel that the camera following the road to reveal a new attraction after each corner worked well. I believe this made the animation flow well and kept the pacing at a good speed.
I am very happy with how the camera looked as if it was zooming through the clouds into Essex. By using a 'fade to white' in Premiere Pro, I was able to create an
almost seamless transaction between scene 1 and scene 2.
I feel the sound effects really lends itself to the animation and the voice-over create the feeling of an informative television advert. The music suited the animation and worked well as background music, not taking focus from the sound effects or voice-over.

Difficulties

Some areas of the modelling and animation I had difficulties with were creating a smooth, consistent movement path for the camera as it wound its way around the road.
I also had problems with making a long road texture. To solve this problem I used a seamless tarmac texture and separately modelled the road line which were added to the road at the end.

What I Would Change

There are a number of things I would have changed in the animation given the time.
I would change how the road sits on the ground. I modelled the road from a box but it could not sit level with the ground because the noise modifier on the ground would stick up through the road. I would have taken the vertices on the ground that poked through the road and moved it down but I did not have the time.
I would have liked to change the smoothness of the camera movement around the road to a consistent speed, slowing down on corners. I couldn't do this because it was the first thing I animated and all the other models were animated around this. Changing the camera animation would mean I would have to edit all the other animations and I did not have time for this.
For the ground I used a seamless grass texture. Given the time I would have liked to make a big ground texture myself that was less obviously tiled.
Finally, I would have liked to change the music. Although I feel the music suits the animation, I think that there are more appropriate pieces of music that could have accompanied the scene.

New Skills & Techniques

For two models in the animation I used a very common technique which I call 'selective modelling'. This entails only modelling and texturing parts of the model that will be seen by the camera. I first became aware of this technique when watching the Director's Commentary on Disney Pixar's Up. There is a seen where you see a crowd of people with hats on from behind that laugh. In this scene, only the hats were modelled and animated because you did not see any part of a human.
I found this technique invaluable as It saved me a few hours which were needed as I did this assignment on my own.
I learnt how to make smoke which will come in use for animations I do in the future. Adding realistic smoke is an easy way to make an animation scene seem that much more plausible/realistic.
I also learnt how to make realistic volumetric clouds. This again is an easy way to make an animation scene seem that much more plausible/realistic.
Finally, I learnt how to effectively time manage. Because I created this animation on my own, my work load was a lot more than other peoples. This means I had to schedule and plan each part of my animation.

Conclusion

In conclusion I am very happy with the final animation I have produced. I believe it is engaging and a suitable length to keep the viewers attention.
The family activity theme I had in mind has been realised with help from the voice-over and the animation showcases a good number of the best family attractions Essex has to offer.
I am also pleased with the reaction and opinions received from other students, my lecturers and Ms Ellie Constantatou. This makes me feel that the vision I had in my head was realised appropriately.

I feel that working on my own, although limiting on objective opinions and other ideas, was the best course of action I could have taken. From the beginning of the assignment I had a vision and was able to work to make my ideas come to fruition.