2D Background

2D Background

Week 1: For the 2D background project we have been set to work on creating our own 2d animation background. I was looking forward to this as we were going to be learning digital painting, I had done this before however not in the same way this project was asking of us. We began with making abstract tonal explorations from a animation background blogger. I enjoyed this as it helps you see the shading in different backgrounds.

Week 2: We began with drawing very basic layouts for our animation backgrounds. The only thing which I was not happy with here was creating a background from a piece of writing given to us. I can understand how this can help some people but for me personally I really enjoy creating something which is my own. I discussed this with Kathy and I discussed that id like to create something from the real world i have seen and photographed myself, which i then add my own twist to. I got the all clear and began to look for places in Cornwall that i found interesting. I went round a few coastal paths and found a perfect place I wanted to make my own background from. I photographed it and turned it into something very different as i began staging this scene out.

Weeks3 - 4: These weeks consisted of me designing the basics of the background. I got real world reference for this as we was trying to achieve a realistic background scene.

Weeks 5 - 9: During these weeks this is where the most amount of work for creating the background was done. We learned how to parallax so I was ready once my background was done. This was a nice refresher as I had completely forgot how to do this. Also the painting stages of the background had begun at this point, I really enjoyed this as it was something new to me, I've never really learned to paint. I think I did a great job considering it was my first time digitally painting a background. Using real life reference really helped my background come to life, without this I think it wouldn't look as good. I struggled with creating bushes as they are so full of many different colors I found this hard to get across in the panting process. Once everything was done I began to work on my parallax, I had a few problems here with getting the right distance between each layer. I think I created a pretty good parallax with it focusing on the boat moving across the water. I also found it difficult to Separate the trees on the zoom in to the boat. I manged to create a exaggerated separation on the trees In the end however i think this looks good and also refers to the animation background side the project.

Week 10: During this week I refined my parallax so it was smooth and consistent thought out im very happy with the final render of the background. I'd of liked to make the bush more realistic as to me they almost bring the parallax down in quality. However at the time this was the best I could do.