arenaandheri.co.in · packed opening visuals for his movie, Taare Zameen Par. Mr. Tanseer Ahmed, an animation artist from Rhythm and Hues, took a mas-ter class for the students to

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http://anivolution.arenaandheri.co.in/

Designer: Dhir Mehta

CS6 Rocks In conversation with Puneet Sharma Industrial Visit

An Animator’s world (Tanseer Ahmed)Industry Interview (Dhimant Vyas)Stop Motion

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Designer: Kirtee

As we come to yet another issue of Anivolution, discussing our digital ani-mation journey at Arena Animation, we thought to feature, an alternative method to animation, Stop-Motion Animation. It is one of the most loved art-form for bringing life to an inanimate objects, which lot of people are unfamiliar with. This month we have decoded the secret of this art form for the students, who are fanatic enough to take up the challenge and make a stop motion short film.

Past month gave us an opportunity to interview some of the industry profes-sionals who shared their encouraging experiences. We have featured some of the top professionals from the graphic and 3d background. It gave us an insight on what goes in the real world with some motivating views. The month went with a blink of an eye and this brings us to yet another is-sue of Anivolution.

As we feature stop motion this month, we got a special opportunity to in-teract with Mr. Dhimant Vyas, a well-known claymation artist of media in-dustry. He shares his experience of working with Mr. Aamir Khan for power-packed opening visuals for his movie, Taare Zameen Par.

Mr. Tanseer Ahmed, an animation artist from Rhythm and Hues, took a mas-ter class for the students to develop their knowledge and prepare them for the industry. This month also marks the golden jubilee of the most beloved hoarding character, Amul Girl. She has always been seen on the hoarding with her quick wits, a packet of butter and they are bound to tickle your funny bone.

This month brought us great opportunities and prospects to interact with professional working in digital animation as well as live clay model anima-tion. Our journey so far has been productive. This issue has a lot to offer in terms of what goes on inside the industry. It was a month of ups and down with the weather but the team stood strong. All the experiences that we had during this month, we are presenting it to you in our magazine ANIVOLU-TION. We hope you enjoy reading it. - Team Anivolution

Grand launch of the adobe cS6 Suite.

Arena students witnessing the CS6 launch

Adobe Creative Suite 6 is a quantum jump from its previous version. Almost all the major applications such as Photo-shop, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, Premiere Pro, Flash, and

others have been considerably upgraded. It has come up with 14 new and updated products offering 600 new features. With all these features Adobe folks have tried their best to make the software more mobile. The best update being the improved speed and performance throughout the suite. They have suc-cessfully been able to create a link between different operat-ing systems as well as they have linked their flagship software Photoshop with devices running on iOS and Androids be it a cell phone or a tablet. They showed us the testimony of the lead industrial customers with whom Adobe were linked since earlier versions of CSs’. The presentation was next commenced with the sales report and the growth they achieved with the launch of their previous versions CS5 and CS5.5. After CS5 the growth of the company increased by 45% and with the launch of CS 5.5 they

grew by 41%. To be honest for an enthusiast like me it was a pretty unexciting start. I was looking forward to the demonstra-tion of new features first than any ‘Annual Sales Report’. The event was well organized with the help of Wacom, AJA video systems and Hp. There were two sessions running par-allelly. One was for Design and Web Developers and the other for Video and VFX. The Design seminar was conducted by Mr. Bill Rober and Mr. Paul Burnnet. It was about Dreamweaver, Fireworks, Flash, Indesign, Illustrator and Photoshop. Today the web pages should be apt for all the devices, and CS6 provides three preset interfaces for all the three devices i.e., mobile, tablets and desktops. The key speakers of the Video segment were Mr. Mi-chael Stoddart and Mr. Karl Soule. The session was very well appreciated by the crowd. They briefed about Premier Pro and After Effects. The show reel was superbly executed, with the presentation content being apt.

There was a combine session for Tips and Tricks of Photoshop which was most appreciated by the audience. They displayed the features of Photoshop incredibly. The session was ended with a bang and some surprises none other than Master Collection Creative Suite6. One lucky winner won a Wacom Intuos5 in a lucky draw. The show in all was a great success. It was very well executed and planned. I feel it would have been better if the video and design sessions would have been on differ-ent time slots. Other than that it was a good show. Adobe again tried their best to im-press and ease out customers’ needs and wants, adding upto their luxuries of leisure.

Spokeperson at Adobe CS6 Launch

Spectacular CS6

CS6 Rocks!!

4Designer : Onkar R.

Rahul S.Shubhra S.

Arena Animation, Andheri (W).

CS6 Rocks

Content :

Puneet Sharma has been working with Arena for past 5 years.He supports all the departments of the institute in terms of technical aspects

which includes academics, curriculum design and placement, interaction with the industry, market-ing, sales and content. He is part of The Animation Society of India in the management committee. He is on the jury panel of The Golden Cursor Animation Awards. At Arena he is an integral member of the jury in terms of both short listing and the se-lection of student works for creative minds. He also designs a lot of awards and contests for Arena stu-dents as well as for the faculties. This year he with his team members have planned to get the best of the creative minds on a platform in our industry to honour and recognise their talent. We had the opportunity to interview him. Let us see what he has to say on the following topics.

current trends in the media industry: It is obvious that the media industry is growing as per the 2012 report. This industry is growing at a faster rate than any other industry. We at arena also are looking at evolv-ing to become a media entertainment education provider. Coming from ani-mation, gaming and VFX background we will be expanding our education in media and entertainment. It is in terms of event industry, television in-dustry with reality shows and channel programming. A lot of television chan-nel have come up providing national as well as regional contents. The mo-bile and communication has played an important role in boosting up the industry. Contents consumed by the audience today are more in terms of these gadgets, whether it’s a mobile or a touch pad.

aims and objectives of the arena ad: The arena animation ad is made in both 2d and 3d stereo. It is the first animated ad in 3d stereo on television from an educational background in In-dia. We wanted it to be in 3d because as a leader in animation education we want to be a step ahead in terms of technology. We wanted our audience to ex-

perience an animated ad in 3d stereo. In that twenty seconds ad is a package that shows the experience of ani-mation education in

Arena. Audience should know what a student goes through with regards to education in 2d, 3d, vfx and web multimedia.

Most flourishing sector in the industry: Advertising is one of the sectors in the me-dia industry that is flourishing at the moment. It is also growing at faster rate because a lot of corporate companies are investing in it. Animation is also com-ing up, but through advertisement which has been the biggest provider in animation content. It is fol-lowed by visual effects for films, television and ads. Gaming in India somehow has not evolved. It is there but has not taken the limelight as yet. In the coming years you will see gaming in different platforms like mobile, touch pads and internet.

future of animation in india: One concern point re-garding the Indian animation is our own intellectual property rights or our own animated fea-ture films. We’ve been doing amazing works for others but it is not the same with our own work. Somehow with respect to quality and storytelling we are lacking. There are many films like Arjun that have broken the myth. That has actually boosted up our ani-mation film industry. Somewhere down the line we all are con-cerned with the animation sector but in the other sectors we are growing.

Suggestions for the students: It is the student’s mind-set that is needed to be devel-

oped in a particular way. Today’s generation wants to do everything fast and at a growing pace. However the industry is going through a phase where they are looking at multitalented people and not specialised people. If you are specialised then you must have a secondary set of skills which gives you an edge over others. If you join a studio like Rhythm and Hues or a top level studio, then you have no other way to go in regards to the level of skills. You have to gather more experience and skills working with different produc-tion houses to reach your dream job. This cannot happen in a month or a year, it will take time and for that you need patience.

Learn about the current industry trends in animation.

In conversation with ‘Puneet Sharma’

5Content : Karan D.

Designer : Onkar R.


Puneet Sharma

Arena Animation’s first ever commercial is completed and waiting to be on air. 10 students from Arena Animation Andheri, got the opportunity to visit the

Talking Donkey Live’s studio. Simply, to experience the amount of hard work that went into the pre-production stage of the same commercial. 30 seconds commercial or any commercial has a strong pre-production stage. This advertisement’s pre-production took a week and a half and whole advertisement was completed in a month and a half. The students were guided by Mr. Mangesh Kakade project head. He looked after every aspect and saw to it that everything is falling in place. Mr. Yogesh Sawant discussed the importance of the pre-production stage and solved the doubts of the students regarding character establishment and it’s animation as well. Mr. Mangesh started telling the importance of pre-production. Pre-production stage or rather every stage was done on one to one communication with the clients and pre-production has different sub-stages. The must have of this stage is the thumbnail scribbling, storyboarding and then comes animatics & timing the sequence. R&D should be very strong at each of these sub-stages. Thumbnails play the most important role in pre-production. This is the ideating stage where an

idea can be changed, dropped or modified according to the requirement of the script or story. The most

difficult part faced by the team was how to portray or showcase all the activities that

Arena Animation comprises of into 30 seconds. The Talking Donkey

team tweaked the story a little and came up

with the script

which was again sent for client’s approval. Client was non-other than QUADRUM SOLUTIONS PVT. LTD. It was because of this one to one communication the making of this whole commercial got a lot easier. While making the thumbnails it is necessary to keep in mind about the continuity which should not break. Once when the scribbling or thumbnails are prepared then comes storyboarding stage. This decides which sequence will have what shot and its length including dialogues. Storyboard is a stage where the film is completely printed and runs in the minds of the people working on it. Talking Donkey team came up with 2 storyboards. One having a classroom and characters having fun roaming and another the characters with a human having fun in different environments. These two storyboards was send to the client for approval of any one. It was completely a subjective matter and client’s decision to select the classroom storyboard. This is the final stage of sketching. After getting a clean chit on the storyboard and all the approvals from the client, then comes the

Industrial VisitL i g h t s , c a m e r a a n d a n i m a t i o n !

6Designer : Kirtee S.

Content : Rahul S.


Industrial Visit

Students at Talking Dankey Studio

Arena Animation Animated Logo created by Talking

Donkey

Visit to Talking Donkey Studio:

Mr. Yogesh Sawant

animatics part and designing of the characters is done simultaneously. Animatics basically decide which scene or sequence will take how much amount of time and what would be the camera angles. This stage is completely based on rough animations of characters but a firm decision for timing the sequence and shots. While making characters each and every minute detail was kept in mind. Character establishment and modelling took 15 days of hard work, including propping and characteristics establishment. Once characters had been modelled and propped, their texturing and lighting was done according to background. Their Tee-Shape model was roughly animated on the background to give a rough look of the advertisement. The characters had biped rigging which made the animation lot easier. The software used extensively was Adobe Flash, Adobe Photoshop and for 3D characters & animations 3Ds Max was used. The final movie was rendered in V-Ray. The motto is always to serve the movie and rendering is one such thing which is completely knowledge based and personal. “Logic plays an important role to clear all doubts. Each and everything in any industry has a process to it. Follow it religiously, skipping few of it will land up in hive of troubles”, were the kind words of wisdom of Mr.Yogesh while bidding farewell.

Visit to Printing Press:

In this high technological era of Inkjet printers and Laser Jet Printers, handful students of arena animation had gone to a printing press to understand the workflow of

printing. The complete workflow of printing right from pre-press to the final product was shown to us. We got a very nice guided tour by Mr. Varma. He shared all the knowledge of printing with the students. He gave us a detailed explanation of each and every procedure and saw to it that nothing was left unexplained. The students did try their best to learn with all their concentration. Some samples of business cards were even distributed amongst the students for better references. This visit not only tested the knowledge of color and printing but also designing skill of the students. The process of screen printing and aligning the dual tone was enjoyed the most. The students did enjoy yet another industrial visit at Pragati printing press.

7Designer : Kirtee S.

Content : Rahul S.


Industrial Visit

Students at Pragati Printing Press

Detailed Character Sketch of E

Students observed the printing machine

Press worker with the cutting machine

Tanseer Ahmed is a senior 3d Animator at Rhythm and Hues India. He has been in the company for the past five and half years. He is a BFA graduate in applied arts

and then he did a course in 3d animation. He started off his job from being a junior 3d animator and then worked his way up the ladder to become a lead animator. He has worked on projects such as Golden Compass, Mummy 3, Night at the Museum 2, Alvin and the Chipmunks 2 & 3 and recently on the upcoming film Life of Pi.

What all fields have you worked in? I have always been an animator, I always wanted to be. I never gave much importance to anything else.

How challenging it was for you to reach at your current position? It was very challenging. You cannot explain how much challenging, but it does get easier when you want it badly. I wanted to know everything about animation, how I need to get better, how my teams need to improve and this desire made me a lead naturally. I do not know how much I need to improve but there is no stopping in animation. You can always do betterthan what you do today.

Is there any specific process of animation that you follow or you do it according to the best of your knowledge? There are several ways of approaching an animation sequence. One of it is ‘Blocking / Pose to Pose’ and the other is ‘Straight Ahead’. Different kinds of sequences require different styles of approach. But the most used is the “Blocking / Pose to Pose.

How loyally do you obey the principles of animation? Do you go out of your way to come up with something different? Everything you do in animation is based on Principles of Animation. You cannot do animation without using it. You might break a principle here and there but you still need other principles to make the broken principle work. To be honest

you can go out of the way as much as you desire. But the end result will only be convincing to the audience when you apply the principles. You see, these principles are based on the fact that audience believe in your animation only if your piece of Animation is based on the Principles. Principles make it readable to the audience. They will see what you want

them to see. Animation Principles are like a check list for an Animator, which guarantees you that your animation is convincing enough for the audience.

What is the importance of physics in the principle of animation? I would like to start my answer by asking you. When would you say that you have broken a rule? Guess!! It is when you know the rule in the first place. So if you know the rule you can break the rule. So you should know physics to break laws of physics. You need to know physics to ignore laws of physics in your animation shots. But you will have to do it in a convincing manner. To do so you will need to know the law that you wish to break. The Animation Principles are not completely based on physics. It is mainly based on how the mind of our audience functions. How fast or slow the mind can read or understand the sequence of images that are played in front of them. Some physics is necessary to an extent, as Animation is 90% creativity. You can break every law of physics that a human knows. To do so you need to learn it first.

Giving reactors is more preferred or step by step animation, for defining weight, motion and other characteristics? By reactors you mean Stimulation. Animation has nothing to do with this. Animation is very different from reactors or Stimulation. They can go hand in hand but they are different. These artists are two different breeds all together.

How often is tracking used in character animation? There are types of projects, one is a ‘Live Action with CG integration’ and the other is ‘Full CG’. Full CG does not

Mr. Tanseer Ahmed

Hear it from the pro on what it takes to be an animator.

An Animator’s world

Designer : Bhavesh S.

Content : Karan D.


Industry Interview

8

a

require any sort of tracking. Movies such as Kung Fu Panda, Madagascar are full CG projects. Whereas live action with CG integration is when you have shot live action footage and you wish to add in CG elements in it. Movies such as Golden Compass, Kingkong or Transformers where you have live action actors and you add in CG elements later require tracking.

What do you look for in an applicant’s showreel? A person applying for an animation job needs to have a basic knowledge of animation. But why am I giving

such a silly answer. It is because applicants mostly don’t have the understanding of animation, but they still apply for this job. What I’m trying to point out is that a student that is enrolled to learn Animation has to feel hungry for the knowledge of animation. He/She has to look for it, search for ways of learning more and more every day of their course, and even after that. Learn everything about animation, be it the Principles or its history. Now what an appropriate showreel, well If you are applying for a animation job make sure your reel consists only Animation (Do not add in your modelling or texturing in it as well, make a different reel if u want to have one just in case). As far as your animation reel is concerned, to my personal liking I would like to see exercises that present your knowledge of animation principles. Exercises such as weight lift, Tail animation, Simple ball bounce animation, Push Pull, Walk cycles, Run cycles etc. Dialogs or acting can be optional for fresher. Your quality of work will be judged based on your knowledge Principles of Animation.

Would you like to give any suggestions to our readers to be successful in this field? Biggest of all my suggestions is, be a Specialist. Aim at one. If you want to be or if you love to be an Animator, give your best to learn Animation. Try and be among the best in the lot. So how can you be the best? Students who are trying to be professionals always

say that Studios ask for experience. It’s true.Animation is all about experience, you learn Animation by experience. Students that come out of academy mostly have very less experience of animation. Note, by “experience” I mean to say, the time that is spend animating. Don’t blame your faculty. Instead spend some time animating and gain Animation experience. Do your exercises, it is like a workout. It keeps you fit. For example If I do a ball bounce animation today it doesn’t mean I don’t have to do it again ever. I will have to do it over and over to perfect my knowledge. Each time I do it, I do better than the previous attempt. Basically what you are doing here is that you are gaining experience. This will show in your showreel and when I gain this experience. I can be an asset to any lucky Studio. Simply start doing stuff, you will figure what works and what not. Show your work to others and take reviews from them. Be open to any suggestions coming your way, you are lucky to get them, even a child can sometimes make a big sense. Shoot references, refer videos for study and animate, there is nothing wrong in referring videos, this is how the major studios do their animation. Do a lots of sketching, this will improve you poses, and try acting out your animation yourself; this gives u a better idea. Above all don’t lose your heart, you will slowly get there.If anyone is looking for help or suggestions, I have a Facebook page called “Animation Highway”. I will be more than happy to help you all learn.

Mr. Tanseer taking the master classes


Content : Karan D.


Rhythm And Hues

9

Designer : Govind P.

Content : Rahul S.


Industrial Interview

10

The industry does not require his introduction. But,

fo r the students to connect to Mr. Dhimant Vyas, the best example is the claymation advertisment of Taare Zameen Par. Yes, Dhimant Vyas is the man behind the clay animation stop motion of Taare Zaameen Par. To add more to his success stories then he is the first Indian to go to Aardman Studios to shoot an episode of most popular claymation globally on-air Shaun – The Sheep*. He is an ex-alumni of National Institute of Design. At NID he managed his way to get into advance diploma in communication design with specialization in Animation film design. Mr. Dhimant is very passionate about photography, sculpting and creating illustrations. He had a

dream of animating characters as it is used to fascinate him. Today he is living his dream as a Senior Animation Consultant – Animation Design at Tata Interactive Systems.

1. When did you start your career as a professional

and how was your student life? If I look back in my past I loved animated films from my childhood

and was wondering how those

drawings

and puppets move? I use to make clay puppets, drawings, crafts a lot. I managed to get selected at National Institute of Design for advanced diploma in communication design with specialization in animation film design. My dream started coming to reality when I was introduced to animation course at National Institute of Design (NID) by one of the visiting faculty during my fine art study. Student life was very tough. I was born in a big family of three sisters and two brothers. My late father Dalpatram had a tough time raising us. He spent his hard-earned money on educating us to brighten our future. I used to make toys and sculptures with the clay that my mother brought from the riverbed. I made a lot of small toys as a child which my parents used to exhibit to relatives and friends with immense pride. My professional career started when I completed my course at NID. There were not many options when it came to animation. Ram Mohan Biographics was the only place where major animation activity took place. They produced quality work. Here I worked as a key animator and did a few ad films.

2. What gave you the idea of taking stop motion - clay animation as your main stream? Clay animation is one of the medium I love animating, besides that I love to use classical 2D animation, cut out animation, flash and experiment animations. Somehow I got more projects of clay animation to work on. Usage of clay is extremely convenient in animation due to the flexibility of the product. It is available in innumerable colours and it does not dry off. This medium can be used and reused. Claymation is a part of stop motion in which clay puppets are made placed in miniature sets with lots of lights. Then the motions are captured in the frames. We have to make 25 frames for 1 second of video. It’s like capturing the images and when you play them you can view it in motion. An animator should know the principals of the classic animation and should have a keen observation. Timing in this field is very important and this skill one acquires through rigorous practice. Another important aspect of this field is that one should know the technicalities of the field. Claymation takes a lot of time but it is fun when you see the objects created by you in motion. Your imagination

takes full control and you can execute whatever you feel like.

Claymation MaestroClaymation Maestro

Mr. Dhimant V

yas with

his clay-m

odel fish

From Buttoned-up Clay Models to Animated Clay Characters.

“There are no shortcuts if you want to deliver quality work!”

Designer : Govind P.

Content : Rahul S.


Industrial Interview

11

3. You are the first one to make a stop-motion video for Taare Zameen Par’s title in India. How do you feel about that project and how was your experience besides working on the stop-motion, working with Aamir Khan? Thanks to Aamir for choosing the clay animation style. It is a craft with a human touch to it so it also tugs at the audiences’ heartstrings. It works well with the main film because the story needed this kind of feel to it. The scenes depict Ishaan, the main protagonist’s imagination so the transitions had to be smooth and convey the dream-like quality. We used transitions like morphs, camera moves, elements appearing and disappearing.Else, you can have one element dragging you to another scene, so there is no cut till the end. And you do not realize when those three minutes pass by. Aamir’s thinking is crystal clear. He knows what he is looking for and conveys it exactly. It is up to us to realize his vision. He is a perfectionist but at the same time he respected my knowledge and experience with clay animation. He gave me full freedom, only giving his inputs from time to time but leaving the responsibility of the work squarely on my shoulders. Having the director’s trust in your ability is vital. It was physically stressful but creatively most satisfying. I thoroughly enjoyed animating it. A very important thing while animating is to be able to maintain correct timing. Each element has a different speed and a unique style of motion. Sometimes, one shot has 20 to 25 items moving. For example, there was a scene with 2 groups of fish. One small mistake means everything needs to be redone but timing is something that you learn with experience.

4. How difficult is clay modelling that you do? And how is their rig-setup done? After making innumerous clay models, I have learnt how to tackel a problem if it araises while modelling itslef. I use aluminium wires, square brass tubes and ball & socket joints to make a basic skeleton. Cloth tape, form sheet, fevicol and clay is used to make the model. And for eyes white beads are used. In some casees, if there are scenes with lip expressions, I make all replacement ‘mouth set’ first.For morphing, I plan and make all changeable models before the shoot, the same I did it in Taare Zameen Par shoot. 5. What is the procedure to make a clay model which stays intact and has appropriate movements? How to maintain those clay models? Do you keep them in a particular environment? Oil based clay which is used in clay animation is very difficult to handle, it melts in warm weather condition and attracts dust, so you need to work in air conditioned studio and dust free atmosphere. You

need to have proper boxes or cupboards to keep your models intact. Animator has to handle it softly while shooting.

6 . B e f o r e starting any stop-motion project what is your mind frame? For

example: do you decide at what fps it will be played and then shoot accordingly. I try to feel and be like the character myself while shooting, same like any live action actor would do. Animator’s job is more challenging then live action actors because animator needs to act like animals, birds, creatures or fantasy characters. Where actors mostly act like any other human characters. Each species have their own personality and own timings while movements so I need to understand correct fps before animating them. Thorough observation is very important in the field. Sometimes I watch live action videos frame by frame to observe each and every detail.

For more information on Mr. Dhimant Vyas has provided his web-site www.dhimantvyas.com

Mr. Dhimant Vyas with Mr. Aamir Khan

*Credits to Aardman Studio and Creature Comfort Photos for Shaun the sheep.

Animation is fundamentally defined as a state of being full of life and energy. Sometimes even over-reaction of any person can be tagged as that person is animated.

The most popular example of animation is a flipbook. We all must have played with it in some point of time in our lives. Animation is a simulation, of movement of series of different pictures or frames, to create an illusion of movement. This effect of optical illusion is a well-known scientific phenomenon of persistence of vision and can be shown in different ways. The earliest examples of animations are the cave drawing done by our ancestors and Egyptians. However, there are no such devices to depict these graphical drawings in motion, so they are not considered as animation. But, if these same drawings are observed carefully then they appear similar to the series of animation drawings.

Animation is not only creating characters digitally and bringing them to life on computers. Animation has in-numerous methods to bring any

o b j e c t / c h a r a c t e r /drawing to life. There is no particular date or year of animation’s

commencement. But, if we talk about theatrical animation then yes, world renowned character Mickey Mouse debuted in the year 1928 with sound but in black and white. Mickey Mouse was a character animated from a

sketch. The method is known as traditional animation where in each frame was drawn by hand. There are many other alternative methods through which animation is possible. Out of which one such method is Stop-Motion Animation.

Ever wondered how an object gets life when there is no human around or how did Imran Khan and his co-actors floated in air till knee height in the song ‘Bhaag Bhaag DK Bose’ from the movie ‘Delhi Belly’? Yes, all of them are executed by using the stop-motion technique. Stop-Motion is an art of exaggerating life in non-living/living things to perform unnatural and unusual stunts. This type of art is seeking lot of fame and becoming very popular as an alternative method in each and every domain. Be it a short film on individual level or a television commercial, stop-motion video is conquering the lime light.

Clicking sequence of photographs of actions and playing them like a video is the easiest way to explain stop-motion animation. To get into the depths of stop-motion animations’, it uses basic science of ‘persistence of vision’ of human being. Human eye is capable of viewing things in motion at 1/10th of a sec or faster. Stop-Motion uses this science and the sequence of images is played at faster rate. A stop motion can be done with many techniques. If an object moves or it is build, its stop-motion video is possible. To make a stop motion video the pipeline is the same.

First is the pre-production stage in which the story, script, storyboarding and most important medium to be used is decided. Then is the production stage in

Content : Rahul S.



Animation techniques

12

Animating the inanimate.

Click By Click

which a still camera is used to click photographs. For light set-up it completely depends on the pre-production stage. During the production stage it is always advice to start the compilation as and when the shoot is in progress, so as to detect the faults and rectify them. Once the photographs are shot or animation is done, it is very difficult to re-shoot the same sequence and replace it in the final document. For the post production and compilation there are many software like Dragon Frame, Monkey Jump, Adobe PremierePro and so on. But, many prefer Dragon Frame for compiling the images as it is a very swift and its professional tools helps in animation and visual effects. Different type of medium uses different technique of shooting. The most popular mediums are using clay, stick figures, toys, sand; paper, sometime human beings and list goes on. The basics of claymation is applied to all the other mediums. For making a clay stop motion, we need to have a story, script, and storyboard just like any other short film. Then character modelling, background designing and light & camera set-up. Clay being a delicate medium needs a little extra care with the models. While clicking photographs of the clay model’s action, its first key position’s photograph is clicked, then to make the animation smooth more and more of in-between poses’ photograph is clicked till the next key-frame. This same technique is applied to all the other mediums. If the above step is compiled as a movie with faster frame rate, then the model seems to have life and is moving on its own. The more photographs of in-between poses are clicked; the smoother is the animation after compilation.

The basics of shooting Stop-Motions remain the same only the medium changes. And selecting the medium to support your script is where you become a director.’ – Rahul Sharma.

Content : Rahul S.



Animation techniques

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Sand is one of the strongest medium which has emotions and drama to it. Its color and effect leaves a very bold impres-sion in a person’s mind provided if it is well planned and executed with precision. Working with sand is one task where your patience, dedication and love for the art is expressed by your illustrations. Animating sand by any method, live

action or stop motion is not an easy task to execute. This project synopsis is taken from the project 'Half Life'.

Step - I

Develop a strong script from a concept. The pre-production stage should be very strong. It should be so strong that the whole film should roll in mind before even starting. If it is a stop-motion then the sketches and transitions should be in place. To be comfortable with working in sand, one should practice by keep their sketches below. Practice and patience are the key factors in making very strong and fluent sand visuals.

Step – 3 Setup for the sand animation is not an easy task. To document sand animation, the technique of photography that is used is called ‘silhouette photography’. This type of photography everybody must have done it knowingly or unknowingly. A silhouette is when the subject is of one solid color mostly black and this is achieved by back lighting the subject. Similar technique is used to record footage of animation done in sand. Where the sand is bottom lit.

Step – 2 Selection of sand is the most important factor which will decide the texture, mood and color of sand on screen. If the quality of sand if fine and thin then, the flow on the glass surface will also be extremely smooth and give the artist the smoothness to try for long and controlled strokes. The sand available on the shores of Mumbai is not at all adviced as the sand is polluted and thick. Sand available in some beaches of Goa can be used. Else, if possible the californian sand is the best. It is rich in texture and very fine. On the other hand there are many sand-artist from U.S.S.R. Their love for the art and precision is unmatched.


Stop-Motion Tips - Sand

14Designer : Bhavesh S.

Content : Rahul S.

Stop-Motion with SandSteps to follow for making a Sand Animation Stop-motion.

Step – 4 The setup should always be in dark room. Any and all the source of light should be blocked while working. Light entering the room can spoil the mood of the sand and can disturb the lights. To avoid labourous work and reshoots, it is adviced to make a proper to-do list for each and every step. Following this process of pre-production can reduce the work and inturn save some energy for future works. It is always prefered to use a big size table glass. The camera is traditionally placed right above and in the center of the glass.

Step – 5 Once pre-production and production stage is planned out and the execution has started, it is now important to know the timing and an approximate frame counts. For that, post-production stage should also be carried out with the production stage. If the video has a voice over narration then that recording should be done. Taking that rough recording the animation should be executed so as to get the idea of frame counts.

Step – 6 Once production has started and the sequnces have started getting shot as per story-board and time schedule, it is always suggested to start the compilation of the same as and when the sequnces are getting shot. This is the major step taken by stop-motion sand artist while working with sand. For compilation of the images there are many software available in the market. Most prominent ones are Adobe PremierePro, Dragon Frame and if any effects are required to add then Adobe AfterEffects are used.

Step – 7 While editing the video there are many things that needs to be kept in mind. As the technique is silhouette photography, the sand illustration should have a strong black colour. If in case, style lights or coloured lights are being used, then even their colours needs enhancment according to requirements. To make the video more effective and interesting, the sand animation should be smooth and it should have a string backgroundscore to supporting the script.Follow the above steps and enjoy sand animation. It is a beautiful art to convey social messages and show strong satire.


Stop-Motion Tips - Sand

15Designer : Bhavesh S.

Content : Rahul S.

Indian comic industry flourished with the huge success of Amar Chitra Katha and Chacha Chaudhrai. This in turn gave rise to many other

Indian characters and started a riot of laughter, humor, sensibility, smartness and most important delivering social messages. These messages were presented in a very graphical and comedy manner. This approach was very much appreciated by the audiences. India being a developing country, the comic characters’

characteristics also resembled the common man. Each and every comic character be it protagonist or an antagonist had the characteristics of being smart and street-wise even though represented as sluggish. There are many such characters in the Indian Comic Industry, some were consistent, some dissolved with time due to lack of story or scripts.

Out of the swamp of characters

Suppandi is one such

character.

Suppandi: Suppandi, a well recognized and a flagship character of Tinkle Comics of India Book House Publications, after Chacha Chaudhari. This character was a big hit amongst the readers known for his stupid actions. His characteristics represented a village imbecile. To add-up more to the list, he is characterized as a prominent stupid and an ignorant servant. His looks aren’t cute and he is has been visualized as a typical servant with oiled up hair, long nose to characterize his interference in every topic. Shirts and shorts are the clothes he is always seen in. He has always shown living in big cities and big townships, working as a servant at many places. His ignorant, stupid behavior has often costed him many jobs. Suppandi debuted for the first time in tinkle comics in January, 1983. The character of Suppandi was not conceptualized by creators of Tinkle Magazine. Suppandi was brought to life from 3 narrative stories sent by Sameer Salman from Trichy. This concept was rendered into comic form by the Tinkle studios. All the illustrations of this character were done by very famous artist Ram Waeerkar. Ram Waeerkar did the illustrations till 2003 and after that his daughter Archana Amberkar took over the job of illustrating the comic. Archana Ambrekar had tweaked the character as it represents today’s character. Later on Suppandi g o t his own

Indian Comic Legendary characters who created a mess and tickled our funny bone.

The Legends of Blunders

Designer : Nilesh G.

Content : Rahul S.16


Indian Toons

The Legends of Blunders magazine ‘Suppandi 48’ by ACK media as a quarterly issue. This magazine did tremendously well with the readers and was favored by many readers. India being land of tricky places and tricky names in which Suppandi dwelled in the hearts of people for being dumb. The Adventures of Suppandi received all the fame more than what a real life Suppandi may have earned. There was one more such character ‘Shikari Shambhu’ which had similar popularity and consistency but was exactly opposite to Suppandi. Shikari Shambhu was one more such venture of Tinkle Comics which had a nice reputation amongst the readers. Yes, by the word Shikari he was a hunter but the laziest comic character in the face of comic books, whereas Suppandi being the most hard-working guy. Shikari Shambu always had a goofed up getaway.

Shikari Shambu: Shikari Shambu, is one of Tinkle’s most beloved comic character. He is a hunter who often puts himself into torment situations and blunder his way out. Shikari Shambu’s characteristics were again related to a lazy man becoming hunter accidentally. He was a very lazy hunter, who spends most of his time in hammock hoping to do nothing. Most importantly, he was a cowardly hunter but due to some streak of luck he always fumbles up and emerges as a hero. In the beginning, Shikari Shambu did not have any prefix, he was merely known as Shambu. It was revealed in one of the stories that Shambu, once accidentally fell on the tiger knocking the tiger down. That incident earned him the title of ‘Shikari’. Since then he became the flagship character of Tinkle Comics. Besides his behaviour characteristics his physical characteristics were also very famous. Shikari Shambu’s illustrations were done by Vasant Halbe. He kept in mind the characteristics and then illustrated the character. His character had a big hat covering Shambu’s eyes and nose pounding out of his hat. The most prominent feature of was his moustache because of which Shambu’s

emotions could be seen. He was given a gun in his hands as a prop. But, tinkle comics had seen to it that no animal should be harmed. Some of the colleagues had posed problems with the character’s name. But the sheer charisma and keeping wildlife conservation theme in mind, Uncle Pai being the editor decided to let it go with the flow. Slowly after few episodes his trademark gun was separated away from him. Still Shikari Shambhu’s persona did not fade away. Shikari Shambu tried his best to avoid getting into any troubles but, trouble always used to follow him. He used to be afraid from ants to elephants but landed up being an animal catcher in world’s eyes. Shikari Shambu received fame, recognition. Good enough to get himself and android application and he is now being toyed and played as a game on android platform for amount of Rs 57/-.

Designer : Nilesh G.

Content : Rahul S.17


Indian Toons

In our previous issue we had given a brief on colour theory. This issues will give you an in depth knowledge on few top-ics discussed before. This issue will be about the primary,

secondary and tertiary colours. For those of you who have read the previous issue, it will be clear to you on how these colours are generated. There are two model to these colours, ‘The RGB Model’ and ‘The RYB Model’. The three categories of colours (primary, secondary and tertiary) are used according to the mode you are working on.

Additive And Subtractive:

The RGB model is based on additive colours. These are used for modes such as television, computer and video displays. This is purely technological and comprises the avail-ability of phosphors and colour triangle. Phosphor is basically a substance that exhibits luminescence and colour triangle is an arrangement of colours based on the combination of the additive primaries. RYB Model is based on subtractive colours. These co-lours are used in real world scenario and not computer gener-ated like RGB. They are used in paintings, art and art educa-tion. Many of us have used more than three primary co-lours in our designs and paintings. Red, Green, Yellow and Blue are the four psychological primaries. To this we can also in-clude black and white. This is based on our visual system. The colours that we see or use on our day to day life have great impact on one’s life. They hold deep meanings and hence they are used in a very subtle manner. They must implicate the presence of emotions and story.

Red is a colour that denotes anger, war, fire and violence. It also sym-bolises love and passion. In history it is the colour of Devil. It also gives a feeling of importance as use see the red carpets used in awards and celeb events. It is also a sign of warning which we see in the roadside boards with stop signs. Courage and sacrifice is also associated with red. In design-ing red is a very powerful colour. It can have a great effect when it is

used in a design. It is the best colour to portray love and pas-sion. The brighter reds are energetic and darker reds are el-egant when used in designs. True red stands out against the black background that gives the designs an elegant look. With white background it gives an impression of professionalism.

Green:

Green is a colour that is usually used to associate with the environment. It symbolises abundance and renewal. A new beginning and growth can also be portrayed by green. Brighter green is very vibrant, therefore it exhibits energetic feelings. Olive green is related to the nature while darker

A graphic design to save tree

COLOURS AND HUESUnderstanding the significance of colours.

Designer : Mahesh L.

Content : Karan D.

Red:


Colour Theory

18

Poster depicting the nature of red

green is more towards the affluent side. It is also a symbol for envy and lust. The colour green is also seen on amphibians, reptiles and insects. In some countries this colour symbolises prosperity.

Yellow:

It is the colour of warmth and happiness. In ancient history during the period of Maya yellow was represented as preciousness or ripe. It is related cowardice and deceit. In some countries it is the colour of hope. In design we can use this colour in different occasions. Bright yellow suggests a sense of happiness. Dark yellow gives an antique look and hence can be used to portray permanence. Yellow is the brightest colour, therefore it attracts. It also relates to sun-shine and we usually represent yellows as the colour of sun.

Blue:

Blue is the colour of sky. In English language blue is used for sadness. It is depicts calmness and responsibility. Light blue is refreshing while dark blue is more of strong and reliable in nature. It has a spiritual and religious connection in many cultures. Blue hold different meaning according to different hues and shades. While designing you have to define the exact shade of blue to portray a certain situation. Bright blues can be used in designs that bring out the sense of playfulness and darker blue can be used for corporate designs.

Orange: This colour is very vibrant and it brings a feeling of change. This is associated with autumn and change in sea-

sons. It depicts health and vitality. Orange is the colour of citrus fruits which is acidic in nature. This can be portrayed on rust as it occurs due to acidic reaction. Dark orange acts as a neutral to lime green coloured background. It is also used for showing a friendly sign or inviting impression.

Purple:

This colour exhibits creativity and imagination. As it is the combination of red and blue it takes up attri-butes of both. In some countries purple denotes mourn-ing for widows. Deep purple is a symbol for royalty and wealth. While lighter shade represents romantic envi-ronment.

Working with colours can be an arduous task but at the same time it can be fun. When these co-lours are applied in an effective manner, it can generate overwhelming feelings. It will help you put your imagi-nation into your designs with strong emotions. Colours as an emotive factor can play a huge role in a design and respectively it will have a long lasting impression. These colours have different hues and saturation levels. Make sure you use the appropriate shades of it to tell your story.

Room having the presence of happiness

A painting of calmness and serenity

Autumn awakening

Colour of imaginarium

Designer : Mahesh L.

Content : Karan D.


Colour Theory

19

Rockstar Games has yet again impressed us with the re-lease of Max Payne 3. It has been 9 years since the last instalment but it was worth the wait. The series revolves

around the protagonist (Max Payne) and his life full of ill-fated events. He was a DAE Agent and an undercover agent in the last two instalments. In the third part he is a private security for the wealthy Rodrigo Branco. The game is set up in South America, Sao Paulo, Brazil. The game shows the commotion between the rich and the poor. It’s a place where the Favela Gangs terrorise the locals and haunt the streets. They are the root cause of all the disputes and turmoil.

About Max:Max Payne is a man who has lost a lot in his life and seeks retribution. In the present version nothing has changed. He is still shaken up by the death of his family. The game takes us to the streets of Sao Paulo where Max is right in the middle of the hostiles. The scenario of the local was not pretty and for Max it was going to get ugly. All hell breaks loose when Ro-drigo’s wife Fabiana gets kidnapped. This leads to a series of unfortunate events faced by Max. This makes the story more dynamic and dark.

Script:The script is amazing and very compelling. It has a lot of depth in the plot. The core of it is characterised by his cynicism and his metaphoric views towards the world around him. It goes to and fro form past to present. The game has amazing cut scenes that give you a cinematic feel with brilliant narration. These cut scenes acts as loading screens which helps you to stay in the game flow. Film noir is very good in the game with

the crime scenes, corruption and shams.

Gameplay:The gameplay is fan-tastic. The third person shooter gives you an amazing view on your character and his ac-tions. It is action packed with dodging bullets, slow motion and guns blazing. Max Payne 3 has provided us high calibre bullets penetrating the body with blood splat-ters in the kill cam view. The kill cam shows the bullet moving in slow motion, hitting the tar-get. The game brings out feel of being in an action movie. The cin-ematic style and the shocking violence never fails to gain ones atten-tion. The story mode last for approximate 12 hours. Apart from the story mode you have the arcade mode and the multiplayer. In the arcade mode you can select various levels and score points. These scores are compared against other players which gives a status on the standings at the global level. The multiplayer mode lets you play with people around

Revenge is Sweet

20 Designer : Karan D.

Content : Karan D.


Game Review

the world in a server or you can create your own personal server and play amongst your friend. Both these mode keep you occupied even after you have finished the story mode.

Artificial Intelligence:

Targeting and shooting is well tuned and very realistic. It combines the accuracy of shooting from a first person shooting with that of the third person. The gunplay has good control with response to the movement. This helps Max to roam freely without any depreciation in character movement. This type of animation makes the gameplay dynamic. The amount of detail work went into the movement of the character is immacu-late. In the game you are allowed 360 degree shooting and free movement which helps you keep sight of the target. The physics generated for the character is well integrated with the environment which is perfectly executed with awesome animation. Level of details is high and one of the best parts of the game is bullet impact. It is the point of impact on other objects and characters. It is so precise that when you shoot a person at a particular region, only that part gets affected. They also respond according to the different type of weapons with varied force. This is an awesome feature in the game

which makes it very genuine. The AI (artificial intelligence) of the game is very unique. The reaction of your enemy varies depending on who they are. There are several factors that AI functions on some of which are bullet impact, reaction to injuries, taking cover, alert levels, reaction time and nervous-ness rate. All this is depended upon the type of enemy.

Verdict:This game is the first of its kind which redefines all the other action games. It has everything that you are looking for in a game. Good action, cinematic effects, amazing story line, perfect animation and accurate AI. It’s been fun playing the game which provides you with relentless actions and gives you goosebumps. A must have for all the gamers and gaming en-thusiasts. It surges your adrenaline level with excitement and fun.

Ratings:Publishers: Rockstar GamesPlatform: PC, X-Box360, PS3Price: PC - Rs.999, X-Box and PS3 - Rs.2699 special edition -Rs.5999

Lock and Load

21Designer : Karan D.

Content : Karan D.


Game Review

We have often heard about the tales of Mahabharata and Ramayana during our childhood. It brought us

great knowledge and understanding about our culture. The goal of these stories was to instil a sense of purpose and camaraderie in us. It has taught us the meaning of good and evil, jealousy and contentment, greed and kindness etc. I as a child was very inquisitive about these mythical tails. These stories have inspired many of the film makers. One them was Arjun-The Warrior Prince by Arnab Chaudhuri.

Movie is about the journey of Arjun and his quest to find the

warrior within him. Legend has it, Arjun possessed

unfathomable skills in

archery and was trained in martial arts. His valiant qualities have been portrayed throughout the movie that defines the true nature of a warrior. Story revolves around a small part taken from Mahabharata which is a prequel to the battle of Kurukshetra. It starts with a woman telling the story of Arjun to a young boy. This gives us a flashback when Arjun with his Pandava brothers are training under Dronacharya. The rivalry between the Pamdavas and Kauravas becomes more prominent as time passes by. This rivalry leads to a chain of unfortunate events that ruins the life of Pandavas. They are sent to 13 years in exile after Yudisthira loses everything to Duryodhana in a game of dice. During this period Arjun part ways with his brothers to overcome his fears and to hone his fighting skills. When Arjun returns, he alone fights a battle to protect Virat.

About the movie:

Arjun : The warrior prince Arjun : The warrior prince Reliving the epic journey of the legendary archerReliving the epic journey of the legendary archer.

Arjun amidst forest fire


Content : Karan D.22


Movie Review

Arjun : The warrior prince Arjun : The warrior prince Arnab Chaudhuri has done a great job in directing this film. The movie is made in 3d and then rendered in 2d. Animation is amazing and vibrant. I especially liked the swayamvar scene where Arjun jumps into the water and shoots the fish. The level of details they have given in the movie is very impressive. The depth in the background and the objects is very life like.

As compared to other Indian animated movies this one is way more appealing in animation and storytelling. The fighting scenes are well made. The scene where Arjun and Lord Krishna fight against the bandits amidst the forest fire was brilliant. Visual effects are cutting edge which enhanced the look of the film. The animators have done a great job in rebuilding the past by giving nice details in the environment. The narrative bit was good and well executed by the voice over artists.

There are few drawbacks in the movie. Movements of the characters are a little rigid which hindered fluid motion. The story

is well told but it seemed incomplete due to the exclusion of the main battle. I

was actually looking forward to the epic battle. Apart from that there

are few scenes missing from the story. However it did not have

any drastic impact on the movie.

Arjun-The Warrior Prince has taken Indian animation to a whole new level with no doubt. Nevertheless animation in India has a long way to go in order compete at a global scale. Gone are the days when adults use think cartoons and animated films were for children. Now days these films have gathered some of the most beautiful storylines and sequences that has captured the attention of older generation. Arjun is one amongst them that will appeal both adults and children. It has good animation that will dazzle kids and the adults will appreciate the story. The language is

in archaic Hindi which complements the movie and its style. Dialogues are well written which availed moral teaching. Throughout the movie you will gain some sense of morality which is very enlightening.

Animation and direction:

Drawbacks:

Verdict:

The Movie

Story

Animation

Direction

VFX

A serene background from the movie

Well defined characters rendered in 2D


Content : Karan D.23


Movie Review

Fruity Loops is music composing software which they have suddenly launched for iOS devices and not the Mac. It has all the high-end features of

vintage drum beats to now a days’ trance music. Many composers seek help from this software to compose their tunes. This software was introduced first for desktop computers, and now imagine all of these features in a much simpler user-interface on an iOS device. Yes, FL Studio is now available on iTunes for only $19.99. Browsing through the music apps sections thinking what can convert the beats running in your mind on to a digital platform, fruity loops is the answer to all the music composers who have an access to iOS device.

uSer-interface: “The fastest way from your brain to your speakers,” the app declares as it is loading. The regular users of fruity loops will find the UI quite simple. Struggle is bound to happen for some time to familiarise with the workspace. The workspace is very

informative but little complicated as the workspace windows are overlapping. The desktop version is better as everything is right in front on the main screen. Replacing instruments from loop is one task that needs to be remembered. In windows, the instruments can be dragged and dropped but in iOS version to replace an instrument, it needs to be first selected or a new track has to be created with that respective instrument. But this somehow made the application’s window clutter free and organised it properly. This is multi-track based software. You can either start creating music directly by tapping music on keyboard or use the step sequencer to achieve perfect timing.

featureS: The app allows you to add as many steps or piano as you desire to have. The software boasts some

amazing new instruments which the desktop version doesn’t have. To get convinced from the power of the software it also has all the tools for tuning and tweaking the sounds. Creating a loop and integrating it into the track is also less tedious, as it does it automatically. As this software is complete integration of desktop version, it can not only move, cut and copy but also has a piano roll whose notes can be edited by changing its pitch, duration and velocity. It can also be adjusted manually by dragging with finger, not everyone can play perfectly on a touch screen so these features help a lot.It has 133 instruments including drum kits and sliced beats. FL Studio is like a vast music shop to play with and specially when it is on the iPad and iPhone.

Verdict: I am quite convinced by the performance of the software on iPad. It is very swift and did not lag in any of it’s operations. The software has quite a lot surpirse elements where you can play any intrument from its library and record. Later, work on those notes,

quantize them change the pitch and timing of the recorded notes in the track edit window. The only flaw is it does not record directly from the device’s mic, which on the other hand its counter software garage band does. Here is one scope for the software to improve. The software has no sharing options other than exporting the sound in wave and midi format. The sound can be sent over to desktop for its further enhancement, which is one good thing about exporting. I would like to see more file formats and other sharing options.

Creating Music on the go.

Designer : Onkar R.

Content : Rahul S.


Applications

24

Musically Yours!

Romplr is an application where you can mix music. It is no more of listening but also interacting to make music. Create the best music you can be-

fore the timer runs out. You have to have the style of your own that sets you apart from the rest. It is a game where you compete your way to the top 50 remixes. It is an amazing app which gives you ample option to create tracks. There are two modes to it, game and freestyle. The game mode is all about creating your mix and com-peting with people to the top charts. You will be given 90 seconds to create which will decide your standings in the global level. The free style mode is where you can practice, experiment and find your own sound. It has no time limit and you can record your work. The app is available for iOS, Android ans Symbian.

interface: The interface is simple and easy to move around. All the options are available in one area and you don’t have to jump from one option to another. You can select a mix kit from the store to get started. You

can use the centre buttons to line up few loops and turn them on and off as and when required. These loops will play automatically after the beats and will synchronise with the other sounds. The side buttons are used to trig-ger effects that will allow you to put an edge to the mu-sic. To make the best remixes you have to combine them with creativity, rhythm, speed and variations. You also have shakeups and solos that will support your track. The shake effects are used by shaking your device for-ward.

featureS: There around 40 free tracks available for this app and still uploading with new releases every week. The complete list features top artists like Rihanna, Kanye West, Jay Sean, B.o.B, One Republic, Owl City

and many more. Even the new artists and their tracks are also being added to the list. The tracks are from dif-ferent genres such as techno, hip hop, dubstep, electro, pop, rock etc. It has simple functioning with 8 loops and 7 fx which enables you to create music. You can view your previous compositions and also the top tracks of others.

SharinG: When your mix is complete you can share it with your friends over Facebook, email and romplr.com. The created mixes can also be saved on your phone for other purposes. When your track is in top 50 it will be herd by many people. However getting there is not a cake walk, you have to improve your techniques to be the best.

Verdict: This app is most suited for hip hop. Apart from that it can also produce other types of music. You have

to be technical and inno-vative. I have found the app pretty good. It gener-ates some awesome tunes that can be used for many purposes. However there are few shortcomings to it. The app requires constant internet connection for it to work smoothly with all the features available. Not many tracks are available for free. There should be more variety of tunes in order to make the tracks better. Overall Romplr is a good application in fact en-

Designer : Onkar R.

Content : Karan D.


Applications

25

Amul.. The taste of India...Needs no introduction. As the name stands for itself, AMUL is Amulya (priceless). After revolting and struggling against rowdy Polson

Dairy, with the prime initiative of Sardar Vallabhbhai Pa-tel supported by Morarji Desai, a group farmer in small vil-lage of the state of Gujarat viz. Kaira District Co-operative Milk Producers Union established this very brand, in 1946. This, today’s heavy brand, was handed over to Gujarat Co-operative Milk Marketing Federation. Spreading rapidly in Gujarat, in a span of 68 years, the success of this dairy co-operative movement has taken the dairy industry in India to new heights, being today’s one of ‘The Largest’ producers of milk products in the world.

The utterly cute little girl was born in 1966 when Sylvester daCunha, the then Managing Director of daCunha Advertis-ing Agency signed on the account of Amul butter. It is inter-esting to note that the chubby girl has always been on the hoardings but never made her way to the television.

The very own Amul girl has turned 50 now. “Oh my God; is she really 50 year old now”, is the expression in every Indian’s heart. Who would have thought that the largest cooperative in India created way back 1946 would actually come up with such an innovative form of advertising? It is a big milestone in the history of Amul. A new concept along with such a prominent and clever tag line, strikes the right string almost every single time. These Friday releasers are something to look at. However, the most

amazing part of these ads is

that they a l w a y s bring the best news head-lines may it be politics, scandals, movies, cricket, etc in such a humorous way that catch every eye. A combination of the catchy

one liner with simplistic il-lustrations is what

Amul billboards are all about.

Lets take a look at some of those :

First Decade:

The very first Utterly, Butterly, Delicious hoarding was the Amul girl kneeling and praying God to give her the daily bread with Amul butter. That cute little girl made her way to the hearts of the people straightaway; it was love at first sight. The hoardings were surrounded by people mesmer-ized by little village belle. The little girl winking and smil-ing at the people made everyone smile back her too. The ad became very popular and was very successful.

Second Decade:

While I was going through the ads of this decade I came across a very cheesy and sappy one which was regarding the topic police department requesting the increase in their salary. What was the cartoonist and the designer thinking when they handed a bowl in the hand of a police consta-ble and had put the caption along saying “Police Sir, may I have some more”. This was too much. The police at least

The first Amul Billboard

Police man asking for increase in salary

50 years of delivering butterly advertisements .

Designer : Siddharth C.

Content : Shubhra S.26


Ad Review

deserve to be respected and honored for the service they provide us and not be humiliated like this.

Third Decade:

Amul never failed to appreciate the cricketers in India. Dur-ing the test series between West Indies and India in 1983 Sunil Gavasker’s performance was splendid. He made centu-ries back to back, moreover in the 6th test he made 236 runs without losing the wicket. He was performing so well that Amul came up with the hording which had the same design as the first one but said “Easy, sunil, we can’t change the designs so fast”.Both the ads were nicely correlated.

Fourth Decade:

Here Amul didn’t fail to cover up this Oscar winning movie TITANIC in its hoarding. It has got the same poster that the movie had which could have been humorous as the hoard-ings usually do. The creative team could have used its witti-ness to make it worth a good hook since this simply brought

disappointment to the most awaited audience.

Fifth Decade:

The Jagan Mohan Reddy assets controversy made its way to the high hoardings of Amul with the witty twist that is awaited by everyone by adding a tagline “Reddy! Get Asset! Go!”

The Kadapa MP arrested and lodged at Chanchalguda jail by the CBI on May 27 2012. At its charge sheets, it has accused Jagan of getting investments of several crore rupees from firms into his own businesses as part of quid-pro-quo, when his father late YS Rajseskhara Reddy was the chief minister of Andhra Pradesh.But this was not it. Amul fell in controversy after display-ing those on the billboards as they received a call from a lawyer, whose last name was also Reddy accusing them of insulting all the ‘Reddy(s)’ in Andhra Pradesh.

For half a century with both ups and downs the Amul girl managed to keep the place in people’s hearts. Where does Amul’s magic actually lie? Many believe that the charm lies in the catchy lines and witty presentation that we laugh; be-cause the humor is what anybody would enjoy. It is pure and simple, everyday fun. I would now look forward to see some more of her on the Televisions now. Let’s hope to see her soon on televi-

sion as an animated character.

Sunil Gavaskar’s century against West Indies in Delhi

Sunil Gavaskar’s quick century in succession

On the popular oscar winning film

Politician Jagan Mohan reddy jailed on corruption grounds

Designer : Siddharth C.

Content : Shubhra S.27


Ad Review

Premium class mobile phones just got a step ahead and have a new meaning. A decade back, premium class mobile phones were restricted to high end Nokia mobile phones, blackberries and i-mates. Now, after successful run of Samsung’s galaxy brand in market and acceptance HTC mobiles, they release their successors, the HTC One X and the Samsung Galaxy SIII.

Android operating system has played an important role in bringing up these mobile giants. In comparison, both these phones stand to the ground and tackle each other firmly in all the aspects. Thanks to Android, all the mobile phone using this operating system looks similar. It just comes down to what is the heart of the phone and how well the design has supported the UI and processes of phone. Let’s skip to break down and compare few aspects which are important to know before investing in any of the smart-phones.

round i – design:

Choosing a mobile phone on its looks is a subjective matter. A portable design, with durable body is a win situation with me. Galaxy SIII has a 4.8” screen, 136.6 x 70.6 x 8.6 mm dimension weighing 133gms on the other hand HTC ONE X boast a 4.7” screen with 134.4 x 69.9 x 8.9 mm dimension weighing 130gms. Both of this mobile phone has multi-touch input and advance corning gorilla glass to protect their screen. Galaxy S3, however has used advance technology of corning gorilla glass that is corning gorilla glass 2. This glass promises to withstand shock of daily usage without compromising on the quality of the display. The built of galaxy S3 is indeed polycarbonate and used traditional design with a shiny plastic look and feel to it. On the other hand HTC One X has no doubt used the same material but they have made HTC in a unibody giving it a solid look and feel. The screen type of screen used by Samsung remains the same AMOLED with capacitive touchscreen, where as HTC ONE X uses Super IPS LCD2 capacitive screen which they use for some of the elite phones. Screen resolution boasted by both these phones is same 720x1280 making both the phone HD. The grip of S3 is much better as it is curvier so it gets little easy to handle and while removing from a skin fit pairs of jeans. However, I found the colour vibrance of HTC ONE X to be much better than Samsung Galaxy S3 on full brightness. The design and built quality of HTC ONE X is better and leads by just making it a unibody mobile phone. Even the touch buttons on the body of the phone is placed properly without interrupting in any process. S3 on the other hand has the same problem while typing a text message; maybe my palm is too big for the phone.

round ii – user interface:

Both the phones use Android 4.0 Ice-Cream Sandwich. To make the UI look different these phones use their own respective UI. Samsung uses Touch wiz UI and HTC uses Sense UI, both of these UI has made sure that it won’t let Android 4.0 down. They have incorporated UI very well although it is same and old but still they

managed to make it look fresh. Samsung’s UI is however little superior as it response to the touch input. It’s a tie for the user-interface, as both of

them have stick to their original UI rather than exploring or doing something adventurous. At this level its good they did not try to venture new else it could have played with the reputation with the

models previous versions hold.

Just word play or do they have the ‘wow factor’ in them?


Content : Rahul S.


Gadget Review

round iii – features:

Despite of having similar dimension both these phones are power packed with performance and style. Features on the other hand are lead by Samsung Galaxy S3. The responsive features used by Galaxy S3 are inspried by nature for example the unlock screen has a water ripple effect. When you swipe your finger across the screen, it gives water ripple effect and unlocks the screen. The synchronization of sound and visuals is also good. The sounds used by the phone are also smooth and subtle which imitates feeling of eco-friendly environment. HTC ONE X has focused more of 3D animations and graphics for its touch response. The performance of 3D graphics is very active and quick. HTC ONE X boasts a superior Quad-core 1.5 Ghz processor than Galaxy S3. Galaxy S3 on the other hand has Quad-core 1.4 Ghz Cortex-A9 processor which is no less. The start time taken by inbuilt applications like camera; HTC did start-up pretty fast. Speaking of which, Camera is an integral part of both these phones.

round iV - camera:

I was very much curious to get my hands on the camera of HTC ONE X as the commericals were endorsed by a fashion photography intern Nick Jojola and he was recommending to use the phone. When I started using HTC ONE X’s camera I was quite impressed by the quality and procesing speed it delivered. The interface of camera is simple with rule of 3rd grid provided in the start-up. When I started using Samsung Galaxy S3’s camera I was completely amazed by the colour representation and the co-lour it threw on the screen. I tried both the mobile phone’s camera and I was pretty much impressed by the quality they have to deliver. Now, about the simultaneous HD video recording and image recording which was newly launched in HTC One X was completely hyped in their television commercial. The resolution of HTC One X camera and Samsung Galaxy S3 is 8mp with 3264x2448 pixels. The video record-ing of Samsung galaxy is more superior with resolution of 1080p@30fps and HTC One X is 1080p@24fps. HTC One X video recording comes with video stabilizing and Samsung Galaxy S3 comes with only image stabilization. Samsung Galaxy S3 continues to lead the pole position but Nokia’s Pure View 808 launch may have shaken the grounds of camera imaging.

final bout:

Samsung Galaxy S2 is one of the best mobile phone running with Android OS. HTC one X and Samsung Galaxy S3 are in the market for 38,000 and 40,000. One can also think to buy a big wide screen televi-sion with that money. Keeping the reputation of Samsung, Samsung Galaxy S3 does deliver that performance for people who really like mobile phone inspired by nature. People who are fasinated by 3D graphics can buy HTC ONE X. It is a completely subjective for peo-ple to selct their phones. Users who are comfortable with the UI of HTC can upgrade their handsets. The processing of HTC ONE X is more promising than Samsuing Galaxy S3. Samsung Galaxy S3 has a S-Voice natural Language command and dictation which to be honest needs a lot of improvement. Even iPhone 4s’s Siri is not perfect but the best part is they are upgrading and fixing the bug with that. Samsung over here has an oppurtu-ity to improve. To conculde the winner, it is totally subjective, I would prefer a Samsung Galaxy S3 over HTC ONE X. But if you do not want either then the option of widescreen LED television is also avaliable.


Content : Rahul S.


Gadget Review

Kirtee & Bhavesh

BG Design & Flash

Devesh NarkarCorelDraw

Siddharth Chavan

Flash

Raj NathuIllustrator

Ramchandra KhandekarBG Design

Shruti Sah

Illustrator

30Designer : Siddharth C.


Students’ Work

Vinit Girkar

Flash

Sushil3D maxMukesh Kanvadia

Photoshop

Sayali HorambeCharacter Design

Omkar Shinde

MayaSuhash SawantIllustrator

31Designer : Siddharth C.


Students’ Work

Designer : Dhir Mehta


Tips n Tricks

32

Aabra Ka DabraSOME QUICK TIPS

INILLUSTRATOR

TO ENHANCE YOURSKILLS

Text tracking:

Alt + Arrow Right Key: Increase tracking by 20

pointsAlt + Arrow Left Key: Decrease tracking by

20 points

Text leading:

Alt + Arrow down Key: Increase leading by 2

pointsAlt + Arrow up Key:

Decrease leading by 2 points Converging

points together using average

function:

Object-path-average (alt+ctrl+j)

Tilde Fun:

Take any object and hold ~ to get some amazing effects.

Take Gradient Circle, go to object>Expand and specify the number of objects to

be split>Pathfinder Pallete and Divide and then hit Shift+Ctrl to Ungroup

Delete the band of colours as per your requirement

Solid Bands:

Content : Karan D.

U m b r e l l a m a k i n g a c t i v i t y . The students of Arena were all enjoyed the rain of art and fun in Arena Andheri. The activity organized was creating umbrellas out of chart paper and designing them in a beautiful way. The activity was coordinated by Miss Shital and Amruta Ma’am. As the music played along, the students were charged up with creativity and they came up with some brilliant piece of art. Some created cute looking kid’s umbrellas; some made colourful funky umbrellas, other group created a Warli art design, while one of them made a walk cycle animation on it. In just a couple of hours, the students made uniquely designed umbrellas. All different in its shape and design. This activity was a new experience to the students as they learnd to make umbrellas and take their creativity to a new level.

A r e n a A d i n 3 D . Arena Multimedia launched it’s 30sec Television commercial. The commercial is being showcased in major theatres in 3d stereocopy, while the basic commercial video is shown on major TV channels. The 3D commercial will be displayed in theaters showcasing 3D stereoscopic movies and also the Ad will be available on 3D enabled TVs and mobiles. The Ad was shot at Arena Andheri Centre. 10 students of Arena Andheri were given the opportunity to be a part of the ad. The video has been conceptualized by Quadrum Solutions, created and animated by the team of Talking Donkey Studio’s and converted from 2d to 3d by Magic Tree.With its revolutionary concept Ad of 3D commercial and the slogan of “Get the skills Get the job” Arena Multimedia is all set to offer great careers in animation industry.

A n i m a t i o n M a s t e r C l a s s . R & H Master class held in Arena Andheri centre by animator Mr.Tanseer. The master class was conducted for 2 days. On first day Mr.Tasnseer gave the students the knowledge of basic priniples of 3d charactrer animation. Also he asked the students to make an animation of hand banging on a surface and detailing it by observing carefully how the hand movement goes. On the Second day the students were given the knowledge of how the animation has to be refined. The students were asked to make a ball animation but with all the detailings including how the gravity acts, the squashes and stretches etc. The master class session was very informative and the doubts of the students regarding creation and execution of animation were cleared.

Arena Andheri Times

Designer : Dhir Mehta

Content : Kunal N.


News

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Word SearchWord Search

n c o r u l a d m u on n o e c k a o a a tg t u m b o i r c n pi a s a b o r l e i ss l m o c u d e u n me l l m i h s a l f ad i p o h s o t o h pn e a n i m a t i o ni l l u s t r a t o rh i t k s i a s b o nl i c e u n r n t s n

Find the given words* in the above puzzle :arena, animation, photoshop, flash, illustrator, corel, nuke, combustion, adobe and indesign.

*The words can be marked in any direction:

Answers for last month’s quiz:

Stress your eyes, sharpen your brains and find the words.

34Designer : Kunal N.

Content : Kunal N.


Game

Which heavenly weapon does Arjun use in the movie ‘Arjun : The warrior Prince’ ?1) Brahmaastra2) Pashupata3) Indraastar4) Narayanaastra

In which year was Pixar found ?1) 19682) 19753) 19794) 1973

The famous comic character ‘Spiderman’ was created by ?1) Joe Simon and Jack Kirby2) Stan Lee and Jack Kirby3) Stan Lee and Steve Ditko4) Joe Simon and Steve Ditko

Which Indian Painter hold the record for most expensive Indian painting ?1) M. F. Hussain2) Tyeb Mehta3) Syed Haider Raza4) Vasudeo Gaitonde

Who is the president of Adobe Systems ? 1) John Warnock2) Dr. Charles M. Geschke3) Shantanu Narayen4) Karen Cottle

Solutions for the Quiz of June 2012

1) - c) Beauty and the beast2) - c) 19393) - d) Nick Fury4) - c) Computer Generated imagery5) - a) Emile Coahl

Brain-a-thonBrain-a-thonAre you smart enough to answer them?Are you smart enough to answer them?

35Designer : Kunal N.

Content : Kunal N.


Quiz

Purnendu Halder It really feels great after being the first student in Arena Animation Andheri to pass the Adobe Photoshop CS5 ACA exam. I feel proud to be an Adobe Certified Associate. It wouldn’t have been possible without the help and support of my faculties and friends. The success I achieved today is all because of my hard work and constant practice. Regular lectures by Tanvi Ma’am and the daily question answer session helped me gain confidence and I got to know more about the software. Photoshop CS5 is really a very amazing software and knowing it in depth as helped me a lot to be a professional in it. It was due to this exam that I started designing much faster.

Talent’s Tale

Designer : Rahul D.

Content : Kunal N.


Students Interview

36

Proud Brijul Nair scored the maximum marks 897 out off 1000 in an international exam. It’s a moment of pride for me after being the highest scorer in Adobe Photoshop CS3 ACA exam in Arena Animation Andheri. I expected to pass with marks around 800, but I was stunned to see my result ‘897 of 1000’. Shocked at the moment with my score, I was pushed up a cloud higher when Sumeet sir said that I was the highest scorer in Arena Andheri till now. Achieving this milestone wouldn’t have been possible without the help and support of Chetan Sir.

Brijul Nair

In the Limelight

Name: Manish Surti

Name: Amol Pokharkar

Name: Nikhil Parab

Name: Girish Kadam

Name: Sukanya Shenvi

Name: M

anoj Shinde

Name: Pramod Prajapati

Com pany :Krisnela

Company: Prime Focus

Company: MEL

Company: DEE

Workshop

Company: Xion Advertising

Company: FCP Edito

r Taj P

hoto Studio

Company: MEL

Students

placed

Designer : Rahul D.


Students Interview

37

sumeet

Typewritten Text

Rahul S.Karan D.

Bhavesh S.Govind P.

Onkar R.

Rahul D.

Mahesh L.Dhir M.

Kirtee S.

Niles

h G.

Sidd

harth

C.Sh

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a S.

Kunal N.

Content WriterPhotographer

Conten

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Content WriterDesignerContent Writer

Designer

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DesignerDesignerDesigner

Desig

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Cover page Designed by : Kirtee Shingan & Bhavesh SawantWeb page Designed by : Karan DuttPoster Designed by : Siddharth ChavanBack Cover Designed by : Rahul Dhas

Designer : Sidhharth

Documents

arenaandheri.co.in · packed opening visuals for his movie, Taare Zameen Par. Mr. Tanseer Ahmed, an animation artist from Rhythm and Hues, took a mas-ter class for the students to