Good day!
And the most exciting part of my school year has arrived. I am to begin producing my animation short film! Alone! And to be able to do so, one last task had to be done: I am to take on the hat of the Production Manager, and be able to schedule and organize the production flowchart and time-estimate for Liron Topaz great movie "This Side Up":
After reading Liron´s Blog, I was able to determine that he had 36 weeks (more or less) to produce this movie on his own. With this in mind, I produced a Flow Chart that in my opinion shows the correct steps to take and in the correct order for a one man production to be able to run smoothly, organized and have good chances of being completed.
So here it is, my Flowchart for the movie:
Now comes the most important part of the preparation for the production of an animated movie, the production schedule. Liron´s movie has a duration of 2.5 minutes (150 seconds), so for him to be comfortable and have a realistic objective regarding the amount of seconds he needed to animate per day, he had to dedicate most of his production time to animation.
I estimate he needed around 16 weeks for animation only. Considering a working week (5 days), he had 80 for animation. His production takes 150 seconds total, which allows for 1.87 seconds of animation per day. This is already a bit, but he is a talented animator, so in my opinion this is a very acceptable estimate.
The time-estimate for the movie:
Comparing my calculations with the only student that I could compare them with (http://katitzisblogg.blogspot.com/2011/02/project-11-production-planning.html), I can see that the flow chart is very similar in its task completion order. Even though I think the flow chart is just a tool to show how the production and its different activities are organized into different stages, it is very important to separate the different tasks into different stages, so that one has an objective. It keeps things organized and easy to maintain a linear workflow.
Now my time estimate is very different from my fellow student. I considered more time, since Liron actually had more time, and this allowed me to probably be more accurate in calculating the necessary time for the whole production stages to take place in a feasible time and order.
Regarding my Time Estimate, I allocated 16 weeks for animation. I believe, and this will probably also be reflected when I plan my movie, that having good time for animation is essential. Animation is all that it is about at this point. How good my animation will be is determined by how much time I will have to do it, and to be honest the more the better. I also allocated 3 weeks for rendering because the quality of Liron´s movie is quite good, and there is always unexpected events when it comes to rendering, so its good to have a decent amount of time to do it.
There are tasks in my Time Estimate that overlap, such as the Character and Environment and Assets design, as well as composing and rendering, since one will be rendering shots. I believe they can overlap since they are related and can be done simultaneously.
In any case I might be very wrong regarding my Flowchart and Time Estimate, even though I believe it realistic. I also scheduled everything and tried to have good time for every stage of the movie, because it is also important to consider unexpected events, and if one plans everything with good time, it is easier to change plans and adjust if there is need for changes.
That´s it for today. Write´ya soon!
