I am UK based film producer who has dabbled a little bit in animation on previous projects that I have worked on and am very excited about what I have seen regarding open source software. Currently I am in the process of putting together a children’s feature length film and want to make it as a 3D animated production.
'I only recently discovered Blender and from the limited projects I have seen (Elephants Dream & Plumiferos) I think the results prove that there is massive potential here for the film industry.
I am looking for someone (or maybe more than one person) who knows a lot more than me about Blender (which is not hard) and would be open to having a chat with me about the possibilities of making a feature length production in the UK using open source software.
Email would be the best way to get in touch to start with and from there we could potentially meet up to discuss further if required. This is not a call for the director or lead artist of the project but if I do meet people with great ability then anything is possible (please excuse how patronising that sentence comes across - it’s really not meant in that way!).
Anyway if anyone thinks they might be able to help me then please send me an email and if you could let me see an example of anything you have done using Blender (or any other animation software) then it would help me to see what kind of level you are at.
I’d advise you to also get on irc chat (freenode server) and join #blenderchat or a similar blender related channel (there’s a few). That way you can ask lots of blender users ‘live’ lots of questions.
Thanks for the advice Macouno, I will join the live chat. And Bigbad I want to chat to people first to find out how feasible the project is but if it goes forward there would be payment to the people involved. But as I stated this is not a call to arms just yet but a simple call for help.
I am a producer from the so called ‘traditional film world’ (i.e. live action) and up until recently animated features of any quality has been way out of UK budgets. But now seeing what can be done I think there is real potential for quality movies to be made this way.
Anyway if anyone thinks they can help please get in contact - oh and I now don’t care where you are from as the response from the UK only call has been, well slow.
So anyone who thinks they can help then please drop me a line.
“But now seeing what can be done I think there is real potential for quality movies to be made this way.”
What animations did you see?
I’ll tell you right away that a couple of artists isn’t enough to make a feature length film. You need at least 20 artists for 2 years to make anything. Minimum. Cause there is no easy way in the animation industry.
Hey Bigbad, you got it in for me or something? As I mentioned in the original post I have only seen ‘Elephants Dream’ & ‘Plumiferos’ using blender but they are a good starting point.
We are not looking to make an animated movie with 2 people but at the moment we just want to chat to a couple of people to work out logistics etc. We have access to finance and are in a position to hire who we need if the whole project is deemed to be feasible.
Olive Pictures, just to say good luck here. If people sound harsh it is only because we get a lot of people on the forums that either want people to work for free or that seem to think it can all be done by one person in a month
Olive Pictures, One more piece of advise… take a little time to look around and find an artist in your area, these forums can make that easier as well, just do some searches. Then ask that person directly (send a private message). Of course you would also have to show them a bit more about yourself than what you mention here. Not everyone reads everything that’s posted here.
I was chatting to a mate of mine this very morning about doing a feature-length film. Not that I could, well I could but it would probably take up most of my life, but because it would a be a serious achievement and something to be well proud of!
I saw something on www.animwatch.com about a guy who made a 7 minute animation that took 8 years!!! The animation was quality though.
I wouldn’t say I’m a guru but I’m pretty confident with Blender now and I might be able to give some advice. I’m pretty busy working on an animated video for some local rappers. It’s five minutes long and I anticipate it’ll probably take a year (I have a full-time job and two kids)! http://www.albinal.com/video/VideoTemplate.php?VideoName=FC.flv
also here to wish you luck - you might ask at cgtalk.com in the blender section. While the majority of blender artists do visit here, there might well be additional blender related artists over at cgtalk.com.
As regards others comments regarding a feature length film, number of animators, and time frame - it really will depend on how complex things are - both ED and Plumiferos are fairly detailed movies with complex models and moderately complex backgrounds. Also on the experience of the animators - most of the animators on ED were fairly inexperienced (all had done animation before, but none of them had done a lot of animation); the quality of the tools (for ED - blenders animation tool set started out somewhat crude, and improved to usable; during Plumiferos they became more usable; during Peach they are becoming kick butt).
Personally I’d recommend contacting Ton, who is the lead developer on Blender and heads the Blender Foundation and Blender Institute and who arranged Elephants Dream, Peach, and every other major Blender project. He also sponsored (via the Blender Foundation) for experienced Elephants Dream animators to come and help train artists for Plumiferos when they were starting out (training artists to use Blender who were experienced in other 3D software).
Unfortunately if you were to email Ton right now, it will be two weeks before he gets back to you, since he has left on a two week holiday.
I just wanted to say on the board thanks for all your help. You have been and continue to be very generous with your knowledge and it is much appreciated.
i would be interested in talking about the logistics/ technical side of things, if you wouldnt mind?
my main strenght in blender is modeling, which usually takes the least time when producing animations, well compared to animating which takes the largest chunk out of the time frame, from my own experience that is.
ive seen whole sets put together in a matter of days, sometimes even hours (modeling, not texturing/ lighting), yet ive only seen a few frames of animation over a period of one or two months. So from experience if your aiming for a small team, you will want a lot of animators, 1 or 2 modellers and well the rest of the team, im not sure about that…texturing takes a while to do, lighting does aswell since its usually on a scene by scene basis but over a few months im sure this could be done by atleast 1 person.
anyways we can talk more via email if you would like, i have PM’ed my email to you
