Animation Blog - Liron Aluf

Wrapped Up Short Film

2011-12-17T15:00:00.001+02:00

Last year some of us from Crew972 worked on the short film "Wrapped Up". We meant to finish it on time for the holidays season but stuff happened and we kinda missed the opportunity.
Well, holidays season is here again so here's a link to our short film, which is actually relevant for any shopping rush :)
Credits are on the vimeo page!
Enjoy :)

Future City

2011-12-01T23:31:00.000+02:00

I really wanted to finish that one but I've realized I'm stuck. I'm not sure about the final look it should have and after trying many different ideas, I've decided to do something quick in PS and post it here.
Didn't even manage to choose the amount of lens blur... so I've uploaded several versions.. :)
Maybe someday I'll come back to finish it..

It's been a while, but I finally drawn something..

2011-11-04T23:16:00.002+02:00

It's a cat! :)

Gypsy Caravan WIP - Lighting

2011-05-24T02:32:00.000+03:00

1st pass, still trying to make it work with the background.

Gypsy Caravan WIP - Textures

2011-05-16T02:52:00.000+03:00

Up next - lighting!

Gypsy Caravan WIP

2011-05-09T02:49:00.002+03:00

I've started modeling this Gypsy Caravan today, so far it took me about 4 hours.
Tomorrow I'll do the textures.

A bedroom rendering

2011-04-18T14:01:00.002+03:00

I needed to fix some of the textures but since this is just for fun, I decided to leave it that way and move to the next one.

A Library Rendering

2011-04-08T20:56:00.001+03:00

Another architectural rendering - this time of a library.

Architectural rendering

2011-04-04T16:34:00.005+03:00

Here's something I did yesterday.
I edited Carla Animations' architectural reel and felt like working on my own shot..

New dialog shot

2011-03-26T19:32:00.002+02:00

Here's an animation I did a few months ago. I found a video on youtube with a 3 year old girl recording a makeup tutorial. She was so cute I had to use the sound from her video.

Special thanks to Shuki Gamliel for the guidance :)

Another drawing

2011-03-25T21:32:00.003+02:00

Next one will be in color!

Another PS sketch

2010-12-07T03:22:00.003+02:00

PS Sketch

2010-12-03T02:34:00.004+02:00

My first attempt of drawing a human figure on Photoshop with lighting (with a reference).
Was a nice therapy :)

I'm officially an AM alumni!

2010-03-27T03:00:00.002+03:00

This is it! 18 months in Animation Mentor are now over and I'm officially an alumni!

I won't be able to get to the graduation on July because of work, but it's ok as long as I'm working as a character animator ;)

Congratulations all of my AM classmates!!

P.S- Time to switch the Animation Mentor badge on the blog to the alumni one :)

My final AM reel

2010-03-18T03:01:00.004+02:00

Well, I think it's final... :) Only one week left to go so I think this is it.

Next week AM ends and my new job starts!

This term was great. I know when it's great if I look back at the work I've done last term or even in the beginning of the term and think it's horrible :) and I do think my work from last term and from the beginning of this term is horrible, so I guess I've learned something :)

I can't really look at the reel anymore.. I see so many things I don't like but my mentor says it's ok so I guess it's time to take a break from it before I really lose my mind..

Anyways, here's a version of my reel-

Celebrating a new job!

2010-02-18T02:49:00.010+02:00

Good news! Gabi and I got a job as junior animators!
We're going to work together on an awesome project. The job starts on the same day of my last Q&A in Animation Mentor so this day is going to be both sad and happy at the same time.
I don't really want to say goodbye to AM but I'm also very excited to start working as a character animator :)
So as ran and stimpy used to say- Happy happy joy joy!! :)
(it's a silly cake, I know, but on the other hand it has 700 grams of chocolate inside!!)

Animation Mentor Gathering Israel

2009-12-26T00:20:00.004+02:00

Finally, after 6 months (I think..) we had a meeting at a restaurant in Tel Aviv! it took us a while and not everybody showed up but it was still a lot of fun :)

Final Dialogue Scene for class 5 in Animation Mentor!

2009-12-16T02:27:00.009+02:00

There it is! finally! well actually I'm not too happy with it but I can't look at it anymore so I'm taking a break from this scene :) (not even going to render it any time soon).
I will probably continue working on it next term on class 6 which is all about polishing what we did in Animation Mentor.
Can't believe this term is already over.. one more to go and that's it :) woohoo!

Week 10 - Polishing!

2009-12-08T14:50:00.003+02:00

This is my assignment for week 10, this whole week I've been polishing the hands and fingers and smoothing out the arcs (well I admit, I was staring at shot 5 for almost 2 days.. :) )
I have to continue with the polishing especially on shot 5 and I need to do an eyes pass and all that stuff.. and of course, address my mentor's notes.
Still have 2 more weeks to work on that scene. week 11 will be the last week with e-critique and week 12 is just for uploading a progress reel to AM web site but I usually still work on the shot on week 12.

New Dialogue Layout

2009-11-05T00:59:00.004+02:00

So I chose a dialogue from the movie "The Kid" and here's the layout and a basic blocking pass.
I still need to adjust the last camera and probably push some poses, add breakdowns and refine the hands.
After the caveman animation I figured I like to animate subtle movements (though there aren't many in the caveman animation :) ) so this one should be fun :) plus I really like that dialogue :)

Animation Mentor class 5 final facial expressions assignment

2009-10-20T14:28:00.003+02:00

Finally, my caveman animation is done!! :)
This week we had to finish the facial expressions for this shot. It's so nice to finally see the finished animation after so long :)
Next week we need to choose 3 dialog lines for a 2 characters shot. I've been searching for dialogs for over a week now, I watched 2 seasons of House and Private Practice, 1 season of Grey's Anatomy, 5 movies, and few episodes of How I Met Your Mother and Dollhouse.. and found only 4 lines... I don't like this searching part... it's not easy to find a dialog for 2 contrasting characters with no background music that I can relate to...
I also want to choose something difficult to animate because I think this is actually the last animation I will do in Animation Mentor since the next term is all about polishing what you already have.. but after all, I'm still having fun :)

Animation Mentor Class 5 week 2

2009-10-11T22:20:00.005+02:00

This week, in addition to refining the facial expressions, we were asked to choose 2 pictures and recreate the pose on bishop.
Here are my 2 photos-

And here's my second pass for the facial expressions. I added the first camera just for now and will remove it when the caveman's facial expressions are done :)

Animation Mentor Class 5 week 1 !

2009-10-04T22:10:00.003+02:00

Class 5 has began! :) My mentor for this term is Mark Pullyblank and the assignment for this week is to block out the main vowels and facial expressions. It's a bit weird because the lecture for this week was only about lip sync and nothing about facial expressions but I think everybody managed, so I guess AM know what they're doing :)

Here's my lip sync and facial expressions blocking-

Animation Mentor Class 4 Progress Reel

2009-09-19T01:46:00.006+03:00

Class 4 is now over. I had the best term so far in Animation Mentor. I had Brett Coderre as a mentor and he's great. I also liked all of the lectures. It was so much fun and I learned a lot.

So here's my updated progress reel :)
Next term we will add the facial expressions for the last class 4 assignment (the first one in the reel). I think it will be difficult to top class 4 but I still hope class 5 will also be that awesome.

Oh, and I'm going to Italy on the break between the terms!! woohoo!!! :)

Animation Mentor class 4 week 11

2009-09-14T00:40:00.005+03:00

Here's the last assignment for class 4! woohoo!! :) I will render the 2 shots from this class for next week and then off to class 5! :)

Here's a rendered frame from the last assignment :)

New logo and web site for Carla Animations!

2009-08-31T18:14:00.003+03:00

We launched a new web site for Carla Animations, we also have a new logo-
http://www.carlaanimations.com/
The reels are still the temporary reels we had before, but soon they will be updated as well.
woohoo :)

Animation Mentor class 4 week 8

2009-08-23T21:52:00.004+03:00

This week I had to re-block my shot according to the mentor's notes. At this stage the shot should still be in a "blocking" mode but with more details such as slow-ins/outs, extremes etc.
The sound is from the movie Young Frankenstein by Mel Brooks.
Next week- splining!

First V-Ray render

2009-08-16T00:00:00.008+03:00

I did that one a long time ago. This is the first interior scene I did using 3ds Max and V-ray.

I wanted to really understand V-ray so I decided to render our living room in both night and day.
It turned out as a good decision because right when I finished it, I found a job in architectural renderings :)
The video is not so good but it was also a good idea to render the scene turning from night into day because then you can really understand how to deal with v-ray.

Animation Mentor class 4 week 6

2009-08-11T11:26:00.005+03:00

I did some changes to the shot according to the mentor's notes and rendered it. There are some stuff I still need to fix like drifty parts and some pops but I'm not going to work on them now. Maybe I'll do that on the last week of this term.
Last term I studied mental ray on Maya 2008 and I thought I got it pretty well but for this term I'm using Maya 2009 and it seems like some stuff in Mental Ray changed and on top of that I had to render a museum and didn't want it to have any windows, only spot and ceiling lights.. welll.. needless to say.. that's not my strongest side.. yet! :)

Animation Mentor class 4 week 5 assignment

2009-08-02T23:43:00.004+03:00

So this was the last week for working on that acting test before moving to dialog.
It was a rough week as well after I was asked by my mentor to make lots of changes.
I believe I will fix whatever the mentor will tell me for next week revision and after that, this shot will be left alone..

This week we will be choosing a dialog!! woohoo :)

Carla Animations

2009-07-27T02:03:00.003+03:00

Some good news-
Gabi and I have opened a small animation studio called Carla Animations!
It can be found here- www.CarlaAnimations.com
We are currently working on our 2 reels, one for character animation and one for general animation.
I hope we will have more updates soon :)

Some architectural renderings

2009-07-20T22:59:00.006+03:00

Here's some of the stuff I did at 3dig. I worked there for almost a year and then decided to focus on my animation studies.
It sure was a lot of fun :)
Here's the website - 3dig

First charcoal sketch

2009-07-20T22:23:00.005+03:00

Here's my first charcoal sketch. I sketched my grandmother since it was easier for me to see the guidelines on her face :)
I did that almost a year ago.. I think it's time for a new drawing!

Animation Mentor classes 1-3 progress reel

2009-07-19T15:44:00.003+03:00

Here's my progress reel for classes 1-3.
Usually the last assignment in every class comes first but since the class 3 assignments should be played in their order, the first class 3 animation is also the first assignment. (I hope it makes sense :) )