Ricardo Graça has made this no less than 6 min short, which is quite an achievement. He made it all by himself and spent about 2 years working on/off to complete it. "Nós somos assim" is Portuguese and means "That's what we are".
Ricardo writes about the process:
I like illustration and animation a lot, and about too years ago I decided to write scripts to short movies and short animations; I decided to begin with animations, using free software like Blender, Gimp, Inkscape, Cinelerra, and everything that's possible.
It's very hard here in Brazil to make animations and have a job to survive, the difficulties are very big. I simply didn't have much time to dedicate to the animation, so it took me two long years to conclude
I had to study a lot of animation, the principles, you know, everything possible, and I had to live with a lot of people saying that Blender is bad, and I was not a good animator, and you know, these things. I know that I have to study a lot more to be a good animator, designer, illustrator, but I had to start from somewhere! So that's it! I like what I'm doing and I already started a new animation 2 weeks ago. I like Blender a lot and other free software too. Nowadays I'm using Linux SUSE and all free software that I can find inside the web.
It'll be interesting to see what Ricardo produces in the future!
[ev type="youtube" data="f1cqyosWM_k"][/ev]Read more at Ricardo's website Ricolandia.com
Updated May 28th: Ricardo has made even more images from "Nos somos assim" available here.
31 Comments
Cool! Really cool video! Two years worthy :)
Great work! Sometimes you just have to do what everybody says you cannot do. :-)
Considering that this was a one-man job, this quite an outstanding effort. Well done Ricardo Graça!
In general, the character animation wasn't too bad, espcially since it seems he did this using Blender 2.37. Also the effects work was quite neat. I was a bit confused about the ending, but perhaps that's just due to the fact that this is in a foreign language for me.
Great job, Ricardo!!!
The story is very funny.
@Aligorith:
The girl says "it wasn't that!" (referring to the flower the boy brought).
Very nice! Worth two years. Keep dion the good job, :-)
Congratulations Ricardo on completing the short! =D
:D Great!!
Congratulations!
A good movie, a very good story!
Oh man the boy has it rough! Obviously she isn't worth it.
I really like the way you made the eyes Ricardo. Is there a tutorial for those, or could you even tell me how those were made?
Nice stuff!
Nice work!
It's hard to predict what will happen with "Nos somos assim"
really good
Nice work!
It's hard to predict what will happen with the boy
really good
I found that animation it is not hard to do but for making it you must know the foundations!
That`s why to make it outstanding you need an good eye for movement and sincronization and an autocritic mind!
See your imagination from other`s point of view you will see that even your outstanding work it is not outstanding at all but can be marvelous!
Evreybody starts bad! ;) Thats life;)
Nice good start!
congratulations !
another fine proof that a one man band can pull great results from open source tools... and a good concept !
That was wonderful! I am inspired to work harder. Your ability to combine your imagination with the skill at creating a good cinematic design, and the technical skill at using Blender is very impressive. I look forward to seeing more from you in the future.
Thanks again,
Byron
very impressive job ricardo!!!
keep up the good work!!!
Hope to see new stuff from you!
Good work, and good attitude man! Deaf ears to naysayers! Thumbs up to you and your movie.
Congratulations on your completed movie!
First of all I'd have to say it takes some real serious effort to complete
a movie, even if its 15 seconds or 2 minutes.
I'd like to offer some critique to your work if you want it
it's not supposed to be negatively but more aimed at giving you even more
success in your future work perhaps leading to something you've been dreaming off?
Ok, here we go:
1) Don't elongate scenes by stretching them, even though you probably
worked for hours, days and months on some of your first scenes it only
should be displayed for the planned amount of time...in this movie
the opening scene (running) was a tad bit too stretchy for an unpatient soul like me ;)
and I nearly switched it off...but waited it out because it's a Blender users production :)
2) Spend more time on rigging your character, it had some obvious "bend" areas
that doesn't work well...you can overcome this by blending 3 vertices with two bones
and it will deform beautifully! Always work on low-res poly when rigging...and use
highres as the last modifier. It will bend even prettier. (An old proven trick of the trade)
3) Spend some time texturing your character! Its YOUR character the audience
see all the time...so you can in fact save time on the backgrounds by spending
more time on detailing your character. I like the eyes however! Very nice!
And now for the ROSY part :)
It's obvious to me that you like animation - you are doing FAR better than I ever did as a beginner
back in the days. Of all the Blender works I've seen people put out there you rank higher
than a lot of them, good work Mate!
Of course things can be improved a bit in that department...but judging from your
very nice effort I bet you can see that yourself and will probably strive to improve that wether
we say so or not ;)
What amazes me though is your courage to go on-and-on to finish the movie, and that you did.
Of 100 people trying....about 5 make it to the finishing line...that makes you a rare breed :)
Again, good work and the very best of luck with your next accomplishment
Very nice!!!
I hope I can do something half that good the day I'll make a first animation...
A job very well done indeed! I look forward to your next film. I imagine this very website to be the perfect place for you to find other artists for collaborative works, for you've proven your ability, patience and above all dedication. The world loves things like that.
Very nice work. I definitely appreciate the effort you put into that, and I think a lot of the animated movement is very well done. I agree with JoOngle, you need to edit. Almost all the shots go on considerably longer than they need to go, and this makes it hard to stay with. Tighten the edit up, and cut most of your shots to about half their length, and the movie will be much improved I think.
Cara, sua animação ficou legal. Mas as vozes deixaram a desajar.
Mas ficou excelente sua animação e olha que você a fez no Blender 2.37!
Great Work!
Very nice, the whole thing, video, audio and story...
Especially the fact that it has been made as an one-man project makes it respectable.
Ricardo- Congratulations on being alive after completing an animated short.
I loved it. For a 1 man production, and limited time and resources, you did an excellent job. Good luck on your next project. Give us updates as you go on the next project, looking forward to it.
I second what JoOngle said above. I nearly quit watching because the intro walking was so stretchy! And the guitar loop became a bit monotonous... but man! Good work! I hope I can do something like it one day.
Ricardo has made even more images available here:
http://ricolandia.com/artigo/
I edited the article to include this as well.
//Mathias
Good job and well done! Keep moving on with your skills!
Good Work Ricardo, i like it a lot... the face guy is very expresive too.. :)
This is really a good job and i do respect to your efforts.I'm not an expert on blender to criticize you for animation work,but all i can say that "keep on what you are doing"...
wooooow!!!!!!!Good work.
i'd like to be your sudent.
Keep going.
Very interesting. I found your blog on google and will bookmark it now. Keep up the great work.