Starting from Scratch

So on my quest to create the perfect demo reel for Animation Y’all! I decided I’d shoot my shot with one of the greats and message Richard Lico on Linkedin to ask if he had any advice on demo reel must-haves. To my surprise, he answered he gave me way more advice than I deserve. He gladly gave me some questions to ask myself about my reel - stuff that employers would want to know like do you understand the technical side? Does the movement look real? How will it feel when played? Is this animation unique to this character and does it show their personality and what they’re feeling?

He then broke down my reel and gave me detailed notes on each shot. They were all amazing notes but the one that I felt like I really needed was to understand the character. What are they thinking? Is there any reason they would do things differently than other characters? Can you see their personality through the animation? I wasn’t expecting him to be so generous but I appreciate immensely.

The original plan was to keep working on the animation system for the Jokull character but there’s no personality or backstory there so I’m scrapping my reel. The only shot I’m going to keep is the undead sword swing - after addressing Richard’s notes of course. So I took a look at Kiel Figgins’ shop and really like the vibe of this child swordsman rig and got to work creating a character.

Enter Shao, an fourteen-year-old orphan raised by the Samurai who has had every minute of his life dictated for him with rigorous Samurai training. Through this, he’s grown cold and jaded with no respect for the Bushido Code and even his own life.

I scoured Pinterest for reference and made a mood board that I thought best represented Shao. After that, I turned on some Japanese Zen music and created a few poses. I might do a couple other poses just to flesh out his character a bit but I did three that I’m pretty happy with. Thanks for reading, mood board and poses below.