Teaching TV Paint to the Students at NUA is quite a change from any of the Adobe products, it’s a bit of a lore unto itself. No keyboard shortcuts are the same – I tell a lie, ctrl z!
None of the students have com across this type of software before so it really makes sense to give them a very basic but practical introduction, that being said, I am not a natural 2D animator, my Graphic Design and Illustrator background means I usually like crisp lines, clean colours and none of this sketchy stuff, which is the way I actually draw!
Below video test was my first foray into TVP from simple footage that I shot in the garden and it just turned out really well, really gorgeous movement.
I had also recently mocked up a lip sync/rotoscope sequence with a freelance client so had got the basics of using video in TV Paint (massive files!) down and I really love to push and expand software in different combinations.
Below final output video –
So, to really get my teeth into it I gave myself an extension project… let’s take the output from TVP and play with it in After Effects, and I had the perfect piece of footage to try it with and a brand new 16″ cintiq to test it out on.
The clip I wanted to use was an outtake from a music shoot, where we had attached a go-pro to the head of the guitar.
So I did the rough layer then a refined layer in TV Paint, which looked quite nice all by itself (see below)
Then I drew the strings in on a different layer, witnessing some amazing bending of the strings as I went through it!
These were the only layers I decided to draw in TVP as I wanted to take more time to play in After Effects.
In After Effects I wanted to see if I could get some interaction going between the TVP layers and filters/effects available in AE, I also scaled and repeated layers to add more visual cues from the music.
I really liked the way it ended up and using the larger cintiq was a joy!