Tree Falling

I be fallin' trees with the paper I'm using!

Tree Falling is also the name of this shot - this is the 44 frames of a bird that flies through the shot. Ink drying on the floor before I erase the pencil, scan, then color on the computer.

PD085_TreeFalling is the craziest shot I've ever done:

SIX painting layers (BG sky, midground trees x 3, ground plane, foreground elements).

ONE 3D computer animated layer (giant robot stumbling and hitting tree).

SIX layers of particle systems, using two different pieces of 3D software (leaves falling from the tree as it falls, and smoke pouring out of the back of the robot).

TWO classically animated layers (1 is the bird, another is dust billowing around the robot's feet (thankfully re-used from a previous project).

TWO shadow passes.

ONE falling tree, which is a bunch of paintings strategically placed to look like a tree (and not flatten out like a piece of paper) as it falls towards the camera.

Some objects are moving in and out of focus as they get too close to the camera, and there's a bunch of camera shakes as well.

Son of bitch! No more shots of this complexity in the rest of the film, thankfully.

Will post some of the paintings and stills of this shot tomorrow if nothing else interesting comes up.