The Building Of Igloos

Here we have some material tests to see what the igloo should be made out of. These were created by Martin Burn. I think the sanded plastic one (front left of the group photo) has the best texture and looks pretty interesting with the light shining through it

Martin also made a mock igloo, to check that it is the right size for the puppets. We decided it needed to be a little bigger to allow room for me to get my hands in comfortably, allowing me to be able to move the puppets about when animating.

Silicone and Oil Paint Skin Tests

I found this fantastic video that showed me how to use silicone properly:

Here are some tests I did of silicone on foam. I realised that white silicone is horrible stuff and clear works so much better. It has a nicer texture, finish and can achieve more subtle colours. I was able to get the mottled effect I was after and score cracks in the silicone with a cocktail stick. I learnt the silicone needs to be realy thinly applied in order to work, allowing you to build it up in layers.

Distance

So this is where I'm going to explain my film idea, so take a seat, grab a coffee and enjoy.

The film is called Distance, it will be stop motion, set in the Arctic and use Inuit art as inspiration for the art style.

Distance is a story about missing someone you love, whether it be a partner, brother or sister, friend or parent. It shows how missing someone can really, really mess with your head.

The tale follows two Inuits, a girl, Aluki and a boy, Anik. Aluki is forced to say a tearful goodbye to Anik as he is leaving on a long hunting trip. Anik gives her his necklace before he leaves and we see the pendant is a carving of a strange face. Once Aluki has waved Anik off into the distance, she sadly returns to her igloo. But when she opens the door she is confronted with a strange creature staring at her. The creature has the same face as the one on Anik's necklace. Aluki rolls her eyes in an 'urghhhhh not again' type way and pushes past the Creature.

We then see Aluki picking berries and putting them in a sack. Something hits her in the back, making her stumble forward. She turns round to see the Creature standing some way off behind her. It slowly bends down and forms a snowball, readying to throw one at her again. The Creature's facial features never move, it can only tilt its head, making it more creepy and strange as well as making it seem like it is constantly staring at Aluki. The Creature does everything very impassively and there will be lots of awkward type stares between Aluki and the Creature. The Creature is always about, standing there, staring at Aluki.

There will then be a montage type scene where Aluki is shown doing her daily tasks and constantly being prevented from doing them by the Creature:
Aluki rubs flint together to start a fire, as soon as she gets a spark and the fire alights the Creature walks over and pours a bucket of water over the fire, quenching it.
Aluki fishes in an icehole, as soon as she gets a bite the Creature comes over and cuts her line with a knife, sending the fish falling back into the sea.
Aluki tries to sleep, but the Creature is there poking her every few seconds, keeping her awake.

Aluki is chopping wood up with an axe. As she raises the axe, the Creature quickly unties the axehead, so Aluki is only holding the shaft. She swings and due to the changed weight, falls in a heap in the snow as she overbalances. She is at this point incredibly angry. She is sick of the Creature's incessant presence and just wants it to leave her alone. She gets up and tries to make the Creature leave, brandishing the axe shaft and gesticulating angrily. The Creature, however, just continues to stare at her. It takes a step towards her. Aluki gives a cry of despair and runs off. If the Creature won't leave her, she will leave it.

Aluki has run very far in her state of anger. She comes to a stop, panting. She hears a noise and turns to see a polar bear emerging from the water. But instead of a polar bear head, it has the head of the Creature. Aluki runs away from it.

Aluki reaches a rocky area. There are lots of birds sitting on the rocks, watching her. She blinks and opens her eyes to find the birds all have the face of the Creature. She runs off into a nearby cave.

Inside the cave, the Creature's face begins to appear all over the rock wall, staring at her. Some of the faces extend out of the wall towards her on stalks, thrusting their faces at her, she falls to the ground, surrounded. She scrambles up and runs away. No matter where Aluki goes, she cannot escape the Creature.

Aluki runs out into the open snow. Everything is white. Snow is falling. She is in a state and she is angry and sad and scared and confused, all these emotions swirl around inside her, consuming her. As she stumbles around the snow falls faster and heavier, it is a blizzard, engulfing her, just like her emotions. Aluki is lost, physically and mentally. She collapses. Our view is obliterated by snow. And the Creature is, finally, nowhere in sight.

We now go to Anik, who is in the forest, shooting caribou with his bow and arrow. But it turns out that he has a Creature following him too. The Creature looks the same as the one following Aluki, but with  a different face, the same face as the one carved into the wooden bangle that Aluki wears on her arm. Just as Anik looses his arrow, the Creature nudges him, making him miss. Anik tries again, but as he is about to shoot, the Creature disappears into thin air, with an explosive sound. This startles the caribou, causing it to run off. Anik, cursing, gives chase and follows the caribou through the trees and out of the forest,  into the snow. He loses sight of the caribou, but spots something lying in the snow. He realises it's Aluki and runs over to her. She shows weak signs of life and Anik bundles her up in his arms, carrying her off into the Distance.

The last shot we see is of the two Creatures sitting side by side, watching Anik carry Aluki off.

The End.

Ok so now I'm going to explain where I was going with this. I wanted the film to be ambiguous enough so that the audience could take their own slant on the story, so that it is relevant to them. So I wanted to keep the Inuits' relationship with one another open for interpretation.

For me this is what the film represents:
Aluki is missing Anik so much and this causes her a lot of sadness. The Creature represents Anik's presence in Aluki's mind, she just can't stop thinking about him and how much she misses him. No matter where she goes he is there in her head, just like the Creature. She is unable to get on with her day to day life as thinking about Anik distracts her and causes her to not be able to carry out simple tasks. So the Creature gets in the way of Aluki's tasks, just as thinking about Anik does.
Aluki grows annoyed and then angry at the Creature, representing how her sadness has turned to anger and resentment towards Anik for leaving her and putting her through the pain of missing him.
Aluki decides she has had enough and decides to leave Anik/ the Creature, to distance herself from Anik emotionally and the Creature physically. But this is hard to do and so no matter where she goes she sees the Creature's face, representing her inability to just cut Anik out of her life.
The blizzard represents how her emotions have escalated, leaving her in a state, as all the contradicting emotions she feels towards Anik writhe around in her head.
Anik has a Creature following him that represents Aluki's presence in his mind, as he is missing her intensely too. This Creature purposefully scares the caribou, which causes Anik to find Aluki and help her, as it represents the bond between two people, where in your time of need the people closest to you can often just sense something's wrong, kind of like a sixth sense and no matter where they are, no matter the distance between you, they will be there for you.

The film is slightly abstract in style. I wanted the viewer to be unsure of what the Creature was until the end, so there is a weird, mysterious atmosphere through the film. The film is slowly paced to start with, but picks up as Aluki's emotions become more intense. There is a quiet awkwardness to the film (I hope that makes sense!) enhanced by long stares between characters and stillness of characters juxtaposed by fast movements.

If you read all that then fair play to you, it was incredibly long and rambling, but it hopefully gives an insight into my film.

Inuit Art

This is the point at which I realised I did not want to create the Sun story for my third year film. Time was running out though before the beginning of term, and obviously I had no film to pitch. So I did the only thing conceivable at this point and took the dog for a walk and contemplated life.

On this walk I began to think about a previous film idea I had had. It was about Inuits. I then thought about Inuit Art and connections and thoughts began happening in my mind. So I went home and started researching Inuit Art and Inuit history and myths and legends.

I find Inuits fascinating and adore their art, their carvings are quirky and full of personality. The shapes are curvy and smooth, often very simple form-wise. They created art that spoke of the nature around them. I drew out some of their carvings which you can see below. I find their art very inspiring and rich in ideas.

Style Influences

I was planning on using Celtic art as inspiration for my film, as when Una went down to Earth I wanted her to experience nature, with forests and mountains and the like, rather than civilisation and cities. I felt this would contrast the most with the Sun, which I thought could be inspired by the Cold War. Below are some examples of Celtic type art which I copied out (including from 'The Secret of Kells'). Celtic art has a very flowing, swirly form, with shapes twisting in and out of each other. 

Here are some examples of Cold War architecture and design, which would influence my design of the Sun. They are in some ways the opposite of the Celtic art as they are heavy, cold and unwelcoming, with bold solid forms, unlike the intricacy of Celtic.

Hello Again

Hi!! So despite a lack of posting over the Summer I have actually been doing lots of animation related things. I have been developing ideas for my third year film. I worked a lot on one idea, which involved the sun, a girl and a considerable amount of fire, but then decided that it was not the right time to make this story. I've put it in a metaphorical drawer in my mind for now.

I then came up with another idea, which just felt....... right. It felt like me, whereas the other idea always felt a little distant somehow.

So now will follow a dramatic explosion of posts, as I try to encapsulate at least some of the many thoughts that have been spiralling around in my head into tiny bite sized chunks of intelligible text.

Chasing Birds Script

This is the final script for Chasing Birds which we handed in for our Pre Module. If Chasing Birds does get made as a final film next year, this script will have to be revised a lot, but I feel that the basics are there.

Frisbee Throwers

We have to animate a 60 to 90 second segment of our film after the Christmas holidays, so obviously this is a very small fraction of our feature film, so we needed to choose a good scene that could work on its own somewhat, while giving a flavour of the themes of the film. The scene we chose is where Ernie is showing around the disguised Doug in Human Heaven for the first time. He leads him through an attractive looking, busy green city, full of fountains and plants. The streets are full of people relaxing and socializing. Two of Ernie's friends call out to him and he introduces Doug to them. But Doug spots two people playing frisbee in a park and is suddenly overwhelmed by his natural dog instincts and struggles to control his urge to chase the frisbee. He cannot fight it and runs off on four legs, with his trench coat flapping out behind him, hat flying off his head, while Ernie looks on in dismay.

I was tasked with designing the two frisbee throwers. I initially was going to make them young adults but after an unsuccessful drawing session I went away and decided they would work better as little kids. I then came up with two characters I was happy with, applying slight asymmetry to their clothes and hair to give them charm. Rachel Gilbert doesn't really have any examples of people in her work, focusing instead on animals, so I had to base my kids on her animal characters, trying to keep the same shape structure, which I believe I have achieved to some extent. The textures and colours of the characters fit with her style and match with my design of Doug. 

The Style Card...

My style card for the 'A Dog's Afterlife' film was a Falmouth Illustration Student, so my group had a lot of free reign on this in comparison to the style for 'Chasing Birds'. We took a look at past Illustration students blogs and websites and came to the conclusion that Rachel Gilbert's style was best suited to our story.

Above is my attempt at reproducing some of Rachel Gilbert's work. Her style uses simplified forms, soft watercolours and rough textured brush strokes. The limbs of her characters are very skinny and tend to taper towards the end, whereas the torsos are quite boxy.

Below are some images of her work, as you can see, she does incorporate more detailed line work into her illustrations, such as the 'One Who Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest' book cover.

A Dog's Afterlife

I feel it's about time I update you all with what I've been up to in the world of Pre Production, so prepare for a fair few posts...

Since my group is made up of four people we are required to produce two Production Bibles for our Pre Production module, so 'Chasing Birds' is our first film and the second one we came up with is a feature film called 'A Dog's Afterlife'. It is based upon the Pick and Mix cards I got and it originated from my plot about different heavens for different species. 

A dog called Doug dies in a car crash alongside his owner, but in the no man's land between the heavens the two are separated into Animal Heaven and Human Heaven. Doug desperately wants to find his owner and is not prepared to just sit around with the other animals and not question where all the humans are. The animals are fed everyday in the canteen by a zebra, but Doug is suspicious of him and decides to follow him when he leaves. Once the zebra is away from the animals he pulls off his zebra mask, revealing himself as a man. Intrigued, Doug continues to follow him and is led out of Animal Heaven and into Human Heaven. He confronts the man and pounces on him, pinning him to the ground and demanding he explain what's going on, but it turns out the man is a laid back, friendly guy who decides to help Doug out. The guy, Ernie, explains how humans like to keep the animals segregated as they don't believe they have souls and how he is a cook in the palace kitchens in Human Heaven, with his other duty being to feed the animals.

Ernie helps Doug to infiltrate Human Heaven by teaching him to act like a human, giving him clothes and teaching him to stand on two feet. The pair then set out to find Doug's owner. 

Style Update For 'Chasing Birds'

The birds animation, which now has the working title of 'Chasing Birds', required a style and so the tutors gave us the Art Deco style card, telling us to focus on 1920s Vogue covers. My group was really pleased with this as the fairly regal looking illustrations suit the Victorian England scenes extremely well. The Vogue style makes use of angular face shapes combined with flowing, curvaceous bodies, pouting lips, small delicate nose shapes and slitted eyes, all of which sexualises the women. The clothes are often quite detailed in contrast to the basic face shapes. A washed out watercolour style adds to the delicacy of the images, as do the soft grey outlines. Patterns are a common feature of Vogue covers, sometimes filling background space or being applied to clothes. 

Below are some images that I copied to get a feel for the Vogue style. 

I then set about implementing this style into my designs for the girl, named Eliza, who is the protagonist of the story. Eliza is meant to be about 10 and this posed a problem as all of the Vogue women have very angular faces with strong bone structure and obviously little girls have rounded softer faces... so the youngest I could get her to look while still retaining a Vogue feel was mid teens. Eliza is also meant to be this athletic tom boy and not sexualised in any way, so again it was tricky to get that Vogue influence in without altering the characteristics of the girl.  Below is my design development, ending with the final coloured version, incorporated into an action shot as we've been told our characters need to be shown doing what they will be doing in the animation, rather than just standing about which is the kind of 'go to' pose people (like me) do when designing characters.

I think I've got the body shape looking quite Vogue like although in the final version I did make the legs too skinny. The rips at the bottom of the T-shirt are too long and distracting, so would need to be reduced greatly in size. The background sky works well and retains the style nicely.

Eline then took my design and put her own twist on it:

So we all decided this worked better as she looks the right age of about 10 and has quite a boyish figure. It will also be easier to animate as the shapes are simpler than mine and the hair is far less complex, with only a few strands... since mine was fairly crazy looking and would literally be impossible to animate in the time frame we have... it would've looked good though...

Pick 'N' MIx

In Pre Production we were each given 4 random cards: a style, character, setting and genre card which we had to combine to create an idea for an animation. I got Falmouth illustration student, angel, palace kitchens and documentary. I researched past illustration students' blogs to find a style I liked and found Patrick Atkins. I replicated some of his work to get a feel for his style:

His shapes are very simple and his marks are violent and scratchy. There is a prominent use of black and this is strongly contrasted by whites and off whites, creating strong lighting in his images which heightens the drama within them. The illustrations are quite dark in mood but the basic shapes used to create the characters prevent the images from being too sinister as it gives them a quirky edge. I felt this dark but quirky style would compliment the plot I came up with well....

So. The plot. The opening scene would show a lion killing a zebra, with the audience's sympathies lying with the zebra. But the lion would then die somehow and his spirit would find its way to this kind of no man's land, purgatory type place, where loads of spirits of different animals and humans are. There are entrances to lots of different heavens, as every species has a different heaven. But there is a mix up and the lion ends up in the wrong heaven: the zebra heaven. The zebras hate the lion because his kind kill zebras, so they ostracize him and force him to work in the Palace Kitchens, an underground dungeon beneath the palace where the leaders of zebra heaven live. The lion finds that many other predators have ended up in zebra heaven too and they, like him, have been banished to the palace kitchens.

The lion spearheads a revolt against the zebras, rallying up his fellow predators. But things get more complicated for him when a young zebra finds its way into the palace kitchens and befriends him. She shows him that not all the zebras are bad and wish to condemn him and the other lost animals to an eternity of slavitude. The lion tries to stop the uprising of the animals but it is already in too full a swing and they no longer listen to him. A great battle between the animals and zebras ensues and the young zebra gets caught up in it. The lion manages to rescue her and since everyone is distracted by the war the two friends manage to sneak out into the no man's land between all the heavens. The zebra helps the lion find the lion heaven and then there is a bittersweet parting as the lion and zebra cannot be together as they both must go to their respective heavens.

Here are some character designs I started on:

Funny In 15 In 5

The first project of the 2nd year is Funny In 15 In 5. We were randomly put in groups of 3 and have 5 weeks to create an animation that lasts 15 seconds and makes the audience laugh. Let me tell you now, this is incredibly difficult!! I'm working with Zoe and Elf (their blogs can be found at http://zoewakefield.blogspot.co.uk and http://elliotforrest.blogspot.co.uk repectively.) One of the ideas my group threw around to start with was having some cute dogs and killing them off in humorous ways, going for comedy through gory cartoon violence. I had at a go at storyboarding this idea:

We decided it wouldn't work though as it would be longer than 15 seconds for one thing and it's not actually particularly funny for another. It would probably work better if the you literally had one short shot per dog death, so it was very fast paced.

We then developed another idea, shown in the animatic below. Zoe drew it up, I got the sound effects and Elf put it all together in Premiere.

The premise is a lumberjack cuts down a tree and it randomly falls on a cow, the humour coming from the randomness of it, in a kind of 'wtf?!' way. But yet again it's not that funny... 

Before we scrapped this idea I drew up some character designs for the cow and lumberjack. We were going for a very simplistic look as I think it's a simple idea and simple characters have more of a comedic nature. This style would also fit with Elf's background design:

Here are some images I used for inspiration. I wanted to take the simple curves and fluid shapes into my own designs.

I used the simple shading in this last image as the basis for my on character colourings. So anyways here's what I came up with.....