EP: Turnaround - Emily

Alongside the expression sheet for my main character, I also created a very simple and quick turnaround to put in my art book and to give myself a reference to develop upon when I have completed my animatic.

Although they are really quick turnarounds, they give me a really good idea of her proportions and how she will look from the key angles. 

I also used the opportunity to simplify the character, particularly her clothes, as these were too detailed in the previous designs. Without all of the small details, the character design looks a lot less detailed and much easier to replicate. The only complex part of her design is her coat, which can be removed if it proves to be too much to animate later on. 

Overall, I'm pleased with my character and I feel that I will be able to work well with her.

EP: Expression Sheets - Emily

The last time I visited my character I had just completed a digital test and decided that I liked how she turned out, which led to me creating an expression sheet for her, as I was happy with her face design.

Expression sheets are something I have never done before, and I was surprised to find that I actually really enjoyed creating one for this character. It was just really fun to sit there pulling faces in a mirror and recreating them with the personality of my character.

As a starting point, I think that I have a good selection of facial expressions to work with that I will develop on once I have a better idea of the facial expression she will be pulling throughout the film.

EP: Artbook

EP: Pitch

During my pitch I walked through my ideas, my initial character design and the script that Sylvia and I had created. Whilst my feedback was all positive, there are few areas I need to focus on in order to refine my ideas and make the most of my work. 

First of all, I need to do more research for my character and refine her, as at the moment she is too detailed and could be improved upon. I need to focus on looking at artists or animators that create simplistic characters that don't contain too much detail but still manage to get across personality and appeal.
I also need to work closely with James to lock in backgrounds, as these will have a significant role in telling the story and creating an engaging and beautiful animation. In order to do this, I need to make a plan of the whole world for James to work from and work with him to create one world that can be used for multiple shots rather than many different scene files.

Finally, I also need to work on a more detailed Gantt chart that I can share with those that I am collaborating with so that I can keep on top of time management and keep on track with my animation.

EP: Storyboarding the Introduction

As part of the introduction, Sylvia and I decided that we should use the first 30 seconds as a somewhat montage to set up the scene and give an audience the chance to discover what has happened to the character before placing her in the situation and watching the main narrative. We decided to this, as we felt that it would make the narrative a lot stronger, but would allow us to establish where the character is, what has happened to her and how it has happened without using up the 2 minutes for the film. This gives us more time to fit in character and plot development, ultimately creating a stronger story and one that is also more engaging.

Therefore, we deiced that the introduction would consist of six five second slips that switch between the character being in the alternate world and the character being in her natural world before opening up to the character exploring the alternate world in front of her.

Rough storyboard

I'm happy with the overall storyboard and feel that there isn't too much content. However, it will be a very quick sequence o shots, so I may have to revise some of the shots which I will do once I piece together the animatic.

EP: Environment Sketches

Surprisingly, I have found sketching for the environments to be quite difficult this time around as I feel that I am slightly confused about what it is that I specifically want within my environments and how I want my character to react to it. 

Although I know that I want my introduction to take part within a cave and I want the main story to take place within an alternative world which is mainly a forest, I'm not 100% certain on how to go about that. However, I decided that I would sketch the first thing that came to mind in the hopes that it would clear my head and give me a better sense of direction in terms of where I want this to go and how I want it to look aesthetically. 

With this in mind, I started by sketching out a few cave illustrations, however, these are what I struggled with most, as I am not sure what kind of cave James would like to model at this stage, whether he wants to stick to low poly or go more realistic with his modelling, and as James has other priorities right now, I feel that it would be best to leave this until he can be with me to run through what he would like achieve. 

I found designing the tress a lot easier that I did the caves, as I had already decided which kinds of trees I wanted to use. I chose to go with Beech trees, more specifically those found in Ireland, as they tend to intertwine with themselves and are full of little knobbly bits and twisted branches. I felt that these helped to create a stronger sense of mystery and would work really well in creating the archway that leads the character to the main reason she is in the world. 

Thumbnails for layout

Although I felt a lot more confident creating these sketches, I am still unsure as to whether or not I was capturing the right visuals for my project. This is proving to be quite frustrating, as I want to create visuals that James can use to begin designing the world for my narrative to take place in and we can begin to move forward, as at the moment, I feel that I am at a bit of a stalemate and not making much progress. 

In order to fix this, I think it would be best to speak to James again and decide how he wants to build to the world, whether he wants to use low poly or something else. I feel that this will help me to get a better understanding of how I should be representing my ideas through drawing and kick start my concept art. 

EP: Environment Mood Boards Continued

On top of the mood boards I created with James, I also decided to create a few mood boards on my own to influence other elements of the word design, such as which trees to use, the tone and lighting for the park in the introduction sequence, and the bridge leading to the village.

Park

Trees

Bridge

Lighting and tone for park in introduction

Again I focused on how I wanted the elements to look within my animation as well tone and lighting. I feel that I have enough research to begin environment design with a clear idea of the mood and tone I want to create within the world that James will also be able to understand.

EP: Environment Mood Boards with James

As James and I were working together to create the environments for my animation, we decided that it would be beneficial to also create the mood boards together, so we knew that we were both on the same wave length and it would also allow James to set boundaries on what could be achievable for him to make and what wouldn't. Reading through the script we found that we would need to create a minimum of 7 platforms that each contained a separate element of the world, and each of these platforms would contain key aspects of the story.

Caves

Cabins

We started with caves, as James feels that this will be the toughest element of the world for him to create. James discussed what he could do and stated that we could go low poly or more realistic, however, low poly would save time and may work better with 2D animation over the top. With this in mind we researched real caves and those that have already been created in Maya to get an idea of what we can achieve and the different kind of aesthetics that we could explore. We then did the same for cabins.

Whilst James was looking more at the shape and elements within each of the assets, I was focusing more on atmosphere and mood. I want the atmosphere of the environment to reflect the story and the situation at the time, so lighting and colours are going to play a huge role within the environment design. With this in mind, I researched specific settings, particularly within the cabin scene, as I wanted to be clear on what kind of lighting James would need to use.

Overall, I feel that we have a good selection of work to influence us and I am confident that we are both on the same wavelength and have the same idea of what needs to be achieved.

EP: Collaborating with James

James agreed to work with me on this project as environment builder, as I wanted to create 3D backgrounds textured to look 2D. This was because I felt that it would leave me with more time to focus on character animation and design. It would also solve my problem of working on perspective, as this is something that I struggle with.

For the last few weeks I have been working closely with James to produce a simple map of the world I want creating and how to go about building the world in the most efficient way for James. During the christmas break, James and I sat down and had a day of working together on mood boards and world plans in order for James to have a better idea of what was expected of him and how much work he would have to do.

Map of alternative world

Map of alternative world

Map of real world

James and I agreed that we should plan the world in blocks, as this would allow James to create a world in which he could remove the blocks not needed for certain scenes but keep everything in the same scene file within Maya, reducing file load and keeping everything in the same place. From here I will begin to develop environment sketches to help James design the worlds. 

EP: Developing Script

Sylvia made good work with the initial script and got it handed over to me within 2 weeks of me giving her the rough treatment. Overall and I am really happy with what she has created and I feel that it conveys my ideas very well in an interesting and engaging way.

Script

However, I'm a little worried that the story may be too long for a 2 minute film. So I brought this up with Sylvia, who said that if there is anything I need her to re-write she is more than happy to help do so. Having said this though I'm not sure which areas of the script I can leave out and which areas I need as essential shots.

With this in mind I have decided to storyboard the script to help visualise the story and see what elements from the story I can take out and which elements can be shown with sound. For now I am going to work on environments, as I am collaborating with James on these, as we are going to experiment with making 3D backgrounds that we then texture to look 2D.

EP: Collaborating with LCoM

On the 1st of December we were given the opportunity to meet up with some music students at Leeds College of Music to discuss work ideas and potentially collaborate with people for our final film. 

Whilst there I spoke to a number of different people and groups and I received some positive feedback on my ideas and I had several different people interested in a collaboration. However, after only receiving samples from two people, I decided to work with Daniel, a student specialising in film scoring, as I felt that his work was most appropriate for my ideas.

Since then we have set up a dropbox where I can share all of my work with him and vice versa, we are also in communication over email. 

So far I have sent him character designs and the script, however I feel that things will pick up as soon as I get the animatic done. 

EP: Collaborating with Sylvia on Story

Returning back to my narrative, I decided that it would be beneficial for me to get someone else involved in the story development, as it would provide me with alternative opinions and help me to create a well thought out story. Therefore, I asked Sylvia if she would like to give me a hand and play the role of story developer within my project, which she agreed to. With a second mind to contribute ideas, we were able to create a narrative outline that pin pointed all of the key events I wanted to happen within the story.

Outline of narrative

Sylvia was happy with what I had produced and felt that it was a good foundation for her to begin working on a more refined version of my treatment. We had both agreed that Emily would be the focus of the story and it would follow her throughout with supporting characters being the raven and the plague doctors. However, I didn't want my idea to be too cliche yet I didn't know how I was going to avoid this, as I have never written a script for this kind of narrative before. 

Whilst Sylvia gets on with script development, I am going to consider collaborating with someone who specialises in music for my film. 

EP: Emily Sketches

As I struggle with character design, I found this to be a lot harder than I expected, as I struggled not to just simply re-create a character I had seen before. Having said this however, I feel that my initial character sketches have turned out quite well and I am pleased with my first attempt at my character. Referring back to my mood board I focused a lot on texture and line work, as I feel that these are two elements that will be important within my work. I also took a lot of inspiration from stop motion films such as The Boxtrolls, Paranorman and Coraline, as I really like the character designs within those films.

Although my initial sketches have turned out quite well, she is a little too detailed to animate with, but I feel that I have gained a better understanding of how I want her to look and how I want my line work to appear.

Initial sketches

Developed sketches and poses

I then decided to attempt to re-create the character digitally to see how she would translate from traditional media, I also used the opportunity to test a quick colour pallet to flesh her out a bit and give me an idea of how she would look rendered.

Digital and colour test

I am happy with the overall look of the character, however I feel that she is a little too detailed, especially the coat. This is something that I will address when I refine the character, but I like the rest of her and feel that there isn't too much to change.

EP: Character Ideas

Although I wasn't having much luck with creating an ending for my story, mapping out my ideas in thumbnail form has given me an insight into how I want my characters to behave and react to their environments and the events happening around them. In particular, I have a very strong idea of the personality I want my main character to possess. I know for certain that I want my character to be female and I want her to have a strong sense of curiosity and adventure but I also want her to be quite stubborn and grumpy.

With this in mind, I began to do some research into how I wanted my character to look and the drawing styles I wanted to explore for my animation.

Drawing style and main character reference

Raven reference

Other character reference

I knew that I wanted to create my animation using digital animation, and focus on using textures and different brushes, so I focused on finding visuals that demonstrated the use of textures and a range of materials. Although I really like the idea of using traditional media, I feel that it would be better to create the animation digitally, as I am much quicker at it this way and it will allow me to create more work to a better standard.

However, I only really focused on the raven in terms of design, whilst the other two boards focused on textures and materials. I like the idea of creating a simple design, but one that still conveys texture to somewhat replicate a pencil texture. This is something I want reflected throughout the whole animation and is something I will experiment with before moving onto final character designs later on down the line. 

Extended Practice: Thumb-nailing Initial Ideas

The story of my animation was something that I wanted to get nailed before I started thinking about characters, as I felt that the story would influence the characters more than the other way around, making this an important stepping stone between my ideas.

I started to thumbnail a rough narrative that I had first imagined when thinking about my ideas in the hopes that it would give me something to work from, develop and refine.

First draft

I managed to get to get to a point where I felt that the story should be coming to an end, but was struggling to find an appropriate ending that wasn't cliche or disappointing. So I decided to go back through the story and not force it, as I felt that it would eventually arrive to a natural ending.
However, I still didn't have any ideas, but it did make me begin to think about how the narrative I was developing was actually quite cliche in the sense that it was the typical hero story, and whilst I was fine with the story being cliche, I realised that it would have to executed really well in order for people to focus on something other than the cliche story. This has made me think about how I develop my story and whether or not I want to avoid the cliche hero story or focus on creating well executed animation and characters. It may be worth getting someone else involved with the script writing to help me develop the story, as this will help me to take an objective look at my own ideas and refine them.

EP: Rationale

At the start of the project, we were given the task of producing a rationale to help answer the important questions of; why did I want to make this?; and what does it mean to me?

At this stage I already felt that I had a good idea of what I wanted to explore, having developed a rough story idea over the summer, so I found this really useful in pinning down the specifics of my project. I really wanted to create an animation that was heavily driven by the characters and the narrative, as this is the area I want to focus on for my career. I also wanted the film to demonstrate my skills as an animator and use the project as an opportunity to learn the software TVPaint. 

Not only did it help me pin down how I wanted to create my final film, but it also helped me to pin down the why, which in turn aided in the whole process of how I would tackle such a large project. I knew from the start that this would be quite ambitious, so it made sense to collaborate with as many people as I could. 

Although I feel that this project will be extremely challenging, I also feel that it will be a great opportunity to learn more about myself as a practitioner and to figure out where my strengths lie and what I need to focus on and improve. I'm really looking forward to getting on with this project and seeing how far I can take it.