First year animation film - the sea tale

After weeks our film project is done. I am so happy to see all our work  been put together into this film. 

It was such an experience. I love my team mates. I love our meetings and brain storming sessions. I think that we work ready well together and was able to keep it together until the end.

We've put alot of thoughts into the sequence. Manipulated scenes and effects as well as our thoughts on the music to accompany the scenes. There were more ideas to the ending from the idea of having the character being a ghost from the beginning to the idea of having a grim reaper standing behind him but on our final decision we decided to go for  the simple crane smash. 

Sea project scene shots

Working on full speed for the sea project. I've been working on the 2D scenes for the flash back section of the film.

The most difficult part is doing them from different angle as well as making the movement as smooth as i can because its a slow sinking scene. foreshortening hand reaching  I had to redo so many times because I just can't seem to get it to look right.

Life drawing

Ident project.

The Ident project has to be one of the most challenging task I have to do considering that it only has to be about 6-10 seconds long.

After working and completing other project I felt a bit burned out when it came to working on the ident. I was looking forward to being as creative with this as much as I can and with the amount of the time I have for each project.
  Right before starting my draft on the ident ( which I still have little to no clue of what I was going to do) I took short trip to town with a friend from the course and started talking about squid ( yes squid ). That became a starting point for my ident idea. It seem a bit funny to begin with but it kept me going and thinking hard about putting these ideas together. My first idea was a squid painting with its own ink. Of course, after giving it a few thought I wasnt sure if there would be a problem with me animating with real squid ( it was going to be a frozen squid which I can buy at Asda).

SO.. I ended up making a puppet using a planet crafting kit I bought on that day in town. I did a few test on how the squid would move.

Its a pretty rough test but it turn out alright.

Suddenly my mind shift again. Perhaps it was because of the panic of not being able to get my Ident done on time. I brain storm another idea at once. A back up . I started to think back on the Ident and re-read the brief again. I began to wonder if I made this to complicated for myself. Sure, the idea seems good and the final product would be good as well but I would need more time to work into it and that is what I don't have.

I went back to the drawing board (literally) and began to do a few sketch of the Falmouth university font. Now at the time I was having trouble with my drawing as well. Soon after I did a few sketch , I thought " why dot I do an animation using the white board? It's easy and I can fix my mistakes better on it." And thats what I did. 

It was simple and I still can be creative with designing a unique patterned font for the Falmouth university. Thought there are always room for improvements. There is an issue of the camera moving so the Ident scene does shake a bit as well the continuity of the words fading into the white board. 

Overall I really enjoy the project even if it took me some time to get the idea out of my head and piece them all together. I could also say that this project also help me  with my own drawing a well. I got hooked on to the patterns and have been applying them onto my own personal art work.

Adaptation animatio scene test



This is an exercise using a backround layout from story book and animate the enviornment

 

The background I chose was from a graphic novel called Nine lives. From the original piece I've focus more on the outlines and shadins of the picture than the sketch detail. I change the background colour pallet to blues.

 I've recreated the background and seperate them into layers in photoshop then import the layers again as folders into toon boom for the animation. The bits I animaed was the moon, the coulds (which I've added as extra ) ,the trees, birds, water and a small crab.

I've decided not to add the cat into the layout since I want to focus more on the background movements and the idea of havig a small crab wold still draw  attenion but is not the main focus. Just to add a bit moe mvemen into th backround.

 

Here is the final product of my layout animation.

Work in progress.

Animation Background

Exterior animation background layout

Ranger Rick story board: Exterior background from story boar, the firefly meadow.

  

Layout sketch

Exterior section of the forest ( The meadow) 

Forest Final sketch.

This is the basic outline I did on pencil. I will be working more into the background in paint tool Sai.