This week, me and Vlad also put aside time to assemble our storyboard into an animatic. While the storyboards don't really stand the scrutiny of being blown up and put in an animatic, we felt it was important to get a feel for the pace and rhythm of the animation. We edited it to one of the songs Vlad has come up with for our animation, edited down to roughly a minute and I found it has given me a much clearer idea of how the final animation is going to turn out. For better or worse...
Creative Tension and where we go forward with the production
...which brings us onto the creative tension me and my partner have been having over the production as of late. This week we were finalising how we wanted the production to play out. I was very much for assembling the animation in a 3D Space using the tools in Maya, either editing in the 2D elements in post-production, or by importing them into Maya. I've been itching the use Maya for a while now in the context of a big college project and saw this module as my opportunity, but working with a partner requires compromise and my partner did not share my same admiration, opting instead for a more 2D solution to a lot of the problems our animation will present. (Moving water, reflections, 3D Space etc...) This admittedly did lead to a few days this week where little progress was made, but luckily after a word with the tutor, we came to a sort of mutual agreement. I am going to create the 3D Assets in Maya, creating UV maps for Vlad to use so he can colour them in Photoshop. We are then going to assemble these 3D assets in 2D Space, essentially compositing them in After Effects but still retaining the 3D assets. While I am disappointed and would have like to have created a significantly larger amount of the animation in Maya, I am willing to compromise for the sake of collaboration and try to make the most of the situation. This has also motivated me to pursue 3D more vigorously as a part of my PPP and Responsive Modules.
On Thursday we were given our first brief for the Responsive Module of our Studio Practice. For this first studio brief we are tasked with responding to one of several individually focused live or competition briefs as a way of demonstrating 'emerging creative interests and professional ambitions within animation.' On the college's E-Studio, we have been given a list of potential websites with potential briefs to respond to, so most of my time was spent researching into what brief I feel I want to respond to in order to reflect my own individual creative ambitions. I was immediately drawn to the website Loop-de-loop, which runs a monthly international animation competition revolving around a key phrase, which this month is 'Breakfast'. I was inspired by the sheer variety of the responses so far from gifted animators around the world, who showcased a diverse range of abilities. For this brief I definitely want to stray away from my usual stylistic trappings and experiment more, particularly with motion graphics, 2D-Rigging and 3D, though the relatively short turnaround that is expected for Loop-de-loop probably doesnt leave much time for me to learn 3D character animation to my own required personal standard. Still, I am very much looking forward to exploring the brief as I feel it will come as a welcome change to what I am currently doing on Character and Narrative. One thing I definitely want to ensure and lay out from the outset is that the final outcome of this module be completely different in style and tone to what I am currently working on in the Character and Narrative Module.
I took some time this week to fulfill one of the study tasks which was to produce a short character animation using the DUIK plugin in After Effects CC. As I am already working on an animation using the DUIK tool, I took this as an opportunity to experiment a bit with another drawing style and create a walk cycle. The result is what you see below.
I started off with a few drawings in my sketchbook which later developed into a simple character design of a man in a shirt with a prominent moustache and a tie which moved as he did. The original idea was to have the character change walk cycle mid animation to show a contrast between a happy and sad state, which would be reflected in the walk cycle. However, due to time constraints and a limited number of assets to work with I went with a simple walk cycle. Assets were created in Photoshop and imported into After Effects as a composition. I did encounter a few problems, most notably when the face would not move with the head when using IK Chains in DUIK, which is an issue remedied by animating the face within a separate composition and animating it with DUIK inside another comp. Lessons like this, which are a very basic oversight, are helpful for when I come to create my final character rigs for the final animation.
Style Tests and Maya Exploration
The bulk of the first half of the week was dedicated to creating some style tests for the design of our animation and experimenting in Maya with what was feasible to get a feel for the logistics before starting on our animation. I created the style test seen above in Photoshop (using some assets such as the lighthouse and the island which I created in Illustrator) based off some of the ideas we had written down in our sketchbooks. We already had a rough idea of how we wanted our animation to look from the go ahead, but it is important to evidence this through the creation of style tests so that we could garner feedback form tutors and our peers. Since we are going for a sort of dissonant art style for our animation it was important to me especially that the final style we go for be aesthetically pleasing, as I feel there is a real danger, since we are experimenting with so many different styles, of the final product lacking appeal.
I also spent quite a large chunk of my week reacquainting myself with the tools in Maya, as for a large amount of our animation I am hoping to include it somehow for some of the environments and props within the environments. Most of my time was spent experimenting with different ways to model and shade a lighthouse as well as ways of simulating water, which was simple enough with the help of various maya plugins. What is important however is that we get the water looking right, so it meshes well with the 2D assets of the animation and does not detract from the overall aesthetic of the animation.
So far I am fairly happy with the results from a modelling perspective, where I feel there is room for improvement is in the colouring, lighting and shading. I tried experimenting with Maya's Toon Shaders (as you can see above') to mixed results, so for the final product I am hoping to use UV mapping to colour the meshes in Photoshop beforehand (while still retaining the simple low-poly style) in order to save a lot of hassle and allow for a more freeform modelling process. I will continue to experiment with Maya and find solutions for problems we may encounter in the future in order to nip them in the bud early and save us stress in the future. 'Character and Short Story Design' Seminar with Steve Henderson
Midway through the week I also attended a seminar with Steve Henderson outlining some of the key features of narrative in animation and some of the ways in which we could enrich our narratives through implicit narrative design and layered narrative planning. He showed us an example of a short film with a strong layered implicit narrative; 'Runaway' by Cordell Barker.
'Runaway' is a prime example of a short form animation with a multi-layered narrative. The explicit narrative is that of a runaway train and the hijinks that ensue when it's conductor is absent, but the purpose of the animation very clearly lies in the less obviously yet infinitely more interesting implicit narrative which is a scathing and satirical send-up on capitalism.
Almost every design decision, from the design of characters, to the composition of the mise en scene, serves the purpose of reinforcing the implicit anti-capitalist narrative. The carriages are laid our and structured very much the way the Capitalist system is ordered, with the rich put first and the poor figuratively and then literally left behind. The core idea of a runaway train also reinforces this idea that the Capitalist system is 'a runaway train' heading for disaster, with the peaks and valleys of the environment almost symbolising the fluctuating stock market and uneasiness Capitalism brings. Barker's imaginatively animated short film is a densely packed critique yet also an entertaining and, at least on the surface level, light-hearted short narrative which works so well precisely because it has such strong implicit and explicit narratives.
'A film needs to be honest. Not just a project to get a three picture deal from Hollywood. It should be from the heart.'
-Don Hertzfelt, Director of 'Its Such a Beautiful Day'
The rest of the seminar explored lots of other ideas of how writing should be structured in a short animation. Being the organiser of the Manchester Animation Festival, Steve is an expert in this field. One of the main things I took away from it is that writing is not just the creation of a script, it is the transferring of ideas from your head to the page, anyway you want to. Work how you want to work and however is best for you when you can. While scripts are expected in industry, ideas can form any way. A script should be seen as a shopping list for what you need to create a film, the ideas and crux of the narrative should be figured out and defined before you write the script.
Storyboarding
Ideas for Storyboard Thumbs
Our rough storyboards are now finished and ready for colouring. We worked on them collaboratively to ensure there was a proper synthesis of our ideas and so that we could properly split the amount of work done this week between us. We started off by referring to our notes and basic narrative outline and came up with the descriptions of the shots and shot-lists before illustrating the individual panels. This was done to ensure that every shot led into the next one and was motivated by some kind of directorial decision, whether it me to flow into the next shot, or for some broader thematic purpose, such as framing the characters in a certain way in order to show the power dynamic or placing objects in the foreground to divert the viewer's attention in the frame. It is important to me that the storyboards be succinct and cut out any unneeded fat which doesn't build our characters or progress our narrative, in order to create a straightforward yet richly detailed animation which will fulfill our artistic ambitions as well as the brief.
Rigging Tests
As well as creating our animation using 3D assets, we have decided the characters will be 2D assets rigged in After Effects using the Plugin DUIK. So, ahead of creating the final rigs which I will begin work on once the storyboards have been coloured and finalised, I created a test rig to test the style and to see what changes could be made to the design in future in order to ensure a more fluid model in the final animation. Assets for this rig were created in Photoshop after I tried recreating a hand-drawn looking style in Illustrator but couldn't quite get it to look the way I wanted it to with Vectors. While the assets for this rig were created as raster images, I drew them at 300dpi at a significantly higher 5400 x 7200 resolution, meaning they wont appear pixellated at 1920 x 1080.
Character Rig created in Photoshop
DUIK is a plugin for After Effects which allows you to use the pin tool to create bones and hierarchies in a model rig in order to simulate more realistic movement and animation, particularly in character rigs. In order to create a fully posable leg for example, first you must pin the thigh, knee and ankle, then select the layer and create a 'Bone'. In order to create the hierarchies for the leg I used the parent window in After Effects to parent the ankle to the knee and the knee to the thigh so that when for example the knee moves the ankle follows suit, which cuts down a lot on the tedium. Then in order to create a working bone which could control the limb realistically I selected the ankle and created a 'controller' layer, selected the bone pins in order of hierarchy and created an IK chain, which allows for the limb to move without bending out of place or distorting the image for more realistic character animation. While I do feel this test was a success, I will make a few changes for the final rig, such as creating the assets in a T pose.
This week we were briefed on our first Studio Practice Module; Character and Narrative. For this we were tasked with producing a short 30-60 second animation revolving around a focal character, a short narrative and character performance. We were also given the opportunity to work with a partner in order to develop an animation as a part of a joint effort. I chose to work with fellow classmate Vladimir Voinovski because I feel our skill-sets compliment one another and we share a lot of the same ideas creatively. We are both open to experimenting with different mediums and software in order to broaden our creative horizons, evidenced by the fact we have chosen to create our animation partially in Maya. Neither of us are particularly accustomed to the inner workings and intricacies of the programme, however we both feel it is important to boldly try new things at Level 5 in order to prevent simply treading water creatively, using the same techniques we used at Level 4 and not making any progress professionally.
I spent the majority of this week planning out the logistics of how we are going to structure our narrative, the events that transpire and the overall feel of the world, both visually and in terms of audio. Audio is very much Vlad's specialty, but we worked closely from the every beginning to ensure that everything from the audio and the visuals complimented the themes and aesthetics of the world our animation is supposed to take place in. The core ideas for our animation emerged from brainstorming sessions which focused heavily on atmospherics and connecting previously disconnected ideas in a coherent fashion. We took inspiration from songs we liked to listen to which inspired us creatively and conjured up imagery we found appropriate, connecting these ideas and forming them into a narrative context. What we settled on was a dreamlike narrative centuring around a main character adrift in a sea of consciousness of his own creation. This played to both of our strengths, as I am very much interested in the technical aspects of generating surrealistic imagery, working in a 3D space and combining dissonant styles, while Vlad's work in the past is more transgressive, experimental and, to put it bluntly, 'a bit out there'.
Character Illustration
From there we went our separate ways to generate ideas for our characters. I took inspiration from a drawing I did over the summer of a sort of darkly-angelic character which I felt had a lot of narrative potential as a symbollic figure in a dreamlike narrative from another character's perspective. The design comes from a deeply male gaze, so it would make sense to have them in our narrative as a psychological projection. Later in the week we met up and exchanged ideas on each-other's characters, giving eachother pointers and input as to how the final designs should be. One thing Vlad suggested with regards to my design was to include a mask for my character, which I then tested in my sketchbook. I suggested some ideas for his character too, such as the emphasis on the silhouette of the character, as I believe a strong silhouette and emphasis on basic primitive shapes is key to a strong character design, something I picked up from the Visual Language module from Level 4.
Initial Ideas Mind-map
Initial Sketchbook Ideas
Initial Visual Ideas (Will probably be recycled for Storyboards)
Face/Mask Designs
Face/Mask Designs. (In the end we opted for our character not to wear a mask.)
I also filled a few sketchbook pages with visual ideas for frames in the animation before we start producing storyboards, imagery which would form the basis for our narrative. I was particularly keen on the lighthouse motif which was inspired my a John Maus album cover, and we tossed back and forth a couple of ideas in regards to how we should frame the two characters in relation to one another in order to properly define their power dynamic, something which greatly interests me as an animator who places a lot of emphasis on direction, cinematography and editing.
Character and Narrative Moodboard
Moodboards usually play an important part in the pre-production of any animation, so I opted to make one in conjunction with early brainstorming sessions so the focus could be on visual research as opposed to becoming bogged down in notes. Through research for my mood-boards, we decided to opt for a low-poly 3D aesthetic for the 3D elements of our animation, drawing inspiration from painter Ryan Browning's geometric landscapes as well as various 3D artists whose work I found on Pinterest. The 2D elements of our animation, the characters as well as some of the environmental effects, will be created using the usual Adobe Software packages, Photoshop, Illustrator and After Effects. Our characters are going to be rigged in After Effects using the DUIK plugin which I experimented with over the summer, in a similar style to the animated war documentary 'Waltz with Bashir'.
