Backgrounds/scenery /further chracter development

I decided to use inks and watercolours to create the backgrounds for my animation. I layered colours of the same hues on top of each other to create shadows and dimensions to be worked over in black ink later. I enjoyed the method of randomly layering colours and creating random scenery from the blurred outlines.

for my first concept art piece i decided to keep a rounded and blurred shape to the outline to create a sense of isolation for the character.

Because he's quite a silly and cute character I like how different the backgrounds look against his stature and bright colour. The juxtaposition is something that I've wanted to create for a long while. I enjoy how the mixed media challenges the concepts of aesthetic in animation as well as the texture that is brought up on the watercolour paper. 

Here I experimented with creating a swamp-like scene with a river running through it. I used very watered down inks to create this foggy scenery. I plan on working over this background in photoshop in order to merge the two mediums together but still have them clash.

For the branches I decided to look at swamp scenes that have these draping and wet looking branches that hang down.

I want to keep the backgrounds simple but unique. I added some cartoon style mushrooms to connect the character with his surroundings so he didn't look too out of place.

I created a lot of washes to be used for the character's close up shots. I stuck to the same colour scheme but watered them down quite a bit. for the head shots, I want to impose the character's faces onto the scenes so create a jarring visual.

Here, I started to re-create my initial swamp sketch by adding more colour and depth to it. I kept more to the brown side of things plainly because I don't want my character to be washed out by the green backgrounds. When I scanned the image in however, the colours were a lot lighter than I anticipated so I worked over the top with  darker shades.

I want this to be used as my opening title for the short, so my next step is to re-work over the top using black ink and then re-work over that in photoshop.

Here I created a rock and the bank that the character is going to be sitting on, staring at his love interest. My idea is to layer these together to create a shot where the character looks at his reflection in the swampy water.

This painting is what I want to use as the swamp water. I feel like the colour of the swamp is heavily influenced by my research and mood boards.

I created this piece to work over the top as a little flower bush. I also want this image to double up as the characters bouquet of flowers that he finds.

I did some more orange based swatches to be used in close ups.

I decided to use lighter colours for this background as it is when the main character is staring longingly at his love interest, so I want the colours to match the mood. I also want the shot to be central. I came up with the idea of having lovely and light music playing for this moment. I also want a sort of glittery kind of effect around her in order to portray the instant love my frog character feels for his love interest.

Overall I am happy with how my backgrounds have turned out, hopefully when I work over them they will become a lot more clear as to what they are, instead of looking like watery swampy messes.

Character design/Visual research

character designs/ concept art

Here I created this piece of concept art as an experiment of what I want my character to look like in his environment.

I experimented with different head shapes and eye sizes to try and find the perfect size for my character. I drew him with a red top hat but I'm not too keen on it. I feel like it would clash too much with the backgrounds.

Here I did a quick sketch of a frog in a strange and quirky pose. I am trying to understand the movements and the shape of a frog in order to portray it correctly in my animation.

Here is my final design of my character. I really like how cute and dorky he looks and I feel like his appearance portrays his personalty really well.

I decided to play around with some more ink in an attempt to find a nice yellow toned green for my character.

I decided to do some further research into strange frog poses in order to understand their bones and joints.

I feel over the course of this week i have had slow progress with designing my character, however my final design is something that I am excited to animate.

Story Development/ storyboard/ anamatic

After being unsure for a while about what my story could be, I finally decided on a simple yet interesting story. 

I initially wanted my character to be extremely sticky, and to stick to everything that he touches, but I couldn't think of a real story line to go with the idea.

I eventually decided to simplify my story down and create a cute narrative about a love struck little frog.

I feel like the abrupt ending fits well with the short amount of animating time that I have. I also really like the idea of an abrupt ending because of the comedic effect that it provides as well as the fact it's a classic way to end a characters scene. (I've also really wanted to use this ending since first year)

With my animatic I wanted to create simple shots that describe whats going on in the scene. Unfortunately, because I'm not too great with computers I was unable to add sound. This is something I definitely want to develop on in this project. I have a lot of technical difficulties when it comes to adding sound, and because of my limited software at home, I find it difficult.

I now feel like I have a well rounded story. My next step is to develop the image of my character further.

Initial sketches

At the beginning of this week I decided to change my story as well as my character and theme. I found that my original idea was too much focused on the aesthetic, and I found it incredibly difficult to come up with a full story because I was far too distracted by the overall look of the animation. The brief story that I had come up with was difficult to develop into a well-rounded and short story.

My new idea is centered around a frog. The reason why I chose a frog was because I feel I could utilise their characteristics to create dynamic movements. Because I want to create these dynamic movements, I feel like a frog would be perfect to manipulate into creating exaggerated movements.

I decided to research into the various types of frogs to determine what sort of visual research I would pursue. I gathered a couple of images and key terms as well as key features of the types of frogs to gain a brief understanding. Instantly I was drawn to the frogs that were bright coloured, like the poison dart frog and the tree frog. When thinking of a typical frog colour, the colour green is the main colour that springs to mind, so from this I have decided to have a green frog. I prefer the green hue of the tree frog because It’s bright, and I want the animation to be bright and vibrant.

I decided to create a mood board that consisted of dynamic and detailed images of various kinds of frogs. Even though I am drawn to the idea of my frog character to be a tree frog, I wanted to explore various types of frogs just in case certain characteristic caught my eye. One of my aims was to collect images of frogs in dynamic poses to work from and try and capture their body shapes.

This was an initial quick sketch that I did when I was creating my mood board.

I mainly chose these photos because of the dynamic poses that are demonstrated through the frogs limbs. I also chose these images based on colour and shape too. I am more drawn to the cuter side of these animals rather than the large and bulky kind.

These are some initial sketches I did using oil pastels and water colours. I focused mainly on the faces to try and gauge the sort of shapes that make up a frogs head.

I really like the look of the tree frogs, mainly because of the longer arms and legs and also how bright they are. I am going to base my character loosely on the tree frogs.

I did more research into frog faces using felt tip.

Here I started to quickly generate ideas by simplifying down certain aspects of a frog, like the head and legs. I really like the idea of the frogs limbs being long and thin in order to enhance the bulkiness of the body and to make him appear flimsy.

I did some quick sketches of frogs hands. I mainly focused on the tree frog. I like how goofy the hands look, and because I want my character to appear goofy, I will probably experiment with this look further.

Here I used crayons to play around with the shapes of my character. I like the large eyes and head that counteract the slim body. I also like the idea of using oil pastels or crayons as a medium for this animation. I feel like a stop motion model for this character wouldn't appear as smooth as I would want. Even though I prefer to be sketchy when I draw or animate, I still want to capture the fluidity.

Here I developed the look of my character further by looking into how his moouth would open.

This is a brief idea of what I want my character to look like. I like the large eyes as well as the lump of a body. The thin arms and legs add a sense of flimsiness to the character which is what I am aiming for.

Overall I feel like my visual research was successful and I now have a clear understanding on what I want my character to look like.

Research into animations/ felt

My initial idea is to create an animation based around a rabbit/fox running away from a hunter. I want it to be stop- motion and mainly be created using wire and felt. I want to create a rusty and weathered feel to the main character and his surrounding to match the setting of a forest. I feel like this project could be a helpful step forward for me to attempt to create a decent length stop-motion animation.

I spent a lot of time visually researching into other artists work that I wanted to try and aim for and take inspiration from. I’m drawn mostly to messy looking models that have weird shapes to them and vivid colour schemes. I have had experience creating felt flowers and plants in the past and I enjoyed the process of felting and sewing to create flowers and small characters. I enjoyed working on top of various materials and combining different techniques to create strange, textured objects. I feel confident in being able to create my character and its surroundings using materials such as felt and wire because of the experience I've had working with them in the past. However, I feel like the materials would be expensive and that it would be a very time consuming process for just one person so I find this fact quite daunting.

Edmond by Nina Gantz

I really like the texture of felt and how there's slight movement on the skin and clothes with every movement in this animation. I also like how they combined stop-motion and hand-drawn animation to make facial expressions. I think that if I was to go down the route of using then I would definitely find it difficult to animate the characters facial expressions, so I think I would have the character be mute and focus mainly of the visual story-telling aspect. I also have an awful voice, and would find it awkward to ask somebody else to voice my character.

The Maker by Christopher Kezelos

I really like the overall aesthetic of this animation. It's dark and lack dialogue so the main focus is on the movements and visual story-telling. I also like how this animation is based around a little rabbit creature as I want to base my animation on an animal character.  

I did some brief research into how to create felt objects as I am interested in creating a felt animal for my animation, however I am still unsure whether my story will be decent enough to create an animation for.

My next step is to develop my story further, and also do some visual research into the sort of character I want to create.

Weekly summary - Briefing

From this briefing I made key notes on what the brief is asking for.

- Develop a focal character for the film
- Design a world for the character to be in
- Dialogue is not required
- Think about performance and acting
- 30 seconds

I was in two minds about whether or not I should work on my own or with a partner, but alas, nobody asked me so I decided to be on my own.

When looking through the themes, no ideas initially sprung to mind, so I decided to create mind maps for the themes that sprung out to me. In the back of my mind, I knew that I wanted to create a stop motion animation this year and I felt like this could be the project that I could attempt that with.

I created a small list of techniques and sort of guide lines for me to work towards in my second year. I want to push myself this year and create animations and characters that are different from what I have done before.

• become comfortable creating using computers
• stop motion character design
• explore multi media animation

I decided to create a few mind maps to try and create ideas for the narrative as well as a lead on what sort of character I wanted. I mainly focused on word association, because I find that to have been the most successful way for me to create ideas. I explored the titles and themes that I felt I could create an interesting animation with by creating mind maps and Pinterest boards of images that relate to the themes as well as images that triggered ideas for me.

Happy Days:
I didn't really get much of an idea from this one. The ideas and brief narrative that I kept thinking of were very similar to each other, and that just involved a main character having something good happen to them. I feel as though if I thought long enough, and gathered enough imagery to stimulate my ideas I could think of a decent narrative around a character that involves a sadistic and gloomy sort of story line, followed by a twisted happy ending.

I associated "happy days" with the hit tv show of the same name. It got me thinking about the era the show was set in, and the nostalgia that was captured in the show. I thought of how interesting it could be to try and capture that era and create a world and a character that heavily resonated that time. I am quite drawn to this challenge, however I feel as though it could be difficult for me to create a story line and character without any comparison to the characters in the tv show because of the same name. The reason why I didn't create a Pinterest bored on this theme was because all that came up was stills from the tv show.

Predator/Prey:
Initially, typical pairings and animals came to mind. Such as deep sea creatures including sharks/fish. In a previous module last year I created an animation that was based around a large fish so I decided to scrap this concept asap. Woodland creatures such as foxes and birds also sprang to mind. A concept that I explored briefly was between a Fox and a Hunter, the Fox being my focal character and the narrative running along the lines of the Fox running for his life through the woods; pursued by the hunter. Eventually the Fox would find a safe place in a cabin, where he would find many taxidermy woodland creatures hung up on the walls. Horrified, he would try and runaway again. At this point, I gave up on creating a story because I hadn't explored the other themes.

Leap of Faith 
This theme stood out to me most out of all of them. I feel like it was because the first idea that I had was playful and I could turn it into a funny narrative. I quite like slap-stick comedy and I feel like exploring extremely exaggerated movements would be a fun and interesting visual theme to explore, so i tried to come up with brief concepts that would involve slap-stick comedy. I was initially drawn to the concept of a mountain goat, leaping from mountain to mountain and exploring. I also liked the idea of a frog leaping around in his environment.

Road to nowhere
The first idea that came to mind when i considered this theme was an adventurous character exploring an environment. I definitely want to explore the different techniques that go into creating sets, and stop motion characters, and I feel an adventurous theme would help me explore environments and replicate them in the form of a set.

Opposites Attract
I found this theme quite difficult to explore because the typical connotations with "Opposites Attract" sprang to mind, and I also felt like I had come up with sufficient ideas in my previous theme explorations.

Because I couldn't decide on a theme, I decided to create a mind map on what I want to explore, in hopes that I could apply these desires to a theme in order for me to develop my practical skills. I also jotted down concepts that I had thought of during the summer when I was trying to develop my narrative skills.

I definitely want to explore stop-motion, however I would find it difficult to afford the materials, as well as creating the world that the character lives in in the short period of time. I was hoping that I could work with somebody else or in a group to create a stop-motion animation because I feel like it could be achieved to a great standard, and I wouldn't feel comfortable creating a stop-motion animation on my own because of how difficult it can be. 

An idea that I had been playing around with over summer was based around my own pet hamster. I wanted to create a story where she would escape from her cage and explore the house or the city. Another idea was to have her have a secret life as a secret agent. 

I would like to explore textures and create felt characters as I have had previous experience creating flowers and creatures using felt and sewing materials. I enjoyed this process and would like to revisit it and attempt to create a set made of felt flowers or a swamp-like environment.

I found exploring what I want to do and concepts that I want to explore useful in deciding what sort of animation I want to create. I want to create a playful animation with a good narrative. I also want to focus heavily on creating the environment for the character as I haven't had much experience doing this in previous projects.

Pinterest.

I decided to turn the pinterest to create bored that consisted of images associated with Road to Nowhere, Predator/Prey, Opposites Attract and Leap Of Faith. I also created a bored that had images that related to things that I want to create and explore. 

I selected to save these images to this board because I felt like they were striking images of environments that related to travel. I still wanted to explore the idea of a lone character exploring a waste-land, maybe an apocalyptic world. I feel like I could explore lighting through the use of the sun because I quite like the deep hues that the sun creates and I feel like it could be a good source of mood lighting for an animation.

I still felt like this idea could be quite difficult to stick to the theme, However a concept that I will probably pursue would revolve around a fox running away from a hunter, through a woodland area and finding solitude in a cabin only to look up to see various animals stuffed and hung on the walls of the cabin. He would then escape to try and find somewhere else to be safe. The idea would be that he would be constantly searching for a safe place away from the hunter, but can't.

I would quite like to animate a fight scene of some sort. I like the idea of creating a brutal and bloody fight scene. An owl and a mouse could be an interesting fight scene to create. I feel like the juxtaposition in size between the owl and the mouse could be a good concept to explore. The narrative could go along the lines of the owl flying around and catching and eating small mice, and gradually the prey get larger and larger until the owl erupts into a fight with another animal that is a lot larger. If I developed this story I could create quite a nice animation.

I quite like this theme because I feel like it would be fun to explore opposites visually. However, from collecting these images, I still found it hard to come up with a concept to explore. I was definitely drawn to the idea of a hedgehog and a snail because I felt like I could create a cute narrative. 

I am really interested by creature character design, and I feel like if I chose this theme, I could base it around an animal. I want to explore creating textures, and visually explore a characters personality through their appearance, as I thoroughly enjoyed character designing last year. 

I created a Pinterest board focused around images that peaked my interest e.g models of animals, fabrics, textures. I really want to create a stop motion animation because the idea of create a physical world and a character that fits into that world intrigues me. I have a hands on approach to a lot of projects and prefer the practical side of animating.

From exploring some of the themes of the project and also my own interests, I've come up with a rough idea of what I want to touch up on and how I want to create this animation. My next step is to choose my story and character