Environmental Storytelling: Choosing Locations.

For this brief, we were asked to go out and draw three different environments, two of which had to be unfamiliar to us (well, that's the brief in a nutshell). I had no idea where I wanted to go, so got a few suggestions:

- Harrogate
- Seaside/the coast
- Tropical World (my sister has been pestering me for MONTHS to take her there, but no).
- Brimham rocks

The coast really stood out to me, as there would be a nice combination of nice views and towns/buildings, and I could even look at fairground rides if there were any. Despite this, I was still unsure of whether I wanted to go. I had been to a lot of the main places along the coast anyway (eg. Blackpool, Scarborough, etc), and wanted to stay true to the brief and not cheat. That, and it was going to be FREEZING at the coast.

I decided I wanted to go to a town or city, and ruled out looking at rural environments, simply because I thought urban places would allow for more interesting drawings, and I could look in depth at the architecture of the buildings, and really consider the space surrounding them.

After a few days of thinking, I finally decided on my locations. York and Nottingham. I chose York because I had heard that it was a beautiful city and wanted to check it out for myself. I would be able to look at the Shambles, York Minster, Clifford's Tower, and the medieval walls that enclose the city.
The reason for Nottingham isn't as good though I'm affraid. Two of my dearest friends moved to Nottingham back in July, and I haven't seen them since then. I was invited to stay over with a couple of other friends, and thought it would be a good opportunity to walk into the city center to do some drawings while I am there. Granted, the reasoning behind choosing Nottingham isn't ideal, but it is still a popular tourist destination and It would be nice to find out why. I do know that Nottingham is home to the largest city square in the UK, which is dominated by the Council House, which would be nice to draw.

For my final familiar place I think I'm going to stick to Leeds. In particular, I'm going to look at the city center, and the different shopping quarters as I think the architecture in those buildings are beautiful.

The Classical Elements: What's That?! Another Update?!

Yes it is.

I've done LOADS since my last blog post, and I am very pleased with how it's looking. I am very near completion now and I couldn't be happier.

Almost Finished!

I have managed to get the colour in the animation completely finished. This includes the hand and the lighter at the beginning of the animation, as well as the flames. When this was done I went on to design and animate the facial features of the girl character. As you can see the idea of keeping the girl relatively realistic went completely out of the window. When I came to facial features I tried a number of different possibilities and designed everything on different layers on top of the girl's face so I could easily hide features to see which one I preferred. I went with the eyes that were featured in the video (obviously) as I felt they looked the best, but I was unsure of the mouth. Nothing that I drew seemed to complement the rest of the character, so I just drew in the movements of the mouth with a basic line and thought I'd come back to it by drawing in lips around the initial shape. I found that when I completed this I didn't want to add any more to it, as I thought the simplicity of the mouth suited the character. Looking at it now though, I should add colour to her mouth in the frames where it is open, so it actually looks like she has a hole in her face (for lack of a better phrase).

I actually thought that once I had considered the colour in the mouth I would be finished, but then I realised that I had the facial features of the flames to do. I drew the eyes as just black circles, that I erased where appropriate to create different facial expressions. This took me a fair few hours to do, and when I had finally finished I went to save it and the computer crashed, and I lost the work I had done. It was fair to say that I was DEVASTATED, especially because I couldn't retrieve the work I had lost. So I am going to have to do it all again. Fabulous.

The Classical Elements: That's Right, Another Update.

Since my previous update, I have been animating the girl in the story. I have got her breathing in and blowing out the candles, which seems to work fine. Once I had finished this, it meant that I could then go back and add the background behind the candles, which would be the green of the girl character's t-shirt. A slight problem arose when I was doing this. When the camera angle changes and shows the candles stood in a row from a different perspective, I didn't know whether to have the backdrop still as all green, or to be more realistic and show the girl's arm and the rest of the walls. By doing this it gave away that the green is the girl's shirt, and I wasn't sure whether I liked that. I felt this would change the impact of the reveal (that they are sat on a cake). Because of this, I decided to just stick with the green backdrop to ensure that the impact would be greater when it is revealed to the viewer that they are on a cake, and are in fact birthday candles.

 Green Background Test

I went ahead and tested the background to make sure that this is what I wanted to do for definite and I think it works fine. I think it would have been nice to see the girl's arm/side so that there would be a change of background which would make it more interesting to watch, but I didn't like how this would change the impact, as I said previously.

Another element that I was unsure of was the cake. 

To create the cake background that you can see when the camera is zoomed in on the candles, I simply took the original cake drawing and scaled it, making it bigger. Because the original drawing was quite small, when I did this it meant that it looked pixelated. At first I didn't like how this looked and was going to paint over it again so that it would look smooth, just like the rest of the drawings/characters. The more I watched my animation through the more this pixelated look grew on me, as it looked as though it was out of focus, drawing more attention to the characters, which I thought was great. It also meant that when the cake was scaled back to it's original size it came "back into focus", which I thought was fitting, as this is where I wanted the focus to be in that scene, along with the female character. 

For the time being I am going to leave the cake as it is, as I like this out of focus feel it gives. It is possible that I shall ask others for their opinions later, and if needs be I can always draw over it.

The Classical Elements: Yet Another Animation Update

I have recently designed the human character, like I said I would in my previous post. When I was doing so, I came across a slight problem. Because I had drawn the cake and the background all on one layer it meant I would have to draw around the cake as I couldn't move the girl to sit behind it as the background would cover her. I didn't really fancy doing this, as it seemed I was making things harder for myself than what they needed to be. So instead I copied the cake onto a separate layer so I could rearrange the layout to create depth in my scene. It also meant I didn't have to be precise with my colouring around the cake, as I could be messy and the cake would hide it all. This also meant I could confidently colour right up to the edge of the cake without accidentally drawing over it or leaving white gaps around it. 

I'm really happy with how the girl turned out, and I think she is my favourite element of the whole animation. I love her hair especially, as I really like how it looks as though there is light shining on it from the "ceiling lights".

I wanted to try and make her quite realistic in comparison to the candles so that there would be a contrast between the two types of characters. This would also put emphasis on the fact that the girl is intact human and alive, whereas the candles usually aren't. I reckon I have done a good job at doing this. Hopefully when I draw her face on a separate video layer, I will be able to keep this realism consistent. 

The Classical Elements: Another Animation Update

After I completed my initial candle sequence, I thought it would be best if i designed the background next, so I did just that. I started with the room rather than the backdrop behind the candles as this would just be the human character's shirt and I am yet to design her/him. I didn't really plan this out and just drew what came to mind. Despite this lack of planning I really like what I have created. I especially like the texture I have given the door and the table. Originally it was just going to be a solid colour with just a bit of shading, much like the rest of the elements of the background, but I didn't really like the way it looked. It was too simple. So I played around with different brushes and managed to give the wood a grainy look. 

I did a similar thing with my cake. Again, it was originally just a solid colour like everything else in the animation so far, but just like my door, I experimented with brushes to see what I could create and I think I was successfully able to give the cake a texture that made it look like sponge. 

Background and Cake Design

Having created my background, I went on to planning out the movement of the human character, as well as some of the keyframes of the candle flames. The addition of these initial sketches has, in my eyes, strengthened the animation, and has allowed me to get a better idea of what the final piece is going to look like. 

Update Three

I'm really pleased with my progress, and I can't wait to see what it will look like when it's all finished, especially now I feel I don't have that much more to do. My plan of attack is to draw the human character in colour, then add the backgrounds into the beginning scenes.

The Classical Elements: Animation Update

I managed to get my sequence plan finished pretty quickly, though I am missing a few details and I shall have to get this sorted. I was able to create enough content to meet the requirement of the brief, and at this stage it looks like it's going to run smoothly. I can't say for certain as I haven't yet drawn out the flames and backgrounds.

So it looks like that's what I'm going to do now. 

Update Two

The Classical Elements: Animating at Last

Due to how much planning I had carried out, and because my camera zoom tests went well, I decided to start animating. I just jumped straight in, using my tests and my storyboard as a guide. 

What I have so far

I started off by marking out where the characters were going to stand, as I believe the candles to be the most important element of the animation. The backgrounds and other features shall be drawn around them, rather than trying to fit the candles into a predetermined space. 

To get started I copied the candles over from my original drawing, and pasted them onto each frame in the video layer I created in photoshop. As there wasn't a lot of movement from my characters, I was able to progress very quickly by simply copying frames. I haven't yet drawn the flames in detail, but I have sketched the key frames out on a separate layer, so I will be able to return to this at the end after I have drawn out my backgrounds, so I can work with transparency levels to create different effects/textures for the flame.

To say this is going to be my first complex animation using Photoshop and video layers, I think I'm doing well, and have actually surprised myself at how much I have managed to get done in such a short amount of time. I might have been able to get more done if I had realised sooner that you can't paste more than one element onto one frame within the video layer, and that I would have to create separate layers to work with. 

So, to summarise, I think it's going well so far. I am going to continue working the way I am to get my candles finished, then I shall begin to consider backgrounds if I have no amendments to make. 

After Effects: Induction Two

We started of the induction by briefly recapping on what we did last week. Then were then taught how we can edit our keyframes if we feel the sequence is too slow or too fast in the RAM preview.

Recap of Last Week and Editing Keyframes

We were also shown how we can edit the INTERPOLATION (I know, fancy). So again, I experimented with tools I already knew how to use, but this time I changed how the solid layer moved by using the Convert Vertex Tool. 

Experimenting With Convert Vertex Tool and Auto-Orient

(I'm not sure why the light blue box twitches half way through. Shall have to look into this)

In the second half of the tutorial we were shown how to import files from photoshop, and the different ways we could do this. Once we had seen the difference between the different file settings, we imported some images to play around with, to test the potential of the programme.

Using Position and Rotation Keyframes

In my first test, I wanted the balloon to fly from one side of the screen to the other, stopping to perform a loop in the middle. I did this by adjusting the position and rotation keyframes of the object. I think it went pretty well, and I was able to make it move at a decent speed and the loop seems to run smoothly. Michael then pointed out to me that I could have made the balloon loop easier by adjusting the Anchor Point of the image.

Rotating Around an Adjusted Anchor Point

I took Michael's advice, and tried to make the image rotate around an anchor point that wasn't positioned in the middle. It was a lot easier to do, and it also made the loop much smoother. The advantage of doing it this way as well, is that there are fewer key frames, so it makes editing the sequence much easier. 

I'm not even sure.

Finally, I created another sequence, that combined pretty much everything we have been taught in these sessions. I'm going to stop talking now because this post is too long. So there we have it. 

Premiere Induction

Earlier in the week I had a Premiere induction. I had used Premiere before at Art Foundation, but I had only done so briefly and I also had to self teach using YouTube videos, so it was nice for me to find out if I had actually been using the programme correctly. Which I had been to some extent.

In the induction we were shown how to load and edit videos and image sequences, as well as how to export the videos once we were finished. We had a couple of example clips and photographs that we could play around with, and I personally chose to experiment with the opacity of the layers, as well as different effects such as Black and White and other video effects. In this case I used Twirl.

We were also shown how to work with sound. This is something I had done before, but it was nice to be shown what it was exactly I had to do, because I'm pretty sure I went wrong a couple of times before. In my test, I experimented with slowing the sound clip to distort the way it sounded, and I think it nicely (some what) complimented the video.

I'm happy with the result even if it was just a play, and it was nice to learn how to exactly use the programme effectively, especially when it came to keyframes and fading in and out. 

After Effects: Induction One

I really enjoyed last week's After Effects tutorial, one reason being that the tutor was MINT and made a joke that made me cry, the second being that it went a LOT better than the induction I had in Flash. My god, I really didn't enjoy that.

I found After Effects a lot easier to use than flash, as I actually understood what was going on and how to use the different tools we were shown. I felt that I had much more control over the program as I was able to get it to do what I wanted it to.

Testing the Basic Features of After Effects

We were shown all the basic features of the programme and what each panel in the window did. We were then shown how to create solid layers, and we had a play around with making them move, rotate, increase in size, etc, similarly to what we were trying to do in the Flash induction. I felt like it went a lot better than the flash tutorial, as I was actually able to get the shapes to move in the way that I want them to, so it is likely that if needs be I shall choose AE over Flash. 

The Classical Elements: For The Birds

For The Birds is an excellent animation short by Pixar. I first saw it when I was a young child, and it still amuses me today, but I have chose to look at in now because of the camera angles it uses.

For The Birds by Pixar

This animation short uses the same sort of camera angles that I am wanting to use in my own animation. Other than the one exception when the small birds turn to look at the bigger bird, the entire animation is shot facing the same direction, and just uses a variety of different shots. I was a bit cautious about not using a variety of angles, as this can help portray a sense of space and the scene that the characters are acting/living in, but after seeing this short again, it has made me realise that you don't necessarily need to do this to make the animation interesting. I think that because I'm not doing using a variety, I will need to focus on using a range of different shots however like what Pixar have done here. I really like how they have used close ups to show the emotion of the birds, and how they have used medium shots to show how many of them there are on the line. I think the type of shot has been carefully considered, which is something I shall do with my own animation to make it more visually pleasing. 

The way the camera pans out to reveal more birds sitting on the line, is more or less what I wanted to try and achieve with my line candles, so if needs be I could use For The Birds as a guide to try and make the camera pan in the same way. 

I also like the way how the camera quickly zooms out to show how close to the ground the birds are because of the big bird weighing them down. It makes the scene feel more dramatic and this is something I would like to incorporate into my own short. I want the camera to quickly zoom out to reveal that they are sat on a cake in front of a human character, to help represent the shock that the candles are in. Hopefully I will be able to create a similar kind of effect to what Pixar have, as I think it has worked really well for them.

The Classical Elements: What is a Flame?

I don't really know how I got onto watching this animation, because its an educational video about science and what a flame is and in that sense it isn't useful to me at all. I did however like the way one of the candles had been animated, so I guess it's relevant.

What is a Flame by Benjamin J. Ames

I almost didn't watch this animation all the way through, as I wasn't a fan of the style of the flames at the beginning of the video. I think the art style works well for this animation, and it helps to explain the science behind fire and flames, but this wasn't something I wanted to work into my own animation. I'm glad I sat through it though, as there is a slight variance in style, and I really like the way the candle's flame has been animated at around 0:42 and 0:57. It's quite basic, but still has a certain degree of realism, and I think that style would compliment the candle characters I have drawn quite nicely. I also think it would be very easy to animate, which is always nice, especially if there's no reason to over complicate things. 

Also, not relevant at all, but that song at the end. Wow. Just wow. 

The Classical Elements: Once Upon a Candle

Once Upon a Candle is an animation short produced by Animation Workshop, and I think it is fantastic. Not only do I think its visually stunning, I also think it would be a great reference for my own animation. 

Once Upon a Candle by Animation Workshop

 I feel like I am repeating myself when I say this, but I really like the way that the candle burns and how the flame moves and flickers. I also think it has been produced to a very high standard, and the flame, as well as pretty much every other element in this animation, has a high degree of realism. As much as I would like to be able to create something this realistic, I highly doubt I'm going to be able to at this early stage, however I can look at it as inspiration for the movement of my flames.

Another thing I like about this animation is the way the candle moves about the desk. It moves as though it is very flexible, and rocks back and forth to gain momentum to jump along with the stand he is kept in. I also like how this changes when he melts down to half his height. He still moves in a similar way, but because he is much shorter he can't gain as much momentum and his movements become much shorter. He also looses the ability to jump because of this. I think this is a great animation to look at because of this range of different styles of movement, which have been executed very well. I definitely think I will return to this animation for these movement sequences as an inspiration for my own animation.

Not only do I like how he "walks", I also like the way he moves his whole body/head to help express his emotions. I hadn't even considered doing something like this, and when I thought about my animation I just imagined them being quite stationary and having all their emotion being portrayed in their facial expressions. I would very much like to try and give this a go and incorporate it into my own animation, as I think it could really help explain the narrative, as well as enhance emotion. 

The Classical Elements: Candle Animation by "Mo the Half"

I was looking on YouTube for candle references, and this particular animation really stood out to me. It was produced by someone with the username Mo the Half, and I think it's a really good sequence of a candle burning and being blown out.

                         

Even though it is a basic animation that isn't really well known, I think it accurately captures the movement of the flame, both as it is slowly burning and as it is blown out by the wind. I also like the addition of the smoke rising after the flame is extinguished, and is something I didn't even think about when I was storyboarding. I think I could definitely consider this to be a source that I potentially work from, as the sequence is beautifully drawn, and I think it deserves more recognition than what it has received.

The Classical Elements: Lightheaded by Mike Dacko

Before I got started with animating, I wanted to do a little bit of research into work that other animators have produced to help me with my own. In particular I wanted to look at how flames flicker as well as how candles burn, and how other artists have animated this. I could just light a candle myself and draw from it (which I'm probably going to do), but I wanted to see how other people have tackled it, so I have a range of options for when it comes to animating my own flames. 

Lightheaded by Mike Dacko

Whilst browsing the internet, I stumbled across this animation by Mike Dacko and I'm glad that I did because it's a great example of what I was looking for. The flame looks realistic and gives off a warm glow, and I like the way that the flame is transparent towards the wick. It actually seems as though it is burning. I also like the way that the flames sway slowly/slightly from side to side, to show that the atmosphere is calm. This is what I want to initially create in my own animation, but then I shall have the flame under distress as the child blows out the candles. I could then look at when the characters in the animation are running as another reference for this. 

Even though it is not necessarily relevant this time around, I also really like the way that the characters walk in this animation. The running and walking cycles are very realistic and they give the character more personality and life, which I think really enhances the character's appeal, especially as their limbs squish slightly as they run. I would like to incorporate this aspect into my own animation, and have my candle seem "squishy" as it curls up and extends to try and jump closer to the female candle in my story.  

Another thing that stood out to me about this animation, was the sounds that the characters make when they are emerging from the hot wax. I think it compliments the movement/action well, and I would like to experiment making a similar sort of sound for when my candles are places on the cake. This maybe another subtle giveaway to the ending that I give, but then again it could just be a noise that makes the animation more bubbly and quirky. 

The Classical Elements: Testing the Camera Zoom

Before I made a decision to animate using Photoshop, I wanted to test the characters and more importantly how I would make the camera zoom out. This is a big thing for this particular animation as the characters don't move that much, and the whole story is about more candles being revealed and the interaction between them. 

I opened up my original drawing of my candles in Photoshop, and tried resizing and repositioning them so that there would only be so many candles on display. I started of by trying to get just the first two candles in the shot. I resized them to the height I wanted them to be, and placed them in the centre to try and create the shot that I had planned in my storyboard/animatic. The problem was that the other candles are too close together, and so they don't move out of the frame. In order for me to do this, I would have to move the image to the right of the frame to push the other candles out of the shot, but this would just look odd as there would be too much white space on the right. So that wasn't really an option.

A Diagram I Produced to Explain What I Mean. (Clearly, I am a Diagram God).

I then had to consider what I could do to overcome my problem. Here's what I came up with:

- Alter the storyline: I could have the candles placed into shot one by one. This would be slightly more effort to animate, but a perfectly good way to introduce the new characters. 

- Adjust the storyboard: I could change the shots that I use. By using close ups I can focus on just the two characters and not have any others in the shot. 

Quick Camera Zoom Test

I decided to test my second plan very quickly. I knew it would work in the sense that I'd be able to get the characters I wanted in the shot, but I was unsure how this would look visually, hence why I tested it out. I think it works quite well. Granted it seems to move a little quick, but it is just a test, and I shall be able to neaten this up when I come to produce the actual animation.

Watching this back though, I realised there is a problem with this method when it comes to my opening scene. I wanted the male candle to be placed next to the female at the beginning of the line, but I didn't want you to be able to see the rest of the candles, which you would be able to do if I used this method, as in order for it to work I have to start off with a close up of the first two characters.

I was unsure how to put my thoughts into words, so here's a diagram incase I didn't make it clear.

I could just roll with it, and start off this way, but I really want the viewer to see that he gets placed on the cake and then lit. I like that is a subtle giveaway to the ending, but you only really realise (maybe) at the end of the animation. 

To overcome THIS problem, I could have the first male candle placed next to the female character, that has already been placed, BUT none of the other characters are there yet, as they have yet to be placed. I can let the candles do their thing, and then zoom in on the characters faces/flames. At this point the other candles can be placed without the viewer knowing, and I can commence with my original idea. 

Sounds good to me. 

The Classical Elements: Preparing to Animate, Part Two.

Here I have returned to my candle drawings. To begin with I didn't draw the flames as I was wanting to animate them separately, so I have drawn them in on a different layer to the original drawings.

No Colour

I started off by simply sketching the flames, and did this with just the original candle sketch showing to see what it would be like in full black and white. I think it looks okay. I used a different type of brush to draw the flames, and also made it quite opaque so the flame would appear to have a different texture to the rest of the candle.

Flames in Colour

Then on a different layer to the flame sketch, I added in colour. Similarly to the first one, I used an opaque brush to make the drawing look more like fire, and used unorganised strokes to make it look like it was flickering. I started off by testing the colour against the original candle outline, and I quite like how this makes the flames stand out. Having said this...

Full Colour

... I think my final test is my favourite. For this one, I just made the colour layer visible to see the characters in full colour. Up to now, I am considering producing the animation in this way as I have not yet explored with using colour, but I shall have to see if I have the same views once I have included a background. 

The Classical Elements: Preparing to Animate

I had asked a few people about what Matt had suggested in the critique, and the responses I got were pretty varied. A few people preferred the novelty number candle, where others liked the idea of having a more abrupt and tragic ending, so in the end it was entirely down to which I preferred and which I wanted to work with. As much as I like Matt's idea, I still think I'm going to go with my own, simply because I like that particular character design. Also, the addition of this character allows me to get more varied camera angles, which will be more pleasing for the viewer.

The next thing I had to think about was the way in which I was going to produce the animation. I wanted to try and produce this one digitally, as I have not yet done much digital drawing and I want to gain experience doing so, but as I don't have photoshop at home this would mean I would have to get my animation finished before I break up for Christmas, which is in two weeks. Which was not going to happen in any way, shape or form. Not when I have other projects to juggle.

So with digital animation ruled out as an option, I was fully prepared to start animating traditionally. That was until I had a discussion with Mat (teacher Mat) about where I was up to. I explained my idea and my plans for having the camera zoom out to reveal more characters as the animation progressed. He pointed out that it would be much easier to digitally produce my characters, I could easily move and scale the characters, which would be very time consuming if I were to hand draw the transitions. I then realised that my characters barely move, so if I were to draw the animation digitally I could have the bodies on a background layer, or simply copy them over to a new frame. Then I would only have to draw the flames on each layer to make them flicker. Matt also pointed out to me that I could buy Photoshop for £8 a month. Which I can afford. So lets go digital.

Well, at least try it.

That's what I've done here.

 Candle Characters - Outline and in Colour

I drew my candles in Photoshop to see what they would look like. I started off with the basic outline, and then remembered that I could quickly add colour by using the paint bucket tool and brush. So I did that, and as much as I like it in black and white, I think the addition of colour greatly improves the aesthetic of the piece. So it looks like I'm going to go for digital. It's going to be much quicker than traditional and it will give me more experience in a field I am interested in. It also means that I will be able to add colour, as I think I maybe rushed for time if I try this by hand.