Concept Art & Work Process

Concept Art

As the film will be a collaboration of styles- 2d, live action, pixilation and After Effects. Instead of trying to meld them together and attempt to have a seamless existence between them - which i saw myself failing as it is an extreamly hard thing to do- I have thought about taking a different approach, recognising that each style will create a different look/feel and exploiting this to create an overall collaboration/diverse feel to the film. With this in mind i came up with the idea of an intro sequence with a different style to the actual film, you see this alot in animation these days with 3d movies having 2d animated credit sequences, I think it looks great and is a great way to introduce some new art exploring the same ideas expressed in the film.

I really love Cassandra Rhodin's fashion art, I think it matches with what I am trying to express with Pips various costumes- beautiful, dark.



This has influenced me in the direction of fashion art as an idea for the credits sequence, these images are DEFINATLY not finished/fully developed:

Work proccess

The collaboration style is also a factor I considered with the behind the scenes work, currently I have a team of 6 friends who have all gratiously agreed to work on this project with me along with that I also have 2 bands and have obtained the rights to the Moby Gratis production music. When making this film I want it to be as fun as possible, I much rather working with people than sitting at a computer on my own and I have found that having other people on board has really kept me motivated and has also allowed me access to skills that i do not poccess myself. Win Win.

Pixilation Scenes & Testing

Transition Scenes

I'm currently working on scenes 3 and 5. These are the scenes I will use pixilation to show the transformation of PiP firstly from good to possessed and then back again.

I found a great music video from We Have Band called "You Came Out" to reference for the scenes. Very fortunatly they made a "making of" and also display all frames of the animation of a flicker account. The sites are listed below:

Film Clip
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JtGJ1lD23-U

Making Of
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8frf-tPdrU

Individual Frames
http://www.flickr.com/photos/39167181@N06/

I also found some great face painters to get some ideas, one of which:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FazkweWiZ4Q

Animation Test

I've done another few tests on the animation of the monster.
Initial Eye Test



Also with Jacks help I have come up with a process to follow for animating the monsters body and eyes, this has been a great help as it gets very confusing without having the process locked down step by step. Choosing when to use keyframing and when to straight ahead animate has helped me get the best movment from my work.

Initial Testing Of Monster

This is the first test I've done with the monster to get an idea of the shape/size/movment and also the effect/look I'm aiming for. Below are 2 videos, one of the flash animation I did and one of the same animation but with a few effects on it to give it a smokey non-solid feel. It still needs refining but I'm very happy with the results.

Flash Animation

After Effects

Finished Script, Initial Concept Art & Make-Up

Testing

I filmed some hand footage in Jacks class the other day to explore the emotion expressed by the hands of the monster so looking forward to checking that out next class.

I've also been looking through the video copilot tutorials, they're really good. I was interested in the tutorial:

http://www.videocopilot.net/tutorials/the_portal/

It has a nice way of creating smoke and also has a technique I could use when Pips soul exists her body which creates a 3d look to a 2d object eg the girl steps through the portal (2d video footage) however we see her nose and face come through first followed by her chest, neck and shoulders.

Set Backs

Discovered my first set back on Monday night, an After Effects file I had created with Jack exploring the effects I could apply to my 2d animated monster had corrupted and appeared to not have saved. I was happy with the the direction we were heading in, luckily there's not too much work required in re-creating the file.

Script

I've shown my script script to Jack, Darren and Neil and have made some small changes to it, everyone was fairly happy with the first draft so it's finished.

Make-Up

Bought what should be the last color i need for the body paint today - green, so i can green screen out the arms. Just need to find a green t-shirt some where and I'll be ready to test different looks as well as how effectively i can green screen out the background and arms.

Also here are 2 initial make-up sheet tests Lucy has done for me:

Concept Art

I've began the concept art for the backgrounds, characters and car. I compiled a brief mood board for Pip and the Monster character to give some direction to Pat and George who have agreed to do some images for me, still haven't heard back from Callum wether his keen or not and also sent off another email today to try get 1 more person on board.

Here are the character mood boards:

Note: the Pip board only relates to the soul and possessed costumes, I haven't started on her intro costume look yet.

PIP:

MONSTER:

I'v also had crack and created 1 background image, it was a bit of a mind job as there are so many different directions I can go but I think it helped me progress into the layout and colors I might like to use

Background:

I'v began compiling reference images for the car, the driving scenes in sin city are very helpful as I'm heading for a similar look- highlighted outlines with a lot of black/near black color

Slow Progress

Progress feels so slow at the moment, I don't really have much to show for the work iv put in so far but hopefully that will turn around once I finish off my script, thumbnails and storyboards and begin focusing on character design, concept art and the fun parts of pre-production.

Make-up

I bought some body paint monday, I have black, red and white for the evil spirits hands, I'll test it out soon. Wether I use the live-action footage of the hands, rotoscope it or just use it for reference it will be very useful. Darren showed me a great scene from fantasia which is similar to the look i want for the evil spirit, it can be seen here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Txo06c1k9sk&feature=fvst

Production Plan

I've finished my production plan, my pipe line has showed just how busy i'll be this year. I aim to get all the live-action part of my film out of the way by the time i come back for semester two so I'v got ample time to animate everything.

Most likely I will be filming the live-action part on the semester break, I've spoken to my dancer and she is free, I'll also need to confirm with my make-up artist and film crew what there availability will be.

Scholarship

I applied for the Mick Young scholarship, got a call tuesday to say I'd been shortlisted, I have an interview on friday. Hopefully i get it, the extra cash I could put towards my animation would make a major difference.

Script

Iv finished my first draft of my script, showed it to Neil this week and I'll show it to Darren next class on friday.

Thumbnails

Besides scene 6 I'v finished all my thumbnails bar some refining.

Sound

I'v locked down 4 of the 6 scenes with tracks and also the credits. My amended music choices are as follows:

Scene 1

(Intro) - Crepes "step from side to side and smile"

Scene 2

(Soul 1) - Moby Gratis "scream pilots"

Scene 3

(Transition) - Moby Gratis "jltf 1"

Scene 4

(Possessed) - Hollow Everdaze - waiting on getting the C.D to choose track

Scene 5

(Transition 2) - Undecided yet

Scene 6

(Soul 2) - Moby Gratis "wait for me" - villa remix

Credits - Crepes "step from side to side and smile"

Getting the music locked down has helped me heaps with creating thumbnails to map out my ideas.

Also here's a pic of a woomera, its an instrument that creates low rumbles kind of like thunder, I think I'll use this as a sound effect for the evil spirit.

Initial: Concept Art, Sound & Shot List

Concept Art
Went and got some paints and canvas for a mate who has agreed to do 2 concept paintings for me, he said he should have them done in about 2 weeks. realyl looking forward to them.
I have asked 2 other people for some concept work, 1 has agreed to do some and waiting to here back on the other.

Sound
I was thinking of going for a minimal feel with the sound on my production but have changed direction and have started searching for music. I think i'l be using a different song to suit each scene/dance of the animation. Some scenes are locked down, some iv got nothign for yet, some iv got a few tracks to decide from

Intro: Crepes "step from side to side and smile"
Soul 1: Moby Gratis "wait for me", "scream pilots", "wait for me (villa remix)"
Transition: Moby Gratis "pilots (ambient)", "slow light 2 (ambient)"
Possessed: Hollow Everdaze
Transition: Moby Gratis "pilots (ambient)", "slow light 2 (ambient)"
Soul 2: Moby Gratis "Ioma"
Credits: Saskwatch - "Dn't wana try"

If the feel of the sound comes across as too choppy, i'l try use the same songs where i can but I will definatly need different songs for the intro, soul, possessed and transition scenes as they all have very different feels.

I have access to a Woomera that creates sounds similiar to thunder, i''m going to use this as an intro sound for when the evil spirit is to appear.

Shot List
I'm about half way through my shot list at the moment. Once I'v got this completed I'll be able to punch out some storyboards and a script, I find it eaiser to get my ideas down on paper with images.

Treatment

After a woman is hit by a car and dies, an evil spirit attempts to possess her soul. The female protagonist of the animation is Pip, she is a 20’s something woman and is hit in the middle of a road whilst attempting to cross it. The style I’m aiming for is fun, dark and theatrical.

Pips soul exists her body and begins to gracefully dance around. Unbeknown to her an evil spirit creeps up and then grabs her violently. Her soul becomes possessed by the spirit and transforms from good to evil. The spirit ties strings to Pips limbs and raises her up like a marionette.

Controlled by the strings Pip is no longer elegant and dances similar to a puppet, the evil spirit makes fun of her and enjoys doing so.

One individual limb at a time Pip resists the strings. Regaining control of her soul she completely breaks free of the spirits. A fight ensues.

The evil spirit attempts to destroy Pips soul but she evades his grasp. She fights off the spirit, her soul re-enters her body and she is re-born into the human world.

Pip’s human body then stands back up and hurriedly continues crossing the road.