When I started my final project I looked at a childrens cartoon called Adventure Time, which is actually really good!
I’ve been analysing the style, bright colours, how they animate it and found a magazine that interviews the creator Pendleton Ward (as shown in the picture).
I’ve passed my second assessment which means that I can progress to the final stage of foundation art. For the last couple of weeks, I’ve been writing about 2 possible project proposals that I could work on for my final grade, and research artists and animators which link to the ideas.
For the first idea I was really inspired by this music video which I recommend, just because the story is visually interesting and I quite like the song a lot.
—->http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVzljDmoPVs
For the second idea, I remember watching this video a long time ago and popped up in my head when I was brainstorming. I recently watched it again and thought that it would be cool to make an animation which involved different styles. This video is also a good one to watch because it’s entertaining and just a good watch.
In life drawing a while ago, one technique we used was drawing with a wax candle as if it were a pen or something similar, but we couldn’t see what we were drawing. Then afterwards we would paint a little bit of water and ink over the top, which showed the wax underneath.
This technique was very similar to Henry Moore’s when he drew the people in the underground during the war. So as one of the researched artists, I analysed some of his work and read about his history.
My group for Sound Perspective has looked at this short film as inspiration for the shoelaces documentary we had to make. We noted how the film has used different media, similar to what we had to do. Also we liked how it sped up throughout the film then suddenly got slower, then faster again, which keeps the audience glued to watching it and seeing what happens next.
It’s a graduation film from the Royal College of Art, 2007, Have a look!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INae1sGWnq0
Story, Animation, Direction: Johnny Kelly
Voice Over: Bryan Quinn
Sound Supervision: Mike Wyeld
Foley Artist: Sue Harding
Foley Engineer: John Mark
MONDAY
I started recording my new project animation onto the program called Dragonframe which takes a photo of the traditionally made frames. The type of animation I’m using is cut out, which is where I cut out the characters and their limbs separately then try to move them without jogging them.
TUESDAY
Today I was still recording my animation and drawing more pictures to cut out. The most fiddliest bit was making the bear’s arms and legs move, trying to make them look smooth and have an almost believable walk cycle.
THURSDAY
My last day before assessment on monday! I finished recording the animation and finally started editing it on Final Cut Pro, but the frames are too slow and I don’t know how to edit them to make it faster. If I had more time, I would be able to find out. Also I couldn’t get back onto that specific mac computer because someone else started editing theirs, and didn’t come off it at all. So in the end I went home because there was nothing else to do. On monday, my plan of action is to get into the studio really early so I can edit more of the animation before the deadline. If not, then at least I have something to show…
I’ve been looking at the fashion photographer Tim Walker, who had an exhibition a few months ago and just recently finished called ‘The Storyteller’. It was pretty good because it had most of the props that he used in his photo shoots, like the huge skull looking down on you from the ceiling, the broken Humpty Dumpty, also large doll with curly hair standing near the exit, smiling “Innocently” more like creepy. There were loads more props and many of his photos mixed in, displayed in various ways like just hanging on the wall and resting in crates with hay.
All in all, the exhibition was visually pleasing and gave me the sense of being in the same story like world that he has created over the years. 🙂
This is a close up of the article that I had to annotate during part 2 of foundation art at UCA.
This is one of the articles I had to annotate for the second part of the foundation art course at UCA.
MONDAY
We started a new project called Sound Perspective where we had to choose from three sounds and objects from the two lists in the handbook. The main idea I’ve come up with is an old Colonel who has many trophy stuffed animals from hunting in his youth. They end up coming to life, and he ‘accidentally’ kills himself.
TUESDAY
The next day we did a sound workshop, so went to a studio where we could record sound for the opening of Pixar (with the lamp jumping on the i) then got to edit it on the computer to fit with the animation. We also discussed different sounds used in movies like diagetic, non diagetic, ambiant etc.
THURSDAY
The last day of the week, everyone in the class had critique. All of us brought in our mounted story boards from the Christmas project. we looked at how well they were presented and the originality, then presented the best three to the class and discuss why we chose them.
Next, everyone watched our unfinished shoelaces animation and thought that it wasn’t too bad, though it needed improvements like adding sound and changing the green screen into the cafeteria background.
We need to add one more hand-drawn animation which isn’t finished yet, I’ve added mine to the computer and looks quite smooth surprisingly. I thought it wouldn’t have been good enough because it might have been jumpy with the walking cycle.
The last thing we did was peer assessment. We all brought in our portfolios for a random person to look at and see what we had missing, what was weak (mine being a lack of researched artists and needing to critique my work more), and what was good (mine being a full sketchbook and a very detailed analysis of the artists I have researched).
MONDAY
There wasn’t many people in our class today because of the snow, but I managed to get in. So for this day I did more of the Tee Pee animation including over the weekend. There wasn’t much else to do because the lack of the group.
TUESDAY
Slightly more people turned up today, though still not a full house yet. I carried on drawing more animation frames, then started painting them with watercolours. I found using watercolours quite nice and bright but took a lot of time too. The problem with using these paints was that if I wasn’t careful, the paper would get soggy from the water. Also I was using any A4 paper I could find which meant that some would have different qualities, so some paper would get soggier than others.
THURSDAY
Eventually the whole group turned up today, so we got more one-stop motion done using boots and hi-top shoes. For one type of shoes we used thin wire so we could make them role on the balls of the feet, it worked really well but we had to practice first to get the timing right and be able to control them.
As well as doing that, I also painted more animation frames which meant that I was busy for the day.
Aaaaah You Wimpyfluff 