Monday 31 January 2011

Back and forth

Currently going through several iterations of the animatic, Hard stuff getting it timed right.
Hoping we can get it sorted by tonight.

Thursday 27 January 2011

Some complications with mediums

A few talks have been had, the topic being, How were actually doing it?

We originally said it would be 2D Flash/ToonBoom for the first half, composited with 3D elements such as the train.

The clouds would be mostly done in after effects.

Followed by the Imp section entirely created in CGI.

With tutor comments and ideas, Sean asked:
  • Will the 2 Different scenes clash because of art style/medium?
  • Would it be better to create it all in CG?
This made me realise, why not make it all in CG? theres 6 of us, we should be able to pull it off.
However it's still a big big ask. For instance we would need to make several human characters in maya and rig them. Not to mention animate them all individually for the whole film. This may sound like me not pushing myself but as a group we decided it would be best to go with our original vision of a 2D and 3D hybrid.

Liam out

The Story

As promised I said I would outline the story so this blog actually made sense.
Okay here goes.

The screen is black and you hear the sounds of a train crossing going down, including bells, warning sounds and mechanical sounds for the barriers.

It fades into a train approaching the camera with a low angle.

It starts to rain and everyone shelters under an umbrella or a newspaper.

The first half of the story focuses on one man, and this man becomes confused when as the train passes it seems never ending and all he wants to do is get to the other side. To add to the confusion the train is mysteriously going backwords and forth in the same place???

The mans umbrella is pulled away from him by the wind and thrown around the sky and into the clouds twisting and turning.

The clouds begin to fade out as the umbrella dissapears and a little baby imp in his bedroom is revealed.

Credit to Hollie Steptoe

He is surrounded by a toy train set including track, people and landmarks of Lincoln made up from basic childrens toys such as building blocks.

The imp is actually controlling the real world and so its his actions, ie him playing with the train going backwords and forwards is what is causing the train in the real worl to act in such odd behaviour.

Hope that makes sense :/

Monday 24 January 2011

Jobs jobs jobs...

After a bit of chat with the group and working out the rest of our film we have now all got things to do and planned out what we need to do for the next week.

Aaron has taken on the role of the director of the film which I am pleased for because it makes it much easier to listen to 1 person in terms of work load and goals that are set.

Currently I'm working on the animatic, Collaborating with Hollie to try and perfect the animatic to please the group and our tutors.

Also on the side I'm starting on the modelling of the realistic train for the first sequence. I am pleased with this as its the first bit of modelling I've started to do. This job was originally assigned to Sam but unfortunatly he has kept out of touch with the group on occasions and he hasn't always been in the studio on lecture days/meeting days.

Hopefully the animatic should be done soon, if not by a few days then next week. This should be a realistic target but we shall see how things go.

Liam out.

Sunday 23 January 2011

The blog begins...again

After a successful first year, I'm back baby! I achieved a 2nd for my work in our group project.
I hope to better this grade within my next works.

We have now currently been put into groups once again, this time substantionally bigger! 6 in our team consisting of:
  • Liam- Modeller
  • Aaron- Animator
  • Martyna- Modeller
  • Hollie- Concept/Post
  • Erica- Concept/Texture work
  • Sam- Generalist

So far we've been given an idea around the famous Imp of Lincoln and between us we had to work out a story. Struggling that Paul suggested a couple of ideas to help us along and we found one we liked and couldn't resist taking on.

We had this whole idea of a baby imp character playing with a train set, which would be a toy based world of lincoln which showed places like the cathedral built with building blocks and other toys etc.

Then we thought of a story around it and came to the conclusion that the baby imp was actually the controller of the town and so for everything it did, it had a reaction on the real world. Being as young as he is, he plays around with the train going backwords and forth and we wanted to represent that in the real world and the result; everyone waiting at the crossing for the train confused as to why the train is all over the place.

Have to leave it as that for now, unfortunatly cut short. (working on the animatic at this point in time)