Production Update

After only just handing in our pitch documents we had to gather our work for the pitch Thursday just gone. I was nervous about it as I hadn’t prepared anything for it yet. I spent the days running up to it building up a few images that I wanted to show to sell my project alongside working on Images for Patsy. 

I was really pleased with how the pitch went. I got some feedback from the judges straight away which was a mixture of neutral positive. Which I thought was alright. The following day we were given our proper feedback and project were given lights according to if they were okay (green) needed more work (orange) or and issues and production would wind up stopping (red)

Unfortunately Poolside was given a red light. This was hard for me to take as I had been working on this for a while and it had become my baby sort of. But form the one to one feedback I got given by the tutors they helped make it clear that it wasn’t the fact that the project was bad it was just not the sort of project they wanted going through into production. They told me it was more of a short short than a short film, which I understood. 

I think If I had the opportunity to go back and redo my pitch I would have maybe put some more dynamic poses for the concept art which may have helped sell my idea to the judges as they had never seen my project before. I will try my best to continue this project in my own personal time and try and make the most out of the situation that I am in. I think it would work as a small short 40-second animation which would be great to put on something like my showreel.

On the positive side Patsy has been given the amber light. One of the main issues that we have been told to address is the design and style. We need to communicate more of the 1940s America. I had a feeling that they would tell us to look into this if we got Pasty through the pitching stage. So I have started to dive more into the research again and look at re designing the characters and we are also looking into re working the backgrounds as well to help display the era and style. 

Also I have already started looking around at the other projects that I want to become involved with now. I have approached Dear Nana and asked if they need someone to work on there storyboards and also the 2D side of the animation pipeline. I have also been approached by Mr Tidbro to do some 2D animating for that as well which mean there will be no rest for the wicked. 

Poolside - Conceptual Artwork

Week 5 - Creative - October Review

So as of today I have just handed in my pitch document for Poolside. It was a stressful week but as least its done and I can carry on developing the project further.

I thought I would take some time to evaluate the first month of being back up to this point. I have been pretty successful in terms of kick starting my own project. It’s been a lot of hard work to cram into this first month. This is due to the fact that I have yet to bring anyone else onto the project. Apart from a few pointers here and there from course mates and tutors this project has been all me. This has been good as I was able to let my designs run wild and crazy and enjoy the time making a project that has been for me. On the down side it has been a lot of work to digest and especially in the run up to this hand in I felt like I could have cracked at any moment.

While this project was in full swing I decide to give myself some extra work to do as I jumped on to Marc Cullen’s project very early on in the design process. I wanted to try and push myself in terms of character designs. It was really interesting to work with someone else again. It was a great opportunity to stretch my design skills as Marc has a very strong idea of what he wanted. Also looking at other artists that I wouldn’t have normally looked at was very helping in developing the character design and my visual style even further. There have been points where I have felt like I had taken on too much work by jumping on this one. But as I take a moment to reflect and evaluate I think it is going to be extremely beneficial in the long run.

The next objectives on my agenda are to carry on developing the thumbnail storyboards alongside with the pitch, which will be happening in just under a week now. I am a little worried about standing in front of everyone as I am used to talking in front of my own class but with the other year groups and also the judges this extra dynamic has made me feel a little worried. But I think with a good amount of preparation most of these worries will fade away.  

I also need to carry on designing for Marc because as of yesterday evening there have been major story changes which involves the need of new characters and old ones to be ditched. All in the name of animation. 

Week 5 - Creative - Pitch Document (Poolside)

Poolside - Pitch Document

Week 5 - Creative - Pre Production (Poolside)

Here are the beginnings of what I hope to be a small conceptual storyboard for my Poolside Pitch Document. These are the rough sketches which I shall be putting into photoshop so I can add the painterly look I'm experimenting with.

Week 5 - Creative - Character Development (Poolside)

After looking at my development work over the past few days I have chosen my final design for what I want Bobby to look like.  At first I took the simple line art that I had sketched out and began to work on the colour palette for him. I looked at some of the children's illustrators I have mentioned earlier like Pascal Campion. After working on it here is what I came up with.

Now I was pleased with it. But I felt like the lines are just way too strong and seem to be defining it into an uninteresting style. So I took a chance and rendered him without any strong lines outlining him. Below is what I managed to produce.  

I am really pleased with this piece of concept art. I think that a style like this would work really well within 2D and I will begin to start looking into if it is worth producing it in Toon Boom or giving TVP a chance. Along with these designs I have most of my rough boards done up and I shall start taking a couple shots and creating some concept art of how I see the final film looking like. Which I will be including in the pitch and pitch document.

Week 5 - Creative - Character Development (Poolside)

last here is some of the development of Bobby the main character of my project. I selected a couple from the 100s of drawings I did and played around with eyes and nose and posing him in ways that would be suitable for the film.  

I feel like I have made some great progress with him and he is started to take shape now. Below is a very rough body outline from front and side. 

Week 3 - Creative - Character Design (Poolside)

Okay so after the feedback from Helen on my design work I have spent the past couple days drumming up 100 different designs for my character, and here they are.

Week 3 - Creative - Character Design (Poolside)

I've started to take a proper look at what I want my little boy to look like in terms of design and style. I wanted a chunky blocky feel to him so I started by toying around with simple shapes to build up an interesting silhouette.

After spitballing a few designs around I started to settle on this one design in particular.

I really liked the chunky feel of the arms and legs although after doing a couple of different angles I found that his hair seems to be cause a few problems. I just don't know what is wrong with it but I'm just having trouble with the side angle. It is looking wrong. So my next plan of action is to take a longer look at the design and see if it can work as I was having the same trouble with one of the other designs that I tried. I'm not too sure if what I am designing is too flat and two dimensional or I've just lost my drawing skills for the day. Anyway I hope you enjoy the progress I am making.