Reflection On The Week (22): Starting Monday 24th February

Week Summary
Think my work has been more balanced this week for each of the modules.

Reflection on Practice - Now that I have done my Focus Group this week, I need to finish the transcription and then read through it again to summarize my findings to include in my paper and presentation.
Also started working out the structure of my paper and presentation, so need to flesh the bullet points out with the information and references.

Advanced Production - This week has mainly be focused on fixing the design of the dog, which needed to be right as it is the main character. I do feel this has been achieved this week and am much happier with it. Also through sorting the dog design out we have also sorted lots of the colours out.

Going Live - Started working on one of the Going Live assets, it is currently in the modelling stage.

Monday 24th Feb
Wrote out my exact Focus Group Protocol for tomorrow to use.
Booked and picked up audio recorder for tomorrow's focus group.
I also participated in someone else's Focus Group today.
Then in the evening I baked cupcakes and jammie dodgers for my focus group tomorrow :)

Tuesday 25th Feb
Focus Group day! It went well and there were some interesting answers to the questions I asked which will definitely help with my paper/presentation.
Handed in the signed consent forms to the office.
Fixed a few things on my Abstract and handed the final one into the office.
Started transcribing my focus group audio recording.
Wrote out bullets points to try and summarize the structure of my paper/presentation.

Wednesday 26th Feb
Had a meeting with Sharon in the morning to discuss my final Abstract and the structure of my paper/presentation. Also went over what will be happening next week with the practice presentations.

Supervisor meeting in the afternoon to look over designs and the 2D animatic: Click here for relevant blog post link

Typed more of Focus Group Transcript.

Thursday 27th Feb
Went along to life drawing in the morning: Click for relevant blog post link

Had a team meeting and looked over different dog breeds to decide what one would be best to base the dog design from. Also looked up the top 10 most owned dogs in the UK. Then Giorgos went and brought back a dog book from the library. Searching through everything from bull dogs, to Labradors, to Scottie Dogs, finally decided upon the Jack Russell terrier. It is short-haired. A small-medium sized dog. Has clean facial features - easy to see expression. Is originally a British dog breed.

We all sat around and sketched dogs and tried to help towards the dog design. These are some sketches I did:

As it was the Masters open day today, a group was in our studio and we showed them our animatic. It was good to see new people viewing our animatic and seeing their reactions to it - good to know they laughed at the right places!

More feathers were added to the Bird character's arms/wings. Also the tail was elongated slightly as it wasn't too noticeable before.

Friday 28th Feb

Did some more dog drawing today, trying to help figure out the dog design now that we now what breed it should be based on. These sketches here include testing out a short-haired terrier overall shape and colouring's:

Trying out different colours with the shape I was happy with, based on real dogs:

This one with added jumpers and dog coats to see what will work the best:

Got feedback from the group and, along with me, the dog with the dark blue jumper and red stripes seems to be the current favourite. Giorgos then pointed out that the colour of the Owners clothes might have to change now that the dog's colours had been sorted. So I tried out so me variations:

I then thought that a dark red cardigan might work better, so I used the original colour concept which Sheng had done to test this out quickly to see how it looked against the environment as well, with all the characters:

Sheng's original environment concept with my added dog design, and dark red cardigan.

Same again but with a dark blue scarf as Giorgos wasn't too sure about the Mustard yellow scarf. The dark blue however makes the owner and dog look too matching.

However myself and Kirti thought the Mustard scarf might work better, so I tried it in the other environment concept that Sheng had created:

Sheng's concept art with the added dark red cardigan to test out.

Weekend
Started modelling one of the Going Live assets.

Supervisor Meeting - Wednesday 26th February 2014

Had a supervisor meeting in the afternoon to look over designs and the 2D animatic:

Dog design needs finalized - try the designs with and without the jumper to help decide. The breed of dog was discussed. Sharon suggested that maybe we pick a British dog (one that is common or associated with Britain) if we want our film to be recognizable as a British garden. Could it be a black dog? I wondered if it would be more difficult to see, but it might help with silhouette.

The pumpkins in the set design might also suggest it is an American garden...
Maybe look for things to dress the environment that have a cultural reference to Britain.

The owner could be moving a wheel-bin, maybe even stuffing leaves into it.
Maybe it would be better if the garden looked a bit sparse and barren, might help back up the reason for the bird being hungry.

One of the pieces of feedback on the animatic from a focus group was why would the bird still be hungry after already eating 2 biscuits. One answer to this is the bird is really hungry and storing up for winter. However another suggestion is to have the events happen over a few days, but we did try this originally and found that the film was much tighter when it all happened in one day.

Feedback from my focus group yesterday was it would be even more funny to have the dog actually be lifted off the ground by the bird during the tug of war.

Should the owner be wearing more suitable autumn/winter gardening footwear?

Could ask Undergraduates to help with the sound and music - what sound and music will we need? - something to consider...

Animatic is under 2 mins, and there should be some walk cycles and flight cycles that can be re-used throughout.

Overall colours need to be decided before texturing begins.

Maybe bird modelling could find someone else to start?

We all have things to work on for next time, including 3D animatic, animation practice, Character rigs started, Character modelling still underway, Dog design finalized, Shot list created, overall colours decided.

I'll be working on the 3D animatic, practicing animations with free rigs, finalizing dog designs with Sheng.

Supervisor Meeting - Tuesday 4th February 2014

Talked through the storyboards that each member of the team contributed to.

George drew panels: 1-7, 25-27, 37-38, 54-60
I drew panels: 8-24, 39, 53
Sheng drew panels: 28-36
Kirti drew panels: 40-52

Myself and George arranged the storyboards in a storyboarding program called 'Shotbox', I then added descriptions to all the panels:

I then put the panels together into a roughly timed animatic:

Some ideas that were discussed and generated from the meeting included:

• Do we need the INT. environment? The human could be outside in the garden as well, gardening, hanging out washing, raking leaves. First this would save us time having to model, texture and light another environment, and it might also make the scenes more funny, because the human is also in the garden but is completely oblivious to what is going on.
• During the 'tug-of-war' scene, the humorous situation of this could be heightened by having the small bird pulling the dog along the ground/through the air (Bird appears unusually strong - could show how much it wants the biscuit)
• Zooming out at the end to leave on a similar shot that the storyboard began with at the beginning could round off the film nicely.

I've also typed up the script (yes the girl's name is 'Lily', I did not initiate this decision! :p Decided to differentiate this character from myself by spelling it differently from my own to avoid confusion):

Tug of Biscuit

03/02/2014

Director and Script Writer: Lilly Durrant

EXT. House and Back-Garden – (DAYTIME – AUTUMN/WINTER)

A young dog, named PIP, plays in the Garden and runs towards the back door of the house.

INT. Kitchen – (DAYTIME)

A young woman, LILY, is doing chores in the kitchen. Pip comes in through the door; Lily greets Pip,

1.                                            LILY

“Biscuit?”

She then throws a BISCUIT out into the garden for Pip.

EXT. Back-Garden – (DAYTIME)

SFX sounds of kids playing in neighbour’s garden. Dog approaches biscuit, sniffs it and then opens mouth to eat it.

SFX loud kick sound! A BALL flies over the fence and past the dog, immediately grabbing Pip’s attention. Pip excitedly runs out of shot after the ball.

A BIRD swoops down, picks up the biscuit, and takes off with it.

Pip happily pads back into shot with the football in his mouth. He looks down at where the biscuit was and is shocked and confused to find it is gone! Pip looks around the ground and then looks up. Pip spots and focuses on something O/S and looks angry.

Camera zooms out to show the bird sitting on the fence with the biscuit. It then swallows the biscuit, which upsets the dog, and then flies away. The ball pops and deflates in the dog’s mouth.

INT. Kitchen – (DAYTIME)

Pip begs Lily for another biscuit; she throws one outside for him and gets back to work.

EXT. Back-Garden – (DAYTIME)

Dog runs up to biscuit and looks around suspiciously for the bird. Thinking maybe it’s best to save and hide the biscuit, Dog begins to dig a hole for it.

Meanwhile the Bird swoops down and creeps towards the biscuit.

Pip is alerted to a sound and turns around to see the Bird with his biscuit in its mouth. Bird then engulfs it whole and takes off, leaving a stunned Dog.

INT. Kitchen – (DAYTIME)

Pip begs Lily desperately for another biscuit.

2.                                            LILY

“Last one, ok?”

She throws a biscuit outside for him and gets back to washing dishes at the window, which has a view of the garden.

EXT. Back-Garden – (DAYTIME)

Dog runs towards biscuit and then stops. Camera pans up to reveal the bird standing opposite. The biscuit lies on the ground, at equal distance between the two. It’s a standoff.

C/U of the dog and bird, both look angry and determined; each glance between the other and the biscuit.

Both then suddenly race towards each other and the biscuit. Camera cuts just before they collide.

INT. Kitchen – (DAYTIME)

Lily is busy washing dishes. The view from the window shows Pip and Bird in a tug of war with the biscuit. Lily looks nonchalantly up, then back to the dishes, then double takes back to the chaos outside.

3.                                            LILY

Exclamation of Surprise!

Lily throws down what she was washing and runs O/S. Still looking through the window at the sink, Lily can be seen running towards Pip and the Bird, arms flailing and shooing.

4.                                            LILY

(Sound is muffled, as camera/audience still in Kitchen)

“Stoppp! Shoo! Shoo!”

EXT. Back-Garden – (DAYTIME)

As the Bird flies off past the camera, Lily picks Pip up along with the biscuit. She looks at the biscuit, and then O/S.

Bird is sitting on the fence looking very sad; its little stomach wobbles as it grumbles.

Lily looks back at dog and biscuit, an expression of realization crosses her face. She looks thoughtful and then has an idea.

SFX of DIY and building with a montage of C/U’s.

Pip watches with anticipation as Lily finishes constructing something. Camera dollies out to reveal a new BIRD HOUSE/FEEDER. Bird flies to it and looks joyous!

Bird happily munches on the bird feed as the Dog finally munches away on his biscuit.

THE END

The script is currently 2.5 pages long, meaning our film is roughly 2-3 minutes long, so a lot of editing is required. Ideally the animatic needs to be edited to under 2 minutes.

Lastly we went over some Moodboards, these are the ones I put together, wanted to find examples of simple 3D designs, followed by 2D and more illustrative designs:

I've started putting some reference boards together on Pinterest,

Cartoon Dogs: http://www.pinterest.com/2illybean/cartoon-dogs/

Garden Birds: http://www.pinterest.com/2illybean/garden-birds/

There are still designs, styles and colours to finalize. Originally we thought of having a 2D background with 3D characters, the more this project is developing the more inclined we have been to go for a 3D background instead. It will probably be a lot less trouble for us, not having to try and convincingly composite a 3D character into a 2D world.

We also discussed what everyone is working on at the moment and what we should be working on next. I will continue Directing and overseeing the whole project, including the designs, and I will be updating the storyboard and 2D animatic. Sourcing some free 3D rigs to use in the 3D animatic and creating the 3D animatic; this will aid background designs, give an idea of camera moves, and allow me to start animation tests.

For our next Supervisor Meeting in 3 weeks time:

• Have a new updated 2D animatic (fix storyboard)
• A 3D animatic (used with simple models and free rigs, having a 3D animatic will help with what backgrounds we need to help influence those designs)
• Background and character designs - start modelling a character

Supervisor Meeting - Thursday 16th January 2014

Since the last meeting with our Supervisor our story idea had changed and developed, so first thing was to explain our new rough plot idea (the dog who keeps having his biscuits taken by a bird each time he gets given one by his owner.)
The style of the film needs to be decided. Inspirations already include Simon's Cat and Birdbox's Carpark. If the finished film was to be black and white range of colours, it might look to similar to these, so would preferably like to use colour in our film.
Do we even need a background? Sharon showed us an example - Pocoyo:

Who is our target audience? Aiming at pre-school? Or a general audience that can relate to the situation in the film? Pet-owners? People with an interest in local wildlife/environment?
Need to start storyboarding, the story may have an effect and influence the character designs.
Could look at an organisation to get involved with? - If the film is trying to promote a message. Could have a logo/message written at the end? Example that came to mind was Fed Up - Simon's Sister's Dog with the RSPCA:

We want to make sure the human character has a significant-enough role in the film. (Could be having a BBQ in the garden, bird is a scavenger and gets to scrap bits of food before the dog. Maybe the bird is gathering food for it's young in a nest. Or the owner could be taking the rubbish out, scraps of food from that?)
Production roles within the team were also discussed.
We should all start storyboarding and researching, this will generate more ideas and be more time efficient. Plus the story has an effect and influence on everything else, including character designs, modelling, etc.

For the next Supervisor Meeting in 3 weeks time:

• Have a storyboard (potentially a timed animatic).
• Moodboards of reference and inspiration for the style of film.
• Rough Character designs.
• Production Schedule.
• And anything else we have to show.

Supervisor Meeting 1

Thursday 7th November - Had a meeting with the supervisor for our group, Sharon Campbell. Group members are Kirti Goenka, Sheng Li, Giorgos Ontherox and myself.
We talked over the initial brainstorming of ideas our group has been discussing so far, which have all been based around Kirti's research project involving a story with a message delivered in both a 'gain-framed' and a 'loss-framed' mode.

Some notes from the meeting:
- What audience is the film aimed at?
- Careful not to make the film patronizing if wishing to get a message across, like a public information film
- If going for an environmental theme/message, go to a local organization, eg, green peace, get feedback from the organization, what do the public already know/not know about.

One example Sharon showed us of a short animated film which has a strong message in it, but it is more abstract. 'Badgered', by Sharon Colman, looks at themes of war and nature. The message is clear, but abstract, you might not know the characters very well, but it is suggesting something to the audience:

We also discussed that every element in a film can be manipulated to put across a message, such as colour, composition, sound etc. It is how people respond to different design methods.
If we were to go with the split screen idea, for the research, put across the same message on both sides, but just change one element, eg, colour, to make the experiment more controlled by just changing one variable.
The audience would automatically sense which is right and wrong. Therefore making it more abstract and controlled will benefit the project.
I raised the concern over finishing the film for May/June, earlier to allow time for testing the film on an audience for research. Instead of doing this, Sharon suggested what Kirti could use for testing on an audience for the research project - the animatic. The animatic could explore both versions of the story/film, then we would use the one that received the strongest response for the final film, due for completion in August. If we didn't use an animatic, we could film a live action version which could be used as live action reference for the animation. One of the key challenges/issues here would be that an animatic is not always very clear to fresh eyes, as the audience would be viewing what is essentially a very rough draft of the final film.

The next step for our group is to sit down and lay all of our cards on the table, discussing exactly what we want to get out of this project, this will hopefully make developing an idea for our film easier.