13/12/2010 - Formative

Today we had our formatives and I stood up alongside my group to present what we had done so far in 'Smitten'.

The general feedback was very encouraging, people seemed excited about our idea and liked the direction the art was headed, there was no critique to speak of concerning that. The only thing we were advised on changing is to cut to the princess during different scenes of the animation to show that she really doesn't want to be rescued (frowning at the noises the Knight is making as he dances round the castle and enjoying being asleep in bed at the beginning).

Over the winter break myself and Yuki are going to keep working on concept for backgrounds which I will update here, and I might also do some animation background tests for Matt so he can begin animating.

Until then, I wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year :D

Next piece of Concept Art

Using Maya blockouts for help;


I have completed the second piece of concept art in the Mary Blair style;


I've tried to add in new things that relate to her personality but will have to check with Matt tomorrow whether he wants those things in there and whether the colours are correct as well.


Also added the princess into the scene to try and see what that would look like. The first has stronger lines and the second weaker;


Also went back and added Don into this piece, two different line qualities;


Will get feedback tomorrow!

06/11/2010 - Monday's Lesson

Mike was very pleased with this Mary Blair-esque concept work attempt;



So we are going to try and use this style for a couple more pieces of concept art to see how it looks and also place the characters in them to give an idea of the finished look!

Also just want to mention another source of inspiration that I have been using, the BBC drama series 'Merlin'. It is set around the same time period as our animation and so I've been watching it and taking into account the kind of objects they have in the background for instance.



Next one is the Princess Tower and then the entrance hall..

Matt has also updated the Princess' profile so that we know more about her and can therefore decorate her room more accordingly;

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Not much is known about how she came to live in a tower, but rumour has it that she was raised and educated by the guardians that live there and over time they have formed a loving brother-sister bond.

After realizing the intellectual shortcomings of her guardian teachers, and with a lot of time to spare in her isolation, she set about educating herself. It is through learning that she has found an escape from the monotony of her environment.

Having surpassed her teachers she now spends her time educating them, reading and playing chess - quite content with the sheltered life she leads and has no intention of being rescued.

She is smart, pretty and although she has tried to teach herself the proper etiquette of the time, many of the habits of the guardians have rubbed off on her since birth so she doesn't share the typical interests of a medieval teenage girl.


So I want to add in little details that will convey her personality across :)

01/12/2010 - Trying out Different Styles in SAI

Tried to re-create my last concept piece using simpler shapes and tones;


Have also gone back to using SAI to see if I can get a new spin things;


And a quick attempt to be similar to Mary Blair's work.. but I don't think it looks as good as the above two attempts..


I think I will need to get Yuki to help me learn SAI... everytime I look at her blog she's done some amazing new picture with it and I have to say I'm quite jealous hahahah XD it pushes me to work though, I love the 'Smitten' team!! Team Smitten = awesome.

Tree Background concept

Another completed piece of concept art;



After speaking with Mike yesterday though, I have decided to try a more unusual look for the film using these concept artists as inspiration;
MARY BLAIR;


WALT PEREGOY;



TADAHIRO UESAGI;


Abstract!!! Expect more experimental pieces in the near-future :)

Finished Colour Palette and Concept Art

Well it took the best part of three weeks (the progress of which can be seen in the Dan's Unit blog) but we finished the colour palette!



At least.... as close to the finished colour palette that we can get for the moment. Matt and I have agreed this is just a rough wash and the concept art will be a lot more important to determining the design than these small thumbnails, but it is a start.

We also realised we did not research at what point animation companies usually make colour palettes... perhaps we attempted to make ours too soon before we began the concept art which was why it took so long to complete as we were still finalising things.


Also did some concept art;

My original attempt;


Which was then improved via advice from Mike on 2-point perspective. Original image with perspective reference;

And the improved image;


I think it looks much better :)

Matt also told me he wanted the table to be white with the shading being a reddish hue like one of the examples in the interior moodboard, so I quickly did a version with a white table for him as well;



Mike also spoke to us and said we should think about the time period our piece will be set in and then research things for the decor accordingly. He gave us a few starting points to look at;
-The Austro-Hunagarian Empire (and the Museum of the Decorative Arts)
-Museum of the Applied Arts
-The Victoria and Alvert Museum - looking at Ceramics
-Maybe think about using the banisters on the stairs to lead the eye of where the action is heading
-Art decor

So that's what I hope to finish next as well as doing more concept art that focuses on different perspectives!

Changes

Hello bloggers. Just a quick post to notify you of some changes.
I now have two blogs because there are two different assessors (Mike and Dan) with different requirements for passing this year.

This blog will contain all finished designs for my projects (Mike's assessment), while I will post all the WiPs and tests (Dan's assessment) to http://mvinallbayear.blogspot.com/

I also made a portal for assessors to find the section they want at http://mvinallportal.blogspot.com/

Also made one for PPI at http://mvinallppi.blogspot.com/ which has information about research into my future career.

Thank you!

Individual Pitch

Hello bloggers~ It has been almost a month since my last post, mainly because not much has been happening. Just finished the last bit of my holiday and enrolled last week. This week was our individual pitch presentations - scary!

I managed to do mine today after some minor technical difficulties with my USB in the morning and was the first to present in the afternoon.

I showed everything I posted in my last entry, and spoke about my inspirations for the designs and story idea and got some useful feedback;

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Most of my feedback was very positive, but I'll start with the improvements.
If I were green lighted to go forwards with this idea, I would need to make the animation a bit more 'quirky'. I think this would work especially well once the grandfather has entered the videogame world..

As well as that it would be good to have some concepts for the backgrounds.

Apart from that the response was very positive.. People seemed to like my idea and some even laughed at key points during the animatic, which as Mike pointed out, is a very good sign. He also complimented my drawing abilities which made me feel the most happy haha :D
Mike described my girl character as 'manga-esque' which I was kinda trying to avoid but he also said I had really made the characters my own with my style so that's not a problem as far as I can see!
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Anyway.. I really hate presenting but everyone was very nice and supportive both before and after the presentation so I don't have any worries about it.

I've just sent the 3-sentence pitch summary to Mike which I will quickly post here in case I need it for future reference..

'A young girl and her grandfather have difficulty connecting. She is a videogames fanatic while he doesn’t understand the appeal. When he literally gets sucked into the game he begins to appreciate her interest and connects with her because of them.'

As for my classmates work, I was impressed by quite a few pieces and there were a few other projects I wouldn't mind working on such as Emma Wyton's 'Spooked' and Matt Vadis' 'Smitten'.
There were more 2D pitches than I thought so it looks like I will be able to work on a 2D film no matter what happens.. I've also had interest shown in my idea from Dean, Emma, Laura and Mariluz so if it is picked there are a lot of people who could help me.

Not much else to say for the moment, now I await the results!

Finished!

Everything is now complete! Thought I would post it all in one entry so it's easy to find in case I need to refer to it during the pitch and something goes wrong.

Character designs;



Storyboards;


Animatic;