alexandrasanimationblog

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Lip Sync Project (Planning Stage)

I haven’t been able to make much progress on the lip sync project but will be experimenting more during the summer and hopefully completing something on my own. Out of the two audio clips provided I preferred Michael Scott’s quote from the Office. I have a trouble fully understanding Meryl Streep’s accent in the second audio clip and it would be impossible for me to try and replicate her mouth movements in a video for reference. 

I practiced with a mirror for a few vowels and words and sketched a simple mouth with thick lips. 

For the character, my first instinct was a man in a suit, similar to Michael Scott but after playing with various ideas, I decided on a prince character that perhaps is very snobby and power-hungry to match the quote provided. In this project, I will heavily rely on the use of facial expressions and hand movements to fully convey the character’s emotions in the lipsync, in regards to the quote.

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Interview with Max Alessandrini

I had the pleasure of talking to Max Alessandrini, creator of Tommy and Oscar, and asking him about his work through an e-mail interview. 

Q: How did you acquire a job in a studio? I was just lucky. Some common friends told me about a new animation studio that was looking for ideas. I got in touch with the CEO through common friends

Q: Did you always work in your respective field or did you previously assume a different role? (i.e.: Character Designer —> Animator) And if yes, then how many roles did you assume? I was doing may things...  Story editor, script editor, scriptwriter, art director.... I even play saxophone is some scenes 

Q: Which department did you work in and what other departments were you closely linked to? Creative department , but I was also working closely with video games technical department Q: How big was the team you worked with and were there others who shared the same role as you? I was managing 5 scriptwriters, 10 illustrators, 3 software engineers

Q: How much of your work was present in the final product? 99%

Q: How easy/difficult were the working conditions and how much time did it take you to finish your work? The studio was very small and new. It never got involved in a big production like a TV series. We were pioneers in that field Q: What is your favourite thing that you’ve worked on? I am the creator of Tommy and Oscar TV series. Of course it's my favorite :)

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Media Roles and Industries

Aliki Theofilopoulos Grafft

Roles: Animated series creator, director, story artist, writer, character designer, Emmy nominated songwriter, voiceover actor 

Paper Wings show #31 Interview notes

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LgB2Escc9qc

Where did the dream begin?

Loved drawing for as far as she can remember

Loved cartoons 

Didn’t have a prejudice towards anything (cartoons)

Was moved by the beauty and artistry but also the humor and emotional quality of the stories

“There was something really attractive to me that drawings could do that”

Majored in art at USC, there wasn’t an animation program yet, there was one animation class 

Got an internship for college credit at Hanna Barbera - turned into a PA job upon graduating

Took classes at the animation guild at the same time - specialized training + life drawing

“‘At the moment I am terrified’ is the signal that I have to go do the thing I’m terrified of” - on taking risks (time stamp 21:54)

She went to talk to John K despite being scared - took the chance to speak to an animator - that conversation led to an internship

Focused on life drawing so her portfolio stood out by asking recruiters to have a second look on it - ended up working at feature animation

Life drawing - focused on character animation - did a lot before actually animating 

Kept signing up for creative classes - found that she loved ‘story’ - discovered that this was what she was meant to be in all along

Character Design class - important moment for her - redesign characters from the wizard of Oz at the moment (work in class) - felt like she lost herself because she focused on study so she lost her sense of a goal 

Nickelodeon was looking for new talent and was recommended by a friend who worked on Spongebob - character design drawings were given - was told to come up with a show for these drawings - didn’t know anything about pitching at the time - was told to base a character on herself to make her more interesting - actually made that cartoon in a short later on - got hired as a story assistant afterwards “Girls on the Go” and “Yaki and Yumi” (these shorts inspired Adventure Time and Funboy and Chum Chum)

“Who are you and what do you have to say?” - Be yourself 

Even though her shorts didn’t get picked up at first, through that experience she learned how to “make a film from start to finish and writing and post” etc.

“Failing upward” - Not letting disappointments break you because you gain experience and you develop your ideas 

Phineas and Ferb - could storyboard AND write- outline-driven show (not just drawing) - Dan Povenmire wanted female writers because of the key female characters in the show - Storyboarding is writing and drawing at the same time as you think 

A lot of trial and error - stacks of work were thrown away - don’t be too attached to something - busy schedule and constant changes to the story as the show was getting released 

What do you think when you’re making a story? 

From a script - critical - constantly asking “why” - “every scene should matter” - if it’s not entertaining/pushing the story/adding to a character then it shouldn’t be there - how is character A different from character B? How does A pick up a book that is different from B? - Index cards and Post-it notes that say in one word what each story beat is about - building a structure for the characters and story in advance helps set everything for when you develop the story as you go on 

Directing - having a clear vision for the project - technical + story-based side

Knowing your strengths and putting them on the table - being open to collaboration - not having to have perfect drawings yet being able to contribute to a project (even if your ideas aren’t all picked up)

“Many paths to the same place” - no right or wrong way - pay attention but you may not end up where you expect 

Heartbreak of a pitch that’s rejected - how do you deal with it? 

You have to pour your heart and soul into things but you should keep going despite the disappointment - You should continue to have the drive to create - Pitching is valuable even if your ideas don’t get picked up

On being overwhelmed by the home and work balance + a family - female animators concerned over being wives and having families while working in the industry - afraid of having to make a choice (men didn’t have that same concern) - “it is very doable” - not expecting yourself to be perfect at everything and to form friendships with people in the same boat as you (working moms, other female animators etc.) to create support for yourself to be in animation and be a good mother/wife 

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Quarantine Life Drawing 

Using the website Quickposes.com , I selected image categories such as nude/partially nude poses, portraits and hands and set a timer for each sketch. Other than anatomy, life drawing helped me deal with art block and I will be practicing over the summer too to hopefully further improve. Despite not being able to have an actual model, I will be making the most of the current situation.

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Mystery Box (Part 4)

This is what I’ve done so far. Unfortunately my laptop had trouble loading Maya and I’ve attempted to playblast on a friend’s laptop instead. It did not turn out too great so I have this video of my progress instead. 

What I’d want to work on once I get the chance is refining the movements, complete the jump and landing and give more energy to the character overall. Other than that, I am happy with my progress and the hopping in particular is my favorite bit.

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Mystery Box (Part 3)

While working on my animation, I placed my video reference into a Premiere Pro sequence in order to map my exact movements. The jump is the most important bit of the entire animation and needed the most attention due to the angle of the arms and legs as well as the rise and drop of the waist and head. In order to have a clearer understanding of my movements, I used little stick figure sketches to keep track of difficult poses and created a more detailed storyboard than the one prior to the video shooting.

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Mystery Box Project (Part 2)

Video reference + acting out of the storyboard

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Mystery Box Project (Part 1)

I was debating on what I wanted my reaction to be but it seemed to me that joy was a less common option when exchanging ideas with my peers. I was expecting a package during that time too and I wanted to convey an over-exaggeration of my enthusiasm and what more perfect way to illustrate that than a jump in the air? I wanted my character to happily hop towards the box, look inside then jump in joy as if they were expecting the contents and yet are still super excited once confirming them. 

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Puppet Animation - Stop Motion

Week 17 (14/02/20)

After I had finished my walk cycle, I experimented with a couple ideas that I had for the character. Most were unsuccessful but I am quite happy with this one. I brought a prop flower hairpin just in case I needed it and came up with this idea. I wanted her to smell the flower, reminisce about something and then hold it close. It shows a softer side to her character than the confident and sassy walk in the previous animation. I had fun doing this and would love to experiment more.

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Puppet Walk Cycle - Stop Motion 

Week 17 (14/02/20)

During our independent study week, I focused on finalizing some details on my puppet’s design and making sure that her feet worked well for the stop motion walk cycle. 

For the set-up, I used purple and orange gels over the lights to give the scene a ‘runway’ look. Due to her dress being in the way, instead of having her move from one side of the screen to the other, I chose to make her walk forward so that her legs are visible.

I wanted her to have somewhat of prance as she walks by placing one leg in front of the other. Once she reaches where she wants, I made her bow by bending her right leg and having her left leg stretch behind her. When she got up I decided to add a little extra gesture to give her more character which is the hair flip she does at the end. I had to strategically tape her hair to the back to make it seem like it was thrown.

Due to our precious walk cycles in stop motion, I managed to make this walk cycle from my first try. I had it set to 25fps with two shots were taken each time but I’ve played around with the duration to make it seem more natural. I'm quite happy with the end result and would love to experiment more with stop motion.

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Propp’s 31 functions as applied to The Lion King (notes)

(functions 28-31) *could not be pasted with their original numbers for some reason

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Life Drawing

Week 16 (05/02/20)

Used: colored pencils, markers

In our last life drawing session, we had the freedom of using any materials or techniques we wanted as we drew our model’s one pose. Some people chose to make one big drawing while I chose to make many little sketches and studies.

I used color pencils to paint shadows and light, I used markers later in that same session, I tried to create silhouettes and went about sketching the outline of our model’s body in different ways. I can see my improvement over the many lessons we had in these pieces in particular. I feel more confident in my ability to draw bodies, shapes, silhouettes, and shading. 

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Creating Puppets Pt.3

Week 16 (04/02/20)

Used: armature made of milliput and wire, tape, recycled/recyclable materials (repurposed old make-up sponge and black tissue paper and styrofoam)

In our last puppet-making session, I added the finishing touches to my puppet that ended up being a princess/pageant queen character rather than a superheroine. 

The finishing details:

I decided to cover the purple shiny paper of her top with the holographic tape I initially used for the belt. 

I gave her a shawl made from velvety purple fabric that I glued to the back of her dress and had the words “BOW DOWN” embroidered in the back.

From that same material I made a purple bow that I glued to her white yarn hair.

I used cardboard to hold up her overskirt up from below.

I used holographic paper to cut out a crown that I then covered in rhinestones

I used rhinestones for her face

I’m really happy with how she turned out. I even ended up naming her “Miss Thing” which is slang for someone who is seemingly perfect and/or full of themselves.

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Essay: The Lion King vs. Hamlet

When looking at The Lion King, I had to consider the source material which is the Shakespearean play “Hamlet”. Hamlet, being a tragedy, is not necessarily a very child-friendly story and Disney had to make many changes and take various creative choices on how it would be told. These changes also affected the structure of the story (making it more fairytale-like) thus making it match Propp’s functions almost perfectly. 

While reading Hamlet, I decided to compare and contrast the two texts with the main focus being the roles of everyone in the story. 

A general comparison would be:

Simba as Hamlet

Mufasa as King Hamlet (the father)

Scar as Claudius

Nala as Ophelia

Sarabi as Queen Gertrude 

These basic comparisons then led me to comparing the relationships between these characters and how they compare in each text.

While the relationship trees are similar there are some key differences that set the two apart and make some characters’ roles more obvious and true to their archetypes. For example, in Hamlet, the Queen (Gertrude) remarries Claudius after King Hamlet’s death while Sarabi, her Lion King counterpart, does not. This key difference is more appropriate to younger audiences and solidifies Scar’s role as the Villain of the story since none of the lionesses in Mufasa’s Pride (especially not their queen) are on his side. 

Another key difference is Nala’s lack of a father or brother. Prides typically don’t have multiple male lions but it is made clear that Nala is not Mufasa’s daughter and therefore eligible to marry Simba later on in the film. She is the love interest of the hero but where she is different than Ophelia is her heroism and the happy ending she eventually gets. Nala also isn’t influenced by others and is an ally to Simba through and through, as opposed to Ophelia attempting to get information from Hamlet.

The Archetypes/ Fairytale Roles (in basic terms)

Simba - Hero

Scar - Villain/Shadow

Nala - Lover/Princess/Ally

Rafiki/Timon/Pumbaa/Zazu/Mufasa - Allies/Mentors/Donors

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Life Drawing

Week 15 (29/01/20)

Used: Pencil (for sketching) and acrylics

In today’s life drawing lesson we worked on only one long painting. We had to paint our model’s face (in this case torso) with natural “fleshy” colors. Will gave us a briefing on the lighter and darker shades of brown we were to use and how to layer them accordingly. I used the peachy tone as a base (and highlight in some cases), a dark brown, a medium brown (made from mixing dark brown and white) and a reddish-brown for the redder tones on his face and chest/shoulders. I used white more prominently on his nose (where the light directly hit him) and the whites of his eyes.  

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Creating Puppets Pt.2

Week 15 (28/01/20)

Used: armature made of milliput and wire, tape, recycled/recyclable materials (repurposed old make-up sponge and black tissue paper and styrofoam)

I ended up adding an overskirt for my puppet from that same black tissue paper material but decided to leave a gap in the middle (where the tutu shows up) in order to make any movement with the legs somewhat visible. I used some shiny purple packaging paper as the dress’s top and holographic silver tape as a belt to hide the glue I used to attach the overskirt. As for design, I requested rhinestones from Carla that I stoned her skirt with (in a rainbow pattern). 

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Life Drawing

Week 14 (22/01/20)

Used: card paper, acrylic paints

In today’s life drawing session, instead of ink, we experimented with acrylic paints. We had to use three different tones to capture the dark, light and neutral parts of our model’s body based on the lighting. The colors I picked, although unconventional, worked well with our task. I used dark blue for the darker parts, light blue for the mid-tones and very light mint green for the highlights (often mixed with white if it ended up mixing with the other two colors). I was quite satisfied with the result of this exercise although I wished I could redo one or two of my quick sketches.