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Week 16: WE IN THE FINAL STRETCH!!

In this week's blog, we're supposed to answer these questions, reflecting on our experience.

(1) Describe the experience

This has probably been the most stressful and challenging experience I've ever gone through in an entire semester. I was put out of my comfort zone and was forced to learn new things on the fly. In the end, I am truly grateful to have gone through this experience because it taught me a lot about myself and has shown me that there's a lot of people out there cheering on my success. I learned to work around obstacles that are out of my own control and to know when to ask for help.

(2) Describe what you would adjust in your filmmaking process in the future

While the whole computer issues were out of my control, I would probably make sure I had a plan B so that my production progress wouldn't have stalled for so long. I would also have actually used and followed my detailed production schedule instead of doing everything in one sitting because I ended up experiencing a lot of wrist/shoulder pain as well as a massive lack of sleep. Lastly, I think I spent way too long redoing both my script and animatic, so maybe next time I'd spend less time on that or start rough animation earlier on already locked scenes.

(3) Words of advice to future ACM 320 students

Always ask questions and always ask for feedback. Not only in class, but outside of class as well. The best feedback I got on my film was from ACM alumni who have experience with making their own film as well as those who aren't even in ACM. Also, remember to do something you know you're passionate about and will continue to be passionate about because throughout the semester the amount of work will take a toll on you physically and mentally. Lastly, do what you know you can do so that you don't fall behind but also remember to challenge yourself, even if it's something really small. The experience is 100% worth it. DON'T FORGET THAT YOUR HEALTH IS ALSO IMPORTANT!! DRINK WATER AND TAKE BREAKS!!!

ALSO, DON'T FORGET TO SAVE OFTEN!!!!!!!!

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Week 15: I'm Super Tired

This week has been tough with multiple final projects due this week, constant fatigue, and shoulder pain. Anyways here’s week 15 progress:

Animation

Was only able to get up to sq4s1 done in term of final animation, sadly. I’m really struggling on figuring out how to do the almost hyper speed? star animation just to emphasize how fast they’re flying as well as establish space and dimension to the plane. Hopefully I figure it out....soon...yeah... I left a test on in this week’s version as well as a temp background for the shot. Yeah, I’m falling really behind now. Sad :[ 

Araw at Gabi: Week 15 Progress

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Week 14 (Part 2)

Here's a comparison between rough and final animation using sq1s1!

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Week 14: “Oh yeah. It’s all coming together.” -Kronk

We’re still pretty behind but we’re getting there! Hopefully I can finish it on time!! Time for the week 14 update!

Animation

Only got around to doing the final animation for sq1s1. (Yikes.) It took me a while to research and learn how to use the cutter tool (works like a masking tool) due to the lineless and textured aesthetic I had originally planned for. While it does take a lot of time and A LOT of layers, I think it looks really good! Originally I wanted to do a glow effect on the characters, but after testing it out, I prefer how it looks without the glow effect. (Also by not doing glow effects anymore, I save more time and effort in post-production). Here’s the production progress video:

Araw at Gabi: Week 14 Progress

Here’s also a general look into what the final animation looks like for my film. Each layer group contains at least 3 layers. (Base color, mask layer, & texture/another color layer). 

Backgrounds

I really should’ve done backgrounds a long time ago but here we are lol As of right now, I got all the indoor backgrounds done! The only backgrounds left are all the space ones which, luckily, are easier to reuse for multiple shots. I think the style of the backgrounds worked really well with the textured coloring of the characters! There’s a good balance between the background and the characters, and I think it looks believable that the characters are in the actual environment. I’m pretty proud of that! This is the first time I’ve ever done actual backgrounds for one of my animations. Here’s a screenshot of what the screenshot above looks like on its respective background. I’ll also include some more of the backgrounds. (Yes, I did reuse assets and entire backgrounds. Work smarter, not harder lol)

IT’S CRUNCH TIME! LET’S GO!! WE IN THE FINAL STRETCH NOW!!! WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!! GET HYPED!!!!!

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Week 13: We’re Behind Once Again But What Else Is New :’]

I’m really tired (not a surprise). I need more sleep. Anyways, here’s week 13 update:

Animation

Finally, we have finished all the rough animations. Hopefully I can get the finals done a lot faster. In good news, I figured out how to use the cutter setting on ToonBoom which works like a clipping mask which is great! Here’s the progress video.

Araw at Gabi: Week 13 Progress

Updates

I finally got my new PC set up but I’m also dumb and forget to get an hdmi adapter so that I can also have my display tablet also plugged in. I’m not used to having a PC lol I’ve only had laptops up till now. So now I got to go buy one over the weekend. Feels nice to not worry about my laptop combusting and loosing all my progress though lol. I really need sleep. 

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Week 12: I’m Tired But We’re So Close

This week was just me trying to do as many shots as I could. Unfortunately still behind schedule. Anyways, onto the week 12 update!

Animation

Since the last blog I finished rough animations from sq5s1 to sq6s4. Still need to do rough animation for sq6s5 - s11. I contemplated pulling another all nighter and finishing it all tonight but I just pulled an all nighter yesterday and that’s not healthy lol. Sq6 has started to steer a little bit away from the animatic in terms of a couple characters actions I added and some of the compositions but I think the changes look a loot better. Here’s the updated progress video! (Also, have some screencaps from sq6 because why not lol and yes I realize now that her thumb is on the wrong side).

Araw at Gabi: Week 12 Progress

Music

My composer just sent me a new rough draft yesterday and wow. It is absolutely amazing! I’m really glad that he’s also enjoying working on my film! After hearing the rough draft of the music along side the with the finish roughs for sq1-5, I have gained a lot more motivation to finish the film. The excitement has increased from seeing my film get closer and closer to being complete. Now for the music. Wow. Absolutely wow. The details that he’s added in the current draft are absolutely genius! My favorite part being the musical (I believe chromatic?) run as Apolaki throws Mayari. So good! Other really good parts is the musical hits he added like when Mayari hits Apolaki on the head and when the star collides with Mayari. He did such a good job making sure the music and the sound effects don’t musically clash. I’ve been listening to it on repeat and wow. It really does bring my film to a whole new level. Have a listen! (Video is from an earlier progress video and doesn’t include any roughs from sq6).

Araw at Gabi: Music Rough Draft

Closing Notes

I’m really excited. I hope I can finish the roughs soon! But for now, I really need sleep lol. I look forward to returning back to class and seeing everyone’s progress! Good night!

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Week 11: Things Are Getting Better But We’re Still Behind :’]

Things are a lot better since last week, which is great. We still behind schedule with production but hopefully we can catch up soon. Here’s the week 11 run down:

Animation

Ladies and gentleman, it’s late but we’ve finally finished the rough animations for the fight scene! (Now all that’s left is the rest of the film). At least the hardest part is over! I still have to make some revisions to a couple scenes but overall I think it’s turning out okay. All that’s left to rough animate are Sq5-6 and then we’re on to the final and compositing! Anyways, here’s the updated progress video:

Araw at Gabi: Week 11 Progress

Music

My composer recently sent me a rough overall concept/draft of the music, which is great! I love the ethnic sounds of the instruments along with the intensity of the composition. My feedback on it was to make edits that align with the storytelling. For example, while the intensity is really good for the fight scene and the argument, I’d like it to sound more playful in the beginning then transition into that more intense sound as their argument escalates. Another note I had was that I wanted more flute, especially in moments where Mayari is the pursuer/at an advantage or the only one in the shot since at the moment, it is very percussion heavy. A lot of examples we go back and forth with each other is the soundtracks of the PowerPuff Girls as well as Steven Universe. I just sent him the updated progress video of my film so hopefully that helps a little more with the timing. Here’s a disclaimer that the rough draft isn’t fully mixed yet and he hasn't really gotten into the details yet. He mostly did the concept for the first half so far. The video used is also from an earlier stage of production.

Araw at Gabi: Music Rough Draft

Obstacles

Update on my computer: I should have my new computer/set up by some time next week at the earliest. Right on time to get back on track and head into final animations and compositing lol We’re doing a lot better recently so I’m very thankful for that. Still playing a game of catch up, but we’re getting there!

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Week 10: Pain

This week...wow...it really was something. Probably the most unfortunate week I’ve experienced in a long time. Honestly, I don’t know where to start. I guess we’ll just start with the important subject first, the week 10 production progress!

Animation

Sadly, this week due to an unfortunate set of events, I was only able to finish roughs for sq4s1-2. Originally, I had planned to be done with the entirety of sq4 but that did not happen. Here’s to hoping I can get it done soon. Here’s the progress edit of rough animations and the animatic cut together.

Araw at Gabi: Week 10 progress

Music

I had a meeting with my composer on Saturday, March 20. We just went over the animatic and any animation I had at the time while discusses what the mood was for each sequence. I talked about how a lot of my animation for the film is inspired by the animation from the PowerPuff Girls and Steven Universe, so he said he’ll try to incorporate the styles of compositions done from those shows while incorporating the sounds of traditional Filipino instruments. He sent me samples of possible bamboo flute sounds he was looking to use for his composition for my film. He told me he couldn’t find a reliable vst plug in for Filipino flutes but he did find ones for similar flutes from other cultures such as the Indian bansuri, Chinese xiao, and the Bolivian pan flute. Since they were similar in sound and material (bamboo), they were a pretty close match to the Filipino bamboo flute. We discussed if we were going for more an orchestration or a different kind of sound. We also discussed preferences between music of cartoons from different regions. We set a due date of April 20, for the final composition, but he said he’ll get it to me before then. (Hopefully, I finish the roughs by the first week of April so he had more time).

Obstacles

Recently, I noticed that there was a bulge on my laptop in the area of the trackpad and the keyboard. At that point I realized, that the battery in my laptop has expanded and is now bloated which is highly dangerous because it could combust. I also cannot access the battery myself due to one of the screw in the casing on the bottom of my laptop being stripped. In the fear of causing a fire, I’ve had to restrict using my laptop for long period of time as well as avoid using software or programs that overheat my laptop. This includes things such as using Zoom, Premiere, or any really heavy running programs. This has affected many of my class attendance and well as my assignments. Luckily, my professors were very understanding and gave me extensions for some of my projects that were due during the incident. I am currently looking for either a way to repair it or getting a new computer and hopefully I can get it done soon.

I got my 2nd dose of the Pfizer vaccine on Wednesday. While a fantastic thing, I did end up experiencing symptoms from it. I ended up with a headache of some sort where I was feeling random stinging pains in the back of my head which is quite inconvenient while working. I also ended up waking up at 4am, Thursday morning with a fever of 102.5F and had to take a Tylenol and go back to sleep, which was not fun but luckily it was for the most part gone by the time I woke up around 1:30pm. As of right now, 1:23am on a Friday, I feel okay for the most part but I still have that slight sting of random pain in the back of my head.

I really hope I can get everything resolved soon so I can get back on track.

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Week 9: Spring Break Minus the Break

It’s not really a break if you got 4 big assignments to do along with some muscle pain. The only break part was that I let myself sleep in and play some video games lol. For a “spring” break, it’s been pretty cold. Anyways, here’s the week 9 update! (short post this time!)

Animation

Most of what I worked on this week was rough animation. As of right now sq2 is completed with rough animations and sq3 is almost done. Sq2 was quite tricky since I haven’t animated 2 characters interacting each other physically. Getting the movement and timing right was also a little tricky. I think the shots that are done right now, are not bad overall. Timing still could use a little bit more work though. Hopefully I can get all of Sq4 rough animated by next Wednesday, Sq5 by next Friday, and Sq 6 by the first week of April. Here’s my progress cut into the animatic:

Araw at Gabi: Week 9 Progress

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Week 8: Roughs Are Called Roughs Because Otherwise We’d Call Them Smooths

This week was an interesting week, with all the thunderstorms, floods, and power outages. Luckily, I wasn’t working on my film when the power shut down. (Sadly, I was working on a background for another film, and the power outage caused a corruption on that photoshop file and it wouldn’t allow me to open it anymore. That was quite upsetting.) Anyways onto the week 8 update!

Final Animatic

I finalized the animatic to a point where I think I’m really happy with it. I exported it all into ToonBoom Harmony. Some changes I made were things like the shot of Apolaki in sq2s2, as well as some placement adjustments to the characters throughout sq6. I just really hope I don’t end up changing anything again. :’) 

Rough Animations

I only got around to completing rough animations for sq1s1-2. I had trouble deciding on the frame rate I wanted to animate on, but I ended up animating on 3s. I think it turned out okay. There’s probably a bit of choppiness with the movement and lip sync that I’d have to fix but overall I think it’s not too noticeable. I’m very glad I did a lot of the planning and key framing in the animatic, since it helps speed up the process of rough animating. Hopefully, I can get a lot more shots done over the break, but sadly the reality is that I also have a lot of other big class projects due after we return from the break. Oh boy... :’) 

Progress

Here’s the updated animatic, comprised of both the final animatic with sound and the rough animations for sq1s1-2. (Purple = backgrounds, Orange = Apolaki, Cyan = Mayari)

Araw at Gabi: Week 8 Progress

Seq/Shot Breakdown

While working on the first 2 shots, I realized that some of the shots I had planned are probably a lot easier than what I originally put them down as in the seq/shot breakdown. I fixed the spreadsheet accordingly as well as added in the new shots into the spreadsheet.

Music

I talked with my composer this week to go over my ideas and concepts for the music (which I talked more in depth about in week 6). He thought it was a super cool concept and was totally on board. He said it would take him about maybe 2 weeks to create the music for the type of length my film was. He also let me know that he’ll try to find an ethnic sound pack with Filipino instruments before I even mentioned that’s what I wanted, which was super cool, because it means he understands the concept of my film and what I’m trying to do with it. As someone who struggles with words and explaining a lot, it’s always great to find people who understand you and your vision easily! I have a meeting with him on Saturday, March 20, to discuss specifics of the film as well as notes I have for the music. I’ll talk about how it went in the blog post for that week!

Closing Notes

Anyways, it’s 3:16am right now and I need to get some rest because Fridays are really long and busy days for me. Also, I have a midterm exam for my Screening Asian Americans class oof... Wish me luck! Good night! :3

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Week 7: Animatics, Animations, After Effects, & Vaccines (Wait That Doesn’t Start With an A...)

Hello! It is 4am once again and it’s time for the weekly blog update. In unrelated good news this week, I got the 1st shot of the COVID-19 vaccine on Wednesday and I’m scheduled to get the 2nd shot in a couple weeks, which is awesome! I was actually very anxious about it because I was afraid that the vaccine symptoms were gonna affect my progress on my film but so far so good! :D Anyways, onto the actual weekly progress! (I’ll keep it shorter this time.)

Animatic

Mayari’s voice lines finally came in so I was able to add it to the animatic! Woo! I also added more reaction shots of the characters. I realized after I finished it that I forgot to add another over the shoulder shot in sq2s1 so that we can see Apolaki when he talks, so I’ll be adding that in during week 8. I also made changed to the ending scene so that Mayari’s emotions aren’t changing as drastically as before. To summarize, I added some extra shots, fixed some timing issues, tweaked the ending scene, and added voice lines. (Disclaimer: The audio hasn’t been balanced or edited besides clipping it. Disregard caption errors around the 1 minute mark.)

Araw at Gabi: Revised Animatic

Animation & After Effects

I’ve been trying to decide how I wanted to go about doing effects for my film. Especially since, in the original folklore, it is said that the light we see on Earth comes from the eyes of Apolaki and Mayari. I knew that I wanted to have some sort of glow effect on their eyes, as well as their bodies as they’re flying through space. I tried out Adobe After Effects to add the glow effect by using it on a 1 second piece of test animation I did. I made a rough test animation from one of the shots in my animatic and imported the image sequences into After Effects. Here’s me working on it:

I think the glow looks nice in the test animation, but I will continue to tweak it as I go. I added the glow effects to Mayari as well as the stars. Mayari’s glow has a blue tint to it while the stars just have a white glow. Here’s also the before and after clips of the rough test animation:

Test Animation: Without Glow / With Glow

That’s all I did this week, I believe... If I forgot something I’ll either edit this post or make a part 2 lol :D

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Week 6: I Took It Easy This Week Because I Was Very Stressed

As the heading entails, I tried to take it a little easier this week with my workload because I ended up burnt out by the end of last week because I got overwhelmed by school and work assignments and lack of sleep. There was a lot of major projects due last week unfortunately. I still got a lot done though, just not as much as the previous weeks. Anyways, onto this week’s progress check up! (This time with less words and more pictures! Still a long post though, sorry!)

Visual Development

After reviewing my character turn arounds again, I realized a problem with Apolaki’s color design/palette. His skin was too close in value to part of his hair that it’s a little hard to see the separation between the two parts. This is made more visible when in greyscale. I ended up changing the value of the darkest part of his hair so that it no longer blends in with his skin. (V1 is the original, V2 is the new one.)

Script

Once again, we are back with another update on my script. We are now on version 3.3 woo! With this version, I did mostly edits around Apolaki’s dialogue and character. I tried to make him less mean and more of this smug prankster who really cares about his sister. Some examples being that I removed the line where he’s gloating and laughing that he won after Mayari gets struck in the eye. Most of the major dialogue changes were made in the Tagalog version of the script, in order to make it more modern. (Major thanks to Apolaki and Mayari’s voice actors for the help!) 

Araw at Gabi: English Script v3.3 / Tagalog Script V3.3

Recordings & Voice Actors

On Wednesday I got to record the dialogue for Apolaki and Mayari. I struggled a lot with my words when I was trying to explain and convey what I was looking for with each line, but I think I did okay. (Big thanks to Molly for helping to record and direct as we were working with Mayari’s voice actor!) Overall, I think the recording sessions went really well and I had a lot of fun. Hopefully, I don’t need to call them back to do more recordings. I have Apolaki’s lines and have ben reviewing the recordings. I’m currently waiting for Mayari’s lines to be sent over to me, so I should have them by Sunday at the latest. In other news, I got to see and experience the new ACM Media Center at Sinclair. We got to use this really nice sound proofed room. It was really cool! Here’s a picture my friend took of me as we were recording his lines for Apolaki. lol

Sequence/Shot Breakdown & Production Schedule Overview

I finally got to a place where I wasn’t so overwhelmed by the spreadsheet, and since I’m in the more finalized stage of the animatic, it was a lot easier to fill out. I’ll probably still be making changes to it as production progresses but I’m glad I’m at a point where I’m more gaining more confidence to plan out the rest of my production schedule. (I’m sorry if the images are hard to see. There’s a lot of shots because of the numerous camera changes due to the action scenes and reaction shots.)

Here’s a link for a better look at the spreadsheet: Production Schedule

Animatic

I almost forgot to put that I edited the animatic! It’s still under the process of editing but we’re so close to finalizing! Just waiting on Mayari’s voice lines, and the addition of just 1 or 2 more reaction shots. What I have of the edits as of right now are the addition of sequence and shot numbers, Apolaki’s recorded lines added in, fixed timing of some shots, and changes to Apolaki’s mad expressions to smug to match the new lines and delivery of the voice actor. (Sorry if the English captions are too fast, the Tagalog lines are generally shorter.)

Araw at Gabi: Animatic 3rd Pass w/ Apolaki

Music

I have a composer on hand for the film, but as of right now I’ve mostly been doing a lot of research as to what I want for my film. I’m still on the fence about mainly using traditional Philippine instruments or not. (If I don’t go with this idea, I will opt out for more modern concert instruments instead.) Traditional instruments can be hard since a lot of music and sounds commonly associated with the Philippines are due to the colonization by the Spaniards or the Americans. Another issue that comes into play is that I want to do a thing that the show, Steven Universe, does with its music, where each character is represented by an instrument.

Examples: Steven Universe Music Analysis / Sardonyx’s Theme (Pearl + Garnet) / Sugilite’s Theme (Garnet + Amethyst)

In Steven Universe, Pearl is represented with a piano while Garnet is represented with a synth bass. In Sardonyx’s theme (Sardonyx is a fusion between Garnet and Pearl), you can hear that the music is a mainly a duet between piano and synth bass, accompanied but percussion. Same can be heard in Sugilite’s theme, where this time it’s Amethyst (drums) and Garnet (synth bass). 

For my film, my idea is that Mayari would be represented by a bamboo flute due to her soft-spoken nature. (Bamboo instruments known to be more traditional instruments in the Philippines.) I’m still deciding on Apolaki’s representative instrument but for as of right now, I have him as the kulintang, which are like these horizontal gongs, laid out like a line of drums. I think this instruments matches his more brash personality.

Examples: Bamboo Flute / Kulintang / Modern Flute + Kulintang

Other research I did: Inspirations

Closing Notes

By the end of the week, I realized I spent a lot of time on Apolaki’s character. I know I said I took it easy this week, and this post kind of contradicts that from the looks of it, but I swear a lot of these things we’re quick and not physically/mentally draining, so I still stand by my original statement lol. I also got a lot more sleep this week! Woo! I am very thankful to everyone who has helped me or expressed excitement/interest towards my film! I hope when the film is completed, that you all enjoy it and it’s thanks to all of you that I am able to continue working on my film!

Anyways, time to sleep, good night! :]

[acm320jewelracasablog]

Week 5: Good Morning, I Haven’t Slept Yet and It’s 8:44am on a Friday :D

Hi Brittany (and whoever else reads my blogs)! This was very tiring and I am very much lacking a lot a sleep since this week was the week where everything decided to be due. I will sleep after I finish this blog post lol (I’m sorry if there’s a lot of typos or bad grammar in this post, I am very tired)

Casting Call & Auditions

This past weekend I held auditions for my two main characters, Apolaki & Mayari. Everyone was really nice and very talented. I haven’t had time to review the recordings just yet but I think I know who we will be casted already. Some of the auditioners also gave me feedback on some of my dialogue which is AMAZING especially since English is my first language and I’m still very new to learning Tagalog (well not new, new since I took 2 years of Filipino language in college lol). Hopefully I can review the recordings soon but yeah, I think auditions went well and I experienced new things which is always great (except if its a bad lol). 

Production Schedule

I will keep this short. I literally just finished redoing my entire animatic so I have not touched the production schedule at all. (Sorry Brittany! I’ll work on it when I can!) 

Script

After receiving some more feedback on my script after the auditions, I went back and revised it. A lot of the edits were either to take out as much as I can in order to shorten my script or it was dialogue changes to hopefully match more modern Tagalog, since my 2nd pass of my script had more old school or deeper Tagalog. My dad helped with the 2nd pass. My mom helped me translate for my 3rd pass of the script. I do miss my original opening scene but that’d just mean a lot more work so goodbye opening scene, you will be missed dearly. Uh.......I’m tired and I forgot if I had anything else to say about my script so here’s the 3rd pass of it

Araw at Gabi: English Script / Tagalog Script

Visual Development

Last week I showed the rough sketches of the turnarounds for Mayari & Apolaki. This week I was able to finish them, which is nice. I really do think I like this updated design a lot better. Sadly, I didn’t get around to working on environments but oh well, sacrifices must be made lol I mainly tried to simplify the shape design as much as I could. As for color, I tried my best to keep to keep the texture and painterly style since I really liked that about the original designs. Anyways, here’s the finished character turnarounds. 

Animatic

My script isn’t the only thing that went through many changes. I almost entirely redid my animatic form the bottom up. If you compare my 1st pass to my new 2nd pass of the animatic, it’s completely different, yet the same story. I made sure to look through all the notes I took from when I was getting feedback from as many people as I could. I think this pass is definitely a lot better especially the fight scene (thanks for the help Jared!). I think my film is now a lot more visually interesting and I think we get a lot more of the character’s personalities and relationship with each other. With this new pass, I decided to really focus more on the relationship between these two siblings, and not just focus on the overall mythology they derived from. This pass could still use a lot of tweaking especially since I did this all last night (sorry, again) so it’s not quite perfect, just yet.

I know this week we were supposed to deliver an animatic with sound, but I had to do sound at 7am this morning. People are sleeping and recording at 7am is not fun. (Not judging anyone who does find that fun) Anyways, I just recorded the google translate lady saying the lines. Yes, I understand that both characters having the same voice is confusing. Luckily, my subtitles mention who is talking, and you can tell visually anyways lol. The audio is in Tagalog and the subtitles are in English. I was too tired to look for sound effects (sorry again for the 4th time).

Araw at Gabi: Animatic 2nd Pass

It is now 9:26am as I’m typing this. After this is posted I will shut down my laptop and sleep until it’s class time. Goodbye! :]

[acm320jewelracasablog]

Week 4: Stress (A 5 Part Story)

Oh boy, this week had a lot going on. There was a lot of stress, lot of anxiety, and a lot of back and forth. I think it was worth it because the end result from this week is something I’m quiet proud of. Everything is coming along really well I think. Unless I missed something... lol :P 

*Note: This post will be LONG.

Part 1: Seq/Shot Breakdown + Asset List

One of our assignments this week was to create a production schedule. For the most part, I left the production schedule the way it was. I didn’t finish much of it since I was in the process revising my animatic so my production schedule isn’t super complete at the moment. I think the only part of it I did finish was the project schedule overview. (Sorry!) Honestly, the production schedule layout was pretty overwhelming and I had trouble trying to think about it while working on it.

Part 2: VisDev

Our other assignment was to do a 2nd pass of any visual development work. Now this, this I did do. This week I focused more on the character designs. I redesigned the characters to have more dimension and personality to them. I think this new redesign will make their actions a lot more readable on screen. For one, I gave them actual arms and legs! I also did a rough sketch of a  turnaround for both Apolaki and Mayari. (I had trouble with Apolaki’s wild sun shaped hair lol)

Part 3: Animatic Feedback

Yes, I realized that this is a long post and that I had a lot done but just hang in there, we’re halfway through. Outside of class, I sent my animatic to some of my friends, as well as some of my ACM alumni friends. I got A LOT of really good feedback on what I could change to make it better. It made me realize that my story needs more time exploring the fight scene as well as the ending. These scenes are the most important part of my film (and now the only part of my film, which will I’ll explain in the next part). I’d like to say that I now have an even STRONGER understanding of what I want in my film, or so I hope lol.

Part 4: Screenplay/Script

Upon the feedback I received on my animatic, as well as my screenplay, I was back to editing. I rewrote everything into Writer’s Duet. Let me try to summarize all the changes I made in version 2. I completely scrapped the opening scene, and now it opens to Apolaki and Mayari bursting through the door and Apolaki claiming the Earth for himself. (Thanks for the idea, Alex!) I think this way it’s more visually interesting immediately, as well as, we get to see their personalities more. I rewrote the fight scene, so that it’s hopefully more clear, and hopefully more visually interesting. A lot of changes made to the fight scene was thanks to the amazing feedback from the 1st pass of my animatic. (Thanks Jared!) We also get to see Mayari’s broken eye at this point as well, instead of at the end. I also cut out the end scene since I felt it was unnecessary. It dragged the film on little too long after the resolution of Apolaki and Mayari, making amends. The film now ends on the hug and I think that’s a lot stronger.

On another note, I ended up translating the dialogue into Tagalog because I was starting my casting call soon. (See part 5) My Tagalog is very poor so my dad helped me translate the English Dialogue into Tagalog.

Links: Script (v2.1) / Script (v2.1_TagalogDialogue)

Part 5: Casting Call

This right here is what caused so me so much anxiety this week. My screenplay has dialogue, which means I need voices. Not only that, I chose to have my dialogue in Tagalog and since my Tagalog is very poor, I cannot voice any lines myself. So as a result I put out a casting call. To my surprise, I got more emails asking to audition, more than I thought. My cousin, who is an instructor at SLSU in the Philippines, saw my casting call on my Facebook and advertised it to her students. In the span of less than 24 hours, I had 5 people who wanted to audition, along with 3 more people later in the week. As of right now I have people auditioning tonight (Friday, Feb. 12) till Sunday (Feb. 14). Now you see, I have a lot of anxiety and I can be very shy when it comes to new people, and a lot of things in general. The thought of running an audition and directing people, when this is all very new to me, has caused me a lot of anxiety and lack of sleep. BUT! I CAN DO THIS! I BELIEVE! At least, I hope I can lol. (nervous laughter) Anyways, here’s the casting call flyer:

Congratulations! You made it to the end! (Unless you just scrolled past everything, but that’s fine too lol) Wish me luck everyone! (and sleep, wish for some sleep for me as well lol)

Bye bye! :3

[acm320jewelracasablog]

Week 3: Animatics Takes Forever and I’m Tired

This week we did our 1st pass of our animatics and oooooooooh boooooy did it take me forever. I struggled the most with the fight scene and the ending because 1) I am tired and 2) I’m not totally experienced with action shots. Soooo that was an experience. The 1st pass of the animatic isn’t completely timed right since it’s still a little fast at some points, but that’s okay because I’ll fix it during the 2nd pass. This 1st pass is just boarded straight, with disregard to the feedback of the script, which I will implement in the 2nd pass of the animatic. I’m tired and not sure what else to say. I’ll make a follow up post if I remember something later. Anyways, here’s the first pass of my animatic. (File too big, so here’s a link) I’m going to go sleep now, good morning. :’]

Araw at Gabi: Animatic (1st Pass)

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Week 2: Part 2 (Electric Boogaloo)

I also did some storybeats and visual development rough first passes for Araw at Gabi. It’s mostly just quick sketches of different parts of the story. So this is just a week 2 follow up post because I forgot to post the these. 

[acm320jewelracasablog]

Week 2: Scripts Are a Reminder That I Struggle With My Words

Post Pitch Struggles

After pitching last week, I struggled a lot to determine which short film idea I wanted to work on for the rest of this semester. While I spent a lot of time and effort last semester working on Batik-batik, I’m still struggling with that story a lot and I have lost a lot of passion I had for it at the moment. On the other hand, Araw at Gabi, is a story I’m more passionate about since it’s based on one of the first stories that got me into Filipino folklore and I had a better vision for it. Problem is, I don’t have as much stuff done production wise in comparison to my first film idea. This week was mostly spent making a choice between preparedness and passion. After discussing the issue with my fellow ACM friends and classmates outside of class, at this point, I am leaning more towards my second film idea. (Might use my first idea either for ACM420 or a capstone class eventually).

Scripts, Animatics, & Research (but mostly scripts)

In order to help me make a decision, I started working on the scripts for both films. I thought maybe writing the scripts could help me maybe clear up some of the holes in the story of my first film idea. Writing the script for this film wasn’t too hard in comparison to the other film (which I will talk about later). Having the animatic done already before the script made it a lot easier for me to describe the scenes a lot better. Film 1 Script: *Batik-batik

When it came to the second film, creating the script came with challenges. While I did have a clearer vision for this film, putting it into words wasn’t the easiest. This is mostly because I tend to struggle to put things into words and sentences that are coherent or make sense to people that aren’t me. I did my best to describe the scenes the best as I could. The hardest part was describing the fight scene between Mayari and Apolaki. How does one create a fight scene between gods who are also children but also are fighting as blobs of light in space by just using words? I can see how it would go down in my head but how do I transform visual thoughts into words? In order to ease the the struggle I ended up working on an animatic for the opening (animatic will be in next week’s post). I also researched the visual elements that inspired the style of fight scene I imagined for this film aka fight scenes from the original *PowerPuff Girls. After watching the shot where Blossom and Princess Morebucks are reduced to abstract rapidly moving lights, it became a lot easier for me to put my fight scene into words. Film 2 Script: *Araw at Gabi

Another massive dilemma for these scripts was deciding whether the dialogue should be in English or Tagalog. As of right now, I have the script in English because (a) my first language is English and I’ve only taken 2 years of Filipino language classes and (b) pretty sure most of our class will not understand the script otherwise. 

Despite the struggles, I look forward to working on the animatic some more this upcoming week. Woo!

*The bolded words are links.