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Creating a Believable Protaganist  

For my film, a lot of the main story will depend on the audience's connection to the protagonist, Corra. I thought it useful to look at other similarly toned films with how they generate sympathy for characters that may not be the most morally correct. 

One that immediately came to mind was Nimona, perhaps because alike Corra she is a young shapeshifter seemingly living a lonely life. On rewatch, I noticed that for so much of the movie we aren’t told anything about why Nimona is the way she is. We simply accept her because of her eagerness to help our protagonist and the quirky charms to her personality. It’s not until the end of the film that we really see the deep root of why Nimona is the way she is. After that flashback, she become sless of an outlandish rebel and more of a sympathetic victim who we want to see be coaxed out of their trauma. 

Perhaps giving Corra a clear motivation and perhaps hint of some past tragedy may help to keep the audience rooting for her as steals and evades capture. 

I also thought of the short ‘Annie’ made the League of Legends team to promote the hero in their game. Annie unquestionably does some bad things in this movie from the rumors of her involvement in destroying her previous home to her lashing out her stepsister through the short. At first, I was struggling with what endeared me to Annie so much and why even after the entire house is burnt down, we still feel sorry for her. I think, eventually, I’ve put it down to the fact that she is just a child. She has big powerful emotions she doesn't know how to express and a power she doesn't even know how to control. At no point does she ever have a genuine urge to harm anyone else unless they pose a direct threat to her. 

I'd like to give Corra this inate innocence that comes with being young, perhaps showing that longing to be normal despite her power.

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Spiritfarer

Spiritfarer is also an indie game that makes great use of hand drawn animation. Having all that personality bundled into the animation gives all lot of life and light into a game that can often touch on rather grim themes. 

 Simon Nakauchi Pelletier and Alexandre Boyer who’d animated on the project did an interview with Toon Boom Harmony about their work on the game. It here I got a glimpse of the sort of scale these projects work at. 

Stella, the protagonist of SpiritFarer, can perform 100 actions in the game. This isn’t even considering the reduced animation sets for all the other characters. Now, I am never even going to get close to matching that level of quantity with the time I’m given so I’m forced to ask myself how much would be feasible. Right now, I’m thinking maybe 20 in-depth actions or maybe more if decide to strip back the complexity. 

I loved the little test that the animators included along with this interview of Stella leaping from the platform with her hat. Her design looks relatively ordinary until wind catches her hat and all of a sudden you get the feeling of wonder and magic present within the game’s world. 

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Gris

I also opted to explore the work that went behind Gris, an indie game with one of the most beautiful art styles I’ve seen. 

It all looks very painterly, with color playing a large part in the gameplay as you venture to return color to a grey world. As I’d initially assumed, this was all done hand drawn I was right as this level of fluidity goes beyond what a rigged sprite could achieve. 

I love seeing the frames for the dress animation laid out like this, seeing how they breathed so much life into the simple fabric. I’d definitely want to gear a character animation around being able to feel out movement like this. 

Whilst watching a video delving into the development of Gris, I found the developers discussing how they’d originally wanted to make it even more traditional by animating it all on paper before quickly deciding it was too much work. I thoroughly agree and would most likely draw all my frames digitally too if I were to try a process like this. 

I feel an approach like this would be very well suited to my skillset as, as discussed in that same video, most of the team they had working on this project had never even worked in a video game setting before. As much as it was a game, it was a living piece of art and I find that concept so fun and intriguing. 

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Broken Age

I'd pondered the idea of creating a exploration of 2D video game sprites after playign a lot of indie titles of varying styles, all with varyign techniques behind the way they animate their protaganists and NPCs.

Broken Age is a game I really admire for its unique art style. I’d always thought it was made in entirely 2D but later found out it was made in blender to give it that dimensional feel. I found this small lecture given by one of the games developers as to their design and animation process and was heavily inspired by what I found there. 

They went for a 2.5D feel, which has a different meaning than nowadays. It was a 2D image with different texture planes that could be turned on and off to create depth and create the illusion that the character was turning. They describe it as a “Flipbook which I think feels accurate. They’d start with an exploded view and then would just piece together all the segments in Maya, and from that point it was very similar to how normal rigged 2D cutout animation would go. 

I’d been very averse to Maya in the past due to my dislike of working with 3D models but watching the development behind this has honestly made me a lot more open to doing an experiment like this. Even without pursuing the video game idea I have, I may choose to explore this technique in a different way. 

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Dot - Final Version

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Dot - Sketch Version

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Dot - Character Animation Test

After watching this video, I wanted to try implement some of the techniques they demonstrated to see if it would help to speed my process up as speed was something I’d struggled with in the past. 

One of the main premises was for you to use a stick figure to help you plan movement which is the main thing I focused on, as well as taking the advice of making the character have simpler rounded limbs to help them be a bit easier to animate. I designed a little robot called Dot, meant to be as simple as possible. 

After figuring out a simple stick figure version of him, I set to planning the animation I’d make. He reminded me of crash test dummies a little, so I decided to have him test out inventions. In the end, I decided to give him a jetpack to test first. 

The process was indeed simpler, and it help keep his legs and arms much more consistent in length but I can't help but wonder how wide the implementation of this method could be. It has no consideration of volume and I think it may give you a bad habit of not considering the size of the rest of the body. Maybe, it could work with some more enhancements. Either way, for this experiment, it worked fine and I’m quite pleased with outcome.

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Portfolio Video #2

This video went quite in depth of what elements of animation you should try to cover within your reel that studios may be looking for. For instance, TV animation will most likely need you to cover walk/run cycles so it would be wise to show these in a portfolio to show you are capable of doing them. 

They’ll be mainly looking for an understanding of animation and its principles, especially when you don't have a proven catalogue of work to turn to so showing and understanding of weight and form can turn things into your favor. I don’t have any pre-existing pieces specifically demonstrating these so I shall most likely venture to do this across the module. 

He also encouraged using the space outside your showreel to cover any strengths or fundamentals you didn’t manage to demonstrate within it so I may have to consider making some supplementary materials after its completion to help my portfolio be as well rounded as possible, 

Still, he again emphasized the importance of quality over quantity and how employers won't have long to view your work. Having a longer showreel might just harm my chances of being considered. I’ll have to carefully think about how long I’m hoping to have my showreel. I’ll keep his suggestion of 1-2 minutes in mind. 

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Portfolio Study #3 Rachel Kim

I first discovered Rachel Kim through her student film ‘Diamond Jack’ but she has since broken into the industry working in some story artist and background painting positions. 

I couldn’t find a portfolio as such, but I did find her showreel from 2018 which is how I'm most likely going to display the group of clips I produce. 

I love the snappiness and energy in all of her movements and find it all so captivating to watch. I really want to explore the way she does character interactions from the Burger Boss clips seen here as I have practiced animating single characters, but I think when they are able to touch and work around one another the work feels much more grounded. 

She weaves in a bunch of finished and unfinished work which is now a repeated theme I’m seeing and it’s quite reassuring to know it’s acceptable. 

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Portfolio Video #1

I watched this short video from a story artist working at Dreamworks as a story artist and some of the common mistakes he sees in animators' portfolios. 

 Alot of his advice was all about confidence. A studio doesn’t want to hire someone with no confidence within their work and doesn’t have a clear path in what they want to do. He specifically highlighted that if something doesn’t have relevance to the position, no matter how much you love it, it should probably be cut because an employer most likely won’t have any interest in it.  

I think his advice to stop waiting for perfection is something I’m going to have to remember through this module, so I don’t spend too much time trying to produce a perfect piece when leaving it rough would be perfectly acceptable. 

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Portfolio Study #2 Giovanna Ferrari

Giovanni Ferrari is an animator who has run in similar circles to the previously mentioned Diane Coat having worked on similar Tom Moore projects.  

As far as I can tell, they have all their different fields all together on the same portfolio but do have tabs separating them. Still, their animations are very well presented with embedded videos that all have clear titles and a succinct description of what they had done there. 

I really love the work she’d done for a supposed cancelled Winnie the Pooh Pilot of Pooh and Piglet simply falling together. The characters never feel too zany or stationary and simply move just the perfect amount they need to keep your eyes pleased. When Pooh spins over, she demonstrates such a profound understanding of his volume that I’d really like to study further and find out how I can replicate it. 

I also admire some the physics she demonstrated in the Breadwinner clip in the way the fabric and hair interact with the wind and effortlessly shows the environment without the need for any VFX or particle work. She also shows a lot of restraint keep some scenes in this reel very still when the mood needs to be tense. 

Looking at her collection reminded me that not every piece I put in a showreel doesn't have to be fully polished and cleaned up, especially if I'm not looking to apply for a specific cleanup position. 

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Portfolio Study #1 Diane Coat

One of the main things I want to achieve at the end of this year is a portfolio of work I can use to start looking for employment. One of the ways I'm hoping to look into this is by looking at the portfolios of animators I admire and are already successful in the industry.

Diane Coat is a French animator who has worked on many of the revolutionary 2D features of recent years such as Wolf Walkers, My Father’s Dragon and the Breadwinner. 

As I’ve seen previously advised, she split her portfolio up into separate websites and sections for her animation work so that employers can see the specific area of work you are applying to do. 

Her Portfolio consists of polished finished pieces and some of her rough work from different stages of the pipeline. There’s a big focus on some expansive wide angles and her ability to move the characters through the scene’s depth. She really makes every environment and character feel entirely 3-Dimensional. 

I think my favorite piece of hers would have to be her Wolf Walkers work. Sometimes the screen can be so busy with characters doing multiple things at once, but Coat manages to keep everything so readable that you can follow every little movement. 

I also love her little test of a shapeshifting owl who turns into a small child. All the little feathers manage to fall so pleasingly and there is such a great character acting in the way child's sheepishly acts and runs away. I’m going to aim for little character pieces like this to showcase and practice putting personality and creative actions into my characters. 

I’d also like to maybe attempt something like her ‘autumn reunion’ piece to help practice character consistency because i think being able to accurately scale a character like that is a vitally important skill.  

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Beginning of Year 3 Summer Brief

Here I'll be uploading all the development going into my major project proposal.

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When I was introduced to Thought of You, a short animated piece by Ryan Woodward , I was immediately captivated by not only the amazing gestures behind his movements but the style, and utilisation of 2D FX to enhance it form a simple live-action study. I love how it isnt so strict with the how the figure allowing for roughs sketches and construction lines to seep through without once distracting from the visuals. In fact, it think the instability very much adds to the story it’s trying to tell.

As my final product, I’ve decided to settle on making a short animated scene inspired by this, incorporating that seamless realistic movements using 2D effects to push it out of realism and into something more fantastical.

As told in his making of video Woodward decided that to get the result he desired he’d have to get real footage of a contemporary dance to work from. So he had a piece choreographed that perfectly told his story in a way that could be perfectly elevated by the visuals he’d add. With my budget and time frame, this is not something I’d be able to source myself however something I want to really take from this is using my visuals purposely. Anything I add should be used to convey the emotions of my subject.

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For this focus-based research I wanted to delve into the study of live-action footage to enhance my animated work. As animation is the imitation of the movements we see every day, all artists pull from their real-world observations, even if it is just from memory. I was initially inspired by Toniko Pantoja when he outlined in a YouTube video, an exercise he liked to do to improve his speed and drawing. This involved taking a scene from a film or show, importantly a live-action piece and not animated, and drawing it almost frame by frame.

The idea behind this was to help break down movements and to elevate his gesture and motion skills. It required the artist to carefully observe the mechanics behind certain actions and how they affected the body as a whole. I’d already enjoyed making my own live-action references in the past so I thought if I pushed the movements I recorded I could achieve some very expressive works.

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Modern Trends in Character Animation

The "Spiderverse" Style

Incorporating 2D elements in 3D animation is not a new concept in the industry but it’s not until the resurgence of Into the Spiderverse that it has become so much of a main theme in modern blockbusters. Just as Spidervere’s own sequel has released so have many others clearly boasting their style influences. 

The first I can remember clearly is Puss in Boots: The Last Wish which took a harsh departure from the style of its predecessor and instead adopted a much more stylised approached. Instead of trying to capture a semi-realism, it opts for a style that feels very hand-painted in both the characters and backgrounds. I think this works extremely well for the story it’s trying to tell. Whereas spidervese opted to mimic comic books, this feels much more like an illustration from a fairytale. I also appreciated it bringing back the skipping frames from spiderverse, though this film only uses it within it’s action scenes.

Then, most recently, we have Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem, which instead mimics claymation with uneven rough charcter shapes. Still, though theres the painted textures again and the same lines spiderverse used to distinguish shapes like the chin, nose of necks.

Even Disney is dipping its toes into this space with its upcoming film Wish. However, I think here we’re starting to see the cracks in this technique. I think the less detailed style and thicker out lines on the 3D models oddly make it more reminiscent of the Disney JR shows they used to release like Sofia the First and overally just make it feel a bit cheaper than the other products. I am very grateful though to see the step of, from what i can tell, is a completely 2d animated character in the wishing star.

I don’t have much interest in 3D overall but I am very eager to see if this marks more of a space for 2D specialists to find a place in a 3d pipeline.

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Storyboard Staples

Acting

As my final bit of experimentation on Kenji Ono’s advice, I delved into acting. I wanted to amke a scene where you can understand the dynamic between two characters and their personalities in a short clip with no dialouge. I tried thinking about how I used to sit as a kid which was often cross legged and fidgety.

I purposely made the old woman very stationary, to make her feel colder, only moving to give a stern look to the child. In contrast I wanted to make the child quite squirmy with a slight unsureness but an admiration for the woman.

So I had them sat together, with the child cross legged, and rocking before the woman corrects her. The child then scrambles to imitate the lady, looking to her guidance. With a proud look, herself before rocking again.

I think I really benefited from thinking of how a character’s personality may affect there movements and I think it will really improve my approach to boarding in the future and help make some of the character movement much more believable and informative.