New Idea for Major Project

When travelling to Brighton the other day, I saw something that inspired me to take a whole different approach to my story for my Major Project. I was originally set on it being a story about a group of animals, but now I feel as if I should make a story in favour of helping a cause.

I was waiting at the coach station when a homeless man turned up and began raiding the bin behind me. It was a rainy day and he was poorly dressed, and with him was a small dog that looked like a staffy. He also had a little trolley with him, presumably full of his bedding. He searched through the bin, pulled out some chips and ate them, sharing with his dog. What he did next was what made me think about writing about him

He found an umbrella in the bin and pulled it out, with a look of glee on his face. He put it up, didn't look in too bad shape, maybe one bent spoke. He then put it on the ground, held it with his foot and pulled the material off. I was imagining in my head what he could be doing, I settled with the idea that he was going to make some sort of tool out of it. He then bent down by his dog and wrapped the material around him, tying it to make a little coat. He got close to the dog and kissed it's nose, and it jumped up at him, wagging it's tail.  

I was so moved by what I saw, he could've easily used the umbrella for himself but he used it to make a coat for his companion. I checked in my bag for change but didn't have any, and I really wished that I did. I told my friend what had happened and as she works for a charity that supports the homeless (something I didn't know at the time!) and she told me about what lovely people they are and how we all need to support them. I feel compelled to write a story that follows a homeless man and his dog, and a good deed from a passer by that brightens up his day

BEGINNING the MAJOR PROJECT

With the Pre-Major project being complete, my mind can now turn towards the Major Project. For this project I aim to make a picture book that is more detailed than any I have made in the past. I will be putting my findings from my Investigative study to use and will be creating my characters using primary source material, drawing from live models or using photographs or photography. 

My Dissertation itself examines how animated characters are successfully created, and while I won't be making an animation, I will still be putting to use the techniques employed by the major animation companies (such as Pixar and Disney) when it comes to designing captivating characters and meaningful storylines.

As for my initial thoughts on a plot, I was thinking about making my story about a group of animals. The main character would be a young male Fox, with a cool name such as Slick or Spike. His elder brother would also feature, with a more mature sounding name - Vincent came to mind. The third character would be a hunting dog, such as a beagle or a bloodhound. The story would be based around the two fox brothers and how they have befriended the dog who was originally meant to be hunting them. This was inspired by a little piece of work I did in the Pre-Major Project where I illustrated a poem about a fox in gouache for a workshop.

Obviously nothing is set in stone, and I will use the Christmas Break to have a think about this further.

Rounding Up the Pre Major Project

With the Pre Major Project coming to a close, I feel sad to have to finish a project that I have enjoyed so much. I have focussed primarily on character and concept art design, even including the live brief that I picked up (which I cannot post details for).

For me, my Butterfly Dragon character was one that I was extremely fond of, but felt needed something to make it more exciting. The character in itself is fine, but the world in which i pictured it for my first story and animation needed work, the character had little to interact with. The addition of it's own special world and friends really bought the whole concept to life.

With this project I worked very close to home and did lots of things that I really enjoy. Character designing is something I'm passionate about and I put a lot of care and work into creating some exciting designs. I feel that my abilities with Adobe Photoshop developed substantially across the Pre Major Project and the Live Brief, and the scenes I created to portray my characters had a unique style that I'm very happy with, and I carried this 'block colour' style over into my animation. 

The animation itself pushed my ability to animate with the program. Attempting to make backgrounds and scenes that move was a time consuming task and at times had me wondering if I could even do it, and I'm happy it was successful. This is also the first time I have imported pre-made backgrounds and animated over them, and I feel that this is the right thing for me to do in the future as it looks a lot better than creating the background and the animation at the same time.

Overall, I'm very happy with this project and am very happy with what I have produced over the past few months.

Finishing Up Animation

Today my day was spent in the studio finalising my animation and bringing it all together. I polished off a part which I had already started and finished up the final two shots for the short clip.

The first clip I worked on was the shot from outside of the Volcano that I had started work on early last week. I added some little sparkles to the sea and some waves in the lower right hand corner. After I had added these minor details, I felt like this piece was complete.

The next part to work on was the overhead shot of the forest with the dragons flying.

I began by drawing a 6 frame flying cycle of the dragons, and then proceeded to move them slightly along as the animation progressed (They're only little, they don't get far!). I then added shadows, clouds and other dragons to bring it all together.

The final part of my animation is set at ground level, with the characters flying over the trees as other butterfly Dragons look on. I firstly animated the characters, using 5 frames and moving each forwards and upwards slightly as they progress. I then worked on moving the background downwards, finally adding a dragon in the foreground who pops up at the end.

As for the backing music, I did a bit of searching around. I didn't want this animation to be silent like the last and felt like it needed some upbeat music to really sell it. I began with the idea of using Gusty Garden Galaxy music from the game Super Mario Galaxy. I liked this music originally but on second thought felt that it was unsuitable as it is easy to recognise as being from a Mario game.

I also took a few suggestions from others, ranging from Comptine d'Un Autre Ete from Amelie to Window by The Album Leaf

In the end I settled on a song that I love, being Cucurucu by Nick Mulvey. My reason for this choice, is that as I was working on my animation the song was in my playlist, and I noticed by chance how perfectly it fit with my work.

For the animation however, I decided to use the Cucurucu Instrumental as I felt that the vocals over the top were not as suited to my animation as just the music on it's own.

As the final animation when completed is large in size, I cannot upload it. I have attached a youtube link to the final video.

Completed Animation

I am very pleased with my animation and hope that it shows of the world I have created in all of it's glory.

Last Minute Scenario and Formats for Printing

With the deadline fast approaching, I had finished all my planned illustrations with good time to spare. However I did have an idea earlier that I decided to recreate as my 7th and final scene for the hand in on Tuesday. 

This scenario was heavily inspired by the time of year and gave me the perfect opportunity to make another cameo from previous stories involving the Monarch Butterfly Dragon. This scene shows the dragons getting their presents - being a piece of fruit - on Christmas morning, as coloured fireflies decorate the trees around them.

I really enjoy the layout and colours of this scene and I'm glad I found time to include it.

I've also been getting my work ready to print tomorrow, and have been formatting the scenarios on A4 pages. I decided to use the same sizes for all of the scenarios to ensure continuity and harmony within the illustrations. I will then take the dual and single frame illustrations and trim them once printed.

Here are a few examples of how the illustrations will look when printed.

Animation Progress

As part of my final submission, I have begun progress on a little animation to accompany my still images, featuring the dragons flying around their home, showing off the world that I have designed.

I made a plan for this animation previously in my sketchbook, and it will feature several different shots of the dragons flying about, including the rough animation of the dragons flying that I made earlier. 

My initial realisation had the dragons flying, the trees rustling and the clouds billowing, but I had an issue with the lack of movement in the background. I rendered the animation but was unhappy with the result.

I then began to move the wall, by repeating the frame of the wall including a slight movement each time. This ended up consisting of many frames and took a while to do, I was slightly happier but felt that the movement was not enough.

I then enlisted the help of a friend who studies Graphic Design and is a pro when it comes to moving image and motion graphics. He helped me edit the video to make the wall phase into the distance. I had to erase the wall from my video and provide it in a separate file to allow him to edit the two together.

However, when we rendered the video, we noticed a thick red line outlining the dragons. 

Here is the final render for the video! I notice the outlines are a bit thick in places and blurry in others, but I am happy with it. I haven't got enough time to figure out how to fix these issues so I will just leave them be. My friend was also unwilling to spend any more time editing the animation due to time pressures for his own work, so it will have to stay as it is. The slight errors are minor but I am happy with the movement overall.

Final Character Scenarios

As I created my previous character 'group dynamic' scenarios, I kept having ideas for more that I could make! The ideas that followed my last scenario, being the 5 part drawing in the flower bed, were that I could make a few related to seasons. My first idea was something related to fire and snow, and then leaves and autumn. 

My ideas for the characters are that the Blue Morph is the loud and annoying one, the Pearly Eye is the creative and timid one, and the Monarch is the clumsy leader figure of the bunch.

I aimed to emphasise these traits with my newest drawings. I started by planning out how to do the autumn scene, drawing up ideas for the Pearly Eye Butterfly Dragon's leaf outfit (I already knew what the other two would be doing, the scenario lends itself to their natures). I then moved on to the winter scene, showing the leadership role of the Monarch Butterfly Dragon. I decided to have the other dragons copy his unique ability of breathing fire through his nose to demonstrate this.

The scene depicting the dragons playing in the autumn leaves.

The scenario showing the dragons getting warm in the snow.

More Character Scenarios

As part of my final submission I aim to draw a load of different character scenarios, ranging from single up to 5 frames.

I began with the first idea I had, which was to draw the scene with the chicks. As I planned in my sketchbook, I would scenarios showing the natures of the dragons, in scenes of them admiring a flower bed and sleeping at night.

I also decided as an added bonus, to draw my dragons over my Volcano Concept art, as I love it so much and think it looks great with this addition.

This scenario shows the dragons flying towards the island.

This scenario shows the different positions in which the dragons sleep.

This scenario has 5 frames and shows the dragons admiring flowers, and the mishaps that happen.

Cinematic Concept Art

The idea to create a 'look book' for my Butterfly Dragons came about after my last meeting with White Lantern, in which we were shown examples of concept art which had been used for films. These examples showcased how the artists present their work to clients and this inspired me with my work.

Another thing we discussed is the use of framing for concept art. Most of my concept art up to this point has been framed in a photo aspect ratio, as I like my art to look like a photograph. This is incorrect however for cinema concept art, which uses cinematic wide to make the art longer as if being viewed on the big screen. This makes it easier for directors to see the vision of the artist. 

I have framed my concept art in the way in which it would look if being presented to a client.

The Dragon's Hidden World - Concept Art

Alongside my work on the characters, I have been working on concept art for the world in which they live.

I wanted to tie this work in to my previous work on the Butterfly Dragon to ensure that my animation and story involving him still stay relevant. Because of this, the Butterfly Dragon does indeed still live in a large pear tree. 

I started out with the idea that this tree was enormous in size and was home to many butterfly dragons, including the Monarch Butterfly Dragon who lives on the lowest branch.

I wasn't incredibly inspired by this idea, however, and felt that for a species as magical as butterfly dragons, they needed an equally epic home, in order for it to be believable.

A while ago I was playing around with the idea of them living inside a volcano, and this has since become the basis for their 'hidden world'. The dragons live in a forest which has grown inside an extinct volcano. The Monarch Butterfly Dragon lives in the largest pear tree, and the other trees are home to many different varieties of butterfly dragon, two of which being the Blue Morph Butterfly Dragon and the Pearly Eye Butterfly Dragon, who are the other two main characters.

My short animation that I will include in this project will show off the dragons and their world, so I have been working on concept art that I can use as background material for the animation as well as for my character 'look book' that I aim to create.

The concept art has been simplified for the animation, as the characters will not contain a high level of detail due to time constraints. I will add details such as moving clouds, dragons and water when I come to animate.

These are the three backgrounds that I will animate over. This is something I haven't tried yet as I usually create the backgrounds in photoshop as I animate, so I hope the risk pays off.

This is the concept art for the Volcano Island which I will be including in my 'look book' for this project.

This is the concept art for the inside of the Volcano, showing the little dragons that live there.

Character Scenario Illustrations

Alongside work in my sketchbook, I have been creating my final illustrations which I will present alongside my 'look book' and animation. As discussed with Joel, I will be drawing my characters in scenarios that demonstrate their personalities. 

I saw Joel briefly after our original discussion and showed him my work in progress and he suggested framing my scenes to enhance the dramatic effect and ensure that the focus is where I want it to be, which resulted in my altering my previous scenario and forming 3 frames from the original 2.

Not much has changed apart from the first frame being split in two

One point raised by the tutors was that my characters look too similar. Having designed the two new dragons based on the original one, this was intentional, however I feel that the three are easy to tell apart. I took to Instagram with a poll to see if people thought the same.

In total my poll got 14 votes with 100% in favour of yes.

I do understand why the tutors suggested making them different sizes, however my dragons are variations of the same species, and therefore are similar in size and shape. 

The background for my poll was created from a sketchbook doodle of the 3 dragons interacting. There were two sketches in particular that I decided to scan and colour on Adobe Photoshop. As I have been working on my characters, I have been doodling them in my sketchbook from time to time, and occasionally will take some and make them digital.

I particularly liked the fire breathing sketch as it shows another little quirk of the Monarch Butterfly Dragon - that he breathes fire from his nose rather than his mouth.

The sketch of the dragons breathing fire inspired me to create a scenario showing this off. I came up with the idea in my sketchbook to show the clumsy side of the Monarch Butterfly Dragon, which then leads to the destructive and silly nature of the Blue Morph Butterfly Dragon.

I'm happy with this scenario and I feel that it will be one I print as one of my final pieces. I am especially pleased with the colours and how exciting and vibrant they are in each frame.

Character Personalities - Critique with Joel

Today I had a quick meeting with Joel to discuss my project so far. I showed him my project from the very start, beginning with my initial dragon sketches and the 'Observers Book of Butterflies' that I painted in, to my latest animation and digital paintings. 

He really enjoyed how I had worked into the little book, and enjoyed my development of the characters. He also really liked my little animation of the flying dragons, and said it's something I should definitely include. 

However, Joel made the suggestion that I shift the focus of my project slightly. I was intending on producing a concept book, showing my character designs and their world, alongside an animation of the dragons flying around the world. Joel however favoured the idea of focussing on the group dynamic with my characters. He suggested I create illustrations showing how they interact, how they respond to one another and the mischief they cause together.

I love this idea, and straight away created a two frame illustration showing my characters interacting and having fun together, and this is something I really enjoyed making.

Group Flying Animation

Today I returned to Photoshop to create a quick animation to test out flight with my characters. In my previous animated work, I didn't do much related to flying, so this involved a lot of planning to figure out the movement pattern of the wings.

I began by drawing a circle and mapping the wing movement using lines, adding the details after. When I was happy with my movement, I added the other dragons, and I am pleased with the outcome.

Chris Haughton's Children's Book Workshop

Today I had a workshop with Illustrator Chris Haughton in which he showed us examples of his work and asked us to create our own work using his simplified style and palette. 

He explained that he starts every children's book with lots and lots of simple messy sketches of his subject, so that when he comes to create his character he's very familiar with it. He then cans some of these in and begins to experiment with them on photoshop. 

With 'Shh we have a Plan', he forced himself to simplify his designs by then making them as paper cuts, which eventually formed the final designs once edited in photoshop.

He asked us to bring in a photo which had colours that we liked, as well as a story line and reference imagery. I bought in:

This is the photo I chose because I like the colours

I chose this as I felt like I could create a storyline inspired by it

These were my reference images

I created a short story about a fox trekking through a snowy forest until he finds a clearing and can see the stars. I did this illustration using gouache and a limited palette of colours. 

Working on Character Personalities

One of the things I was told to work on was the personalities of the characters I have created, and with the recent holiday season I decided to make some Halloween inspired art with my new characters.

Here is a drawing of the dragons with their pumpkins.

Here is a series of drawings inspired by how people react to Halloween being over.