Working as I go

Week 1-2

Researched genre of Horror, Brainstormed character designs and developed story.

Week 3-4

Scripting and story boarding. Reworking designs based on feedback and focusing on themes.
My characters were too cartoon-styled and friendly looking so I started to play with different silhouettes.
I drew from reference and then tried to apply that to new designs.

Week 5-6

Maya workshops. I attempted to create a tent for my DIY modelling task using eClothe but I don't fully understand the workspaces and how they effect the tools.
Restoryboarding

Week 7-8

Wire armature building. Sculpting the face plate.
Creating armatures takes time. I had the option of using Plasticine once i'd built the foam and bandage base. I chose to use air-dry clay instead as it won't crack when I move the head. I have decided to also make clothes for the puppet instead of using Plasticine because I really like the textured quality of my designs . I started sourcing fabrics to use.
Collecting more sounds.

Week 10-11

Creating clothes for wire armature and waiting for face plate to dry. Painting the face plate and attaching hair. I painted the clothes also to add wear and grime. I really enjoyed the experience.
Filming walk cycle and collecting sounds for animatic.
Working on my DIY maya piece- spear

Week 12-13

Reworking animatic and beginning animation process by sketching key frames.
I do not feel confident with my backgrounds. The feedback I received from peers is that they don't mesh well with the character as they are too textured in the same way. I have experimented with using oil brushes in Photoshop ontop of a textured background to mix and smooth the texture. I like how this fades out the background and still has textures.

Week 14-15
Animating
I started by filling in what I had started the week before with in betweens as well as sketching out the other scenes, limiting it to the time frame on the storyboards. I realised that inbetweeing did not work for the seal scene as the seal was losing its shape as it dropped. I switched to drawing straight ahead which helped smooth out the motion.

Week 16-20

Animating. Post Production. 
Deviate from storyboard- I did not have enough time left to execute the longer and more complex shots left so I toyed with other, faster scene ideas that would still progress the narrative.
Finished all the scenes.
I began editing the animation together. I noticed that the pacing was all wrong- all the scenes individually looked right and played well but, when together as a sequence, there was no room to register the action of the scene. I used premiere pro to add frame holds and change the play speed of certain clips to help remedy this.
I also added flashes and rearranged clips to ramp up the intensity of the piece and give a feeling of disorientation as the story shifts from normal to supernatural.

SketchBook