Pre-Viz for Slime Mold Life Cycle

There are few changes ( for insatnce at the very end you'd see no cross disolves) just to see what works better. I no longer can see it objectively,but hope the line of action is clear.

Animatic for the Life cycle of a Slime Mold #2

To hang a slime mold upside down or to spin the camera?

Since now it is clear from the animatic, that there is the confusion with the line of action, I need to fix it.

But I also see two ways of fixing it.

One is to make the slime mold, fruit hang dawn as if from a real ceiling. But there would be problems with composition, since what works now might be entirely wrong when the panels are flipped. Yet still this would be an option in order to make the line of action clear

Or we could make the camera rotate to mach what's actually seen in animatic. For instance from the establishing shot the camera would actually pan and rotate at the same time to make the "upside down" view normal. And just before releasing the spores it again would rotate to "world's point of view" ( a made up term of mine.. :/) and we'd then see a jump cut of spores falling down.

I'm constructing pre-viz now so this is a good time to decide which approach to choose.
Since now it is clear from the animatic, that there is the confusion with the line of action, I need to fix it.

Animatic for the Life cycle of a Slime Mold

The Animatic is a useful reference for the timing of animation later on in the stage of production. Though there will be changes.

Most importantly, this was the first time I started thinking about soundtrack so early ( before it was always considered only as a final touch). Now it is clear how much it can influence the later construction of animation as well as how much easier it is to imagine the action with the help of music.

Hopefully this piece of soundtrack ( from V for Vendetta (DIr. Andy Wachowski, Lana Wachowski, 2005)) works.

New Chancellor of UCA - Zandra Rhodes

Today I had a great opportunity to participate in the Installation of Zandra Rhodes as a first ever Chancellor for the UCA. I was lucky enough to win the competition between student ambassadors to participate in this event in London's Banketing House.

As today It was explained, Chancellors mission is to make sure University is holding to its philosophy, direction of development.

Instantly recognizable with her distinctive pink hair and blue eye shadow, Zandra Rhodes has achieved worldwide fame with her textile designs which are worn by rock stars and royalty alike. ( examples could be Diana, Princess of Whales, Jackie Onassis, Freddie Mercury)

Zandra Herself finished This University in Rochester ( then known as Medway College of design) where she developed a passion for textiles.

At the time of event she gave a very inspirational speech about what it means to be successful as well as what it requires. Essentially the point she was trying to make was that the difference between an idea that in the end succeeds or fails is hours of work and the level of dedication.

Also few practical tips came from her what could help to achieve creative success. As boring as it sounds, believing in your idea and believing that you can make it real is the secret.

SO this was a bit of enlightenment about what's happening on UCA outside CG Arts and Animation baseroom :D

Storyboard for the Slime Mold Life Cycle

 

Storyboard Artist: J.J. Jolanta Jasiulionyte

Storyboard's contribution to the development of the project can't be emphasized enough. From many reasons it is worth taking some time and allowing the luxury not to be rushing. (It was developed roughly in 4-5 days, what is a relevantly long time in 5 weeks long project) Such reasons would be that it is a tool to solve problems of staging, how all the elements will interact with each other, ruff idea of how the camera is going to move and so on. Only after storyboarding is finished, there's confidence to go and start constructing the animation, since it's like you've already rehearsed it.

The storyboard for the Life Cycle of a Slime Mold starts with amoebas gathering into a migrating colony. After what, a more difficult stage of the slime mold forming fruiting body and spores is explained in more detail panel by panel. When spores are formed, fruiting body starts drying out and releases spores to fall down. Spores gently reach the ground and new amoebas come out of the shells. Story is finished with a reveal shot that emphasizes  the scale and the extension of the beautiful process.

To bring clarity in production as well as to clearly communicate the direction in which animation is going to be produced all the panels are done in color with the desired lighting, staging and texturing. The aim is to keep the original look that's seen in the storyboard. 

Go and see finsihed Life Cycle of Slime Mold

Target Audience - Mature School Students (16-18 year olds)

One of the main things to consider, while developing the project is the type of audience it's going to reach.

Not only it gives a direction and hints how furhter the project must be developed, but also it may contribute to the success of the production.

Before proceeding, one first must define the audience, goals and objectives. Goals define the ultimate purpose the project.

Then continuing further , what messages, experience, or content do you want them to come away with ?

ALso, what They want and need.

What content to develop and how best to get it to those you want to reach?

The following is a scheme of questions, answers, tools needed to answer questions and connections.

After doing this I decided to make the pacing of the animation faster with more cuts, add more complex camera movements.

Maya Classes, week 1: Intro to Visual Effects and Skinning

Happy Accidents

Today I was working on my storyboards. And suddenly noticed something emerging from the abstract shapes of slime mold.. So I thought to make a break and see what happens further developing the shapes.
I know it's not project related, but still, this was quite surprising to me. And this little drawing gave idea, what I could perhaps develop after the project :)
But now again, back to storyboarding :)

Concept Art

As I mentioned previously, at the very beginning I chose Caves as one of the places where slime molds can be found. And what this gave me was a further research about this environment and , most importantly, the lighting. See-through slime molds in dark caves are lighten by glow worms, their neighbors.

So this is First 3 concept drawing of what I imagine the Animation is going to look like.
Maybe it’s going to be less textured (if it's going to destract from the slime mold transformation), so far what I notice. I'll see.

Sketching

These are some of the sketches. I'm trying to resolve how the slime mold would develop. Concentrating on shapes, also having texturing in mind.


A question, can artists be considered an audience?
Because that's what I'm thinking when I'm doing this project, as if it's for a competition where you are given scientific process and asked to make it graphically/stylistically appealing.

Slime Mold Neighbour Glow Worm

This is absolutely amazing.

When I chose the environment and the lighting, colour palette, I accidentally came across the glow worms in caves. The feel and the colour match perfectly to what I imagine! Its also going to be a good source of reference.

Just to make it clear, I'm not going away from our main task, quit the oppositely, I want to make the slime mold more interesting.

Slime molds...

Today I read a good new, that we can look to other types of slime molds ( myxomycetes, protostelids, not only dyctiostelids) so I had a look around.

What i found was a variety of them. One might look alien to another. There's a variety of shapes and textures as well as colours.

One interesting fact, Hieronymus Boch in his Garden of earthly Delights depicted 22 different slime molds ( try to find it!)

Also I looked at concept art of others. But just to see whats out there, not relating it with my work.

Thumbnail storyboard for the lifecycle of a slime mold ( asexual reproduction)

I think I'm going for more stylized interpretation of the process.
Even though it would be stylized, I try to keep the scientific data accurate.

I thought to give myself rules, that would narrow the range of possibilities this animation could be heading for.

Everything takes place in a cave ( one of the environments slime slugs can be found)
Caves are dark, relevantly silent place (I'd imagine hearing water drips and wind blowing perhaps )

As I read in John C. Landlot's article there are rare species of slime molds that are different from terrestrial ones, at the same time the same scenario applies to them just for example the formation of the fruiting body can look differently etc.

But how to show the process in a dark cave?
lets say the scientist's come along and are about to investigate it, dyctiostelids. They would be lighting ''the scene'' where the life cycle takes place.


And yesterday, I wrote a letter with dozen silly questions to P. Klappa about this process, mainly asking for details I didn't found info about in both, articles or videos.

One of the ( not to greatly smart) questions was could the sample of amoebas be coloured so it would be easier to observe them without affecting the process.
He said yes.





Just to make a clue how it might be looking:

Its just a hint what's in my head.

But how its going to look will be more clear from my concept drawings. So far I just need feedback is the story and the direction I'm heading clear. Good's and bad's about it

Understanding Cellular Slime Mold/ Dictyostelida

Research carried out for purposes of  art related project

For al those who said nothing is clear, maybe this post will help.

The cellular slime molds (Dictyostelida) straddle the line between individuality and multicellularity.

How they move?

­­Slime molds feed and move via pseudopodia, like amoeba, Pseudopodia - A temporary projection of the cytoplasm, or of certain unicellular organisms, especially amoebas.

Most cellular slime molds lack flagellated stages(long, threadlike appendage)

Defining a Dictiostelid cellular slime molds

http://www.caves.org/pub/journal/PDF/V68/v68n1-Landolt.pdf

OHN C. LANDOLT
Dictyostelid cellular slime molds (dictyostelids) are singlecelled,

eukaryotic,( A cell with a membrane-bound nucleus.)

phagotrophic ( feed by ingesting/swallowing particulate organic carbon or intact [whole] cells )
bacterivores (free-living, generally heterotrophic [an organism that obtains its energy through consuming other organisms] organisms, )

move and feed in an amoeboid manner: by temporarily projecting cytoplasm.

Exclusively microscopic, which obtain energy and nutrients from the consumption of bacteria. present in terrestrial (earth) ecosystems.

These organisms represent a normal component of the

microflora in soils (earth, dirt) and apparently play a role in maintaining

the natural balance that exists between bacteria and other

microorganisms in the soil environment.
The Life Cycle of a Dictyostelium slime mold:

(The asexual reproduction)

(there also are myxomycetes and protostelids slime molds, but we are given dictiostelium slime mold life cycle)

The dominant stage in a cellular slime mold is the haploid stage.

For most of their life cycle, dictyostelids exist as independent, amoeboid cells (myxamoebae) that

feed upon bacteria,

grow,
and multiply by binary (double ) fission (splitting)

When the available food supply within a given microsite becomes depleted, numerous myxamoebae aggregate to form a structure called a pseudoplasmodium,

Within each cell maintains its individual integrity (wholesomness)

aggregate consists of up to 100,000 cells

The multicellular aggregate secretes material that forms a sheath around the entire structure, which forms a tower of cells.

the absence of light the tower topples and migrates as a single organism, The slug resembles a blob of petroleum jelly, leaving a trail of slime as it migrates.

As the fruiting body forms, the cells differentiate into a base, stalk, and apical mass containing encapsulated spores

the pseudoplasmodium then produces one or more fruiting bodies (sorocarps) bearing spores ( see previous video)

Fruiting bodies may take the shape of tiny goblets, globes, plumes

Under favorable conditions, the spores germinate (grow) to release myxamoebae (the same singe cell of the migragting colony)

and the life cycle begins anew.

Wher are they found :

Dictyostelids are most abundant in the surface humus layer of forest soils

Few studies have associated dictyostelids with caves

Few of the species Found in caves:

Dictyostelium caveatum

Dictyostelium mucoroides

Dictyostelium rosarium

Dictyostelium Giganteum

Dictyostelium aureo-stipes,

Dictyostelium . purpureum

Least common:

Dictyostelium citrinum,

Dictyostelium macrocephalum

Dictyostelium polycephalum

( the given species are examples from caves , there are lots more of dictyuostelium species )

Depending upon the particular cave, samples ranged in texture from powdery dry dust or gravel (stones) to very wet clay mud.

To give one particular example of cellular slime mold, I chose D. Caveantum

The spectacular D. Caveatum (Dictyostelium caveatum)

D.caveatum is a member of the dictiostelids , ( "slime moulds" or "social amoebae"). It consists of a single cell and its rather unassuming amoeba-like appearance hides the fact that it is a predator par excellence. it has highly effective ways of killing its prey - other very closely related social amoebae.

If a group of 10,000 D.discoideum cells is invaded by even a single D.caveatum one, they are doomed. The lone invader eventually eats the other species, using their cells as fuel to produce its own fruiting bodies.

After 48 hours, only D.caveatum remains.

single D.caveatum can consume a group of tens of thousands of other amoebae, before it can form a fruiting body.

The signaling to gather into a colony

Spiral geometry of a signal transmitter in an amoeba population (Dictyostelium discoideum) leads to chemotactic movements of cells in direction of the spiral core.

And this is the video illustrating the process from signalling to the gathering to migrating colony