The Selection of 4 Wolf Designs

Discussions of the past 2 weeks have directed development of wolves design to these 4, selected out of.. so far 22 different design ideas for both of the wolves. I hope we could select one of each and I could start concentrating on them two. To solve how they  work together and so on.

Wolves might have 'features' of other animals, for example, a bat. They informed these designs as native Americans have a assigned meanings and signs to almost every common animal. For example, Owl being a bad omen, wolf being a symbol for moral teaching, polar bear being a good omen. It was also very common in their culture to give names of an animal to a person, which he deserved. These reasons lead to considering such other-animal incorporation in to the personalities of two wolves.

 It would be very appreciated if you could express your preferences now.

Retake on Wolf Character Designs

I had an opportunity to speak to Justin today. He gave some really useful advice considering the take on designing. Just how to start and think i different approach to mine. So I managed to pull some new shapes quite quickly. So here is new set of designs for both evil and good wolves.

More at The Wolves Within

WW: Character Development

Having received loads of feedback from both, tutors and classmates I went in to refine some of the more successful examples . Mainly clarifying the construction. I believe by this point It will be clear weather these can be taken further or I should try and come up with some new ideas for wolves' designs.

Animatic #6 with A Soundtrack Composed by David Keefe

Lately for The Wolves Within we were arranging to get someone to compose a soundtrack which would have both, Woodkid's - Iron and Native American tribe music feel to it. And to our big pleasure, Dave Keefe, aka Mustard Kid also a CG Arts  student who graduated few year ago, offered his help :]

The soundtrack you'll hear in this animatic, he calls a demo, adding that rithm can be changed, also not all the elements are yet in place.

Having that and some feedback on our latest animatic # 5, another one is piled together to further tackle the problems of rithm and mood.

Work Placement @ Picasso Pictures: Permitted Publication

Finally James Boty, a director at Picasso Pictures gave the permission to publish project  work I did during those two weeks back in May. Looking back at it, it was an exciting experience, an eye-opener too. I was lucky and happy to have had the chance to meet all the freelancing animators, directors and studio’s producers who truly convinced  and inspired to finish my own creative projects ( Ivan the Bird).

As for this document, it showcases the  pipeline I took for  producing 5 critters. Drawings were done by designer called DJ. I was translating them to 3D models and designing their textures.  The nuance of it was the complexity and details had to be suggested using only the color pass and there the director comes asking to make them transparent-like and so on.

We had to write a diary on our work experience, which can be found here .

 So there it is:

Work Placement @ Picasso Pictures by JJ Jolanta Jasiulionyte

Environment Thumbnails

Some capturing of ideas for environment. I was thinking in sort of three levels: we start from nothingness ( unconscious) then the bad wolf enters, so the environments he "lights up" is revealed as sinister, as if this is what he'd build. Next takes over the good wolf and we see firm golden-brown-like clifs, (lighting for it would be web-like, but for purposes of thumbnails I didn't go into details) Some key shapes, flow and behaviour of environment is there, remembering it is an innerspace, I played with dinamic and theatrical presentation.

@ The Wolves Within

Design Ideas for The Bad and Good Wolves

Life drawing is really fixing things for me, drawing gets more fluid.
Today I had a chance to sketch out some ideas I had for both of the wolves. These are the sheets of variations in shape and structure ( I left other aspects like surface texture, colouring out of consideration). The main references while creating these, were wolf anatomy, of course, and Native American carvings. Influence of their culture will be even better pronounced when we select particular designs and work on their better resolution.

Well, now its time to ask for your opinion. If you have any preference or comments over any of the wolves, drop a line :]

Also, for more, visit The Wolves Within blog

Voiceover for The Wolves Within

When  The Wolves Within started, it was clear a voiceover will be needed  (however if it developed in such directions where it seemed to  take something away, we’d loose it) .

Again, the most beneficial website for this was voiceover.co.uk  . There's a variety of choice in categories (mature voice, ageless commercial , deep and so on )

, I introduced our  project  and the course projects ( a showcase 2011 was very handy here). Also, and importantly,  let them understand we are students  . Asked politely  if they  could possibly take it as an unpaid  project.

It seems we’re in a true luck, because all of them three replied immediately.  After few hours we had one recording  by Philip Banks, and still waiting for another to come.

So here it is:

Jack Parell sent 5 recordings of his:

Wolf Character and Environment idea sketches

I upload some more in-shape sketches of wolf characters and thumbnails for environment.  This is only the very first ideas I tried capturing and serve more as guidelines on which the design would rely.

In my honest opinion, and also from Bob's and Godwins feedback, it seems this can be pushe way much further. The anatomy studies are playing here a lot, but maybe the boldess should instead.

And these fairly vague thumbnails aim to explore directions for environment. However, lots more, for sure, will come.

Ormie The Pig (2011) by Arc Productions

"Ormie is a Pig, in every sense of the word. Pig see cookie. Pig want cookie. But they are out of reach... or are they? Ormie attempts to gain the warm sweet taste that is his obsession. "

Arc Productions present an animated short which is a fantastic example of character animation. A pig is trying to get a cookie that is all you see for entire 3 minutes. But precisely because the animation is figured out down to every frame, these 3 minutes doesn’t seem to bore the viewer.

Simplicity in the art direction and editing would be another thing to note. Only what and when it is needed, perhaps this was the key aim: aqua-paint-like background and merely the objects the character is interacting with; story is told mostly in one long take and camera facing front.

Ormie the Pig is quite a charming piece.

September's Sketchbook

I'll try and keep it a monthly update of sketch selection.
This time it is pritty random and varied. Some life drawing, some ideas for paintings and illustrations, mainly scribbles.

 

Vizualising the Story of the Fight between two Wolves

Leo and I today have finally drawn out an image sequence which now covers the full story. The decision was for both of us to try and create an animatic , so to see each's take. (A note on the soundtrack, it was edited, so at some parts, the pacing music suggests rather falls off...)



 This sequence embodies a metaphor. Two wolves , which represent the good and the bad side in each of us, race from the unconscious part of our psyche to the conscious one, with the aim to take over and  dominate one's entity . On the way each of the two seemingly take over. However, it all comes to an equal fight at the end, as the legend concludes, there is no single winer, as it is us who decide  which side will take over.

Style Approach: References to Native American Art and Design for Theater

The story is taking it's shape, soon we'll work on character and set design and overall style for the animation. Few key sources are informing it: Native American tribe art and (set) design for theater. Amerindians have a symbolic representations for animals,which do vary slightly , here is an example of wolf:

Examples of Totems, pottery, masks, jewelery and spiritual paintings are truly suggestive for shape, colour combinations, surface textures and graphics

The tale is aiming to represent fight happening inside each of us,  in the inner environment. It  has a more abstract feeling , surrealism, lucidity and secrecy about it therefore, the second big influence, as mentioned above, is design for theater performances.

Clear and recognizable structures merge with abstract decorations and fantastic lighting. Volumes interact and start creating something unexpected. Also, it seems one of the major aspects of set design right there is consideration how all of it will play with the surrounding darkness. How the darkens, as one of the key  elements , will play its part. The following example plays with same setting but different lighting approach, which results in mood changes

Lastlly, all the desicions for reference should now come together and be evident and consistent in our own concepts.

Dissertation. Sinopsis of Chapter 1: Film characters as agents of Ideology

Colour Key:
Selected example for analysis
Theorie of ideology

Chapter one introduces a parallel between concept of ideology, it’s key assets and working mechanism with chosen illustrative example of Lara Croft’s character in Tomb Raider (2001)

Key figures in defining what is ideology will be introduced and used throughout the essay, such as Karl Marx, for being a founder of concept of ideology, Althusser, for being one of the later thinkers who developed and refreshed understanding of ideology (also key source Ideology, a Short Introduction by Michael Freeden and SLavoj Zizek’s The Sublime Object of Ideology) .

Having provided the reader with base definition, paper would move to a simple allegory of ideology at work, using Andersen’s fairy tale “Emperors New Clothes” .   

It then draws parallel from weaver characters to Lara Croft, briefly, justifying the choice by introducing facts on phenomenon success of the created character. This will illustrate the following point of ideology’s working principle, creating and sustaining ideological field, disseminating the ideas.

Naturally occurring question will be what could be the ideas this film and character is proposing : a discussion of C. Herbst’s interpreted  meaning the character carries will be elaborated by first of all analyzing illustrations, introducing it’s messages, and discussing the superficiality on which ideology relies when creating the meaning.

Secondly,  it would move to comparing with earlier meanings , and considering the wider context of the made interpretation together with discussing ideology’s need to constantly renew itself so it stays an inclusive and transparent aspect of life.

Third point would be to suggest the affects on receiver’s psychology and following actions to what a wider conclusion of ideologies at work primer and key aim would be stated.

To reach chapter’s conclusion key aspects of ideologies as tools for drawing monolithic illusory view on world and identity, which is very difficult to be aware of.  Also an aspect of it being an ephemeral structure, fragile to introduction of facts  and  more importantly critical deconstruction. It would lead the chapter to its conclusion and smooth transition to postmodern deconstruction.

Thumbnail Storyboards for WW Project

After discussions with Phil and Aland and brainstorming with Leo, I've gathered some intitial shot ideas.
So far I have a feeling the poses and angles ought to be even more so dramatic and well thought out, as the story will be suggested via these still poses and not an animated action.

For next few days the task is still to visualize the story aiming to gather a coherent sequence. This would inform our character designing as well as, even more importantly, what such type of story is asking from us to do ( for example, what other effects to include, or what elements to get rid of)

Panels are not put together in a linear sequence, instead they simply capture ideas for shots