For the Animation Group project, we were tasked with finding mythological stories that could be created into an animated film, going through the pre-production and production stages. For our film, we decided to use the story ‘The Trolls of Vik’, a story originated in Iceland and based around three large rock formations off the coast […]
Final Film: Contribution Reel:
Mice character designs: Mouse animation Test: Storyboard: Environment tests: Environment animation tests:
Animal Studies: Head Modelling: Animation Tests:
My Contribution: Initial ideation: My Finalised assets: Collaborated scene:
For the final product I put the scene into after effects, adding a glow effect onto the advertisement signs, to make them look more neon. I animated a bullet train passing through the scene as the sleek design fits in with my art direction than a regular train. I also added a rainfall effect over […]
Using the buildings in the scene I created copies of them manipulating their positions and opacities and adding a filter over them to make it look as though the ground is wet and the buildings and signs are being reflected onto the ground as I intend to add rain into the scene.
I then used colour balance to adjust the colours, making it less pink/green and more pink/blue, which are the colours that are heavily featured in neo-style cities. I added advertisements onto the buildings which was inspired by the film Bladerunner, helping to add to the futuristic, neo-city art direction.
Using an image of skyscrapers I found on the internet, masked it with the photograph I took to create a more dense looking city shot, I then adjusted the hue and saturation of the image to make it look as vibrant and neon as my intended art direction.
For the third scene, I took a photograph of a plaza outside of some apartment blocks, with the intention of using it to create a cinematic scene in the cyberpunk/ neo-Tokyo style.
I added my character to the masked background on after effects, along with a blank PNG layer so I could add the snowfall effect from after effects on top of the scene to make it more active and help combine the two contradictory styles, I animated the character just by rotating it slightly left to […]
For the second type of media of the mixed media, I created a yeti-like creature on animate to import into the scene, I made his fur vibrant blue and purple so I could later key it out in after effects to give him a real world texture of fur.
Using the images I found, I created a singular image by masking them together, I then adjusted the image to colour balance the trees in the front to as similar hue of blue that the cave used, making it though as they belonged together.
For Scene 2, mixed media, I have an idea of where I want to take it from the start, so for the initial images to use for the scene, I used the internet to find images of snow, snow covered trees and ice caves.
Along with the painted background and cyclist, I also added some objects in the foreground on separate layers, so they could be utilised in after effects to create a parallax effect from them, they were also objects I painted to keep with the art direction of the scene. I added audio of a bike […]
After discussing my art direction with a tutor, I decided to make the scene in a painterly style, I started by painting over the masked image I created to make it look like a painting, I then found an image of a cyclist on the internet and applied the same technique to it so it […]
With the photos I took, I masked them together to make a single image to use as the background for the scene, I then manipulated the image, adjusting the hue and saturation of the image as well as adding an orange filter over the top of it using the blending options.
For the first scene, character matching the background, I went out and took photographs of a park, getting different angles of the same area with the intention of creating a single image using the masking tool in Photoshop.
stand by me show bible
For the art direction of the film, I took inspiration from the TV show Gravity Falls, using saturated colours for the environments as well as heavy outlines for the individual objects within the scene, this helped them stand out within the image and gave the environment a cartoony effect, making it very contrasting to the […]
With the character Gordie created, I decided to make a Lip Sync animation test using audio from the campfire scene from the film, I found this difficult as it was my first time attempting to animate a lip sync, the use of multiple mouth shapes as well as timing them and their positions to […]
I created some expression sheets for the two characters I created to show a range of emotions the boys could show within the film, tailoring the expressions to their own personalities showing individuality from each other.
With the shapes and pose decided for the character I chose the colour palette of white/grey as because as clothing options, those colours can be considered to be the “cheapest” options as the character isn’t very rich compared to that of the other boys in the film.
Using the shape studies from the start of the project, I went on to create a design for the character Chris, focusing on shapes that would portray his character of being strong and the leader of the group. The pose of him with his hands against his hips helps portray that sense of strength within […]
For my final character design I went with the orange/ grey colour palette, as it would stand out the strongest against the green backgrounds of the forests the character would be journeying through in the film.
After settling on a design for the character Gordie, I then went about doing multiple colour studies of that character to find one with a good colour palette that would stand out against the backgrounds of the film. Also looking at different skin tones to see how that would affect the character as well as […]
I created some production art of objects that would be seen within the film, to get a sense of the art style the environment would be shown in. I played around with different train designs that could be potentially used in the film, even looking at making the train a scarier and more intense version […]
I digitally painted some environment thumbnails, using the scenes from the film as a basis for the environment concepts. I focused on values when doing so to show depth within the image.
I recreated a still from the film on photoshop, and experimented with it, using different colours show different moods the same image could obtain, I also painted a study of the still using accurate colours to the original to recreate it.
From the head studies, I then progressed to the body shape, keeping with the look I used for the heads, I drew the body as long and rectangular again conveying height and leanness, I tried several poses before settling on the hand across chest pose, as this was more in line with Gordies and quiet […]
After the initial shape studies, I decide to move forward with a long, rectangular head shape, to help represent the characters’ height and leanness, I then when through multiple iterations of the head shape changing the facial features to try and convey a youthful look.
We were given the film, Stand By Me (1986) as the basis for our animated adaptation. After watching the film, I began by creating various body and head styles with different shapes as the foundation to see which shape would be a good representation for the characters in the film, as each shape conveys a […]
Gareth Bird Animation 