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AE Effects

I really like the style of ‘infinite’ transitions and wanted to incorporate that into my animation and challenge myself to see if i could do it.

I have a good understanding of using the effect ‘CC Bend It’ and like to use it to add easy movement to things such as plants, trees, fishes and hair. This effect is really good for things that need to be fluid in their movement.

A part of my animation features leaves covering the screen which they then open to reveal the next scene, I thought this was a good way to incorporate the transition style I was going for.

I had some difficulty with the Bend It effect as once the effect was applied and the keyframes added, i noticed there was a clipping of the bottom of the leaf that I could not get rid of. The asset was large enough to be placed on the corner of the page and had enough room to bend without it showing the bottom of the leaf, but when added to the comp it would cut off at a certain point.

I emailed Jon in hopes for some help and sent him the project file. He sent me back the technique I was trying to do, with instructions on how to fix it and also a new technique which was to use a page turn effect to mimic the leaves unfurling.

I really liked the way the page turn effect looked and decided to incorporate that idea instead as it was much more dynamic and looked more realistic than the technique I was trying to do.

I originally planned to have the leaves ‘scroll’ onto the screen while bending but the page turn turned to leaves into a fake 3D shape where it gave it some depth and life into the leaves, this way the leaves folded onto the screen.

I think this technique worked out much better than my original plan and I like how it looks and this technique is useful for many other things so I’m glad I reached out for some help as I can now incorporate it into my other animations when suitable.

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Infinite transitions

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-bde6aoRHzg&t=23s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NRlp8dMNsi8&t=64s (1:00-1:20)

In my own time I like to watch tutorials and learn new techniques in After Effects to up my experience in the programme, from that research I have always really enjoyed the technique of using and ‘infinite zoom’ as a transition.

I think this technique makes animations look really professional and seamless, but it also takes a lot of design and a well thought out process to make it work.

I hadn’t tried this technique before and I thought this would be a good time to test it as the collaboration project is quite free in terms of what we can choose to animate and i thought this effect would fit in really well.

When thinking of ideas I kept this in mind a lot and came up with ways of incorporating this technique into my work as I had a few different assets that I wanted to showcase throughout the piece, I didn’t want the frame to just flick from one to the other.

I think this makes the work look more thought out and fit together, as my piece is going to be quite an abstract approach to what my audio is saying, I think this technique helps make it work together and gives an illusion of it all fitting together quite nicely.

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Techniques

With the ideas I had on my storyboard I had a particular effect in mind which I remember seeing in some of Ben Marriott’s work.

I had a quick look on his youtube page and found a tutorial for the effect I was after.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=doSmYieyIgw&t=318s

The effect works well with my style, although I did struggle to try and make the ‘wiggles’ move at a smoother rate, as the style he was going for was to make it look almost hand drawn.

I tried upping the amount of wiggles used thinking that would act as if i was changing the frame rate, but they moved far too quickly. I also tried extending and overlapping the wiggles with the opacity adjusting to make it fade to mimic a higher frame rate but this was too obvious that it was fading.

I think due to the nature of the effect, unless I had drawn each wiggle extremely close together and more of them then it would always be slightly off in frame rate.

I still like the outcome of this as it is the effect I was going for, i just think it sticks out slightly due to the rest of the animation being smooth and fluid, whereas this part feels quite rough.

If I could continue the animation, I would like to experiment with this more and try to add more frames or even trying to adjust the shapes path and keyframe the movements, then duplicate that over until i had the desired amount of wiggles to recreate the effect.

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Western Animations

Looking into western animations and articles and papers written on this topic, I found that in a lot of previous research and many of the papers I mention have all cited this one book by David Whitley.

“The Idea of Nature in Disney Animation: From Snow White to WALL-E”

Fortunately, the library has a PDF of this book available to read, and it’s a definite to read the entire book when I’m preparing for my report next year.

Whitley explores Disney and Pixar animations such as WALL-E and Snow White. In the book, Whitley argues for the importance of nature featured in Disney films that have altered his personal understanding of nature and hopes his study will the same for his readers.

Following Lynsey’s advice, I looked for some ecoctritical papers and came across a book titled: That's all folks? : ecocritical readings of American animated features.

This book is about the history of environmental expression in American animated films. It showcases the view that the contemporary environmental movement and the cartoons it influences in the 1960’s.

This book seems like a good read in preparation for my report and may contain evidence and sources to back up my statements.

I think a main contender of film choices to represent western animations is WALL-E due to the extent the film goes to, to show the effects of pollution and consumerism.

'Movements that are drawn': A history of environmental animation from The Lorax to FernGully to Avatar by Nicole Starosielski is another article I found which surveys the history of environmental animation and charts to aesthetic possibilities it offers for environmental representation.

This article in particular is going to help me write out some of my first chapter where I plan to talk about how animation can be a huge platform in the media to convey these messages to a larger audience.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGOjylUwapQ

This video explains a great view of looking at Pixar as showing humans as ignorant, chaotic and destructive.

A summary of the video:

Across Pixar films they point to how human actions no matter how small have massive consequences across a variety of eco systems.

in finding memo it’s the arrival of humans that comes to fundamentally change the characters relationships, the scuba diver who takes Nemo he is simply taking something to be displayed at a pet store, a sentient object for other humans to look at; in doing so he disturbs a complex eco-system replete with schools, different cultures and its own food-chain, the small action turning the community upside down and the person who has causes this event is never seen again, they are ignorant and never see the fallout from their actions. It is this notion of seemingly the inconsequential having massive ramifications that govern many of the worlds that Pixar introduces us to.

WALL-E exploration of climate change, the main characters entire existent is shaped by the consequences of small human actions and the unwillingness to compromise our lifestyles has left the planet inhabitable and destitute. In WALL-E Pixar not only holds a mirror to humanity but a microscope , demonstrating how the smallest seemingly inconsequential actions can result in chaos for others.

Pixar often broadcasts a broader theme that human being are forces of destruction and chaos.

The video also talks about films such as Toy Story, Monsters Inc and Ratatouille and makes great points at how eco systems and worlds collide.

For when it comes to writing my report, I think searching for more sources on western animations would benefit my report and also looking deeper into the ones I have found so far and exploring the sources they cite as these could also relate to my report and would expand my research, enabling me to explore the topic in greater detail.

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Eastern Animations

For my report I’ve decided to concentrate on Studio Ghibli as the representation for eastern animations.

The choices for this category are:

Princess Mononoke

Spirited Away

My Neighbour Totoro

So far, I’ve found plenty of articles on ‘Research Gate’ where other people have studied similar topics to mine, which is a good source of information and other sources that I can explore.

To start off, I decided to look into searching for studio Ghibli and environmentalism and came across a good few start of sources for information.

In may 2014, Hayao Miyazaki said “I yearned for an earnest and pure world… I could no longer deny the fact that I wanted to make something life affirming”

Princess Mononoke’s main theme focuses on humans interacting with the environment, deforestation and urbanisation. The film highlights mankind consumption and consumerism or natural resources.

“It is a common mythical Japanese belief that if humans are aggressive to the forest, the forest god will return the torment to humans.”

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/4841310_The_ecological_and_consumption_themes_of_the_films_of_Hayao_Miyazaki

Spirited Away includes main themes of gluttony and consumerism, environmental issues being subtle but still present. The spirit bath house in the film containing residents that notice the ‘Stink Spirit’ is a spirit of a polluted river, lost to apartment complexes. – Miayzaki explains.

An article titled: Anime Landscapes as a Tool for Analysing the Human–Environment Relationship: Hayao Miyazaki Films, is particularly interesting and a good source for my report as it explores the contrasts between western thinking to the world view that Myazaki reflects in his films, he depicts humans as an inseparable part of nature.

Games Radar made an article- https://www.gamesradar.com/uk/studio-ghibli-netflix-climate-change/

A particular quote that drew me into continue reading was “Studio Ghibli has preached environmentalism with a sense of nuance and grace that’s unlike anything we’ve seen in western cinema.”

I believe looking into this and exploring the article further will benefit my report for next year.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uC9yw7FHGaE

This video on Princess Mononoke, explores how the film teaches environmentalism to children.

It had an interesting quote from Miyazaki “The idea that nature is always gentle and will give birth to something like the Sea of Decay in order to restore an environment polluted by humans is a total lie. And I believe that the idea that we should cling to such a saccharine worldview is a big problem.”

Princess Mononoke focused on this subject as well. It displays conflict of deforestiation through mythological terms and allegory, Myazaki teaches these lessons not through complex environmental science by in ways that even a child could understand.

“If you take too much from the forest, the Gods begin to die and a curse is upon you”

“If you are not conscientious of our real world environment, there are real world consequences”

https://i-d.vice.com/en_uk/article/epg8pa/studio-ghibli-anime-climate-crisis-hayao-miyazaki

“The studio often infuses complex mythology with a strong environmentalist ethos through its films and, in a world besieged by wildfires and floods, the themes in their films are now more prescient than ever.”

This article by i-D says, Princess Mononoke breaks the complexities of the climate crisis down to a simple cause and effect: when the people of Irontown threaten the environment, nature self-destructs, and everyone suffers. The film’s violence paints a grim picture of nature dying at the hands of an arrogant human army, intent of harvesting its beauty as fuel.

My Neighbour Totoro symbolises the harmony of a balances relationship between people and the environment.

i-D days, throughout the films of Studio Ghibli respect for the planet is fundamental to survival.

“The Princess and the Climate Change: a relationship between nature and man”

https://www.ntnu.no/blogger/menneskets-tidsalder/2019/11/17/the-princess-and-the-climate-change-a-relationship-between-nature-and-man/

Abstract:

This article forms a comparative critical review of two films by director Hayao Miyazaki, Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (1984) and Princess Mononoke (1997), examined through an environmentalist lens. The authors employ the concepts of the Anthropocene field using the definitions by Purdy (2015) and Hamilton, Bonneuil and Gemenne (2015), as well as the discussion of agency from Nimmo (2015) to examine the relationship between humans and nature in the two films. Throughout this article, evidence is presented for the argument that in the film universes, nature and humanity do not share a symbiotic relationship, but nature would survive, and indeed thrive, without humanity, but the same is not true in reverse. This realization shares similarities with the current Earth Anthropocene condition.

“The clearest way into the universe is through a forest wilderness” - John Muir

I thought this article would be relevant for my research due to the ways it examines relationships between humans and nature and also explores they ways the two films interact with the idea of humans respecting the environment and being able to survive with it, but not without.

An excerpt from the conclusion:

Both films are pleading for a more conscious and balanced dynamic between humans and nature where the responsibility for a more sustainable future for both parties lies in the actions of humanity.

For my next part of research I would find it interesting looking into western animations and how they portray the environment differently to how Studio Ghibli does.

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Environmental generational amnesia

From my previous research I discovered a new topic that could be relevant to my report.

Environmental generation amnesia is described by psychology professor Peter Kahn as “the idea that each generation perceives the environment into which it's born, no matter how developed, urbanised or polluted, as the norm. And so what each generation comes to think of as 'nature' is relative, based on what it's exposed to.”

I discovered Kahn’s book named Children’s affiliations with Nature: Structure, Development, and the Problem of Environmental Generational Amnesia.

Kahn examines how people perceive and impact the environment. Cities are constantly growing and natural spaces shrink rapidly, Kahn argues that enables development to continue relentlessly and each generation inherits a new interpretation of what nature is and what the refer to as ‘normal’ surroundings.

“Meaningful interactions with nature not only can teach, but also help people rejuvenate, reflect and recognise the importance of the outdoors” says the University of Washington.

With this in mind, I think some of these sources will be great evidence to back up my statements made in my report and also give me a wider range of topics to explore and eventually narrow down for my final written piece.

https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/11/171115124514.htm

https://depts.washington.edu/hints/publications/Childrens_Affiliation_Nature.pdf

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History of environmentalism in animation

Upon searching for some brief history knowledge of environmentalism in animation, I stumbled across an article titled “Historical evidence for nature disconnection in a 70-year time series of Disney animated films” written by Anne-Caroline Prevot, Romain Julliard and Susan Clayton.

This article demonstrates the disconnection between western societies and nature and they examine a 70-year time frame of Disney animated films, what they discovered was that a natural setting is now increasingly less prominent as representation of outdoor environments in these films.

In the article they considered 60 animated feature films ranging from Snow white to Tangled. The article provides some great data collection that I will consider using when writing for my report next year and I believe some of the information could be beneficial.

To summarise the findings, there were three hypotheses that were supported. One being the representation of outdoor settings changed over the 70-years time frame and two being that the way of drawing or depicting settings includes fewer natural elements, based on the knowledge and mental repsresentation of the film makers.

Disney films over the first 40 years the majority of outdoor scenes has green nature as background and then over the past 30 years, one-half of the movies had more than half or their outdoor scenes in places without traces of green nature.

Within this article they discuss environmental generational amnesia which I found an interesting concept and decided that I would look into that further for my next part of research.

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Research Report Proposal

After speaking to Lynsey and being unsure of which direction to take with my report, I decided to choose a topic that I have previous knowledge in and am comfortable writing about. I have decided to explore environmentalism in animations, particularly comparing western and eastern films.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ecocriticism

This is a topic that upon initial research I’d be able to find many sources and research papers on and is something I personally enjoy looking into and learning about. Lynsey suggested looking into ‘Ecocriticism’ which is defined as the study of literature and the environment from an interdisciplinary point of view, where literature scholars analyse texts that illustrate environmental concerns and examine the various way literature threats the subject of nature.

With my chosen report type being an extended essay, this topic of environmentalism within animation seemed like a perfect fit as it will consist of a lot of secondary research such as looking at texts, films, academic papers and books which this topic seems to have plenty of.

From my personal experience watching films from Disney/Pixar and Studio Ghibli, the portrayal of the environment differs greatly and I decided to look into recourses western and eastern cultures and ethics.

A Problematic in Environmental Ethics: Western and Eastern Styles by Ronald L. Massanari is a book that I found which I will consult further into the research report.

Abstract from the book:

“Buddhism and Christianity have distinct approaches to the questions surrounding the relationships among individuals including human beings and nature. Buddhism may have resources that can help us more clearly care for the environment.”

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CV

This is the CV I made following the workshops from the VLE.

I decided to send it off to the careers team to see if they could give me any advice for adjustments I could make.

Billi replied and gave me these pointers:

​​About Me: This reads well - the only thing I would change slightly is try and pinpoint where your desire to make animation which makes people smile comes from? Is that your favourite kind of animation? Why is that  important to you? The final sentence is a good ambition, it might be a little more specific to the role you were applying for but for your career pack it works well.

Software: Don't rate yourself on your software skills - it highlights to the employer what you feel less confident in. Listing them is enough.

Interests & Hobbies: This is normally written in a couple of sentences to give context as to why you enjoy those things - have they impacted your work in any way?

Education: This looks good - if you were strugglling for space on your CV you could cut the further detail but I think it works well for now. Have you chosen not to include your GCSEs? That's totally fine - just be aware you might need to add them in if English/Maths GCSE was a necessity for the job you applied to.

Employment: Again this reads well - I don't think any edits are necessary here.

I will adjust the CV following this e-mail to improve it further, I think the feedback that was given will help me refine the CV and make it stand out and give the things I’ve written more reason to be there, it will help me define what I’ve said on there to an employer but still keep it simple and to the point.

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Personal Planning

The VLE has a page for cover letter writing, which I decided to look at before writing a cover letter for a job. I thought this would be a good way to build up knowledge in this area, especially writing for the creative industry as it’s not something I have experience in. 

Speculative job applications:

Means contacting an organisation to see if there is a suitable job, internship or freelance opportunity for you.

Important or essential part of job hunting for creative professionals.

A large proportion of work and jobs with organisations in the creative sector are never advertised.

How to make one:

Research all companies interested in working for, where will you live, what do you want out of it etc.

Write a distinctive short cover letter or email for each one.

Attach a cv and a portfolio.

Send the application to as many as you can, being carefully tailored to each company.

Three main things:

Says what you can offer that company, skills and specialisms.

What attracts you to that organisation in particular- their style, clients?

State when you are available for work experience and what you hope to get out of the placement.

Preferably always address to someone, find them on LinkedIn when writing a cover letter- the most appropriate person.

Opening line- short direct and to the point say why you are emailing.

1st paragraph, briefly describe your skills and what you have to offer- adapt personal summary statement, find a link between your practise and theirs if possible.

2nd paragraph, give information about the placement you want to do, what when and for how long but also show flexibility.

Sign off with a call to action, would it be possible to arrange a call or meeting in the next few days to discuss this further- gives them a reason to contact you back.

“Best wishes, yourself.”

In response to a job advert:

The cover letter you write for this will be different from before such as length and style, advert and requirements of the application.

Job adverts:

Identify the specialist skills and experience they have asked for

Identify transferable skills and experience they have asked for

Writing strong paragraphs:

Star method:

Situation, task, action, result

Context e.g work experience

Responsibilities

Skills

Effects your actions had, how did you use those skills

Create a story around your skills- memorable and useful for respected employers

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Personal Planning

I decided to look into some of the careers and employability pages on the VLE to get started on making a CV and cover letter

I watched through the CV writing course and took some notes for when I make my CV.

A CV is:

An overview of skills, experience and education

A written document ‘resume’

An essential part of job applications

An effective CV has:

Make a clear and strong impression

Emphasise key skills and achievements

Looks attractive and is interesting

Is tailored to the role applying for

1 side of a4, usually a PDF

Information to include:

Essential to include:

Your name and a title

Your contact details, hyperlinks for email and website or social media (only for professional work but not too many)

You don’t need to include your address as this can be confusing when applying for jobs in a different location or changing address when a student

Details of education in reverse chronological order

Employment and work experience, can include freelance or any volunteer work

Education: subjects studied, level of studies, institution, dates, grades and any further details

I also learned some of the following:

Writing about GCSE’s are optional and is attentive to the job you’re requiring for e.g english and maths if needed.

You should avoid setting out a long list of GCSE’s- wasted space isn’t appealing and it’s important to have an appealing CV when applying for a creative job.

Presenting employment information should be as follows:

Job title, employer and location, dates, further details about the job

You should focus on transferable skills rather than duties and responsibilities

Optional content for a CV:

Personal summary statement

Voluntary work, extra curricular activities

Skills, relevance for role, e.g proficient in after effects etc techniques

Exhibition list or a credit list- artist/film

Awards, competitions, nominations

References

Interests and hobbies

I also learned that there is a software which scans CV’s to look for relevant details, ATS is applicant tracking software, some graphic elements and formatting features may not be compatible with ATS.

Basic design choices:

Choosing fonts/typeface

Best: Arial, Gill sans, tahoma, Helvetica,

Okay: cambria, garamond

Avoid: calibri, new roman, courier- these are default and people in design have a good eye for default fonts. They will recognise you haven’t made a design choice for your font.

Forbidden: over stylised fonts can appear silly or immature

It is not recommended to use more than two fonts.

Some good ideas for title designs would be to utilise basic typography skills:

Typography skills- Amiee Farmer AMIEE FARMER

A M I E E  F A R M E R

This can give a stronger appearance and can look elegant

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This is a super rough animatic done in After Effects, purely putting my assets together and seeing how they work with the audio and how the timing will work. 

I’ve decided which portion of the audio i want to remove to shorten the animation, this part didn’t work as well and to me, seems like it drags out the animation slightly as the scene where it plays goes on for a little too long. The part i have decided to remove is where James says "I feel expressive, I feel like I’m bringing myself on the inside, outside”. 

I noticed there was also a change of tone in his voice when saying this part whereas the rest sounds more relaxed, so this part sticks out quite a bit when paired with the rest of the audio. 

I think the removal of this will speed up the transitions and make it feel more seamless and less dragged out.  

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Collaboration

Here are my style frames- I’m quite happy with how they came out and the use of the colour palette. I’ve decided that using grain is a good way to split up the pinks from each other without changing the colours too much. If i could get my animation to look like these style frames I’ll be quite happy with the final outcome. 

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Collaboration

Our group decided to tie in our animations together and to make the overall project look more cohesive with out different styles and animation choices, we would choose a restricted colour palette, we tasked ourselves to come up with some ideas and within our next meeting we would choose which one we thought would look best. 

I came up with 5 palettes that had 5 colours in each, some which were similar tones and shades of the same colour, and some which had accent and complimentary colours. 

I thought these would work best with the range of animations and design assets we would need. 

My favourite out of the five i came up with was the different greens and oranges, i thought this would provide enough range and shades of similar colours to be used dynamically and would also fit in well with everyones ideas.

We decided to use Jack’s colour palette, which were shades of pink and a green. I like this palette as it will provide a challenge for us to try and differentiate assets in the animation as the colours are quite similar. Using the green and cream will make a good contrast to the pink and I’m excited to see what the group comes up with in regards to how they utilise this palette. 

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Collaboration

I have decided to use James’ audio, I think from the clip we have it has potential to make a really good response to the question in hand. 

I wanted to be able to interpret the answer in an abstract way and I think this clip will let me do that.

I have made a storyboard which will allow me to move onto doing a quick animatic to then work out the timings and if i need to trim the audio anymore than i have. I currently have about 16 seconds, which is too long and there are two parts which i could remove to make it shorter, it’s just a case of deciding which part to remove which would benefit the animation. 

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Collaboration

The style of my animation is going to be an important part for me as I need to choose one that would enable me to communicate certain aspects of the audio in an efficient way. I know I want to work in after effects, as I feel much more confident in this than frame by frame and would like to continue my development in the programme.

I like the clean, grainy illustrator style and have looked into this a bit, taking in inspiration for my ideas and my storyboard.

Our group has decided to have a limited colour palette which I think will compliment the style I’m going for as it’s quite a flat shape based style with lots of abstract elements to it.

Some major inspirations so far have been from the following artists/animators:

Millie Woodcock

Ben Marriott

Sumin Choi (@suminchoidesign)

Yahira (@yahira)

Diana Stoyanova

Andrey Prokopenko

Brad Cuzen

I love the style of these artists and think trying to use these as reference and inspiration when drawing up my storyboard and style frames will help me push the project forward and lay down the basic ideas of what I’d like my animation to look like.

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Collaboration

When thinking of ideas for the collaboration project I decided to look into some of the BBC listening projects, which is a very similar concept to what our project entitles.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p056kkh9

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p056kkmh

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p044rc21

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03w11pr

These gave me a lot of insight on different ways I could approach the animating process. I knew I wanted to go quite abstract, but not so much so that the animation didn’t really relate to the video. As in some of these videos, some of the imagery is quite literal while other visuals aren’t necessarily representative of the audio.

When planning for a storyboard I will definitely think about this. I believe it would be too easy for me to just animate what they’re saying but I think it would look out of place if it didn’t have some sort of relation.

Looking at a lot of these projects, I think a good way to execute an abstract/non-literal piece would be to have parts appear or disappear to the beat of words. I know I don’t want any characters in my animation but I have a good idea of communicating with some silhouettes of heads and abstract patterns to represent the words of the audio.