Evie Drake

Art Foundation Blog

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Finished stop motion animation.

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Final show set up. 1st shelf (above the set)- practice pieces:

Newplast clay head for character 'End' on block- the head was too heavy for the character armature.

Newplast clay crow- the crow was a practice piece experiment with the clay, I discovered that the dense body made it difficult to maneuver the crow therefore I decided that later in the FMP I would use armatures.

Air drying clay head- the first clay head I created to experiment with facial structure and proportions.

The shelf acts as a display for early development in my FMP.

LED lights and set- The LED lights act as a replication for lighting when the animation was filmed. The set is displayed to show the real life scale for viewers.

Prints above the Mac- The prints display observational drawings from one of my sketchbooks, the drawings were used as inspiration for the facial configuration of my characters 'End' and 'Evie'.

Mac- Displays the film of my animation with the music playing.

2 mini shelves of mini heads on blocks: The air drying clay heads were displayed to show an element of aging- each head has an aged version next to itself.

Plinth displaying props from the animation: sand timer, scythe. These pieces were unable to stay stable on the set for display so were put on a plinth so viewers can still see them and identify them in the film. The character 'End's hand is holding the scythe as the relaxed hand gesture was being displayed on the character. A plastic box top from old packaging was placed over the props to make sure they were not touched and broken/ taken.

Overall, I am delighted with the flow on the presentation; display of progression throughout my FMP.

Ethics: Shelves were leased from the art department and can be used again/recycled in the future. LED lights and prints were ordered online therefore were delivered and perhaps not the best option for the environment- I could have created the prints at college but I wanted to ensure the best quality of items for my show. It has already been mentioned but I re-used old packaging as well.

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Evaluation for FMP

For my FMP I created and directed a stop motion animation which focused on the end of life journey- death. The intention of my animation was to show that death does not have to be feared and that it is an inevitable journey for everyone. This is represented by the friendship built between the characters ‘Evie’ and ‘End’ and Evie’s acceptance of her fate presented to her by ‘End’. The title of the animation ‘Journeys: Accepting the End’ was inspired by the physical end/ death that occurs in the animation and could also be interpreted as the arrival of the character ‘End’.

The character Evie is autobiographical to myself, ethically modelling the character on other people could cause offense and upset due to the sensitive nature of the theme for the animation. The character ‘End’ is based on multiple personas of death; Thanatos the Greek Mythology personification of death and the Grim Reaper. Ethically I did not want to refer to Thanatos for the character ‘End’ to make sure I did not misinterpret Greek mythology and offend Greek culture audience. 

Initially the intention for my FMP was to look at ‘Journeys’ in life that surround global or quotidian (everyday) issues- however as my research developed I realised that I wanted to focus on the quotidian issues which included; loneliness and isolation, suicide, parenthood as a journey and the journey of death. The journey of death interested me the most. Prominent areas of research for my FMP  comprised of watching other death themed animations which include; ‘The Life of Death’, ‘Life is Beautiful’, ‘Coco’ and ‘The Book of Life’. All of which informed the final narrative for my storyboards and finished animation. 

Other prominent areas of research included animation and non-animation based artists/ films; Edward Hopper, Shaun Tan, Ron Mueck, Donald Rodney, Jan Svankmajer, Aardman, Laika studio, The Quay Brothers, Alfred Hitchcock, the film Amelie and Louise Bourgeois. Key books for research included ‘Stop Motion Animation- How to make and share creative videos’ by Melvyn Ternan and ‘The Art of Aardman’ by Aardman Animations. All of which are not death related but allowed me to explore ideas for my characters design and making, set design and filming techniques. The dark blue hues and grey hues palette of my domestic styled set for my animation was inspired by Edward Hopper’s oil paintings ‘Hotel Room’ 1931, ‘Nighthawks’ 1942 and ‘Automat’ 1927. Whilst Laika, Aardman and the previously mentioned books informed my method of constructing my set. 

To film/ take shots for my frames I used an LED clamp light, a tripod and phone clamp. A professional camera was not needed as the quality of my phone camera was sufficient. Angles for filming; the tripod and phone camera allowed a 180 degree horizontal view of the set, zoom in scenes were taken after the initial 180 degree view of the set was complete- the tripod was moved inwards to the set and turned left at a 90 degree angle. To edit my animation I used the Stop Motion app instead of my initial intention of using Adobe Premiere Pro- this was due to easier importation of frames from my phone into the editing software. My finished animation took a total of 603 frames at a rate of 10 FPS. The finished animation has the duration of 1:06 minutes. The film quality itself is clear in some scenes and slightly fuzzy in others- this is due to the cameras altering concentration on different areas of light within the set- however I like the difference of concentration as it makes the film appear older much like traditional stop motion animation films. 

In terms of music for my animation the film Amelie inspired me to use piano music- a somber and well paced instrument; I discovered bensound.com a royalty/ copyright free music site that allows you to download tracks for free and use them for animations. I decided to use the song ‘Sad Day’ from bensound.com- as it fit the pace and morbid atmosphere of my animation. 

Overall, I am pleased with the quality of the finished stop motion animation but if I had more time the animation could have had a longer duration and more technical filming techniques. 

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Bibliography/ sources for all research (Tumblr and sketchbooks)

Stop Motion Animation- How To Make and Share Creative Videos, by Melvyn Ternan

Art of Aardman, by Aardman Animations

Amelie (film), 2001 Directed by Jean-Pierre Jeunet

Anatomy for the Artist- The Dynamics of Human Form by Tom Flint

Coco, 2017, directed by Lee Unkrich and Adrian Molina

The Book of Life, 2014, directed by Jorge R. Gutiérrez

Up, 2009, directed by Pete Docter and Bob Peterson

The Life of Death- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ofnCdC8P70g

Life is Beautiful- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aseq2GClZ9U

https://www.stopmotionworks.com/articles/artofSMchpt7.pdf

https://www.vfxvoice.com/aardman-goes-back-to-stop-motion-basics-with-early-man/

https://blog.vectorworks.net/set-design-laika

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0weVFkmguhY

https://www.pret-a-voyager.com/2009/11/the-amelie-project/

https://www.ikitmovie.com/best-clay-to-use-for-claymation-animation/

https://www.bensound.com/royalty-free-music/track/sad-day

http://www.sarahhauldren.com/animation/wallace-and-gromit-in-the-curse-of-the-were-rabbit.html

https://zeitgeistfilms.com/film/streetofcrocodiles

https://sproutvideo.com/blog/hello-hitchcock-replicating-angles-to-enhance-your-videos.html#close

https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2016/jan/11/how-we-made-pingu-childrens-tv-animation

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0100366/

https://www.aardman.com/film-tv-games/morph/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_i5derkRw4

https://www.zdnet.com/pictures/behind-the-scenes-how-laika-creates-high-tech-stop-motion-animation

https://news.stlpublicradio.org/arts/2014-08-01/st-louis-childrens-film-festival-returns

https://onanimation.com/2015/01/06/the-book-of-life-shot-breakdown/

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2262227/

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1049413/

https://laika.com/

https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/G_1841-0301-22

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Thanatos-Greek-mythology

https://www.britannica.com/story/where-does-the-concept-of-a-grim-reaper-come-from

https://www.ancienthistorylists.com/rome-history/top-10-ancient-roman-gods/

https://historycooperative.org/ancient-gods-of-death/

https://monsterlegacy.net/2017/03/04/dementor-harry-potter-azkaban/

https://kustomsteel.tumblr.com/post/114521046924/grim-reaper-scythe-aluminum-and-pine-prop-for

https://www.wizardingworld.com/features/why-dementors-are-the-scariest-magical-creatures

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Hypnos

https://historycooperative.org/ancient-gods-of-death/

https://www.greeklegendsandmyths.com/thanatos.html

https://www.bristolmuseums.org.uk/blog/collections/symbols-of-death/

https://www.awn.com/animationworld/advanced-art-stop-motion-animation-character-animation-part-1

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Show set up- range of work; early FMP clay model heads, drawings from mini sketchbook scanned and put up on the wall (to show inspiration for finished puppets facial features), set on show with LED lights to brighten the set below.

The effect of the show should be that the viewer can see the style of my work evolving- from traditional clay and observational drawings to newplast clay for more stylised characters.

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The opening sequence 1:33 minutes in (piano starts)- inspired me to use piano music in my animation. The original film is ‘Amelié’ 2001. i wanted to use the same song ‘comptine d’un autre été, l’après-midi’ by Yan Tiersen but i did not have permission due to copyright issues.

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Different technical filming shots- Inspired by Hitchcock’s zoom in shot, circular shot and reflection shot. The film shots are from Hitchcock’s ‘Psycho’ 1960, ‘Notorious’ 1946 and ‘Strangers On a Train’ 1951.

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Light testing: light coming from TV prop. I used my clip on book light an placed it underneath the table and with the settings button on the light changes the brightness between frames to indicate flickering light from the TV.

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Research: Aardman character movement and lighting.

This Youtube interview/ tour of Aardman's 'Early Man' set inspired and influenced my ideas of how to move my characters around the set when filming.

Key points:

-eyeballs: using baking beans so could move them for eye movement to create better character expression.

-FPS: think about how to move characters and maintain a good FPS, idea= take photos/frames in sections of 3, so take 3 photos of each movement.

-Lighting: Think about the effect of light on the mood- perhaps have areas of concentrated light on my characters.

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Experimenting with light- cool and warm LED light setting. I chose cool light due to the blue and grey hues of the set; therefore furthers the sad/ morbid effect on the viewer to match the sad tone of the narrative for the animation.

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Testing flashing red light- for the TV prop.

Overall, the red flashing LED light is too slow and inconsistent for when shots for the stop motion will be taken.

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Old box of chocolates containing night sky flashing lights. The lights are too slow for when i take shots but the unlit background can be used as a window view for the set. Re-purposing an old box for a background= better for the environment.

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Experimenting with shadows- tree branches could be used to cast shadow through the set windows.

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Constructing my set- I used off cuts from wood in the studio to created the base slots and top corner slots. Ethically- this allowed me to again use recycle materials.

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Clothes making sources

Pictures of my clothe making processes are in m sketchbook- here are the youtube videos that helped me. After creating the t-shirt for 'Evie' I used the same process for making 'End's' cloak/ grim reaper inspired cloak.

Evie character- trousers:

Evie character t-shirt:

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Finalised character designs for ‘Evie’ and ‘End’.

Evie's outfit is inspired by the simple clothes I was wearing in my photo shoot- plain white t-shirt and jeans. The reason for this is so the clothes do not blend in with a dark background and makes the character standout when filming shots- also the lighter colour palette of clothing will create contrast between 'Evie' and 'End's characters.

End's outfit is inspired by the Grim Reaper, Harry Potter's Dementors and the Greek Mythological figure Thanatos. Due to the rich amounts of dark dramatic flowing rags that further the sinister atmosphere of the character's arrival.

(reference images are in my sketchbook)

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Final storyboard for my stop motion animation.