imnotyourunclefelix

19. UAL: Wimbledon Student.

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The National Gallery, London

Claude Monet’s Water-Lillies, Setting Sun (1907) 

Henri Matisse’s The Forest at Fontainebleau (1909)

John Constable’s The Cornfield (1826)

Claude Monet’s Irises (1914-17)

The following photos of paintings I saw inspired my interpretation of my animation group’s set design. This visit to the National Gallery inspired me to introduce bright, contemporary colours to our adaptation of a fantastical jungle. 

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Frog and Monkey King - my completed animation puppets

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Frog Armature: Padding Out

During the Easter holidays I aimed to complete my frog puppet in time for going back to university as this was when we were due to start filming. Therefore, I worked incredibly hard over the break.

   When initially padding out the wire armature I was recommended to wrap string around the polystyrene body and aluminium arms and legs so that the plasticine had something to grip on to. This technique worked wonderfully on the frog’s foam torso, however, I was not happy with the end result of the limbs. Therefore, I decided to detach the string and apply miliput to the wire arms and legs to work as the arm’s humerus and ulna/radius and the leg’s femur and tibia/fibula. I felt that this worked a lot better in not only creating more of a rigid, humanoid movement but also in gripping to the plasticine. 

   Another problem I stumbled upon was creating the frog’s face shape as I wanted his face to have movement in order to allow a wide range of facial expressions without the face being completely support-less. The above images are my first attempts at creating my frog’s skull shape out of miliput and foam, I really disliked this creepy style so ditched quite quickly.

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Frog Armature

When making the basic wire armature for my frog puppet I faced numerous challenges as this was the first time I had made a professional approach to building an armature - previously I had just winged it without much thought, however now my puppets were going to actually need to function so I needed to make a supportive structure.

Challenges faced:

  When measuring the length of wire myself and Vicky were unsure what how much aluminium wire we would need for our puppets  as we both didn’t know where to start in terms of the sizes of our puppets. Therefore, we drew out a simple stick-man sketch for each of our puppets and put them alongside each other so the size differences were relevant to our frog and bushbaby designs.

   Another issue I faced was when I was preparing the padding/foam in order to build up the shape of my frog armature. Due to our lack of desk space, I decided to work on the floor, however in doing so someone stood on the foam pieces I had sculpted for my frog’s body. Therefore, I learnt to store every part/component of any armature I'm working on in it’s own box so to avoid this in the future.

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Grinning Man: Cast/Crew Q&A

   During a UAL organised social event, I was invited by my friend Jen to go see The Grinning Man. The Grinning Man is a musical adaptation of Victor Hugo’s novel ‘The Man Who Laughs’ which follows the story of Grinpayne who is paraded as a freak with a travelling fairground due to his hideous scars across his mouth. 

   Having heard very little about this musical and novel I didn’t not what to expect other than a brief synopsis of the novel recited by my friend who was trying to remember what she’d read from a Wiki article. However, I am very glad I went into this performance with no preconceptions as this musical blew me away. 

   Not only were the performances from the cast incredible and the music atmospheric yet humorous, the set design by Jon Bausor (lead set designer) in collaboration with the puppetry of Gyre & Gimble was mind-blowing - bringing Victor Hugo’s story even more to life. 

   After the performance, the audience was invited to stay for a Q&A with the director, Tom Morris; writer, Carl Grose and composer/songwriter; Marc Teitler. At the beginning of the discussion, when talking about inspiration for the show they mentioned how they were disappointed by the Phantom of the Opera as it didn’t live up to the Gothic musical that they had envisioned (especially with all the media hype around it as well). Therefore, this inspired them to create the monster-man musical they wanted and fulfil their search for something that appealed to their sense of the absurd.

   When asked about how he accumulated this fantastic team of artists and designers for ‘The Grinning Man’, Tom Morris said that he wanted to assemble a team of geniuses; looking for artist who can do what he can’t, and think of things he’d never have dreamt of.

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Storyboard

Once we had finalised our genre and narrative, alongside choosing our final characters and set ideas I decided to begin making our storyboard. Throughout my making of the storyboard I constantly asked my other teammates for advice so not to make them feel left out. This proved effective because when I was having an artistic block my team members were able to provide me with a new perspective of how the narrative could be portrayed visually. 

Edit: On 02/03/2018 Andy Symanowski met with my group to discuss our animation and said my storyboard was incredible detailed. His only advice was to add a cell showing what the frog has to decide between e.g. choose between a shot of gold/treasure or a shot of a deserted, poor kingdom filled with unhappy townspeople.

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Genre 

Personally, I was really excited to try my hand at a gangster/film noir inspired stop-motion animation as it would have given us a chance to adapt our children’s story into something darker and grittier. However, after meeting with Kerry (our course leader) she recommended we choose another genre as other groups had already chosen that genre. This disappointed me greatly, however, I realised that this didn’t mean we had to make our film less gritty. In the end, we decided upon a fantasy/adventure genre as this would allow us to create a fantastical jungle full of alien-inspired plants and would further allow us to play with colour throughout the puppet making and set building process.

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Set Design - Initial Sketches by Marta, Emma and Josie 

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Initial Character Design and Sketches

Above are the initial designs and sketches of our characters for our stop-motion animation of the Aesop’s fable ‘The Apes and the Two Travellers’. 

Vicky was assigned the ‘truthful traveller’ so decided to research into animals that appear innocent, cute and lovable as this would help the audience build an attachment to this character even quicker. After looking into tapirs, rabbits and squirrels we eventually decided upon a bush-baby inspired character as their large eyes and ears make them perfect for our ‘cute’ inspired traveller.

I was assigned the ‘lying traveller’ so decided to research into animals that people associate with being sly, sneaky, dishonest and generally evil, in order to further imply this character’s distrustful personality. Initially, we discussed having a snake as this character due to it’s biblical background (the snake convinced Eve to eat from the Garden of Eden). However, we thought this would be difficult to animate alongside the bush-baby character, so therefore, decided upon a frog based character as it would work alongside the bush-baby well but still in keeping with the sly eyed appearance of a dishonest character.

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Aesop’s Fable - The Apes and the Two Travellers

At the beginning of my group’s discussion about which story we’d like to base our animation from we were intrigued by Struwwelpeter’s ‘The Dreadful Story of Pauline and the Matches’ due to it’s macabre narrative. However, we came across a problem very early on when discussing our ideas for this story which was the fact that we’d have to create fire. This is incredibly difficult to do well using stop-motion animation, with our time schedule and with the materials we had. Therefore, we changed our story to Aesop’s ‘The Apes and the Two Travellers’.

Above is our initial mind map of possible ideas for our storyline, including possible characters, genres, themes and set ideas. 

Before starting on our storyboard ideas for our film we decided to create a draft script for our narration as we wanted to avoid our stop motion puppets from talking in order to save time when we begin animating after the Easter break. Once the narration was complete, Vicky and I timed ourselves reading it to see if we need to edit our script down in order to fit the 90 seconds time-frame we’ve been given for our animation. Unfortunately, we ran over by a few seconds so had to revise our script in order to condense the story without stripping it completely of narrative and story. 

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Early Man (2018)

On Valentine’s day I went to see Aardman Animations’ latest feature film ‘Early Man’ as I am making my own stop motion animation for this terms’ project.

The film follows a caveman called Dug and his tribe who live peacefully hunting rabbits in the secluded valley. However, the arrival of the Bronze age threatens him and his tribes’ safety. In order to prevent Lord Nooth from destroying his home and throwing his tribe into the mines Dug challenges Lord Nooth’s prized champions to a football match.

As Andy Symanowski (one of the lead animators for Early Man) is one of our guest tutors for this term I watched Early Man with an appreciation for the stop motion performances. The sets throughout the film were incredible, my personal favourites was The Valley and Lord Nooth’s football stadium. The sheer scale of these builds were astonishing, as well as the attention to detail.

For my group animation this term I hope to make very scenic sets, reminiscent of Aardman’s creations, as we’ve decided to situate our Aesop’s fable in a jungle which will be challenging with all the dense foliage.

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John Lee - model/prop maker

John Lee is a model/prop maker who has worked on various films/tv shows/adverts, such as, Rogue One - a Star Wars story, Fantastic Mr. Fox, Casino Royale and many more.

John Lee went to university to do a Graphics Design course but due to his 5 years passion in making models he decided to develop his skills further as a model maker.

One of Lee’s inspirations is Ray Harryhausen, a fellow model maker in the 1940s who created a form of stop motion animation called ‘Dynamation’. Lee’s love for stop motion is transparent from his work portfolio, working on the sets and models for Tim Burton’s Frankenweenie and Wes Anderson’s Fantastic Mr. Fox.

During John Lee’s presentation at my university he showed us the above image from Wes Anderson’s Fantastic Mr.Fox and informed us that when looking at your sets, see them as modular as this helps aid construction with a constricting time frame and low budget. Additionally, Lee suggested in making aspects of your models removable as he did with the booth in front of Mr. Bean’s annex (circled in red). This allowed for Wes Anderson to have the freedom of filming inside the booth if necessary.

The key thing I learnt during John Lee’s presentation was the use of experimentation, collaboration and communication. Lee is a strong believer in asking for help on the job as this is what the film-making industry strives off; everyone helping each other. 

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Green Screen Filming

For the final task of this project we were asked to put ourselves (or a willing subject in my case) into our colour card models in order to learn how to use the green screen. 

   When my group had an assigned time in the green screen studio I was unable to attend as I had been given the opportunity to partake in some work experience. My group were very understanding of my situation which I really appreciated, however, due to our schedules becoming increasingly hectic we began running out of time to make out green screen film.

   Luckily we had made a storyboard in preparation which definitely helped reduce our time frame when we finally got round to filming our green screen. However, due to our poor time management, we had to make a makeshift green screen in a Print and Time based media studio which we were unfamiliar with. 

   The above clip isn’t a shot from our film but of my own attempt at ‘ultra keying’ my team member into my set as I wanted to put my skill learnt in the inductions to practise. This came quite naturally to me as I find editing really enjoyable, however, I feel that if I had more time I would be able to refine it more e.g. add sound, colour correcting, video transitions etc.

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Sign Making

For the ‘transforming a location’ brief we had to design a sign that would suit our dressed sets and once we had finalised an idea we had to draw a 1:1 scale technical drawing, create a 1:25 scale version which would fit into our 1:25 scale colour card models and then create an accurate 1:1 scale version of our designed sign. 

   Having already previously learnt how to technical draw I was comfortable in designing a relevant sign that would work seamlessly into my set. I had to occasionally refer back to my previous technical drawings to get the border measurements correct and as a reference for a possible layout. However, in terms of the sign making process the designing aspect came the most natural to me compared to the later processes e.g. metal work and wood work.

   Once my design had been completed, I decided to scan my A3 technical drawing into the computer to then transfer over to Adobe Illustrator so I could begin deciding what part of my design I wanted to be cut or engraved. This process was probably the most frustrating aspect of my sign making as it required a lot of trial and error to get every aspect of the design correct for laser cutting. Due to the fact that this was the most time consuming aspect of my sign making I think I would allocate more time towards this so I could make fewer mistakes.  

(Above: my Adobe Illustrator drawing of my skull design, ready for laser cutting - red line for cutting, black line for engraving)

   After finally two of my skulls designs, one reversed so the design would align and be able to glue with the skull working effectively on each side, I began building my metal base. Considering I had never done metalwork before, other than the course required inductions, I was quite intimidated to start work with metal. However, with the amazing help of the metal workshop tutors Sarah and Tyson, I was able to learn how to bend 6mm metal using the vice or moulds they’d made as a resource prior. Additionally, once I had made the curved metal pieces I then welded the pieces together to form the decorative platform for my skull head. The following day I created the base of the decorative extension so the sign could be mounted onto a wall and once I had drilled the appropriate holes and welded it all together I had a completed sign.

   This project task has been a challenge but with a very rewarding outcome as I am extremely proud to see my hard work pay off, especially as I had never used a laser cutting machine properly or worked with metal before. Therefore, I feel that overall my completed sign was a success but if I were to do it again I would organise my time a lot better especially when laser cutting as that is a lot more time consuming than I had initially thought.

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Colour Card Model

This is my completed colour card model design of a Victorian shop front based on my chosen location. I am incredibly proud of the final outcome as I have dedicated numerous hours towards each aspect of this design and think that it works cohesively and effectively.

However, I faced various problems throughout the making of my colour card set:

At the beginning of this creative process, I had never used kapaline foam board before, therefore, I was oblivious to how easy it could be cut through. This caused an issue when making the brick pattern on my walls as I would be occasionally too heavy handed and would then pierce through the surface completely. Thankfully, with the help of superglue and trial and error, I was able to ease off the pressure when creating texture into the kapaline foam.

A big part of making our colour card models come alive was the use of colour and texture, so when I began transforming the original bay window into a shop front it was key that I got the wooden frame texture perfect. I tried to cut into the stencil card prior to painting to see if the texture would be visible against the black framework. However, this was not successful as the black acrylic paint hid most of the scrapes and marks I tried to imprint into the card beforehand. Therefore, I decided to paint my window frames black and then using a cut piece of kitchen scourer scratch away at the paintwork to create more of a worn/aged texture. This created a really effective worn wood effect which allowed my windows to work more cohesively with the worn, dirty surroundings.

Another issue I had was dirtying down the window panes in my door and shop front display. I used acrylic with a dry brush to apply the grime colour and then scratched away at the paint once it had dried so to give the windows a more grubby appearance. However, I feel that this is my least favourite part of my design as the shop front windows are too grubby/dark that you are unable to clearly see the shop front display. Therefore, next time I will apply I lighter coat of paint to the acetate when adding the dirtying down effect to my set.

Regardless of the numerous challenges I faced whilst making my Victorian inspired set I am really proud of the finished piece and the following photos that I took. I love how much detail can be seen, despite not being able to see into my shop front window as clearly as I initially wanted. Overall. I am extremely proud of the final outcome and would love to try my hand at more colour card model-making.

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Technical Drawing: Sign

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Museum of London: Victorian Walk

   The week before my course started for the new year, my friend (Libby) and I went to the Museum of London as Libby had discovered that there was a historically accurate, London-based Victorian street set which was ideal research for our Victorian inspired set transformations.

   During this exhibit we can across various shop fronts and alleyways that were perfect inspiration for our own ideas and set designs. I really enjoyed the cobbled stone, antiquated shop window designs and miscellaneous items on display - this helped me decide what type of shop front I want to create and how I would dress a window display from the late 19th/early 20th century. 

   Additionally, prior to my visit to the museum, I wasn’t aware how colourful and flamboyant certain aspects of Victorian street life were. This has influenced me to continue with my blue, indigo and grey colour scheme as it is reminiscent of the Victorian street life.