Professional Creative Production 1

[mi6011amytaylorsteward]

Evaluation

In conclusion I found this project quite exciting & interesting to work on. I got to look into areas that I haven’t thought about before & create my own survey & get the public’s input on it. I think my research was sufficient & helpful to my ideas & the research I undertook influenced heavily on my style choices.

The problems I encountered were mainly in creating the animation itself. I had problems in creating my ideas physically but I managed to find a solution by taking another method of creating them. One thing I would do differently if I were to recreate this project is to redo some ideas in the animation as I felt they could’ve been better executed visually with another idea. Overall I feel pretty confident with my finished piece.

[mi6011amytaylorsteward]

Final Animation

[mi6011amytaylorsteward]

Hero Poster/Image

when creating the hero image I thought about what route to go down in terms of style. When creating my assets I thought about the hero image & thought about whether I should go minimalist or complex. I decided on a mix of the two by creating a flat colour design with some details i.e. the gradient background & hills etc. I eventually used the same assets to make almost the same scene in my actual animation as I liked the design so much.

[mi6011amytaylorsteward]

Making Of Animation: After Effects

After making the assets, I used Adobe After Effects to create the animation. I first mapped out the audio with the visuals by creating an animatic, this allowed me to see how long the visuals need to be on for & when to start & stop animating. I imported the files of the assets I needed & started animating.

I ran into some problems creating the neon line as I could not quite figure out how to use the illustrator created asset in after effects in the way I wanted. However I did find a solution of tracing the outline with a shape layer, using gaussian blur on one of the layers & using trim paths on the the shape layers so that it would appear as if it were being drawn on. This worked successfully & created the same effect that I wanted with the illustrator asset. Another thing that I successfully did when creating the animation is having the text of “short term” & “long term” move with the windscreen wipers. At first I thought about animating them separately but that would require a lot more manoeuvring of the asset by animating it’s position. Instead I thought about parenting it to the windscreen wipers that were already animated so that it would directly move with it. So I parented the windscreen wipers to the words & watched the scene back to see where I needed to adjust it. I did have to adjust the placement of the words a tiny bit as I needed the words to sit on the lines when it moved. After doing that it looked more cleaner & polished.

Another example of creating the animation that was particularly tricky was animating the “party” scene where the word “party” comes out of the party popper, along with confetti. I did find it tricky to keep up with all the layers building but I did find it fun to animate the confetti rotating & increasing in size as it came out of the party popper.

As for the rest of the animation, I didn’t particularly run into any problems but I did have to slightly alter some of the animation scenes as I found I liked it better than what I had planned originally.

[mi6011amytaylorsteward]

Making Of Animation: Assets

To aid me making my assets, I used Adobe Illustrator rather than Photoshop to get a cleaner finish. When making my assets I referred to my sketches from my mindmaps & storyboards as well as my inspiration mood board. I wanted to have an 80s/90s retro feel to my animation so I chose to use neon & Memphis style to inspire my piece.

I used the technique from the Youtube tutorial I researched to create a neon effect on my assets. To do this I did the following: offset the path, set the offset size, coloured the offsetted path a lighter colour of the original shade, clicked on the original path & use gaussian blur, set the gaussian blur to a blur amount of my choosing. I did the same with the other neon assets.

For the car scene, I was inspired by the 80s vaporwave scenes with hills, trees & the sun in the background. I used a gradient for the background & used flat colours to create the rest of the scene, layering it up. 

For the Memphis style assets I used the Memphis style colour palette I made to colour the assets. I also was inspired by some Memphis style imagery I reblogged on tumblr which included an outline of the shape in a darker colour or black. I liked that technique so I decided to implement the technique in my own work.

Examples of the assets in Memphis style I created:

[mi6011amytaylorsteward]

Techniques: Neon Style

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Colour Palette

After being inspired by my research & inspiration, I decided on a colour palette to go with. As I wanted to use a mix of neon & Memphis style in my animation, I decided to use colours such as: pink, yellow, light & dark blue, purple, green, orange, & red. I then lightened them to create a similar Memphis colour scheme. I will both colour schemes in my animation.

[mi6011amytaylorsteward]

Animatic

[mi6011amytaylorsteward]

Storyboard

After deciding on the final ideas for my animation, I storyboarded them out to visually plan out my animation & to find out how the camera will move & transition from each animation.

[mi6011amytaylorsteward]

Idea: Structure

The idea of my animation to accompany the existing audio will consist of an 80s/90s retro style with a some Memphis style sprinkled into the animation as I felt really inspired by it. The animation will be in 2D & will have some minimalistic style to it as I want the focus to be on the audio. I will create a storyboard to visualise my ideas before creating the animation itself.

The animation will start with a neon outline of a head, to visualise the dilemma that we have. It will then zoom into the next scene of a car driving & with a zoom into the windscreen wipers you see the words “short term” & “long term” appear on screen as the windscreen wipers wipe across. The next scene focuses on the key word “party” which will be in neon as well as the assets. The party popper will pop out the word along with confetti, one star will be followed down screen & will land in a piggybank. The word “save” on the piggybank will be zoomed in on & then fade away. The next key word to appear on screen will be ‘iPhone’, the “o” in the word will change to different shapes & will stop on a rectangle which will followed down screen to land & fade into the ground as sapling grow up to replace it. The scene fades to reveal the word “time” without the dot above the “i”. A fast forward appears on the screen & the screen zooms into the dot to fill the screen. The seen after this starts with a line appearing & growing into buildings. The words “place” appears & then the camera pans down. Afterwards planets pop onto the screen one by one until arrows appear around planet & shrink it (at the same time that happens the other planets disapper), the scene fades to white. Next, a paper plane flies past in a loop-de-loop & off screen. After that, a phone charger tries to charge a phone & it charges, once it charger is removed it becomes dead again (this happens in a loop). Next, a tsunami wave covers the screen & the camera pans down. Circles appear with the words “living in balance” & “thriving in balance”. After fading into the next scene. a board with some nails appear & a hammer hammers the words “circular economy” “rewilding” & “other areas”  as the nails are hammered into the board. A box appears around the scene & the lid shuts it with the word “boundaries” on top of the lid. The last scene is a ball of light transmitting light to create tinier balls of light. Then the camera fades to white/black.

[mi6011amytaylorsteward]

Style Trends: Minimalism & “Reblanding” in Branding/Logos

One style trends I have seen grown into fashion is minimalism or “reblanding” as it was coined by the media. Companies are now favouring a minimalist look to brand themselves as it looks very clean cut & professional. It is also makes it easier to variate designs if needed. “Reblanding” is a term used when companies reinvent their brand, like rebranding, but instead they move to a minimal theme. Some may say reblanding can mean moving to a blander design, but this is not always the case. Companies like Dairy Milk have taken this approach with a no words on their chocolate bar & it was successful because of their status using their unique colour of purple.  This suggests that companies have to have a certain level of status in pop culture before minimalising their designs. For example Google is infamous for their colour scheme in their logo. However as seen in the image below they started their company with a complexer design & minimalised their designs when they became well known to just use their colour scheme to be recognised. Pepsi also does this with their colours & logo as they no longer have words on their logo. Companies have utilised their iconic logos by making it the forefront of the design. For this example Adidas & Starbucks use their iconic logos & font as the forefront of their design, knowing that it will be instantly recognisable.

Photo Sources:

Hinde, Natasha (2019), Cadbury Removes Words From Dairy Milk Packaging For A Very Important Cause, (accessed date: 29/12/20)

Navigation Advertising (N/A), Evolution of Top Brands, (accessed date: 29/12/20)

Shpitula, Natalia (2020), How to Create a Minimalist and Simple Logo, (accessed date: 18/12/20)

What I think is effective, is the fact that minimalism cuts out the unnecessary design & information when you look at it. More companies are reblanding as they want to fit in with the everchanging style trends, but I think it is the best move forward permanently as the design reflects to what the company actually does, not distracting you with a complex logo.

[mi6011amytaylorsteward]

80s & 90s Style Inspiration Board

Photo Sources:

Orta, Diego (2016), '80s Neon Shapes/Wallpapers, (accessed date: 18/12/20)

CharlotteWinter (N/A), Vicky - 80s, 90s, bright neon, shapes, design, pattern, trendy, hipster, memphis design Comforters, (accessed date: 18/12/20)

Justinmind (2018), 10 90s websites designs you won’t believe existed, (accessed date: 18/12/20) DA01 (2015), What 1990s graphic design trends are still considered modern?,(accessed date: 18/12/20)

Satgur Design Studio (2019), 90s Party Flyer Template, (accessed date: 18/12/20)

Keung, Laura (2020), Neon Sign Photoshop Effect, (accessed date: 19/12/20)

DanielCampos (N/A), Vaporwave Background Illustration - Download Free Vector Art, Stock Graphics & Images, (accessed date: 21/12/20)

User17446225 (2020), Retro 80s style tropical sunset with palm tree silhouette and gradient sky background. classic 80s retro design. digital landscape cyber surface. Premium Vector, (accessed date: 19/12/20)

[warakami-vaporwave]

2 Memphis Group and Vaporwave inspired designs I did for part of my collab with the brand @publicspace.xyz

Click here to see how they turned out!

[warakami-vaporwave]

starting some Memphis Group style studies

follow me on instagram!

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[rslashvaporwave]

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[mi6011amytaylorsteward]

Research: MTV & Retro/ Throwback Aesthetic

MTV, a television channel launched in 1981, has rebranded it’s look multiple times over the years to keep up with the everchanging trends & likes of the channel’s target audience, young people. As the years went on & the brand moved on to more than just a music channel, there were various colour deviations of the logo & changes - however the logo itself has not vastly changed.

MTV Bumps: A New Advertising Approach With Nostalgic Style

MTV Bumps is a digital space where you could create your own bump/ident & was a part of MTV’s 2015 new rebrand & strategy of advertising. With this method of advertising you could create your own bump/ident & the company would use it as an ident in between shows. This was a forward way of thinking & made MTV really connect with it’s audience as they incorporated users in with their marketing strategy.

Photos Sources:

1000logos.com (2020), MTV Logo, available at: (accessed date: 18/12/20)

Nuvonium.com (2010), 1981 - MTV’s identity is born, (accessed date: 18/12/20)

MTV ZA (2015), #MTVBump, (accessed date: 18/12/20)