Reflection

Reflection

This film has been a big eye opener to all the little parts that go into making a short film. I have enjoyed making my film and I'm glad that I made it by myself, but if I were to do it again I would get a team together and share the work load with them. Especially for the model and set building parts as these are not my strong points. I would however like to continue making things towards the production, as it is a skill I would like to improve.

I think that my timing of my character movement has come out very well and I am glad that I took the time to reanimate some of the scenes and tested some of the harder to time scenes as I think the film looks a lot better for it.

I was unsure how the use of 2D images and animation would look along side the stop motion animation but I think that it compliments the animation, and the 2D eyes give my characters more personality.

If I had more time I would work harder in the sound studio on the narration direction. Even though the quality of the sound wasn't very well recorded the first time, I preferred the pacing of the narration to how it sounds now. I like how the new narration sounds, as it is very clear and sits well along the music and the sound effects but there a few pauses that puts the pace of the narration out and sounds quite rushed. This was because I didn't have enough time to be able to get more takes.

I would also have liked to have used lip sync within the film, this couldn't happen while I was filming because the replacement mouths didn't fit my characters properly so they didn't form the shapes I needed. I wanted to do the lip sync in post production using Toon Boom but unfortunately I ran out of time as adding the eyes and mist effects took a lot longer than I thought they would and the post production elements were more of a priority for the finished film than the lip sync so I made the decision not to include any at all.

I have enjoyed making this film because it has been like working for a client, having to be in contact with the author and the publishers to make sure they are happy and also I wanted to do the book justice, as I want to show the finished film to the author and illustrator, in the hopes that they will give me permission to enter it in competitions and show it on my website. This has given me the extra push to finish the film to a good standard.

I have liked working with the green screen, this allowed me to put the different layers of mist between the foreground, character and background. I would have liked to have used a matt painting in the background to give the scene a bit more depth, but I wasn't able to obtain one at the time.

I want to take this project back into production and spend more time perfecting the character movements some day. I would build larger sets, especially the island, dividing it up into a couple of sections to show that the character is moving around a large island. At the moment he looks like is on a very small island and isn't moving very far. I would like to use different fabric for the character's clothes because what I used was quite thin and moved too easily out of shape when I adjusted the character from pose to pose. Also recreating the replacement mouths would be a priority so that I can add in the lip sync. I would also like to complete the film to its original length of five minutes so that the whole book has been recreated.

Making this film has set me up with a wide variety of skills within a production to take forward into other projects and I now know which parts of the production I am better at and which I need to improve on. I have enjoyed animating these characters and I am looking forward to animating my next set of characters. 

Using Green Screen

Using Green Screen

After animating a couple of scenes for my film using a black background and putting them into After Effects, it became apparent that I wouldn't be able to key out the backgrounds easily and the characters would be left looking very dark and not easily scene against the black.

I decided to reshoot these scenes with a green background, this not only made the characters easier to see but I could also prefect the characters movements from the previous take I had done.

Example of removing the green screen

Based on the book Here Be Monsters text © Jonathan Emmett 2013 and illustration © Poly Bernatene 2013, first published by Macmillan Children’s Books.

Test Animations

Test Animations

Scroll Unroll

I am testing the frame rate of the character opening the scroll.

Unfortunately the armature doesn't stand very well on it's own so will try this again with a rig.

Scroll unroll using the character rig.

Beach Walk

Quick walk cycle using the external extension rig.
This cycle would have worked better if I had the tie-downs, so that I could secure the leg the character is putting the weight on to the floor.

Second try at a cycle and I think the key poses are ok, but I think I'm bending the legs too much on the down poses.

Test scene using the wheel

Another take, moving the focus onto the wheel.

Lookout scene test

Removing green screen tests

Test of the sea swaying movement

Overlaying the mist

Monster Scene

Monster Scene

Like the introduction scene, I wanted this image to be 2D so that it bookends the film.

I have used the final image from the book and repainted it to make the colours more simple but striking. This will help the image stand out as it will only be on the screen for a short amount of time to make the viewer want to see the full film to find out what happens.

I have used my island set for the background so that it still fits in with my stop motion film.

Based on the book Here Be Monsters text © Jonathan Emmett 2013 and illustration © Poly Bernatene 2013, first published by Macmillan Children’s Books.

Introduction Scene

Introduction Scene

This is the scene that comes after the titles and the narrator speaks about Captain Cut-Throat.

In the book this image is used before the story begins so I thought the use of 2D with my 3D character would be a good introduction to my film because it is showing an image from the book to start with and will ease the viewer into the next scene that will be stop motion puppets. I will also have the last scene of the film in 2D so that it bookends the film in the 2D book style image.

To do this I made the poster in photoshop and brought it into Toon Boom, along with and a colour changed version of the background used for the cabin scene.

I will then animate a knife being thrown at the poster in Toon Boom.

I will add a photo of Captain Cut-Throat when the puppet is finished.

Adding the knives being thrown was a big task for me as I haven't used Toon Boom much before. I asked one of my class mates to help me with this.

I felt that the first knife being thrown was too slow and didn't look realistic.
I edited the timing and I think that it looks much better.

I have now added the narration to the scene and I think it makes the gaps between the knives being thrown seem shorted than they were before the narration was added.
I still need to add the overlap of the poster on the knives so it looks like they have stabbed through the poster.

Adding the overlap of the poster.

When adding this scene into After Effects I found that the scene ended too suddenly so I have moved the second knife throw forward to give enough time at the end for it to fade out.

I've made this image to use a place setting for when I add the image of my puppet.

Based on the book Here Be Monsters text © Jonathan Emmett 2013 and illustration © Poly Bernatene 2013, first published by Macmillan Children’s Books.

Monster Eggs

Monster Eggs

For the island scene I have had to make two sets of the eggs, one set closed and 

the second cracked open.

These will be attached to the island with blue tac so that they can be changed easily.

I have made the monsters that come out of the eggs from Sculpey.

Based on the book Here Be Monsters text © Jonathan Emmett 2013 and illustration © Poly Bernatene 2013, first published by Macmillan Children’s Books.

New Animatic and Scene Breakdowns

New Animatic

Using the storyboard frames and the narration that I had recorded of Bryan Hancox I made a new animatic so that I could see how long each scene would and how long my characters have got to complete each action within the scene.

Scene Breakdowns

Cabin Scene 18 secs - 432 frames
- 2 secs - Captain holding map.
- 4 secs - Placing map and smoothing out.
- 2 secs - Placing candle on top.
- 3 secs - Leaning back nodding, others agreeing.
- 4 secs - Rat leans forward tapping the paper then leans back.
- 3 secs - Character changing weight and scratching heads.

Wheel Scene 7 secs - 168 frames
- 7 secs - Determined face, side view. Moving the wheel with a slow swaying motion of the camera.

Drinking Scene 4 secs - 96 frames
- 1 sec - Lifts glass.
- 2 secs - Drinks and lowers glass.
- 1 sec - Smiles.

Wheel Scene 3 secs - 72 frames
- 3 secs - Happy face, close up on face. Moving the wheel with a slow swaying motion of the camera.

The Mist Scene 3 secs - 72 frames
- 3 secs - Composited image of the ship swaying to a painted background.

Lookout Scene 4 secs - 96 frames
- 4 secs - Lookout lip sync while pointing towards the mist.

Chef Scene 4 secs - 96 frames
- 4 secs - Chef lip sync while waving the frying pan around.

Nonsense Scene 3 secs - 72 frames
- 3 secs - Captain lip sync, close up of face.

Telescope Scene 6 secs - 144 frames
- 2 secs - Mid shot of Captain with the periscope to his eye.
- 2 secs - Zooming into the lens.
- 2 secs - Close up of island reflected on the lens.

Island Scene 8 secs - 192 frames
- 4 secs - Wide Shot, Captain smiling and looking around.
- 4 secs - Captain walking forward.

Skipping Scene 9 secs - 216 frames
- 9 secs - Picks up the egg, lifts it above his head and skips off with it.

Cracking Sound Scene 5 secs - 120 frames
- 3 secs - Stops skipping, looks around scared.
- 2 secs - Lowers the egg from his head.

Giant Eggs Scene 2 secs - 48 frames
- 2 secs - Mid shot of Captain holding a cracked egg with his arms stretching out. Fast zoom onto Captain's face.

Monster Scene 1 sec - 24 frames
- 1 sec - Still of 2D monster
(To possibly animate at a later stage)

Credits 12 secs - 528 frames

Based on the book Here Be Monsters text © Jonathan Emmett 2013 and illustration © Poly Bernatene 2013, first published by Macmillan Children’s Books.