BSA124 References and inspiration

As it was going to be done via claymation, I was interested in our short being made with a material that was malleable to allow for morphing it. This meant that playdoh, or perhaps sand animation was one of the better bets for the look that we were hoping to achieve. Once we came up with our story, we came to the agreement that playdoh would be a good medium to tell it in. This is because we thought it would allow for more freedom in what you can do with it, rather than having stiff figures that look realistic. I personally think that if you are using a medium like playdoh, that can be moulded, it's fun to play with it and make the most of it rather than just creating a world with rules that mirror the rules in our own world.

One concept I had on my mind as an inspiration for the idea of a morphing character was the visuals in the Glass Animals music video for "Pools" that depicts a series of bizarre, morphing scenes. The video is also made using playdoh and stopmotion.

The style of the character is influenced by characters like Morph who is designed very simply-like how we want our character to be. This makes things easier for us because as there will be a lot of movement in our short, and it is easier to break-down and rebuild a simple character rather than a complex one.

I like the idea we had of a human hand being the force that messes with the characters life rather than it being a hand made out of playdoh, or even something else made out of playdoh. This is because I think that it adds another element to the short because it means there is a bit of a mixture of different mediums. I liked the idea of a soft, squishy, unrealistic character being in the same frame and interacting with a very realistic looking hand that is essentially the complete opposite-in that it can't be morphed or changed in anyway really.

Comments

BSA126 Gump walks.

Gump Side Walk The side walk for Gump. I tried to make him seem as if he is a bit of a sloucher-almost as if he drags himself along the ground a bit. He's a bit of a lonely sad guy so I didn't want him looking too perky and happy. Gump three quarter walk I tried to do the same slouchy, sad walk for the 3/4 walk animation, his head is bowed and I hope he doesn't look too happy. Gump front walk I tried to experiment a bit more with the front walk. My initial idea for Gump would be that although he walks upright, he resorts to a four legged walk at times because he is ment to be a bit primitive in his actions and appearance. I wasn't entirely happy with how the walk turned out and it could definitely do with a few tweaks but I'm happy in the sense that his four-legged walking style gives him a bit of personality. I'm still not fully satisfied with the character design of Gump but I am getting closer to figuring out what I want and what ...

BSA126 Bird, Cat, Dog, Horse.

Exporting in quicktime stopped working again because the videos export with a black background for some reason and this ment that you couldn't see the animations as they are drawn in black. Bird My bird flight featured a flying seal, I'm not sure why. I enjoyed making the bird fly, although I had to do it twice because the first time I animated him flying backwards-or something weird. Dog I used a reference to animate the dog walk before adding hair which made him look more homeless and mongrel-like. Then I felt a bit bad for the poor dog, it's probably a good thing that uploading it as an animation didn't work out, it's too sad. Horse The Horse was fun to do because I like horses. I animated the walk first and then added in a cart because I had some extra time. The man on the cart was done a bit lazily and he sort of shrinks and grows with each frame, but it's not really about him anyway so I don't mind. The horse himself...

BSA106 German Expressionism.

German Expressionism in film came about after WW1, after Germany lost the war. Germany wanted to revitalise the film industry and to create a better impression for the country. The German government subsidised the UFA (Universum-film AG), whose studios were the largest and best equipped in Europe. This became Germans golden age of cinema. German Expressionist film lasted from 1919 to 1933 when Adolf Hitler came into power. Unlike other Western films of that period that focused more so on creating realism, German Expressionism distorts reality to create an emotional effect. Expressionism films employed stylised set design, elaborate costuming, shadowy lighting that emphasises bold contrasts of dark and bright highlights and unnatural make-up. The settings are typically distorted and exaggerated, with key themes being madness, criminality and fracturing of identity. German Expressionism was a huge influence in developing the horror genre. They began to tell the story ...

Nina

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