Week 4

Again this week has been purely concept work (above). We did want to get some rough story board thumbnails done, but came to a group decision that because we potentially have alot of external, internal and four characters to cover, developing our concept seems vital at this point. The director was pleased with one of the jungle paintings i did, so he asked me to go away and concerntrate on doing some more, just on external enviroment and the design of the temple outside. I also managed to design some different jungle leaves seperate from my paintings which will help when we come it model out the plants.
Ive had alot of work to do this week. Ive been working solidly and having all the other projects to do, im wondering how i will get it all done. Some time this week was spent on my essay projects which back tracked a bit on my paintings, and my essays still need to be finished.
As a group we made a start on sketching out the internal temple design. We thought about where all the traps might be placed, what kind of traps and how the 2nd explorer can avoid them. The director then sent me a rough birds eye view map of the temple inside. That then ment i could make a start on the outside of the temple knowing what the room was shaped like. Before starting my paintings i needed to ask the director lots of questions so that i could paint exactly what he wanted. There were a couple of things he specifically asked for the temple to have, so i noted them down.
-possible for light to shine through the roof
-not a typical pyramid step aztec shape
-but high enough to poke through above tree tops
-a canopy of trees leading to the temple
-an open area just before the temple
-no rounded pillars
-no very long staircases leading up to temple
-weathered away building with cracks and vines with grey coloured stone.
The jungle trees and leaves and colours had not been discussed so i guess that part was lefted up to me.

Week 3

This week we where ment to be working on the dialogue for our film, but after a long disscussion we all agreed that maybe no script at all would be better. This means that we will have to work extra hard on the animation and expressions for the characters. Having a script is always a safe bet that the viewer will understand what is going on. However our tutor reminded us that an animation with no dialogue can be understood by all nationalities, imagine how popular it could be! it made me think of all the good cartoons and charlie chaplin films that did so well in their time because the story could be understand by different languages.
Not having to work on a script ment we could really finalise the story. More changes where made, such as instead of having three animals of different personalities watching our explorer, we will be having two animals of opposite personalities (one small, excited, high, fast, keeps making mistakes and the other big, slow, but wise, and knows what hes doing). These two animals will be controling the traps of an aztec temple using buttons and leavers. They will be try to stop our explorer from getting the artificate within the temple but somehow the explorer will manage to miss these trap just by chance or funny coinsidence.
Also this week a fellow character designer/illustrator came to give us a lecture. He showed us his work, and gave me many useful tips on designing characters. For example, a good character is one that has a distinctive siolette. This advice really inspired me to work hard on my designs. He had a quick look at my sketch book and incouraged me with his comments.

On Ash's project this week, he asked me to do some different emotions for the old lady charatcer since he was pleased with the design a gave him. However he wanted to change one thing to the design which was to give her glasses.

















More Character Designs for Aztec film

Week 2

This week Ash’s group asked me to do some concept sketches. I had a read through his story and character synopsis’s. I was very happy he asked for my help and pleased to hear that he liked my art work from art work for his film, which excited me since this was the other project I was interested in. I started to do previous projects. But I will only be working part time on this.
For the film I am working full time on (Aztec escape) we worked till late on the story as a group, breaking it down, rearranging parts and changing parts we weren’t keen on, but the main problem we had was thinking up a good ending. After a long struggle we thought of something that made the story complete. We then started working on the characters background lives, there personalities, since this needs to be known before I start designing them.This week we also had time to work out key shots and scenes. I was able to give suggestions of jungle animals from my research material I gathered in the previous week.

Sketches for "Cafe de Beignet" (Ash's film)

Week 1

The chosen film pitches were announced and i was happy to hear that "Aztec Escape" was one of them. I decided on what groups to participate in. I realised early on that my specialism would be an Artistic role, since people say my character designs and concept work is strong. i also enjoy modeling and other areas such as texturing. However, i struggle on the technical and animating side. i will have to contribute a bit in these areas, which is ok as i am good with lip syncing and sound design. I have talked to the Director of "Aztec escape" and he told me to brief myself on the story and as concept artist, start gathering up material on jungles, animals, just research as much as possible.
So i have started working on this film. Straightway ive looked up jungle enviroments, Aztec ruins and animals that could possibly live in the south americian jungle. I will ask the director what kind of animals he is looking for specificly (jungle, common, realistic, imaginery, etc) i've also researched Aztec patterns, colour schemes because even though at this point the story hasnt been finalised, these are areas that i can start working on.

Inspiration from other artists

A good way to get started on sketching concept work is to look up other peoples work that inspires you. My group discussed what different styles we admired, particularlly the
work from a game called “Jax and Daxter” I researched this game further and found some sketches that show the development process of the exterior settings in the game. These early developed sketches can be very helpful to this project Especially since it is also set in the jungle.

While researching this game I also looked at some screen shots from Disneys Tarzan, mainly for colour reference as I remember loving this animation for its bright and bold jungle colours.