The Yew Tree

So this weekend we finally made it to the great yew tree in Ormiston. Mainly for a picnic but I spent the afternoon sketching eyes into the bark and hands into the twigs, and photographing everyone climbing around it. It was great reference for the layout and posing in my story board frames as well as character design.

Prepare to Board!

Prepare to board!: creating story and characters for animated features and shorts.
Nancy Beiman, (Amsterdam, Boston, Focal Press, c2007)

This book is great for tips on story boarding and character design, and this flow chart on the 'Anatomy of Adaptation' is really useful for planning what needs to be done to bring your film together at the end.

Coraline

I watched Coraline last night, I wanted to see what Selik had done with the theme of a child feeling ignored and unloved by her parents, which is what my film is about.  It was really interesting but overall I felt that Coraline is about a girl who is bored. She escapes her normal reality and finds herself out of her depth, it concludes with her coming to terms with life in the country and learning to amuse herself. Where as my story is about Hannah feeling ignored but learning that her mum is there when she needs her and will have time to talk if Hannah asks.

The Story So Far

Formative assessments and sleepless nights...

Last week we had to hand in all we have so far.  Although it was only formative (doesn't count at the end) I wanted to get as much out of my head onto paper as possible so I got useful feedback. The problem was the more I get onto paper the more my mind thinks of, so until my films is done I guess I won't be happy!

In the end I managed to get my sketchbooks and an animatic together that tells my story, but I still need to get the text together and put on some sound samples.  Dan is composing some themes to try out on the different sections, my friend Kat is having a look at the text for me and I am a bit in limbo this week waiting for everything to come together.  Still, plenty of dissertation to write!

Planning a Scene

This is some of my working on the scene where Hannah decides she should go after the moon before I get to story boarding it.

Story Surgery

At the end of this week we have to hand in everything we have so far. To get the most feedback I want to get my story settled and boarded with text on it.  (If possible as an animatic so I can get it sent off to Dan to start the music.) So I put my story board up in the studio and have been pestering people to talk to me about it all day.  Claire helped me realise that I hadn't found a clear premise to the story, and that would enable me to clarify an ending and the point of all the events before.  

I think that the point for me is that Hannah's family love her, even if she doesn't see it.  This afternoon Alan came round to give us some help and he really helped me see that where I was looking to add stuff to the story to help it all link together, I actually needed to strip it back to the key elements, which then seemed to all fall into place.  

Her mother is busy but not neglectful, and she doesn't directly ask her for attention.  When she goes to find the moon it is like her going to find a connection to her mother.  Seeing this made me realise most of the stuff with friends, school and other family members is unnecessary, I only need one family member.  It also helped bring it to a logical end. When the fog clears at the end and the magic of the tree has gone, Hannah is left at the top. Meanwhile her mother has noticed her missing and come after her, she finds Hannah stuck at the top of the tree and guides her down. 

Other things that we spoke about where not showing the mother as a whole at the beginning, not her face, perhaps just her hands being busy doing jobs, as this is all Hannah sees, not the full picture.  This can follow through the story with the tree's hands lifting her to the moon and her mother's hands lifting her down.  Alan also suggested a lovely idea, with her misting up the window at the beginning while she speaks and then wiping it away with her hand, this can act as foreshadowing for when the tree comes to life and lifts her up, he can use his branches/hands to wipe away the fog.  Ainslie had a good idea about her words collecting in the sky and forming the blackness around the moon.

Now, home to watch Coraline, I hear it's quite similar in theme. 

Hello Dan!

Abi has introduced me to her brother Dan Welch, who is doing a module on music for the screen this semester on his course at Edinburgh University.  He is after a film to get his music all over and I think he may be the guy for me! I've shown him a few bits and a quick synopsis and he has sent me this piece he had already with a few changes to suit my film.  Now all I need is an animatic for him to work through...

TV paint

Today Will showed me how to use TV paint. How handy is that! I'm not sure quite what I will need it for yet but I think it will be really helpful at some point, even if it doesn't replace my drawing all together.

Pitching

Over the last 2 weeks we have pitched our film ideas to Jared, Alan and Dave Bull twice. My first presentation got bogged down in the reason for having the text and whether or not I was trying to create the new big thing in educational children's literature. Which I'm not! Since then I've been researching a lot of children's illustration and putting together an animatic to better explain my how I envision the text and image will work together.  The second time round I left my story out of the presentation as that hadn't changed much, and just showed this new animatic.  The sound I've used is just a scratch track so far.  Ideally I am looking for something more busy and upbeat at the beginning, and something that flows from section to section.

This time everyone seemed to get excited about the idea and wanted to add they're own suggestions for where the text could go.  This is the best that I could possibly have hoped for.  Now I know I just need to bash out my story for the next 10 days so its ready for the formative hand-in. If I'd have showed my whole animatic they would have torn me apart!

Dave Bull

We have just had meetings and talks with the brilliant Dave Bull who has worked for the script development department at Aardman. I will be taking some of his tips on board, but he seemed to be excited by my animatic so far with the text on it.

He deconstructed Pixar's Wall-E for us, (which I now wish I'd seen before he told us the end!) and explained about the beats of a story, and the positive and negative balance of the events. A lot of it built on the Hero's Journey theory that I learnt whilst at Emily Carr in Vancouver last year although he had much clearer names for the sections than 'Return with Elixer'! A really great talk and gave me lots to think about with my story this week.

Lauren Child and Dave McKean

Talking of text and image working together I got to looking at Lauren Child's books and films, as well as Dave McKean's work.  Both use text really effectively as part of their illustrations and have given me a few ideas for my text and animation coming together.

Ryan Woodward

This is a little unrelated, but isn't it beautiful!

Boney Villains & Evil Queens

The idea for the tree coming alive came from a long sunday watching disney films and falling in love with the animation of the tall, boney, female villains.

Snow White

This is what I'm talking about!

It's Alive!

An early sketch of the tree coming alive.

My Story...

There will be lots of development this week before we hand in our animatics for assessment next friday, but I here's what I have so far...

Hannah was a quiet girl. She liked school and she liked the other children, Hannah loved her family, but everyone seemed too busy too listen to her.  So after bedtime, every night Hannah would talk to the moon. And the moon listened.

One day Hannah came home, excited to tell everyone that it was due to snow that night.  But no one had time to listen.  Hannah didn't mind; she knew that the moon would be excited too. But when she slipped behind her curtain, the sky was full of fog and the moon was no where to be seen.

In a panic Hannah rushed to check her calender; sure enough the moon should have been full tonight.  She hurried down stairs to get help. But her mum was changing the baby, who was crying, and dad's favourite program was on. No one even noticed her.  Rescuing the moon was up to her.

Hannah took a torch, and her blanket because it was cold. She slipped out of her window, and down the ivy.


DO NOT READ ON IF YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW THE END!


She just make out the old tree that stood near where the moon normally was, so she set of in the fog towards it. (I want to put some more detail in here!)

When Hannah reached the old tree it seemed much bigger and much scarier than ever before. But she could see the feint glow of her beautiful moon shining through the branches and fog. She longed to be close to her friend so she began to climb the tree.

As she climbed the branches got thinner, the wind got stronger and Hannah began to slip. Her torch fell from her hand. She watched it fall through the branches and smash to pieces on the grass far below. She had to cling to the branch to stop herself falling with it.

Tears built up in her eyes as she hung there, she knew she should never have come alone.  Now both she and the moon would be lost, and no one would even notice.  When she thought that it could never get worse the tree began to creak and crack like never before. The twigs and branches shuddered and Hannah watched as they bent into fingers and hands. Then the knots in the trunk splintered and opened wide into bright green eyes.

Hannah was terrified.

"Please" She pleaded, "I didn't mean to, I didn't mean to disturb you."

The tree picked her up and looked at her, Hannah looked back into its bright green eyes.

"I just wanted to find the my friend the moon" She stammered, Petrified that the tree would drop her at any moment.

But then the tree flicked its wrist and launched her in the air, catching her in his very highest branches.

When Hannah dared to open her eyes she was filled with joy, for the tree had lifted her so high that she was above the fog and the clouds and her own world was far below her; she was safe in the hands of the tree.

As she laughed and told the moon about her adventure and her new friend who had helped her find him, the fog below her cleared.  And when she had finished and was too tired to say anymore, the moon lit her path all the way home.

Cynthia

This is Hannah's cousin cynthia performing to her favourite dance track!

Hannah

I drew this character sheet back in May while I was still thinking about my story. Hannah has stayed the same since, although she was called Evie back then.

eBooks

On the idea of bringing childrens books to life, here is an openbook program on Radio4 about the effect they can have on the reader, scroll through to 19 minutes...

Click here to listen

Also while we are on the subject of eBooks, You have to see Alice by Atomic Antelope

Joanna Lurie

This is a film called 'Under The Stone' (2004) by French Animator Joanna Lurie, better known for her beautiful film 'The Silence Beneath The Bark' (2010).  This is the first place that I saw text in working as part of the animation.  It is where I was first inspired to use text as a character in my film, giving me the idea to bring a children's book to life.

Usborne Bedtime Stories

To get some ideas for my story I went back to reading favourite stories from my childhood.  Some of the ones I remember most clearly are from the usbourne book of bedtime stories, Button Nose, Dragon Train, Nail Soup, The King And His Three Children...

I wont tell you them all but here is The House With The Golden Windows.  

There was also 'Lets Go Home Little Bear' and 'Can't You Sleep Little Bear' by Martin Waddell, with beautiful illustrations by Barbara Firth. Here it is adapted for the Jackanory childrens show on BBC.

Elise Simmard

Elise Simard is an Animator working in Montreal.  I love the look of the sun at 1:20 :)
Also watch 'Afloat At Dawn' if you have chance.

The Heron & The Fish

This is a film from project that I worked on with Claire Lamond and Roza Brozek from my class, and Emma Moore who is a music student at Edinburgh University.  It formed the 4th part of a 5 part story with music written and performed live by the students.  Claire, Roza and I have very different visual styles so initially struggled to see how we would work together.  We developed this collaged background and drawn animation to utilize everyone's strengths, its a great way to bring depth and texture to my 2D style and it is the process I will use for my film.

The test...

This is a collage I made last year when we were first asked to think about what we wanted to do with this year.  I was really happy with it and the reaction it got from everyone I showed it to.  So pretty early on I knew this was how I wanted it to look, now I just have to write a story to fit it!