Summary:
Today was an incredibly productive day. The day consisted of an informative introduction to our new module, Animated Narratives. This was followed by a day spent forming our groups for Coursework 1 – and brainstorming all of our ideas for the key theme (“FOOD”) of our group’s future animated short. Below is a picture I took during the lecture.
Module Structure:
Today’s lecture taught us about the structure of the module, and informed us that it consists of two courseworks/assignments:
Coursework 1: Assignment 1: 30 to 60 Second Animated short (Practical) – Thursday 8th May – Noon – 70%
Coursework 2: Assignment 2: Animated short (Reflective Research Blog) – Thursday 8th May – Noon – 30%
Coursework 1: (INFO)
My Group: (NAME: TBD)
Our groups were not pre-determined for us like in our other module for this semester – we were allowed to choose and form them ourselves.
My group for Coursework 1 consists of 4 people:
- Myself
- Aster Atlas
- Jamayne Guibao
- Christine Weng
I am already friends with these three people so it was a great opportunity today to catch up with them and rekindle our creative sparks together. Two of these people I actually know from my Art Foundation Year that I completed last year. I think the fact that I know them (meaning introductions are out of the way) means that we can work more cohesively and in sync with each other. I will be careful though that this comradery and relaxed attitude does not produce any complacency which could hinder the quality of our work – both collectively and individually.
(Aster is not present in the above photo)
Activities Done Today: (IN CLASS)
Activity 1: (VIDEO, THEN ANSWERING QUESTIONS)
Below is the animated short, Lifted, by Pixar.
We were asked to give answers to the above questions with reference to the aforementioned animated short. Below are my answers:
- This animated short follows the story of a small alien training to abduct humans (and failing laughably to abduct a human while they sleep in their rural farm house) while being critiqued by their large alien mentor.
- I would say that the genre is Sci-Fi Comedy.
- The protagonists are the two aliens (the human is merely a vessel acted upon (by the aliens) to comedically illustrate the small alien’s incompetence and the large alien’s skill – plus his eventual empathy for the small alien).
- The driving action is the UFO’s Tractor Beam of Light which the Aliens use to comedically maneuver the Human – They do so via. using the switchboard panel located in an observatory deck in their UFO.
- The main conflict of the short arguably begins as an ironic conflict between the small alien vs. himself – he is so incompetent that he is actually making trouble for himself. But more arguably, the main conflict centers between the two aliens due to their dichotomous personalities and skill levels (plus the larger ones seeming apathy and anger at the smaller one). They eventually reach resolution at the end of the short when the large alien takes pity on the smaller one and let’s him drive the UFO back to wherever they came from.
Activity 2: (STORY DICE)
Each group was given a set of Story Dice. Each face of each die had a different symbol/icon (our pack were all medieval/generic-fantasy-themed) which we had to use to generate the vague outline of a story.
This was prepping us for making our own stories for our animated shorts. The results of our dice rolls and the stories we came up with are briefly described below:
“A gnome child is murdered by a troll creature despite the best efforts of the knight – who rides away on his broomstick to inform his commander of this young boy’s death.”
“A ghostly princess and frog prince who absolutely despise each other meet at a royal ball. They are about to fight before a common enemy emerges in the form of a mysterious masked mermaid who intends to disrupt the festivities. The rainbow dragon host (whose scales can act as an ironic invisibility cloak) – teams up with them to fight her. By the time the stories over – these former enemies have fostered a newfound sense of love.”
“An evil owl stalks and antagonises a knight exploring a magical pumpkin forest amidst stormy weather. The knight eventually stumbles upon what the owl has been guarding: a ring and sword plunged into stone. When he uses them he is granted the ability of flight. He can now fight the owl in the skies.”
“A posh British ghost and Irish vampire are longtime immortal enemies (for monster-based and historical reasons of course *wink*). But when their mutual frog-mermaid friend, who lives in a nearby swamp, wants to set up these two undying lovebirds by sending them on a quest to retrieve a garden gnome left under one of the swamp trees – only love can burgeon forth on their journey.”
“A werewolf archer and drug-addicted rat must make their way through a hidden forest to the Tree of Destiny. Both hope for glory at the end of their story – to gain the Ultimate Strength they both believe the sap of this Tree can grant them. But when they both get there they see they are too late, the tree has decayed from all the adventurers before them partaking of its sap. They both agree in their tragedy to plant a new tree from it’s spores – to keep the memory of the old tree alive. Thus also acting as a testament to their friendship forever.”
“A witch (who can morph into a dragon) and a wizard (who can morph into a werewolf) both enter a haunted house on a stormy night. They both seek the powerful magic fey wand that lies somewhere in its depths and hidden recesses. But as they traverse these ancient rooms, they both must avoid the undead pumpkin king who formerly owned the estate and who roams the halls at night looking to chop off a new head for himself.”
“One night, a brave little mouse from the Midwest finally leaves his cave – dressed like a highwayman in mask and a top hat – he sneaks into the castle of a behemoth dragon who slumbers atop his pile of gold. If the mouse can find a hidden gem amongst the resplendent riches then he may finally gain his wish to travel back in time and prevent a great tragedy in his childhood. But he’s just misstepped – the dragon has awoken…”
Activity 3: (WHITEBOARD WORK)
Once our groups were fully formed we were asked to come up with at least 50 ideas on possible storylines for our animated short – all based around the key word/theme: “FOOD”
Below is the first side of our whiteboard that we used to brainstorm all of our ideas in a very quick-and-dirty fashion. We wanted to approach this task with as much creativity as we could and we simply wrote down absolutely any idea that came to mind – no matter how zany or bonkers it appeared at first glance.
Then we each selected our favourite from the whiteboard that we would carry on to our next Activity.
Below is a page I made that highlights what ideas were selected by us from our board:
(They are highlighted in red)
The ideas selected were:
- “Birds stealing food” – Aster
“Charcuterie Board”(Changed to “Honey Bear”) – Jamayne- “Candyland” – Christine
- “Fake Crime Scene” – Jack
Activity 4: (WHITEBOARD WORK – NARROWING DOWN & EXPLORING)
Now that we had narrowed our selection of ideas to just 4, we could begin the process of exploring these ideas more in-depth. We were now considering the possible plotlines, settings, and themes of our favourite ideas. This too was still a very experimental phase of our creative process with notes scribbled EVERYWHERE.
FEEDBACK (From Alec & Lauren)
INSPIRATIONS & RESEARCH:
Below is a general inspirations & research board I put together combining a lot of resources we thought would be useful as we develop our ideas. Specifically with regards to the simplicity of their design, as well as their relationship to “Food”.
HOMEWORK: (FOR NEXT WEEK)
