This blogpost is documenting the time spent on my animation jam project. I thought to include everything here instead of individual posts, and post the homework tasks individually to my blog. This way all my information that I’ve gathered is kept in the same place!

Introduction:

For our animation jam I was part of group Disney, which I stuck with from the beginning. In truth I wish I volunteered to move around more to learn what the over groups were coming up with or even provide my insight, however I wasn’t used to such a big class and the thought of switching groups seemed very intimidating. There was only so many ideas I could contribute when it came to the same subject, and since it was Disney I began to become bored of the ideas I was formulating. It wasn’t until new people came into the group and offered their ideas that I began to become excited again as it was like a breath of fresh air each time. There were times where things were stagnate and we all had our own obligations to carry on with and I wish I was able to provide more for my group as I felt, looking back, there was a LOT more I could’ve done to help our design processes and inspiration along.

Storming the Castle: Process and Development.

In the beginning we were sectioned off into a divided number of groups. In the beginning my group consisted of  me, Angeline (Who of which unfortunately was in the group very temporary due to being in the wrong class, so I hope I remembered her name correctly. If you’re reading this somehow?? I’m so sorry!!), Aaron, Malcom, Eion, Tiernan. Andrea and Ellen.  I was really nervous at the time however I slowly grew comfortable after getting to know everyone. We carried out an ice breaker exercise where we went around Belfast and fulfilled certain prompts through photographs, getting to know each other in the process.

Once we completed this exercise we got together and was encouraged to write down as many ideas for a world as we could, “The crazier the better”. I had forgotten most of these ideas, we took the crazy part and RAN, but I had a lot of fun just writing down whatever came to mind without a filter.

The ideas I came up with were vampire lifestyle, moths that live on the sun, if you step on a crack you break your mums back, allergic to the sun/people live underground and the floor is lava. The amount of ideas was overwhelming and we talked on discord to vote and discuss our favourite ideas and tallied them to see the most popular vote. We first chose whichever ones that appeals to us the most/we thought would be fun and  refined our ideas from 5 from the board down to 1.

After thinking it over I changed my thought process and decided to go for Disney. If we were to build a world we needed to focus on iconology and visuals, Disney has tapped into many genres, environments and concepts that could be explored vs the other ideas, which is all mostly person or physically orientated. There was one more person who needed to vote however Disney won by default regardless.

We then agreed to plan and further our ideas regarding our world through a discord call. I didn’t fully grasp the concept of a world being controlled by Disney however Tiernan at the time put together a PowerPoint documented all our ideas regarding the idea, which by the end made me understand the idea a little better. I was quiet for most of the discord group call trying to collect my thoughts but seeing what others contributed, alongside Tiernan’s visuals/own ideas, made me more confident in our planning stages. We mostly discussed visuals and what route we wanted to take regarding characters, places, concepts, social issues. Malcom mused the idea of what if all the characters from the “failed” Disney movies lived in the slums, and that idea stuck out to me that there could be an oppression and people wanting to break free from Disney’s control. We talked about if the people were against or for Disney ruling the world, the physical impacts and if those impacts were negative/positive. An idea was brought up regarding the Disney headbands/ears being worn at the theme parks and if these to be put into play. Since it’s situated onto the head we discussed the idea of if people are mind controlled into possibly agreeing and conforming to Disney.

Another concept discussed – who was in charge? Walt Disney himself? We agreed that Mickey being in charge would’ve made the most sense because he’s the most iconic figure relating to the brand. Malcom posted his concept of “President Mickey” and Andrea posted concept thumbnails of their Disney world design and I felt inspired to create unsettling world designs of my own. (Shown below, Andrea’s world building thumbnails and Malcom’s dictator Mickey design.)

Here are my concepts based on the discussions and visual information offered so far. I loved Andrea’s Mickey animatronic/spotlight? And later did a thumbnail inspired by the idea of a massive mickey animatronic patrolling parts of the world.

Discord Discussion 02/10/22. I highlighted the ideas I liked the most and moved onto forming concepts over.

Concept: World Controlled by Disney.

Main Worldly concept: Disney is in control – negative impact.

Environment:

Walt and Mickey Statue

Defaced/Destroyed

Surveillance

Mickey’s figure is larger than Walt’s. Conveys Disney’s brand growing larger than expected.

Each Mickey statue is made in each world’s style / clothing.

Disney Castle is made to look more intimidating.

*Epcot.

Background element.

Futuristic- part of Walt Disney’s vision.

Disney IPs and building structure is intentionally cartoony compared to normal buildings. E.g. buildings look cartoony whilst regular people have normal proportions.

Pixar- Another part of propaganda

Is indebted to Disney. Is made fun of the larger company

Is Pixar the outskirts of this Disney land?

Other Ips (e.g Marvel, Star Wars) are at similar status with Pixar in this world.

Society is divided into zones based on the films- Controlled by the Disney Princesses / The main character of those films

Unsuccessful Ips zones are abandoned and are considered the slums. Includes: Prince of Persia, Pirates of The Caribbean, etc.

No activity happens

Forgotten characters can act as freedom fighters

Festivals.

Includes Disney Parades

Live performances of Disney songs

Defy Mickey and you will be put in the dungeon.

Mickey Mouse’s face is on all printed money

People:

People are dressed to resemble Disney characters (Disney bounding).

Society affects both children and “Disney Adults”

Culture- How is it affected?

Toons compared to real people?

What cultures are erased?

Mind Control- People who wear Mickey hats are mind controlled.

Exaggerated ears / Antennas

*Disney characters as titles

Disney Characters can be used as propaganda, resembling a Monarchy. Comparison between the commonfolk and royalty. Is it a lie?

Can also be used as titles people can inherit.

Residents are referred to as “Cast members” to motivate them to be seen and become icons in this society.

Can be victims of circumstance. – E.g. Belle the Third.

How do they handle the pressure of their role?

Trained for roles? Cast Members?

Rejected people. Would they turn to addiction? Are they impoverished?

What happens when one is replaced?

Political Posters of the Disney princesses- including discarded old posters

The Seven Dwarves act as Mickey’s workers

The Wizard Merlin is Mickey’s right-hand man

Plastic surgery- Do people try to look like toons? (Body horror genre)

Transport methods:

Transport- Steam boat willie boats / Dwyane Jungle Cruise boats.

Or the Disney Train.

Portals (circular video call devices in public spaces) can be used for communication in different parts of the city.

Can be made to look like Mickey Mouse’s iconic head shape.

Law:

Mickey Mouse- A symbol. A dictator. (maybe God)

Mickey is always watching.

Is based in Disney Castle. Can be made to look more scary.

Is Disney’s style adhered to in any new works? Would Disney tolerate indie products?

Policing Force- Cops with Mickey Ears? Animatronics?

World leaders- Disney Villains are in control of the policing force.

Is intentionally done for the public to put their trust into the Princesses who are in control of both sides.

 

I wanted to offer a unique perspective to the Disney world idea and thought of the concept of the normal world slowly being overtaken by iconic Disney iconology, except when mixed with reality innocence is stripped away? I looked at it as once you loose that childlike wonder you start to understand the darker parts of the world. I created the first 4 thumbnails and ran out of concept ideas, which I became frustrated with. When I became more familiar with perspective I implemented the last 2 thumbnails, which look better in composition. I really adored the idea of a dark place being illuminated by spotlight as it sets up really interesting mood lighting, and can lend to the horror elements that we were going for.

The main vocal points I focussed on during the time of our discussion was that of: cops mickey ears/animatronics, Mickey is a dictator, “rejected people” – not conforming to society under dictatorship, Defy Mickey, Toon buildings different from modern buildings (I introduced the concept of having Disney buildings slowly try and take over modern structures), and “Disney Bounding.”

I gathered together a series of images that I could use to bring these thumbnails together. I always worked best when it came to using reference images as inspiration to meld together unique concepts. I was also overly fussy on detail, which looking back on I wish I wasn’t due to being able to pump out more ideas for my group. Although I really liked my thumbnails if it was drawing to sorely build concepts I didn’t do myself any favours.

The two last thumbnail’s were added at a later date when practising tone and values.

It was at this stage of the build-a-world where 2 of our group members, Eoin and Tiernan, went to group 3 while 3 new members joined our group (Joyce, Zoe and Kaitlyn.) Even though I stayed in group Disney I felt nervous as Tiernan was very well versed in our overall concept due to the content he gathered during our discord call, and when it came to selling our idea to the new people coming in I didn’t fully know how to go about translating our concepts. The main things we passed on was “Disney, horror, mickey is bad. Also there’s helmets”. We decided that it’ll be best to make a group call on discord to discuss ideas and upload visuals to miro, a collaborative workspace. I didn’t know what miro was before Andrea made the suggestion, and I had a lot of fun using it. It’s a great way to show rather than tell what our concepts and thought processes were while Joyce and Zoe offered their own input.

I implemented and explained the possibility of Disney having such a big impact in the world the characters would dress themselves without realizing to fit the colours/clothes of Disney characters. I also uploaded my thumbnail concepts and references and shown the group a world-building visual of a bunch of abandoned Disney castles.

Zoe also posted 2 drawings that inspired me. One being a symbol of rebellion, and the other a thumbnail of a Disney castle with circles surrounding the top. I liked how this looked like it was sending signals and posed the possibility that the Disney castle is the main base for everyone’s mind control. I took these ideas, alongside my Disney bound concept and thought of a story regarding a sister loving Disney when she was younger and the brother taking her to Disneyland, whereas now during Disney’s dictatorship her character switches to hating Disney and fighting the very thing she use to love to get her sibling back. I included chains (from Zoe’s rebel idea) and a tattoo on the older design to show the rebellion concept. The helmets are the only way to break the mind control and set her brother free.

Andrea also provided this word Doc of things we discussed for the story. My contribution was of follows: “Animatronics mickey mouse, FNAF insp”, I brought up the idea of Disney’s floating head in a tube which was based on a concept art of Andrea’s I really liked, “Captain hook owns a butchers” (Butcher hooks, horror aspect), “Sibling that was brain washed by Disney”, “Sibling support”, “Kingdom hearts, treasure planet and dream light valley refs”.

As we were still into the early phases of designing our world I proceeded to create more thumbnails based around the concept of Disney horror (Tone and Value Exercises). I was still trying to relate to concept and storytelling regarding the setting and the harsh environment that was overcame by selfish means. Whilst designing these thumbnails I was also thinking about the overall arching story,

Come this stage we were required to switch groups again. I really wanted to switch groups at this point to see what other groups were coming up with but every time I choked up, this is also regarding offering to present our ideas to the class. My stage fright would get the best of me and I would fail to speak up, however Sarah and Ellie came into the group and I felt at ease again. Each time we would change it would bring fresh ideas into the group and I was excited to meet more members of the class. I had shown my concept art to the group and offered my ideas involving the world building. Ellie suggested using masks instead of Mickey helmets so Andrea documented these and sent them into the group chat. I implemented possible inspiration we can use regarding the different mickey masks and what vibe they gave off.

I was off during the colour theory week so I was unable to contribute to that task fully, however the following week we were moving onto character designs and Zoe posted what characters we needed to include involving the story.

This is the narrative and design concept for a rebel leader that Zoe created, which we later then discussed regarding storylines during class time.

As we were still needing to decide character’s and what purpose they had in our story I sat with Zoe to discus possible story beats. I relayed my ideas onto the group about character ambitions and their drive/motivations to stop Disney’s mind control. The group said they liked the idea of involving the brother and the sister into the story and, with consideration of Zoe’s own ideas, we implemented them to have a purpose within the world. We came up with 2 possible endings so the group could have a say in what direction we wanted to take the story.

By this stage we were told to choose which groups we wanted to put our focus on regarding the build-a-world. I wasn’t in attendance the following week so Andrea, Zoe and Aaron worked through story structure for our animation.

Regarding ideas and changes made (since I was off I wanted to get a fuller understanding of any alterations.)

Following this I wanted to get a clear idea on how many people were left in the group, mostly the ones who weren’t posting. Andrea and Zoe proceeded to create designs for the girl, rebel leader and rebel characters. During this period I was still finalizing my concept art and hadn’t the opportunity to send them through.

At this point in time I realized we didn’t have any set documentation on our story after the changes were made. If we were to animate based off of the bullet points from the board I thought it’ll be a lot harder since there’s no set outlining for the animatic or plot. I offered to attempt to write something up based on the plot points mentioned so we had a solid transcript to work off of.

I forgot to post my girl MC artwork. We had made the adjustment of having the girl be young the entire animation due to running out of time to fit the framework, however I wanted to post them to see if there’s any design elements that we could use regarding what I came up with. There was also the factor of the designs being easy to animate, which my designs ended up being too complicated. Breaking our characters down into basic shapes eased the idea of animating too many elements.

Andrea then took all our ideas and implemented them into one overall design.

I had shown this design beforehand, however I wanted to post it to the group chat so all our collective ideas were in one place. I also wanted to attempt drawing the little girl design in my style by creating a quick illustration/fake poster.

Andrea and Aaron had started their storyboards, so I had to keep their parts in mind when creating a base script. Everyone seemed to be in confusion in the chat about the story structure so I thought it was important to post this before anyone else continued further with their storyboards. We also still needed to section off the story based on the amount of people there were in the group and I had no clear answer at the time so I kind of just guessed based on who posted/who already knew. I was open to people changing the story around if it didn’t make sense/fit the world we were trying to create.

Disney 17th November:

We assigned different sections of the story to group members. I split the story from 1-7 (group total) and everyone discussed which parts they wanted. I didn’t know the full total of the group so I did 1-6 people. I had everyone get assigned a part as I made up the script and thought it’ll be the best to write an extra part into the story for myself (extended part of the fight.)

I placed in the story word document if a person is assigned a part of the story they don’t know how to animate or wish to change then they’re able to do so to fit what they want to contribute via story. When talking about the pacing of the story we noticed that there was a lot of story beats for the amount of time our animation was going to be. I suggested we printed out the script, cutting out the sections 1-7 and give out everyone’s animation part. The idea was for everyone to either mark out what they’re uncomfortable with doing or what they think doesn’t need to be included to cut down our animation time, just so long as the beginning and end parts of the animation stayed the same so the transitions between scenes made sense.

Andrea’s documenting which parts everyone had to do:

This was the changes I made to the script in class, so part 6 is now part 7 and part 6 is an extended fight scene after Sarah’s.

We then all agreed on a design for every character in the story. Andrea kept everyone’s designs in mind while creating the final version of the brother and girl. We went with Zoe’s girl design, rebel design and Andrea’s brother design, which set in motion the costume designs for the other guards/rebels.

There was a concern about if we should all stick to a art style. I suggested that everyone can include their own as some people aren’t able to achieve hyperdetailed with the animation-stick to what everyone is capable of doing. I also didn’t want people to stress out as everyone has different styles/art experience. We then proceeded to set our own homework for the week after. The idea was to draw whichever characters are in our scene in our own style. That way we can get a feel of everyone’s individual art style and what the characters will look like when switched between scenes.

My draw up for the brother, the Walt Disney head was yet to be a finalized design:

As well as transitions there was a concern about how we were smoothly going between animations. We finished our story boards and Ellen posted them on discord to see what can be done creatively to switch between each others scenes.

My storyboard:

 

Compiled alongside everyone else’s:

Posting reference images for parts of our animation (I also posted a link to a pinterest board so everyone can add their own ideas/input. These images were taken right from that):

Regarding the colour scheme of the brother/guards uniforms:

We had a discord call soon after that to discuss our storyboard sections. We needed to also establish a colour palette and backgrounds that are shared between scenes.

Below, we were talking about having no dialogue but having music played throughout. This was a good reference to refer to how no dialogue is needed to convey a message alongside main visual locations.

The week we were to finish our storyboards I was swamped by word, so I admittedly wasn’t finished with mine. However I saw all our storyboards combined and saw there were a good few continuity errors. The group brought up that the ending doesn’t read well alongside Ellen’s animation was taken up with the majority of the smoke transition. To make the overarching story make sense to people viewing we decided to alter our storyboards/animatics based on what works well and what didn’t. I won’t lie when I say changing everything around so close to the deadline made me a little worried but it was best having everything finalized and making sense before we did the time consuming part of animating everything.

Sending in Walt Disney head concept as we didn’t have any clear design set in place yet. I also posted a visual of the control room and hallway so it was a similar scene to everyone who was animating those parts respectfully.

Hallway plus exit/entrance locations to sewers on each side:

Control room normal plus damaged:

There was also a concern about where the characters go during the scenes and the layout of the castle. I thought to include a map with guidelines to who animates where during the animation.

My animatic based on all information provided. Andrea suggested a blue colour scheme throughout, and as I’m unsure if I’m able to provide colour in my animation due to the limited amount of time I have to the deadline I decided to include it in my animatic to get an idea on what I want/aim to strive for. I used my storyboard alongside the additional changes we made to add extra scenes of the brother surviving the Disney head encounter:

Colour scheme applied to hallway: