We got a talk on things we should know and understand in animation, like FPS (frame rate per seconds) as well as the 12 principles of animation, and started a practise with bouncing balls:

this allowed us to understand the number of frames per seconds would lead to which result ( something more fluid, more cartoony, or something more like anime).

We had a few new additions as well as a few of us who left, but for those who stayed and had a general idea of what the plot and story was about and overall theme/ideas were, we shared them with the new additions to our team to get them more comfortable to explore what our project is about, so as soon as we would finish the 3D digital literacy assignment we could get back to work.

After having done a class activity of creating a weird creature all together by passing the paper around:

This exercise was quite helpful a way to relax the mind and help for the long process of creating a multitude of different characters.

We had already started with different shapes and styles for the mailman character so we mostly shared what everyone had done that day and agreed which one suited the plot best.

What we focused on was the plot, we created a quick story board and discussed on a deeper story to give the character. We came up with an elderly mailman who missed his grand daughter very much and had a gift to deliver to her (a way to see her) [the idea came from thinking about ourselves in our daily lives, time passes so quickly that some, maybe most, forget about their families specially the elderly. This is like a sweet reminder to not forget your grand parents] on his way there he came across a portal and curiously went to take a closer look, but that unfortunately led to him being sucked into different universes( three), while trying to find a way back his top priority was protecting the package and reaching his granddaughter. The story turned to have a more touching and sweet side to it, so a pastel colour scheme was thought of to convey this sweetness.

  The final design in the bottom seemed the most suitable for the story.

Final team brief before the change:

Before the change, the previous team and I ( group 10) discussed on the final idea of separating the tasks within the group. We want to be able to make use of each individuals strong suit, show our ability of working in a group and cooperate and spend our time wisely so we don’t lose it.

The classwork consisted of two parts, colours theory as well as character design:

Colour theory:

we took a few pictures to start getting an idea of what combination we would want to go for, what message we want to convey in our thumbnails, characters and finally animation.

as well as some vibrant colours we used from our mood board:

We planned out a little colour palette, that we are still working on:

we thought to be able to explain this land going from a very fairy like whimsical and magical land but ominous or even like a poisonous animal, unnaturally bright to a darker grim almost void land.

• We would want to have a colour palette change through out the animation, from those very neon colours gradually fading to ashy, dusty colours, losing saturation gradually. from what we can see so far we are more inclined to do monochromatic or analogous colour choices.
• To add more value to our character we chose to go with that colour choice to stand out from the background, to allow the viewers wandering to have a point to return to, maybe a complementary colour so it is not too disconnected either, if we go for an autumn palette the character could be blue depending on our final decision background wise.
• For lighting we, want to play with light and dark ( ombre et Lumière ) as well as add a hint of purple hue to give it the fairy and aethereal feeling

 

 

Props, Characters and environments

Those are a few pictures taken in a park( they are also shown in the mood board), that inspired a new idea for the environment in the world, to give more of a fairy like feeling to the world, supporting the concept of a whimsical fairy farmers market.

The idea was shared in the group along with the pictures to discuss whether everyone was in favour or not, following that we all came to the agreement to each test out the idea with our own vision based on the first picture, the close up of a tree which looks like it has a lot of smaller little trees on it, and take a decision from there whether or not it would be a good idea, as well as seeing if other people within the group could come up with another concept based off the same pictures.

First attempt based of the pictures taken in the park.

 

some darker fairy ideas, creatures that could be roaming the world.

A source of light ( that’s used as street lamps or portable source of light) and house idea.

Main character concepts: (first-> to last) + inspiration

for the initial 2 designs, the idea for the accessories were discussed in the classroom, the character at this stage was closer to my personal style which pushed me on the next designs to get inspired elsewhere as well as simplify the design.

the inspiration:

the inspiration:

Some previous thumbnail ideas based on the previous concept.

 

Task 1

• we were tasked to draw a one point perspective grid and try to draw a cube or a rectangle, this is a rectangle that was turned into a building, with a bit more exploration with details using a one point perspective.

this is a close up.

 

Task 2

• similarly to task 1, in this case we tried a two point perspective grid, with the option of a cute or rectangle again, in this case rectangles were chosen, and an attempt at creating a street corner building.