Week 9

This week our aims are as follows

Finish everything.
First we need to put all our work together for the presentations on Wednesday. Then organise it so it's ready for Friday.

Well, this week went faster then any of the other weeks so far. It's all been one mad rush in which i have had little to no sleep and have been taking migraine tablets continuously lol. Despite all of this we've got everything together although regrettably i didn't have the time to do the extra concept i wanted to have done. I must be better at organising time next term there's so much to do and i don't have time to be sitting around twiddling my thumbs.
We showed the presentation to the two Mikes and the feedback we got was good. They didn't say anything i wasn't expecting so i'm glad about that. We still have to cut down the animatic, the begining and ending are too slow but i've already started to alter that. I'll get Andrew to do his part too. I want to do a bit more concept and some layout sketches in the following week and finally get the model sheets done and sent out to the modellers. No problems with finishing that next week. I've changed our schedule again to allow me time to do this.
I was really pleased with the feedback from the rest of the class about the animatic. Loads of people said they liked the journey part and we've worked so long to get that bit right that it makes it all feel quite worthwhile.
I handed in my essays despite them nearly killing me in the process. I really enjoyed the film analysis essay although i could always find something new to say about Spirited Away. It was really hard to keep the essay at a reasonable size. i found out a lot of things i didn't know and also had a chance to voice and make some of my own opinions. I was especially interested in the way Miyazaki portrayed Haku as he is never without any references to rivers or water.

We've had some good news about the sound design too. There are too students interested, Mark and Alex and they're third years just like us.

Week 8

Aims
Perfect Animatic and show to tutors so as to get feedback in order to change things before the weekend so that it is free to do the essays and presentation for Mike Hirsh.
Week 8 has gone well for this goal. The journey has been altered as has the rest of the animatic.
However, having spoken to Mike Hirsh we explained that we wanted the stamp collector to come across as a kind man but lonely and obsessed. He suggested a pet. This would mean more modelling and although I was really keen on the idea I knew that it wasn’t really feasible. There are only two of us. We next added that it was too long and between us came up with the idea that the stamp could be delivered. This definitely cuts down the time and adds a little human contact in to show the Stamp collector is a nice guy really.
Unfortunately this meant rapid changing for Andrew as I also worked on making the journey and stamp flow within the pages of the stamp book.
Gareth’s essay presentation went well I thought, no one looked confused so that’s at least one good thing. I tried to keep it simple and not clutter the slides as Mike suggested in his presentation and wrote myself notes to follow. I’ll use this method in the final presentation for Mike too as it was much more successful.
Finally we ran through the whole thing with Jared before the weekend hit and he noticed that the end is a little slow, just a bit too long. The film is a little long in itself so this would be a great place to cut it down. These are the weekend jobs as well as writing up the essays both of which have been planned and just tweaking Mike’s Presentation so that I improve on the bits picked up on in my formative.
My regrets for this week are definitely the lack of concept we’ve been able to do. I think this is partly down to my bad scheduling and incapacity to be able to judge how long something will take. The environments need really pinning down and I’ve had to alter the schedule to allow time for that in the Christmas Holidays. Model sheets also need to be done and I will get onto them as soon as all these silly deadlines are over.

I've answered an email from Jared about getting some students from sound to do the sound for the film so hopefully we'll get some sound designers on board.

Week 7

Aims
Get the journey animatic done.
Week 7 started well as Andrew had gone away and had done some really nice colour work for our film showing the different variations of part of the journey. I’d also by coincidence done the same scene, China and we’d both done them in the style we had chosen earlier.
I have suggested now to Mike Smith that we may even go as far as making each stamp reminiscent of the paintings from that country, for example in Holland it will be painted like Van Gogh’s pictures.
The journey animatic was finished and we showed it to Mike. We had decided that the best way to show the journey was with moving planes and the Stamp collector moving through locations on stamps. The whole thing will look very 2D like when we’re finished I hope as I do love the way 2D films look.
To tie the whole journey in with the stamps we’ve decided to make the collector actually travel through his stamp collection in his book. We travel across the page zooming into stamps to see the collector appear chasing after his beloved stamp.
We also had another lecture about sound in our films and the lecturer has suggested we talk to the 3rd years in sound design. I’m really keen to do this as it means less work for Andrew and I later on down the line.
Goals Achieved.
We have the Animatic, it needs to be shortened, it’s far too long and I need to re-do the journey as we have had better ideas as I have explained above. I was angry on Thursday as I had to miss Mike Hirsh’s lecture due to another migraine.
This weekend we are going to work on our parts of the animatic, changing the bits that are too long and I need to completely redo the journey.
The animatic is worrying me however because of the time it is taking up. Along with the essays I have little time to do anything else along with the added threat of writing up dissertation questions for companies and research.
I have taken to reading the paper every morning and much to my father’s dismay rip out large chunks of it that have any relevance to my dissertation topic.
I’ve decided that my essay topic for Gareth is far too close to my dissertation topic and have changed it to advertising and marketing in the film and gaming industries. This is going very well and I already have a lot of research including finding an awesome site on the internet that has all the films budgets and domestic gross on it. Whoot.

Week 6

This weekend could not have gone any worse.
I got a migraine on Thursday evening- the worst one I’ve had in years. I went to bed and woke up with it Friday morning. Furious, as this was my weekend specially reserved for concept and journey development, I had to go back to bed. Later Friday evening it disappeared and I went to bed really early so as to start work on the Saturday morning. Waking up on Saturday I noticed a had vision disturbance in my left eye, half my vision disappeared. This meant only one thing, I had yet another migraine. This time I took my medicine in a hope that it had time to prevent it from getting worse. Naturally they did nothing as always when I really need them to work. Saturday was also spent in bed. I was no happy bunny. I ended up having to take off the Sunday from work too.
All the while I was furious with myself and my stupid migraines by Sunday evening. All my especially reserved work days had been swallowed by migraines.
All of this now meant that we were behind all of this week. We were behind with concept and the journey decisions.
Aims
Get going with the animatic. Choose a style and go with it.
I need to get some more character designs done that should have been done this weekend but now I have no idea how I can catch up.
Andrew came in with some nice journey designs and while I was waiting I did some character designs for the stamp collector.
We had a great lecture about after effects that explained the programme really well and I’m now much more confident about tackling the animatic.
Tuesday however saw a very angry me as we were put into the Lecture theatre and made to sit through something that sounded very much like the bridging unit all over again. I was furious by the end of bridging and I was furious at the end of the lecture. I did not see the point especially as a lot of my time had already been eaten by stupid migraines.
Conveniently I had to turn my attention this week to essays. They’re very interesting but I feel like I should be doing my film work.
I’ve decided to talk about Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away in my film Analysis. Then for Gareth’s essay I will be looking at how large companies in the industry buy out smaller companies and is this a negative or positive thing.
These two formatives went very well and I will continue my research into the two subjects. I’ve watched the two films so many times I’ve lost count.
Andrew and I have started the animatic and have split the story into three, the beginning in which the stamp is lost, the middle aka the journey and the end in which the stamp collector gives up his precious stamp.
I’ve taken on the end and Andrew has the beginning and we’re still working out how to shoot the silly journey, this is ALWAYS the bit that messes up.
We also went to look for styles for the journey this week. We’ve FINALLY found one we both like and are is going to fit the time period, which is the 1930’s (so I can get rid of planes).

Week 5

Aims
Finish the Thumbnails and get some more concept done for both my film and Asa’s. My concept is still lacking as the thumbnails are taking up all of my time and I’ve now had to start thinking about the two essays we have to write, formatives for those are coming up soon and I need to prepare myself.
This week didn’t go too well, I felt rather de moralised after our formative as we didn’t have as much to show as I would have liked. I had my drawings for Asa to show and some new development ideas of our characters. We had sketched our thumbnails out and were hoping to have had them finished to show Mike.
I’m worried about concept because there’s so much to do and I’m not very good with environments.
After the nasty formative we saw Mike again and showed him the completed thumbnails. It was hard to explain and judge how long the film would be with just the drawings and so we went away to start on the animatic and just touching up the shots that Mike thought needed a bit more work.
Achieved Goals?
Yes, the thumbnails are more or less done except for the journey which is proving really difficult to tie down. I’ve done the concept for Asa and changed the design of the old man a little, he looks a bit more comical and I like his piggy bank. He looks more approachable and kind now rather than aloof and snobby. I’ll keep on developing him this weekend. We’ve been looking at the 1930s for a while now Andrew and I seem to be going in two different directions. I want the journey to be colourful and vivid. I do not want complex modelling as this is a short part of the film. I’ve told Andrew to over the weekend draw how he sees the journey and make a map with dotted line of the locations we visit.