Pitch - The Story Of Jeffery Chide

Well that was another pitch out the way with. Same idea as my last one just more refined in my head since then. I made sure I had my video for it should my mind completely go blank or I just over talk it.

Anyway the panel that we had seemed to think the idea was quite strong. Out of the three the one that most interested me was James Henry a writer from Green Wing, Smack the pony and also Bob the builder. The idea that I have I have obviously become very involved with and tend to overthink it all the time.

James suggested it could be an idea that would work well in a series. I don't know whether that was because of his background in writing or he genuinely could see it working. Either way my writing skills are poor and though I have the basic story beats mapped out and how it will pan out, I would love to get him to go through the script and literally rip it apart and help me rebuild it in a more powerful way.

As I have constantly said, their is no way I am going to produce artwork or any animation for something that isn't strong enough to potentially go the whole mile. It has to also be a very strong idea as otherwise I would loose the drive along the way.

All this into consideration, I can now leave the idea to rest maybe forever or for a few days until we find out what the crack is for the projects and who's are going ahead. Out of all the pitches that I watched and some were extremely strong, Sarah Crombies stood out for me. When I heard her idea I loved it from the start, combined with the imagery she produced and the character, I can actually see this being the first successful film from Falmouth animation if she has a strong team of stop motion artists working on it and I hope it is.

If my idea does go ahead I would like to work alongside someone who knows a little bit about 3D or at least is willing to entertain the idea of using it this year. As well this someone possibly working alongside me on pre production would be extremely useful as I feel I have still not nailed the final look I hope to achieve where I can bridge that gap of an illustrated 3D film. If Jennys idea wasn't so strong she would be ideal to work with as she has this combination down.

Ideally a team of 3 would be perfect whilst having others drafted in and out where they wish to work on their specialist areas. If this doesn't happen, I'm keen to get involved in another 3D project or possibly do a similar thing to Jacob (from last year) in that of character design, modelling and learning the whole process from start to finish.. But for now we can only dream..... and maybe do some dissertation work?..

Anyway here was the pitch video....

3D Experiment

18th October - 3D Experimentation

So I haven't actually tried my characters in 3D properly yet. So I picked what is my favourite design of Jeffery, at least the one that really conveys his personality to me and proceeded to quickly assemble him in 3D. Modelling him was no problem as it was just a matter of tweaking a few vertices. I read a few things on projections and UV mapping which were actually a little more than I needed but for now I have an idea of what he would look like in 3D. I really need to learn how to render objects out in varying ways as I really have no idea. Anyway here is a few screen shots. Would really like to rig him as soon as I am fully satisfied with him, very retarded pose, my bad.

I now need to work out how I want my design to look, I'm feeling 2 and a half D, maybe 3D but just thought I would experiment with a few things, above was just a quick one to through him in a room that would bear some similarity to his when actually designed.

So Year 3

Alright so I'm still going with the basic same premise for my story of last year. Since then I have been playing with the story and how to put it across. I had a bit of a diversion when starting to try and put my character in 3D and found there was something I no longer liked about him. Anyway this post is just so I can get some feedback on my character designs. There all quite similar in facial design but please tell me which ones you like and which ones you don't and why. I have one in mind myself now.

I am designing Jeffery with the character traits bearing in mind, he is a nervous person that lacks self confidence. He will be working in an office and is just trying to fit in. But most importantly he is flat so nothing on him will be protruding except for maybe his tie or something.

Why won't my blogg work!

Why won't my blogg work!

Development of Shakespeare 3D Model

Cannot get the images uploaded properly, I am having trouble with the images so for now as you can see above is the development. It is not necessarily in the right order but I hope you get the jist.

Sunday 6th June

Well I've started to get to grips with this modelling malarkey. I'm loving learning so much, I think their is something about doing an artistic subject that means that you feel like you are never learning or at least you are but its slowwwwwww. Anyway I have learnt a shed load of new tools today in Maya and I have actually enjoyed modelling. I have focussed today on creating a definitive shape for the face working into the eyes, nose, mouth and chubby cheeks particularly. Even through in his tash and beard. I wish I had a few more days to do this but as ever one project at a time, multi-tasking tshhhhh. Don't be silly.

Next up is his hair, full beard and ears. I want to be able to have time to put his body on as it would be a shame to leave it out and it captures a lot of the essence of him. I feel like I am going to have a lot of trouble getting body and head together into something that looks similar to my designs. I now know how I will do the collar however with a little help from the Loft tool.

Well I have two days to do this as I am leaving out tomorrow to do an essay on Animation technologies. Georg, if you are reading this I neither appreciate nor care for essays as it curbs my creative time, limits my exposure to much needed UV rays & reminds me further of why I am a Falmouth student. Just a thought.

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Monday 7th June


Tuesday 8th June

Another average day of work, I’ve been getting really frustrated today as I just want to put the hair on. I’m having trouble working out the best way of doing it. His hair defines him but I figured I would move on and do a few little bits before going back to it. Today I modelled his hand which look alright. I just tried to keep them simple but give them some defining characteristics that hands contain e.g. finger nails, knuckles. I also managed to model the collar today through extrusions rather than lofting as I wasn’t to familiar with the process so stuck to something I know. It has the general shape about it although it needs thickening and a few vertices tweaking. Tomorrow I have a lot to do but I think I have been staring at him to much right now, so I’m giving it a break before the big one all day and maybe night.Today has been very unproductive as I had the essay to get on with as well, my internets been ridiculous so finding tutorials to help me along the way has been lame.

Priorities tomorrow are the hair and beard. Once these are done I will
1. Model a simple ear
2. Add details to his torso.
3. Attach the hand to the wrist
4. Thicken the collar
6. Work into his lower skirt thing.

There is a lot to do but if I can do the most part he will look like my character model design! That would be amazzzzzing!
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Thursday 10th June 8:01am

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! OOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Yep finished. Whats that. Finished. Yes I am. For 2nd year way. Here is a finished image of what I ended up with one with hair and one without. Mainly as I really couldn't get to grips with the hair. There are many many faults in this model but for now lets not dwell. Lets go out enjoy the sun and see the world outside the PC!!!!!!

Pitch and Development Work

So today we did our Pitch , It went well apart from the part where I opened my mouth. I had a feeling I would be struggling to make sense of my words after sufficient lack of sleep and so I was glad I did the narration pre recorded to my pitch. I was quite pleased how fast I managed to get this out. I set myself 3 days to do all the concepts and any remaining work I could muster as all I had from the practice pitch the Friday before was a lead character - Jeffery . As I had spent most of the term thinking about how it would look and trying to pull a strong story idea out I left myself little time to get it together. However I had all the ingredients there so I just went with it. I seem to work much better under pressure as it means I make decisions decisively.

What I pitched slightly different to my final bible story, ever so. The ending for my pitch story was weak but I had changed my mind the night before on the story ending after talking to Andy. Instead of him just popping back to normal behind a wall, Jeffery finds himself in a flat world and pops back to normal. Once more the odd one out. He also gets trapped as he can no longer travel back through the crack. This probably doesn't make much sense but if you check out below my Story synopsis and the pitch above it will give you a much better idea.










After this I really want to keep pushing the style and story. I feel the base story idea is now strong enough to develop further and hopefully create something that could be deemed worthy of a festival place. That is my main aim to get noticed with something that touches people emotionally whilst tickling them with some comedy elements. I hope to also really push some style aspects and nail down something coherent. It is is only in the final two images above that I really got more to grips with what I was trying to do. On the upside I can now paint even faster in photoshop without massive loss of quality. Royboy taught me the most amazing simple tool in photoshopthat made my work flow massively faster so a big YeahROY, as I would have probably produced half the amount of stuff.