4.3.2.1 Teaser Trailer...

For those of you who enjoyed 'Kidulthood' and 'Adulthood', and are waiting to see Noel Clark's latest project, i bring you good news, here it is. He seems to have gone down a similar route as his previous two films, possibly due to the popularity of his representation of London's youths and gangs. I'm looking forward to see what this film brings and a lot of familiar faces have been used as actors... check out the teaser trailer, i know i'll certainly be getting my ticket to see it when it comes out...

CSI scene compared to the Phillips Commercial...

At the beginning of the last unit, i made a post on the Phillips commercial which won the cannes - Lion 2009 Grand Prix. When i got home on saturday, my Mum had kept a recorded episode of CSI which attempted a similar effect. For me, it doesn't work anywhere near as well and a lot of it seems fairly flat, but you can definitely tell where the idea came from. Although, it always interests me to see experimental pieces of work like this because i am always interested in fiding out how they composed them and edited the sequences together... Check it out...

Unit 4 - Storytelling... Developing my Story Idea...

So i'm not too sure whether we're meant to have started to think of a storyline and idea or if Phil wanted us to wait for his lectures. But, according to my Fundamentals of Animation book, aka my holy bible right now, it's important to start on the storyline and work from there. It's almost as if the storyline is the backbone and everything joins to this backbone, however if the backbone doesn't work, neither will its joints. For me, the storyline on this unit will require the most effort and will be the most important part, as nothing else will work without a decent story. Therefore, i've been constantly thinking of a story relating my three words in the back of my mind. Last night whilst i was in the bath, i decided to jot down an idea inwriting, as my book said you can either draw your ideas, or write them, but this is entirely up to each person. I felt it would be quicker to write the idea dwon and then draw up some wuick thumbnails to go with the writing so i knew where i was going with it. So far, my idea possibly starts in a busy French restaurant, we see a customer walk in and as we do so a butterfly flies in. Whilst the customer is speaking to a waitor about finding a table, a small butterfly hunter, on a pogostick, holding a net, barges through the two men, knwocking them to one side. We then see a humerous scene where he bounces around the rest of the custopmers in the restaurant disrupting therir meal. Just as we think he is about to catch the butterfly, jumping up and down on one spot, the waitor grabs the pogostick and the butterfly hunter is in mid-air and falls to the ground. We then see the butterfly hunter being kicked out of the restaurant with buterflies flying round his head from the fall. One of them turns out to be the real butterfly and just as we see it fly off, and think it has escaped the hunter, it gets hit and killed by a lorry. The final shot could be the camera pulling away int0 the sky as we see cars drivingn on a fairly busy road and in the distance the butterfly hinter is jumping up and down angrily and breaks his net... For me this idea needs some refinement and going over but i feel it could be humerous, depending on the style of the animation and the personality i give the characters, all important aspects that i picked up on from my Fundamentals of Animation book...

Unit 4 - Storytelling... 3 Words...

So we've now got our brief for the new unit, Story-telling. I'm looking forward to this unit because i know that narrative and story telling can often be a weakness of mine, so i would like to improve this skill. My three words were Restaurant, Butterfly Hunter, and Pogostick; straight away giving me some thoughts and ideas into a slightly comical and humerous storyline. Being only a minute, i was thinking of something along the lines of the Pixar shorts because they are so popular amongst audiences and so well-renouned for their funny and original storylines. I did have a quick scan through the brief, although i must be honest, i haven't yet had a full in-depth look at it. Instead, i decided to start reading my new Fudamentals of Animation book which breaks down the process of pre-production work for animation and gives some in-depth examples and practices to help your understanding further. If you haven't read this book before it's definitely worth checking out because it breaks down each step of the process in quite some depth and has already helped me to figure out the order that i should develop my animation in. I've also got some other animation books back at halls, but i wasn't able to bring these back home with me because my bag is too full. These other books will come in handy when designingn my animation both preparatory designs and storyboards. For now, the Fundamentals of Animation is a great read and i'm sure this will be by my side throuhgout the development of my animation. I'm looking forward to this unit now as i already have some fun ideas and styles that i want to play with...

Unit 3 - Envrionment: Crit and Evaluation...

So our crit was on Friday and i received a lot of great feedback in allowing me to kep improving. I fully took on board all of Phil's comments and afterwards i asked Photoshop Phil a few questions about further improving the work. For me there were a few things about the image that stood out, like some of sizes of the textures were too big and the wheelchair seems to look too CG. However, Phil did point out some things that i didn't notice like the flatness of the image. Originally, in my concepts, i has painted trees in the foreground so that you could distinguish a foreground, middleground and back ground. However, the tree on the front right needs to be brought closer to the camera so you get more of an overall environment insted of that flatness. It needed to be slightly more layered, which is possibly why it looks so painterly, but i was also going for quite a theatrical look so i think that painterly style became part of that effect. Overall, i feel this was my favourite and best piece of work i've produced on the course so far, but there is definitely more to come and i feel i'm learning more and improving in each unit.

Maya Camera Rigs...

I just thought i'd leave a little post about the camera rigs which i have completed but they're on the uni computers, so i'm not able to upload them. Also, i'm not really too sure how i would upload them anyway. All three were fairly simple to complete, i came across a few problems but nothing overly complicated...

Maya Week 4 - Texturing...

Week 4was quite fun with the textures we got to produce, they were fairly simple although i'm not sure i'd remember how to produce each of the again. They results of these different textures are amazing though and they really seem to bring the images to life. Another great series of tutorials Alan and i'm really starting to learn quite a lot about Maya now, looking forward to seeing what comes next...

Week 3 Maya - Fur...

The santa hat must be one of my favourite things we've produced in Maya yet. I'm looking forward to using fur to create characters like Sulley out of Monsters Inc. This was amazingly quick to make and it looks amazing too. Definitely a cool tutorial...

The other fur practices were great to help us understand how to use the tool. Below is the different textures I was able to create using the tutorial...

Maya Week 1 and 2 - The Pirate's Cove...

So i finished the pirate's cove a while back, but for some reason i never posted it up here. It was quite long and i did get a bit stuck along the way, but overall it was a great introduction to texturing which has helped me model my final piece. It's amazing how good textures can make a model look...

Adding the Final Details...

Today i had a bit of a slow start, mainly due to going into to university and finding that the computers there made my image to dark to work on. I didn't want to mess around with the lightng settings because i was happy with how the image looked on my laptop. However, i will need to consider raisinghe brghtnes slightl in Photosop for the crit tomorrow. Anyway, I was trying t add some more details in Maya like a spotlight for the torch and ossibly tr ut sme fog effects, as well as making some changes to the landscape and trees. But, Maya has been messing me round a little and therefore i had to take the render of what i already had because it wouldn't render properly otherwise. This didn't atter to much though, as i was already fairly happy with what i had textured and modelled and i was ready to take it into Photoshop where i add some details and a backdrop. I firstly added my backdrop which is a series of trees going into the distance. I blurred this slightly and made it slightly bluer to blend in with my model better. Once was happy with that i added aome fog/mist, using the effect i had practiced, and i then made that slightly bluer to reflect the light source in the scene. Finally i added the torch light which i'm still not happy with and i'll probably change several times tomorrow... But with these added details, this is what i have come up with so far....

I may make a few changes here and there between now and tomorrow, but i am fairly pleased with the end result...

My Idea Development - Concepts/Digital Paintings

So i took a break from the modelling and i've decided to upload the concepts and digital paintings that helped me get to my idea... To start off with i knew what i wanted but i wasn't too sure how to get there... One particular image stood out for me which i used as a reference throughout my idea development (I couldn't get rid of this image from my head, all of my ideas and sketches pretty much revoloved around this image). and here it is...

I know what you're probably thinking and it's along the lines of "its a picture of the woods... so what". But the thing i loved most about this image was how theatrical it was and this was the style that i wanted to stick to in my final piece. I feel that my final piece isn't as theatrical as this, however it does have some theatrical elements, particularly the lighting, which is slightly overemphasised but helps create a eerieness. I got so hooked and obsessed with this image that i hit the 'writer's block' and i even began using the image to draw over as a digital painting...

After avoiding the problem for a while and jumping onto my Maya tutorials and completing my essay, i realised i needed to get my ideas flowing again. This break seemed to help me refresh my thoughts a little bit and i came back with new elements to my idea and i was constantly chopping and changing things... in my head... i still haven't got used to this putting my thoughts straight onto paper. Bu thats next on my agenda in improving my skills. However, in our Photoshop lessons, Phil was able to take my ideas and put me on the right path for digitally painting the idea i had...

This was my first real start to portray my idea and although it seems very flat, it was a step further than what i had been stuck on. For me the idea was there, it just needed some perspective, compostion and a lot more depth. This was my first attempt in taking the concept to that next step...

As you can see, i was getting there, slowly but surely. Luckily Phil came back just before i finished this concept and gave me the guidance that i needed to turn the concept above, into more refined concept...

With Perspective, composition and depth i was able to produce a more wholesome concept and get a good idea of where everything could go in my model. I was actually reasonably happy with this concept and i was just going to add a few little details, but again, Phil popped up and gave me a few pointers on deciding how i wanted the lighting to be and straight away this gave the image the eerieness that it needed, turning it from something kind of uncanny to something that was unmistakeably uncanny. However, there was one more important point he made in allowing me to give the image the uncanny effect, and that was storyline. The importance of narrative and meaning in products is massively important and for a second, mainly due to my amazement at how far my idea had come, i had forgotten about the narrative. So i spent the next day or two racking my brain while i was modelling my idea and this was what i came up with...

Although, elements of this image have changed in my final model, like the positioning of the objects, i have pretty much used this concept and the one Phil produced to model my final piece. As you can see the blue blue gives it that eerieness as well as more life, i suppose it is the realistic life given to the image that makes it even more uncanny. In terms of narrative, i still kept it quite simple with the torch and footprints which end near the wheelchair, i feel this is slightly ambiguous and mysterious as the footprints could have been from someone who walking with a person in a wheelchair, or slightly more supernatural, the wheelchair could have been more involved with th disappearance of the person. I feel in the final piece the torch and the footprints will be slightly less suttle and there to make the audience think about what is going on, but the main focus should be the wheelchair...

Developing My Scene - Ambient Lighting...

Just been moving the trees about and positioning them so that the composition in the shot works. I've also added an ambient light which i made blue to follow a similar effect as in my concepts. Still got a bit more to do, but i think it's coming along nicely and almost has a similar uncanny effect as in the concepts... i need to add a spotlight to the torch too because it's unnoticeable at the moment and some footprints as well....

Blue Velvet...

Blue Velvet is a 1986 American film written and directed by David Lynch. The film tells the story of a college student named Jeffrey Beaumont, who comes across a human ear in a grass field, in his idealized American hometown of Lumberton, after visiting his ill father in hospital. He proceeds to investigate the ear with assistance from Sandy Williams, who provides him with information and leads from her father, a local police detective. Jeffrey's investigation draws him deeper into his hometown's seedy underworld, and sees him forming a sexual relationship with the alluring torch singer, Dorothy Vallens, who may be connected to the ear, and uncovering a breed of criminals, including Frank Booth, who engage in drug abuse and sexual violence.

Before watching this film I thought the villain in The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover was the root of all evil, but apparently there is a bigger villain. For me, the surrealism and film noir exhibited in this film work wonders, in a classic film where special effects is irrelevant, and the power of the characters dominates the narrative. I found the film awkward to watch at times because of the power of the sexual abuse scenes, however it did remind me of a Quentin Tarantino style of violence but with a better narrative and less focus on the gore. Similar to poltergeist, the intensity in this film works wonders and your always kept wondering what happens next. It was clear that the film was named after the song of the same name, considering it was played countless amounts of times. However, I found, at times, the storyline to be quite confusing in the middle with the introduction of many new characters, but by the end I fully understood who was who and how they played a part in the overall narrative. I particularly enjoyed the scene in the latter stages where the man was standing half dead with blood pouring from him. It is films like these that has made David Lynch so highly regarded as a director in the film industry.

Poltergeist...

Poltergeist is an American horror film, directed by Tobe Hooper and was released on June 24, 1981. The plot centres itself around the haunting of a suburban family home with the suspected cause being poltergeists. In the beginning we see Carol Anne, a five year old girl, communicating to the spirits through a television set with no signal. As the story progresses, an earthquake occurs, which only the family feel, and the spirits begin to play harmless tricks. What happens next is not so benign. During a rainstorm we witness a tree coming to life and grabbing Carol Anne’s brother, Robbie, through a window. However, this is just a distraction, by the spirits, to leave Carol Anne unattended. A shining light appears in her closet and sucks Carol Anne into the other dimension, controlled by the poltergeists. As the parents pull Robbie from the tree that tries to swallow him, they soon find out that Carol Anne is missing and later find that they can communicate to her via the television set. They decide to bring in a team of parapsychologists in an attempt to get their daughter back. As the team investigates the case further and further they uncover more paranormal activities and establish that they are being tormented by poltergeists. With the help of a spiritual medium, they realise that the entrance to the other dimension is in the closet and in the latter stages of the film we witness a terrifying sequence in which the mother ties a rope around herself and crosses over, bringing her daughter back with her. However, that’s not the last we hear of “The Beast” which is the mastermind behind Carol Anne’s captivity, in a last ditch attempt, it again tries to suck the children into the closet. But the family manages to escape, finally watching The Beast implode the house into the other dimension. The final scene shows the family staying at a Holiday Inn, where the father puts the television set outside of their room.

I enjoyed watching Poltergeist because of the intensity that it provided throughout the film. For me, it is another example of a successful Spielberg film and i'm quite suprised that i hadn't seen the film prior to this. As i said before it was the intensity that kept me hooked and it definitely had a Spielberg feel to it. One of the most intense parts was in the latter stages of the film where the mother attempts to bring Carol Anne back, the pace seemed to be just right and it kept me right on the edge of my seat. However, i feel the special effects, including the Beast and the clown, let this film down, i don't even feel that it was a necessity to even show these as living beings. i feel it's strong factor was the element of the unknown, we as the audience don't know what they are dealing, but we can only imagine. as soon as we see physical attributes though, i feel our attention is taken away from the unknown and i didn't like that. A couple of examples were the tree scene and the clown, which could have easily been scary without it actually moving; similar to the ventriliquist's dummy. I feel The Haunting was a greater success in that sense because it leaves that element of the unknown throughout the film and we never truely know what we are dealing with. Excluding that, i found the film to another great representation of suburban neigjhbourhoods gone wrong. For some reason i seem to find it amusing watching their "happy lives" tormented. i especially liked the end shot with the tv out side there room; for me there was definitely something uncanny about it. i was expecting something to happen.

Developing my Scene...

Just another image of my woods scene in development...



I've added a pathway and ground texture using basic planes to see how they look in my scene. I'm also ging to edit the planes and make the surface look more uneven and natural. also, i've added a torch next to the wheelchair which is barely visible, but i'm aiming to have a light coming from the torch to make it look like it's on, and make it more noticable... i added another mist effect in Photoshop, just trying different techniques out to see what looks best. The scene's coming along nicely...

Concepts for my final idea....

This was what Phil helped me come up with for my final piece in Friday's lesson. My original composition and perspective were quite flat so this whinding pathway seems to do the trick much better, leading the viewer's eyes through gthe woods. You can also identify the foreground, mid-ground and background fairly easily...

Phil then took the concept to the next level adding some hue/saturation and rough details to create a more refined concept. I really like the feel of this image, there's definitely something quite unsettling. But Phil also felt that the image needed more meaning and storyline hence the briefcase in the image... since then i've been thinking about adding more elements to the image to create a story. i've decided to use the tracks on the path as in the image and add a torch, dog lead and another set of footprints. I feel these are small elements that the image needs to give it some extra story without taking it too far... I will post some more concepts soon, just continuing with modelling my scene...

Modelling Trees and Texturing the Wheelchair...

I say modelling trees, but actually they're just cylinders with a tileable bark texture on... however i will need to modify some of them and bring in a few other types of tree to create more variety... i must say though, i was quite surprised at the quality of the trees just using a texturea nd bump map, they look fairly realistic and considering my scene will be quite dark, they should look even more realistic....



I've been texturing the wheelchair slowly but surely. some parts have needed actual tileable textures, other sections were created using lamberts or blinns... i haven't put too much detail into the textures and colours because, as you can see, a lot of that detail would be lost and time would be wasted... i feel the mist works well here, a thick load at the bottom of the image and then it dies of towards the top... i did see sam's model too, which uses 3D clouds as fog in Maya, but im fairly happy with the technique ive used in Photoshop, so im just going to keep working on that to find the best end results...

hopefully as i begin to bring the ground in and a path, the model will begin to take shape and it won't look like trees and a wheelchir floating in mid-air...

Wheelchair Maya Model...

This is the model of my wheelchair for my scene, i still need to add some more details and make some changes, but its coming along quite well i feel. It's also allowed me to try lots of tools and techniques alan has showed us, on my own...

I also managed to find a decent fog and mist tutorial for Photoshop. It's pretty basic and simple, but i think it works... i did try some fog effects in maya itself, mainly using the spotligt, but i wasnt too happy with the renders, so i think Photoshop is the best option...

So, i added some extra details and just finished tidying the model as a whole... i feel it's ready for texturing which will hopefully bring it to life. Although, i don't want to be spending too much time on the texturing because a lot of it will be blurred by the mist...

Halloween...

Halloween is a 1978 American independent slasher film set in a suburban town and was directed by John Carpenter. Halloween is highly regarded as a classic among horror films, and as one of the most influential horror films of its era. In 2006 it was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being, ‘culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.’ It was produced on a budget of $320,000 and grossed $60 million at the box office in the US, becoming one of the most profitable independent films. The movie originated many clichés found in low-budget horror films of the 1980’s and 1990’s, however, the film contains little graphic violence and gore. Critics have suggested that Halloween and its slasher successors may encourage sadism and misogyny. Others have suggested the film is a social critique of the immorality of young people in 1970’s America, pointing out that many of Myer’s victims are sexually promiscuous substance abusers, while the lone heroine is depicted as chaste and innocent. While Carpenter dismisses such analyses, the perceived parallel between the character’s moral strengths and their likelihood of surviving to the film’s conclusion has nevertheless become a standard slasher movie trope. The plot begins on Halloween night 1963, when six year old Michael Myers murders his seventeen year old sister, Michael is sent to a psychiatric centre under the care of child psychiatrist Dr. Sam Loomis. After eight years of treatment, Loomis believes Michael is nothing less than pure evil. As Loomis and his assistant go to take 21 year old Myers to court, after an additional seven years, Myers steals their car and escapes. Loomis decides to find him at all costs. Michael returns to his home town and pursues a bunch of sexually promiscuous teenagers, now wearing a white mask to cover his identity. They end up babysitting later that evening and due to a series of misfortunate events, Michael kills them one by one, except Laurie Strode, the most innocent of them all. Left with the two children, she ends up running from Michael, seemingly killing him twice, once with a knitting needle and the other time with his own knife. This is when the audience begins to believe he is a supernatural force, as he recovers both times to continue pursuing Laurie. She sends the children to find help, which comes in the form of Dr. Loomis, who shoots Michael numerous times, knocking him over the balcony. He turns around to comfort Laurie, before looking over the balcony again to see that Michael’s body has disappeared.

I was confident I has seen Halloween before, but it turns out I hadn’t. I think it must have been Halloween Resurrection, which was similar to the first film. I have to say, I did enjoy this film, but the stupidity of the characters, as well as some errors in the film, left me frustrated. This level of stupidity has now become a trope in the hybrid genre of horror comedies. This film did have me hooked from the beginning, where the very first murder occurs and the pace of the film seems to be consistent from then onwards. There were some typical thriller moments like the hedge scene and the washing line scene, which, added to the supernatural elements that Michael brings, creates a great suburban horror film. We’ve seen it in Nightmare on Elm Street as well and the idea of a ‘perfect’ neighbourhood being tormented has become a horror cliché after the success of films like these. Although, it was slightly humorous seeing Michael survive so many times and watching the teens get slaughtered, the mood somehow still remains serious.

The Stepford Wives...

The Stepford Wives is a 1975 film based on the 1972 Ira Levin novel of the same name. It was directed by Bryan Forbes and remade in 2004. While the film was only a moderate success at the time of release, it has grown in stature as a cult film over the years. The plot follows Joanna, her husband Walter and their two children who move from New York City to the idyllic Connecticut suburb of Stepford. They soon find that the women here all look ‘perfect’ and are obsessed with housework, but have few intellectual interests. The men all belong to the clubbish Stepford Men’s Association, which Walter joins to Joanna’s dismay. After feeling lonely in her new neighbourhood, things start to look up when she makes friends with another newcomer to town, Sloppy, irrepressible Bobbie Markowe. They make friends with another woman who turns overnight from a languid, self-concerned tennis fan into an industrious, devoted wife, which leads Joanna and Bobbie to start investigating with ever-increasing concern. They begin to search other houses around town, and when Joanna, who is an aspiring photographer, wins a prestigious contract with a photo gallery, she can’t wait to tell Bobbie. However, she is shocked to find her freewheeling and liberal friend has abruptly changed into another clean, conservative housewife. Joanna visits a psychiatrist at the insistence of her husband and expresses her belief that all the men in the town are behind a conspiracy of somehow changing the women. The psychiatrist suggests she leaves town until she feels safe, but when she returns home, the children are missing. In an attempt to find her husband, after a violent, physical scuffle with her husband, she visits Bobbie who she believes is caring for them. Desperate, she stabs Bobbie with a knife revealing that she is actually a robot. Feeling she will be the next victim, Joanna sneaks into the mansion which houses the Men’s Association to find her children, but chances upon the mastermind of the whole operation and eventually her own robot-duplicate, which has soulless, black, empty eyes. It is then suggested that the duplicate strangles Joanna, before the final scene which shows all the wives, including Joanna, shopping in a supermarket wearing similar long dresses, large hats and saying little more than hello to each other. The shot focuses on Joanna’s now finished eyes. Stepford Wives, for me, was too repetitive and long, which meant by the time we reached the good bit at the end, I was already frustrated by the rest of the film. Maybe it was the slow pace, in an era when the audience expects fast and snappy cuts. However, I did enjoy the intensity of the ending, in a film I felt was lacklustre apart from the great sense of eeriness it posed.

Dead Of Night...

Dead of Night is a 1945 British anthology horror film made by Ealing studios and its various episodes were directed by several different people. The particular episode we watched was called 'The Ventriliquist's Dummy'. The story follows an unbalanced ventriliquist who believes his amoral dummy is truely alive. Tnroughout the story, we are never fully sure whether the ventriliquist is crazy or whether the dummy is actually alive, and by the end, we're not even sure if the dummy is real. Although it was only short, I really enjoyed this story because it reminded me of the many adaptations i've seen. I particularly liked the way we are never sure whether the dummy is real or not. But, i find it a shame that i've only seen this story after its adaptations because it felt like it reminded me of the classic ventriliquist dummy stories i've seen, when in acual fact, this was the original.