Minor Project - Animatic 1

Now that I've got the sound to go with the video and the storyboard, I have created my first animatic version of my new (and hopefully improved) piece. There are still things I am not happy with as some parts of the animation are rushed / out of sync a bit and there are some frames I would like to improve upon.

Animatic 1 from Ruth Cann on Vimeo.

Minor Project - Drawing the Storyboard

This is my first draft for my storyboard. It will now be turned into an animatic with my voice recording over the top.

Minor Project - Adding Sound

I have now after multiple attempts created a voice over for my script. The next part after this will be to create a really rough animatic that can go over the top of this.

Animatic 1 - Sound Only - The Cherry Red Shed from Ruth Cann on Vimeo.

Minor Project - Where I'm at

After a lot of discussion with Phil, I have gone back to the drawing board as I wasn't happy with my last animatic and had felt like I was stuck with it. I decided it would be best to start again with my story and try to rewrite it more to how I envisioned it.
After a while, we decided roughly with this script for me to read aloud whilst my animation plays over.

The Cherry Red Shed

My Grandad’s shed is painted cherry red with a roof made of tin that rattles in the rain. Inside, kitchen cupboards of different kinds hang on its walls and if you look inside those cupboards, you find metal biscuit tins, and inside them, all the little projects my Grandad never finished. 

Back then, I’d beg him to open the shed just so I could play in it - this little girl almost dragging her Grandad up the hill to the back of the garden.  It fascinated me in there, the smell of grease and charred wood, the dangling light-bulbs, Grandad’s tools lying on the workbench and his loud machines making the sawdust dance in the light.  For me it was a place of magic. 

I’d ask him to make me things; swords, go-karts, elastic band planes – and he could do it. I’d watch his hands as he worked, their skin rough and dry – except for his fingertips, which were soft and smooth, as if all the years of hard work had worn their texture away.

My grandad made rocking-horses in his cherry red shed. I specifically remember a dappled grey horse, it was the first he made - and the biggest. I’d sit on the big grey horse, holding the reigns and rocking. I would imagine riding with them through fields with valleys and mountains in the distance, the sun high above me and the sounds of animals all around.

Around the age of seven I decided I wanted to create my own miniature horse. Grandad pulled up a small wooden step-stool so I could just about see over the workbench. I spent days beside him drawing out my design, using his best tools to cut the wood.  I never finished my horse.  It doesn’t matter. It was that time with him I treasure.

I’ve always been told I’ve very similar hands to my Grandad – I don’t think they mean physically. They mean I’m practical like he is – I’m a maker. I don’t have sawdust in my hair, but yes, I’m giving life to objects too.

I still take Grandad up the hill to the end of the garden, but we go slowly now. The cherry red shed has faded a bit and Grandad’s tools have been set aside.  There are more biscuit tins now.  Some things haven’t changed; the smell in there, the way his hands feel when I hold them, and my love for this toy-maker, this magician.

The next part of my project will be making the voice over that will go alongside the writing.

Minor Project Schedule and Minor Project Inventory

Minor Project Schedule by Ruth Cann on Scribd

Toolkit 3 - Speed Posing (5 mins only) - Week 2

Origional

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After returning back from this piece a week later I have tried to look in more depth about my work. This weeks attempt I felt didn't work as well as the first weeks. I felt that although I looked at the piece I needed to have studied it more before the task, as whilst creating the pose I accidentally got both the arms and the legs around the incorrect way, losing time throughout. The centre of balance is also off as the dancer's weight is on her right leg, whereas Mooms' is spread across both legs which is inaccurate. The final thing I struggled with was the head, due to its size I didn't know exactly where to put the shoulder joints without them looking disconnected. Next time I will like to focus on the weight distribution for my character, and also to study the pose for longer, so I have an action plan before the timer starts.

Toolkit 3 - Speed Posing (5 mins only) - Week 1

Original image

I had 5 minutes to pose moom into the image above, this will be done every week at the beginning of the lesson.

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I've now left this pose for a week and looking at it now there are several things that I would like to improve for the future, starting at the bottom I feel like the leg is too stretched. I also now see that the hips could have been given more of a twist and the shoulders could have been relaxed more as its created a kink in the neck. The characters right arm is also stretched futher than I would have liked due to the bend in the right leg. My goal for nect week will be not to break the characters natural skeleton.