Just trying to figure out the definitive color for the ballroom. I like the green, but I feel once the characters are added to the scene that it doesn't look right. I think the blue one looks better with the background characters, and the main characters stand out a little more too.
I haven't gotten too far with my animatic just yet. But I decided to show my progress with subtitles for now. I'm using a new program called storyboarder, and it's helping a lot to have subtitles and to be able to edit pacing etc as I go. Later, when I get audio files for the narrator, I'll be able to add those in to fitness the length of some shots. I exported as a gif for now, as the video export would not export the captions.
I added the changes you made and also made a few edits of my own to the dialogue and the wallflowers actions.
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I made two versions of the turnarounds, one for modeling and one for color reference purposes. I also made an "anatomy of" for the wallflower just in case the parts weren't clear.
I have a voice actor in mind who I want to voice the narrator. Prozd from youtube who is a professional voice actor and who I will email for rates when I have the go ahead for my script. If his prices are too high however then I will take a look around for some different voice actors to see if I can find anyone else.
This is what I have for my script so far. It's not very well fleshed out due to medical issues stopping me from working for long period of time. But it blocks out the basics of what I want to happen.
I'm not sure I'll add in dialogue at this point. It needs some kind of narration of whats happening though. I'm not sure if i'll have be like old silent movies and have title cards for this.
Or if I'll have it in the style of these kinds of training videos, where the narrator is interacting with the characters. (though obviously less comical and more educational)
I made the design of the butterfly colors a little simpler and then proceeded to recolor them. As much as I love the colors of number 1, I think 2 or 4 will work best with the flower design. I also gave the flower a face here. But I'm unsure whether or not I'll keep it.
I think my favorites from this batch of designs for the butterfly are 6 and 4.
Shaul Wing Colors
I wanted to reference real butterfly wing colors and designs for these. Right now I'm really liking number 3 and I think with some tweaks to the colors it would really fit in with the Wallflower.
I've tried to make them as simple as I can without losing their butterfly look. I decided to give them a poncho like the flowers, but shaped with butterfly wings and butterfly patterns. I like 4 and 5 the most, but I like the pattern on 5 too.
1 a simple back and forth step sequence (anthers move with them)
2 the butterfly spins the flower around (which in turn makes the anthers rub against the butterfly in the movement, pollen sticking to the butterflies legs)
3 the butterfly dips the flower, pulling them back up and then switching partners.
4 the sequence starts again and the pollen transfers through the movement. (i think it would happen when the butterfly dips the flower and their legs brush against each other in the movement) ____
It will take me a while to map out this movement correctly within the conforms of dance and the science I need to convey, so before I do the full animatic, I will do a quick animatic sequence of this dance in a static view order to get it right. But before anything, I will finish my script.
I'm starting to finalize my flowers design now. I want them all to look the same in design and then have colors to differentiate them. Much like in Disney's fantasia here:
So the main flower, the wallflower, will be a unique color than the rest of the flowers. So far I'm thinking of 8 for the wallflower, and 9 and 6 for the background flowers.
1 Opens on a ballroom, flowers dancing with a butterfly, butterfly dancing from one flower to another. 2 Pans to another flower, watching on, not sure how to join. 3 Butterfly notices and goes up to the wallflower, offering a dance. The wallflower insists not knowing how to do the pollination waltz. The butterfly offers to teach them.
4 The wallflower agrees, following the butterfly to the dance floor. The other flowers clear out, forming a circle around them.
5 The butterfly goes through the steps of the pollination waltz, ending by showing the transferring of pollen from one flower dancer to another. (i'll go into detail of this part in a draft script)
6 The animation ends with the camera panning up as the other flowers start dancing again, the butterfly dancing from each flower to another. As they sync up the dancer form a giant flower pattern when viewed from above.
I'm finding it difficult to make more androgynous flower characters, especially since flowers have extremely feminine shapes already. However I tried my best with these designs. I personally like 2, 6 and 8, and I like the shorts on 9.
I'm trying to make the simplicity of this character match those of the flowers I've done so far. I'm going to take number 3 and 4 further to develop more.
This project was difficult, as I couldn't actively go out and record as many sounds as I wanted because of health problems. So I had to make do with collecting from outside and bringing them inside to record. Other than that this project was very fun and I can honestly say mixing sounds together into something new is rewarding.
I do however feel they all sound very "samey". When showing them to my friends they had similar feedback, but maybe that's just my "style" of mixing coming through. I feel like if I were uploading more of my progress and getting feedback for my soundscapes the outcomes would have been different, so I'll keep that in mind for the next project we do like this.
So from the feedback I got from Phil I started to simplify my designs while looking to Lucienne Day for inspiration.
I'm beginning to like these more simplified versions of my Flower Girls much more as a result. And soon I will start to move onto my Butterfly character.
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During Simons lesson today, He told me my idea of the "dance" reminded me of the choreography of Busby Berkeley. His films include dance sequences that are extremely synchronized and very beautiful as a result, which is something I could include. Of course, I won't be able to do something as complicated as Berkeley for this project, but taking elements of these dances could work for this project.
The costume designs for the girls are very much clone like as well, and I feel with the short time we have and the limit of what I can do as a filmmaker right now, this kind of cloning could work well with the flowers. It makes sense as well as in a field of flowers lots of them look similar in terms of shape with the only difference being color in most cases. So when I finish a final flower girl design I will change them in terms of color.
This also got me thinking in terms of the environment for this animation. Since the flowers and butterfly are in themselves going to be quite bright and busy, I don't want the environment to take away from that experience, or to make it too much for the eyes to look at. So I had the idea of making it like a ballroom, or even like the sets of musicals.
While I was looking at Instagram on the train home, I came across the page of an artist called James Brunt. He uses nature to make beautiful patterns. He uses rocks, sand and even leaves.
I feel that the simplicity of the placement of these leaves could make it seem like a natural environment, while still having it look like a ballroom. I will draw up concepts for these ideas over the weekend ready for OGR.
At first, I tried Jordan's idea of designing different flower girls, but These looks too samey to me. I decided I wanted to try and get out of my comfort zone of designing humanoid females all the time. So I decided to try some more abstract designs.
These were the result. I used the Disney Fantasia flowers as most of my influence and I also used the game "Journey" character designs (shown below) as a further influence. I feel these convey what I want much more and they are much more pleasing to draw.
I decided that I want my animation to be based on both pollination and germination. I will hopefully show this as a dance between multiple flowers and one butterfly. As the butterfly character dances from one flower to another, he will also be transferring the pollen. Then the flowers will "collapse" as they create the seeds and fruit, and when the seeds germinate into new flowers then the dance begins anew.
