Assignment 2: Animation

I have been tasked with creating my own animation that lasts for 30 seconds or more, having been planned in detail- with the content, materials, equipment and sounds sorted in advance- before production, which involves animating, editing, adding titles and sound as well as exporting it. The animation must include sound and titles but can be about anything so long as it is made from either model based, cut out, pixilisation or time lapse animation. Each step needs to be documented so the stages can be viewed and analyzed by others.

I'm considering doing a model based animation, like this:

'Doctor Who Action figure Adventures: The Oncoming Storm' by Matthew 'Batmanmarch' Toffolo 

However, if I was going to do a model based animation it would have to be considerably shorter, due to the time frame my animation needs to be produced in. 

I'm also thinking about a cut out animation similar to this:

'Reindeer Sweater' by Egor Shumilov 

However, like the last example, my animation would have to be shorter and also not use other peoples music like the video shown.

I've been thinking about what to do for my animation and what it could be about. A reoccurring idea follows a ghost called Billy through his world, and parody's of real life places.

The style of animation I want to make is similar to this:

'Paper War'

'Tease'

However, I don't think my animation will use the objects around, instead using backgrounds that have been made specifically for the animation in order to save time and reduce the complexity of the idea. 

My backup idea is simpler, focusing on just cut out animation and it follows 'Billy the Ghost' as he works -meaning less time would be needed to create the animation.

The ghost itself is going to be based on this image-

To create my animation I will need to draw each of my characters at different angles and with different expressions, as well as having the backgrounds and props drawn so they can be used. I will also need some models to be used for when I change animation styles for a short time. As well as the equipment needed for the animation I will also need a camera to take pictures and the software to play the images one after another at 25 frames per second. 

I have started to draw out some designs for my characters and props as well as a rough storyboard of what will hopefully happen in my animation. This means that after I draw out the characters and backgrounds I can begin animating.

My Concepts and Storyboard-

Now that everything's planned out, I need to start creating my cut outs. To do this I need to draw the outline of my character- in this case the ghost- and then outline them in pen so I can cut them out easily.

I've decided to create the ghost out of tracing paper in order to make him appear transparent, although this does mean that you will be able to see the lines underneath the joints when they're layered. 

At first I sketched the ghost and it's limbs onto the tracing paper, the ghosts drawn at different angles so I can give the impression of turning instead of just jumping at a 90° angle whenever I need to turn his head.

Then I inked the ghosts so they're easier to see and the lines are harder. This also makes it easier for me to cut them out as there's a more definite outline than there was before.

I plan on animating at home using my phone or iPad to take pictures of each frame. If I animate at 25 frames per second, that means I will have to take a minimum of 750 photos to reach the duration limit of 30 seconds minimum - if we went for the minimum of 12 frames per second there would only need to be 360 images. I plan on using a site called Monkey Jam to animate, due to it being easy to use and available online without any purchase required.  

However, the animation is taking longer to create then previously thought due to the amount of images needed as well as the time needed to fix the set when it is knocked by something.

The First Animation Set-Up Used

 The Improved Animation Station

Editing the Animation in Premiere Pro

Billy - The Complete Animation

After taking all the pictures I ended up using iStopMotion to animate as Monkey Jam required each photo to be imported individually. The animation has 600 images and has 12 frames per second, the total length being 50 seconds including credits. I also used Adobe Premiere Pro to insert the music and export the video as an mp4 file.

I ended up dropping the first part of my idea involving the portal due to the time constraints and the length of the animation. The music in the background is copyright free from the free music archive, chosen because I thought it fit the animation well.

I could improve upon my animation by spending more time and using animation software whilst taking the pictures instead of just my phone - which lacks an onion skin to see where everything was placed before, hence the shakiness and jumps in the animation. Another way I could improve is with my animation set up, as I animated at home meaning I had to get a bit creative in how I was taking the images without moving my phones camera from above the paper.