Tuesday, May 26, 2009

So, as promised, I'm posting all of my pre-production stuff on here in one big, composite post so that you can see the whole process from beginning to end.

The Premise:

I’ve always been a huge fan of the French artist Edmond Kiraz. He’s an illustrator that occasionally draws comics. I’d like to take one of his comic strips from his work and animate it in Flash. One I have in mind is of a girl that won’t stop dancing during and after a party, and gets herself and her boyfriend thrown in jail when she twirls a policeman’s moustache. I’d animate it and use “Linus & Lucy” by Vince Guaraldi for the background music.

The Script:

Title Card

Scene One

A high-class party. A man sits, playing the piano. His girlfriend is draped over his shoulder, watching as a girl dances playfully on top of the piano. The girl’s boyfriend also stands with the couple, watching and drinking a martini. Fade out.

The dancing girl and her boyfriend have left the party. They are walking outside. She is still dancing. Fade out.

Scene Three

The couple continues walking. The girl continues dancing. They pass a police officer. The girl reaches out and plays with the policeman’s moustache. He is not pleased. Cut to black.

Scene Four

The couple is in a jail cell. The man sits on the bench and sighs. The girl continues dancing. Fade to black.

End Credits

The Schedule:

Basically, my schedule is simply to work on the assignment in class. The only real solid dates are as follows:

>5/3: Create Characters and BGs in Photoshop
>5/6: Complete Scene One
>5/10: Complete Scene Two
>5/15: Complete Scene Three
>5/20: Complete Scene Four
>5/27: Final Film

The Storyboard:



Backgrounds:






Lastly, the notes on sound:

Basically, I'm just going to score it with "Linus & Lucy" by Vince Guaraldi.

And here's the finished product:









Conclusion:

Overall, this was a pleasant experience. Flash is a program I've been wanting to learn for a while, and despite the fact that I've only scratched it's surface, it's good to know that I now at least now how to produce SOMETHING with it. Obviously this would look very different if it were hand drawn, in that the quality of the animation would be higher (simply because I'd know exactly what the hell I was doing) but oh well. As for doing anything differently, I guess I'd try to take more time ON the animation and get it really stellar, and probably rework some of the puppets to work better aesthetically. But outside of that, I'm pretty pleased with the end product. Anyway, that's it for me. See you in the fall. Maybe. Probably.

9 comments:

  1. Pretty great. I really like the way they move. It makes me laugh. And linus lucy fits, even though it's obscenely overused.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Really funny. I liked your designs a lot.

    ReplyDelete
  3. very nice artistic style. :)

    ReplyDelete
  4. You suck, suck face. Also, this post is way too long. Its stupid.

    But just in case the professor checks these comments, I'm going to say something nice: I liked your soundtrack. Hahahahahahahaha. Sucker.

    ReplyDelete
  5. I liked it a lot, cute and simple. You did a very good job recreating the backgrounds and the characters. I'm a fan of the minimalistic style, and you did a great job with it in both design and animation.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Very nice! I like the whole concept of animating a piece of artwork, reminds me of Sesame Street or something! You did a great job translating the art into Flash.

    ReplyDelete
  7. I enjoyed your concept. Even though it was really simple I thought the animation was really fun and amusing. And thanks for introducing me to that artist its something I wanna check out. Great job!

    ReplyDelete
  8. You did a good job adapting the illustration into animation. The song fits well with it, too. I wish it was a little longer, though, since it ends a little abruptly. Good work overall though!

    ReplyDelete
  9. Despite the way you feel about the movements of your characters, I think they suit the designs. And I have to tip some sort of figurative hat to anyone who scores their film to Vince Guaraldi.

    ReplyDelete