3rd year project crew assignment

I've just realised I haven't out anything on here about our crew assignment! In addition to our pre/post production projects this term, we have been given the opportunity to work on one of the 3rd year final major projects and have been assigned specific crew roles for that project.
I have been given the role of set dresser for Sarah Crombie's stop motion film 'The Musician' where I will have to paint and add final detail to all of the sets that will be used for this animation. I am really excited about working on this project because I have always been interested in stop motion and have wanted to get involved in a project like this for a long time! I've never really had the chance to properly explore all of the different jobs and aspects concerning stop motion, so this project will provide the perfect opportunity to get stuck in and see how everything all comes together. Before I can get started on decorating, the sets have to be cut out and put together, so I have been helping Orla and Sasha with the painting, sanding and texturising of the sections of wood that will make up specific sets for the film. Here are a few piccies of us a work! :)

17/2/11 life drawings

Here are my life drawings from this week :)

Character face expressions!

In addition to my final designs, I have completed a page of different facial expressions for both characters. I have tried to include lots of different angles for each face, to capture specific emotions/reactions and get a sense of their personalities. Here are the design sheets!

Life drawing 10/2/11

Here are my life drawings from this week, I tried out a new lighter orange colour pastel which was really nice to use and I think works quite well :)

Changes to setting

After hearing some feedback, I have decided to change my setting a bit! My housemate sasha suggested that I could link my fairground theme to a gypsy travelling circus, which could potentially be really interesting to work on because travelling circuses are so vibrant and surreal. I also like the fact that they aren't permenant, and change locations on a frequent basis. Here are some relevant images that I have found which caught my eye..

New character design

Rightio! I have decided to change my character designs for Ana and her astral body, because I think the previous ones were a bit too literal and the colours didn't work very well. The character Ana needed to look a bit more plain and uncomfortable, with very prim and proper clothes and a worried expression to represent her uncomfortable nature.The astral body character on the other hand looked a bit too ordinary and 'human,' so I have now changed her to look more wild and 'free'. I was going to make her wear a long dress but once again it looked a bit too literal, so I have covered her modesty slightly with a long floaty skirt and tumbling curls which link to Alphonse Mucha's style. I also made the astral body look a bit transparent by using the blur tool in photoshop, hopefully she looks a bit more surreal than before! Here are the final designs :)

Life drawing 3/2/11

Here are my life drawings from this week! I tried out drawing on a smaller scale in my sketchbook rather than on an eisel, and found that my judgement on proportion is alot better but my drawings arent very expressive. Here they are :)

Fairground setting

I was given the setting of a fairground for my pre-production bible, which has great potential seeing as fairgrounds are such dynamic and vibrant places. I have written down everything that comes to my mind when I think of fairgrounds, and here are some relevant images that have caught my eye:

Astral body character design

Here is a completed character design for the astral body side to my human character 'Ana.' I initially sketched out the basic shape and features of the character, then added further detail and some colour to the design in photoshop. I'm feeling a bit more confident with photoshop now and I'm quite happy with the result, although I'm not 100% sure this is how I want this character to look (I might tweak it a bit when I do the final image for my pre-production bible.) I wanted this character to look wilder and more free than her 'connected' human, with loose flowing hair and feminine features that are reminiscent of Alphonse Mucha's paintings.