Pasty Child Mock Up Sets

Before we can start properly building the plywood sets needed for filming Sasha's stop-motion concept Pasty Child, we thought it would be a good idea to build some cardboard mock-up sets before we got stuck into the official set production, to figure out what bits worked and what bits didn't. So me and Sash grabbed a HUGE pile of cardboard, got settled in our living room and got cracking. After a heavily gaffa-taped few days we managed to construct the pasty shop interior and exterior (we plan to have these two sets to fit together like a jigsaw to avoid building the same shape twice) and also the pasty child's dungeon bedroom. It was reallhy helpful putting together the mock-up sets because we could figure out how the scale was going to work out with the props and puppets, and we could tackle any problems with sizing there and then. The exterior set, when put together with the interior, turned out to be pretty bulky which made it diffult to transport to uni. So we will have to make the real wooden sets while we are in uni to save having to fit it in Sasha's car. Here are piccies of us constructing the mock ups...

Eighteen Ninety Character Colour Test

Here's one of the characters I drew for Eighteen Ninety with a cheeky bit of colour added. I took the colours from the original colour palette I put together last week, just as a small test to see if they worked with the design. I think some of the colours are a bit too garish and stand out too much, but some work really nicely together. Here is the coloured-in version :)

Eighteen Ninety Character Designs

Now that the rough colour palettes were done, I had an idea of what the character plans could look like. So I got cracking on some character designs that would fit to the style that Insa was after. I used the artists Erone and Amose as inspiration because their illustrations are really unique and have a lovely flow to them. My first few attempts were appalling and didn't fit to the style that Insa was interested in. But, after lots of rubbing things out and doodling with fine liner, I managed to come up with these two designs:

Eighteen Ninety Colour Palette

As I mentioned in my previous post, I am co art-directing with Insa on her film Eighteen Ninety, so I will be giving her a hand to keep the design of the film looking consistent, and act as a second pair of eyes to check if something doesn't look right.

Last week we sat down over a nice frothy cup of coffee and discussed how Insa wanted Eighteen Ninety's design side to look, and also went over what needed to be avoided. She showed me some inspiring artists that had a similar 'look' that she wanted to incorporate into the film, and the colours within the illustrations were spot on to what I had imagined. We both agreed that the film itself needs a strong but careful colour palette that will draw the viewer’s eye to the detail, but not distract them from the main BMX action. So, using the artists Amose, Swoon and Erone as inspiration, I put together a rough sheet of possible colour palettes. Voila!

Christmas went too quick :(

Blimey... I can't believe a whole month has whizzed past.. a very chocolatey/mincepie/mulled wine-filled month which has been bloomin' marvelous (but not so great on the waistline.) It has also been a very unproductive month, and both my laptop and dissertation has gathered a layer of dust.

Well we got the results back from the tutors about our projects the day before we finished for crimbo, and unfortunately my film didn't get picked. I admit I was pretty disheartened by the news because I would have loved to see it go into production and its hard to let go of a project once you've got into it. But in some ways I do feel relieved because it gives me the freedom to focus on the things that interest me the most, and will give me a chance to build up my strengths and build up a good portfolio.

Luckily Sasha's stop motion concept 'The Pasty Child' got chosen, which is fantastic because we can both get stuck into production and hopefully create something that looks awesome :D Sash has said I can focus on set building and props which is great because those bits are my favourite! But I'll also be helping out on all the bits and bobs that go into stop-motion, so I'm excited about getting started!
Our tutor Andy also advised me to work on another project to strengthen and add variety to my portfolio, so I will be co-art directing with Insa on her project EighteenNinety which is a celebration of female bmx riders and highlights the lack of opportunities out there for them. I will be helping to look over the project as a second pair of eyes to check that everything is looking guurd, and helping out with some of the art work. Time to whip out my pens and sketchbook and get cracking! :D

Nestling Animatic

Hurrah!! I've finally been able to upload my animatic!! Youtube was being a bit funny about the video because there is music from the film 'Chocolat' in the background... hopefully it works!

Here is the final animatic for my stop-motion concept 'Nestling' which was put together by Andy Luck. He used the images from my storyboard and put them in sequence, and then added sound effects and the sound clip from 'Chocolat' to create atmosphere. Enjoy!

Nestling Pre-Production Bible

Whoops forgot to post this! Here's my finished pre-production bible for my 'Nestling' concept, complete with tidier storyboards and character designs:

Nestling Pre Production Bible