Working Title:
Attack of the Creature from Planet TrES 2B:
Alien World Blacker than Coal!
Outline Description:
The project is a mock trailer for
a 1950’s style B-movie. I will write a short script for the movie itself. It
will be an old-fashioned love story of young sweethearts separated by an alien
attack on planet earth.
The main animation will be done
in 3D. All the characters and environments will be computer generated. The
creature will be animated in Stop Motion. I will make a model out of clay and
film short scenes using Stop Motion software, these scenes will then be
composited into the 3D environment.
Rationale for Project Choice:
The main reason I have chosen to
do this project is my own personal interest in B-movies. I really enjoy horror
films of that era, as this was before the invention of CGI and the special
effects that were used were a lot more creative. I chose to animate the
Creature in Stop Motion as homage to Ray Harryhausen, who was one of the
original visual effects pioneers.
I feel the Stop Motion will add that authentic B-movie feel to the
trailer.
Another reason I chose to do some
of the animation in Stop Motion is that with the rise of CG animation, it seems
to be a dying medium. I also think it would be a great addition to my
portfolio.
I chose to do the majority of the
animation in 3D to further develop my modelling and animating skills that I’ve
built up over the past year.
Areas for Investigation:
Two of the main areas I will have
to look into are lip-syncing and facial animation. I haven’t done any 3D animations
with talking characters, so I will need to learn how I would achieve this.
Thankfully, there are plenty of online tutorials and I am doing a Sound for
Animation workshop at the University. The workshop should also help with the
music side of the project.
Although I have done Stop Motion
before, my past projects were of silhouettes or 2D drawings, so animating the
Creature will also be a new practice for me. I will need to work out which
material would be best for sculpting the model.
Background Research:
In order to learn more on the
subject I have watched various B Movies, including Ed Wood’s Plan 9 from Outer
Space, which has a similar feel to what I’m planning to achieve in regards to
the style and over dramatic acting. In regards to research on the Creature I
watched some pre 1960’s Harryhausen films. The stop motion animation in Mighty
Joe Young is exactly how I plan to animate my Creature. The rigidness of the
movements will add that old fashioned feel to my trailer. The main creature,
Ymir, from 20 Million Miles to Earth is a big inspiration for my Creature, as
well as the Creature From Black Lagoon (aesthetically).
I have also watched a number of
trailers for films of that era. Although they all tend to be longer than my
trailer is going to be (~30 seconds), I still managed to get the general feel
of them. I noticed that many of those films had very long titles, so as a nod
to that the title to my mock film is overly long. I noticed the font choice is
very important and have managed to find some interesting fonts online. I have
also researched the general look and feel of Black and White footage of that
period, as I will try to emulate this in my animation.
As well as looking into films, I
have also done some research on
various planets. I chose Planet TrES 2B as it’s currently the darkest known
exoplanet. The planet reflects less light than coal (hence the title of my
project) and the cause of the darkness is still unknown.
As part of my research on Ray
Harryhausen, I went to the London Film Museum, which had some of his work as
well as other interesting exhibits. I watched Ray Harryhausen: Special Effects
Titan (2011), which is a documentary of his career, with interviews from
Harryhausen, tributes from famous directors that were inspired by his work as
well as behind the scenes footage of Harryhausen animating and creating the
effects. I have also contacted Bradford National Museum regarding arranging an
appointment to see their collection of Harryhausen’s work.
Literature review:
SHAW, S. et al. (2004) Stop Motion: Craft Skills for Model Animation.
Amsterdam; Oxford: Focal
HARRYHAUSEN, R. & DALTON, T.
(2004) Ray Harryhausen: an Animated Life.
New York: Billboard Books
OSIPA, J. (2010) Stop Staring: Facial Modeling and Animation
Done Right. Indianapolis: Wiley Publishing
JESSEN, T. 2005. Ray Harryhausen:
It Came From the Animation Table. AnimationWorld [Online]. [Accessed 15
October, 2013]. Available from: http://www.awn.com
JACKSON, W. 1997. An Interview
With Aardman's Peter Lord. Animation World Magazine. [Online]. 2(2). [Accessed
15 October, 2013]. Available from: http://www.awn.com
Methodology:
As I mentioned before, majority
of the animation will be done in 3D. For this I will be using 3D Coat and Maya
to model the characters. The environment modelling and character animation will
also be done in Maya. I don’t have a huge amount of experience using Maya to
animate, so I thought this would be a good way to learn more about the software
as it seems to be the industry standard, but my lack of knowledge could also be
a potential problem.
The Creature will be a clay model
and will be animated through Stop Motion software, such as DragonFrame or
iStopMotion. Animating the Creature this way will give the film an authentic B
movie quality. It can be a long, painstaking process, as a simple mistake can
be a huge drawback.
I will be editing the animation
in Nuke or After Effects. I plan on having three layers for the scenes with the
Creature: the background - environment, the middle ground – stop motion
animation of the Creature in front of a green screen and the foreground – the
human 3D characters.
I will also use After Effects or
Nuke to colour correct the animation and add some effects to make it appear
more authentic.
Research Ethics:
After looking into research
ethics, I feel that this project will not provide any ethical problems.
Project Plan:
Week
|
Tasks
|
Deadlines
|
Week
Starting 14/10/13
|
Finalise
idea, Submit Proposal
|
Proposal-
18th October
|
Week
Starting 21/10/13
|
Script,
Concept Art, Storyboard
|
|
Week
Starting 28/10/13
|
3D
Modeling
|
|
Week
Starting 04/11/13
|
3D
Modeling
|
|
Week
Starting 11/11/13
|
3D
Modeling, Previs, Clay Model Sculpting
|
|
Week
Starting 18/11/13
|
Stop
Motion Animation
|
|
Week
Starting 25/11/13
|
Stop
Motion Clean up
|
Progress
Review- 29th November
|
Week
Starting 02/12/13
|
Recording
Voiceovers
|
|
Week
Starting 09/12/13
|
3D
Animation
|
|
Christmas
Holiday
|
3D
Animation
|
|
Week
Starting 06/01/14
|
3D Animation
|
|
Week
Starting 13/01/14
|
3D
Animation
|
|
Week
Starting 20/01/14
|
3D
Animation
|
|
Week
Starting 27/01/14
|
3D
Animation
|
|
Week
Starting 03/02/14
|
3D
Animation
|
|
Week
Starting 10/02/14
|
Editing
|
|
Week
Starting 17/02/14
|
Editing,
Sound
|
|
Week
Starting 24/02/14
|
Render
|
|
Week
Starting 03/03/14
|
Render,
Compositing
|
|
Week
Starting 10/03/14
|
Compositing,
VFX, Titles
|
|
Week
Starting 17/03/14
|
Report
|
Product
Submission- 21st March
|
Week
Starting 24/03/14
|
Report
Submission
|
Report
Submission -28th March
|
Project Deliverables:
The final product will be a
narrative driven 30-60 second animation, consisting of a combination of 3D and
Stop Motion techniques. I think this combination of techniques; as well as various
effects will make a very good addition to my professional portfolio as well as
a good submission for animation festivals. I will also produce a report.
