[INSPIRATION] 1930s Fashion

A section of this animation is set in the 1930s, this will be where the old animator creates Max the Cat and because of this, I need to make sure I capture the fashion styles in the 1930s. The old animator wears a button up shirt, jeans and braces, a very standard style in the 1930s, I collected a variety of fashion styles from the 1920s to the 1940s, below are a few examples of clothing styles: 

The fashion in the 1930s varied between middle class and working class, I wanted the old animator to represent a working class background, one of the things I noticed which kept on reappearing was the braces on a lot of the men, whether it is middle class or working class. One thing I never added to the old animator was a hat, which was very prominent in the 1930s, however because the old animator is inside the house I felt it unnecessary.

I feel happy with the designs of the old animator, as I think he fits the 1930s fashion styles, one of the things I should note is the location of where the animator is from, as there appears to be a distinct difference in fashions between America and England; English men in the 1930s wore flat-caps, in contrast to America who wore fedoras. Although this is somewhat unimportant, I feel it is necessary to address in case I decide to have the old animator wear a hat when he leaves the room. 

[PRACTICE] Animation Test #5

One of the main issues I have been having with placing scanned images into Adobe Flash, is when the images move they begin to pixelate, such as in the second animation test. I wanted to get a better shot of the room with the lightbox, a shot not so clustered together. So I drew a wider version of the shot, with the animation paper on the wall in the place they would be in the animation. However, this time I discovered something which solves the pixelation problem, converting the scanned images to bitmaps. Once an image is converted to a bitmap, it makes converts a raster image type into a vector image type, making the edges smoother and not so jagged, compare the two shots below:

The second animation test:

The fifth animation test:

The latest animation test has far more smoother images moving in contrast to the older image type, this will make the animation more aesthetically pleasing to watch and overall not break the illusion that they're drawings scanned into Adobe Flash. I am going to continue to experiment with the animation tests, I am still currently working on the storyboards, however once they are complete I will begin the animatic process.

[RESEARCH] Robin Shaw Questionnaire - What is the future for mainstream hand-drawn animation?

Throughout November, I have been sending questionnaires to independent animators who have experience in the animation industry. In this questionnaire, I wanted to figure out how they market their animation, their personal preference on animation and their opinion on the future of hand-drawn animation. On the 25/11/2016 I recieved a reply from Robin Shaw, an independent animator who has worked on projects such as The Snowman & The Snowdog, We're going on a Bear Hunt, Irn Bru “Phenomelal Christmas” advert and more recently, Ethel and Ernest.

Similar to the feedback from Neil Boyle, the feedback from Robin Shaw was very useful, it was insightful and nice to see similar opinions from one and other. I filmly believe that this information will help me throughout my Masters,  Below is the questionnaire with the feedback in full I received on the 25/11/2016:

The Future of Hand-drawn Animation in Mainstream Cinema  

Robin Shaw

What medium of animation is your personal preference? 

I have no personal preference. As a practitioner my field of expertise and interest is in 2d traditional hand-drawn animation, but as a viewer I have no preference whatsoever. As long as there is something narratively and visually engaging and, with any luck, non-derivative I am happy.  

(Regarding the previous question) Any reasons for this? 

There is a difference between the creation of animation and the viewing of it. As a creator, I am by nature a someone whose passion is drawing and the expression of feelings, thought and movement through drawn animation and illustration. As a viewer I wish to be immersed in what I am seeing, be it conventional animtated features or much more experimental work.  

As part of the independent industry, how do you (or your team) market your films? 

I don’t. That is left to the producers, broadcaster, distributers and financiers. 

Why do you think CG animation is more dominant in mainstream cinema? 

CG appears to be increasingly dominant in animation and I believe this is the logical result of trends within the industry and audience tastes. 

Obviously technology has caught up with directors’ and designers’ visions, in that the bridge to be crossed between imagination and end results on screen is far shorter than ever. This is something with which 2d drawn animation cannot compete. There is a verisimilitude possessed by CG which is difficult to achieve in traditional animation. This, I believe, has led to a shift in audience expectations. The viewing public see little difference now between watching a live action film (increasingly using large amounts of CG) and an animated feature. They are both capable of the same style of story-telling and cinematic feats and this leaves little room for 2d animation with all its limitations. 

Aside from this, there are surely far more mundane economic reasons. The games industry for instance, is so tied up and almost synonimous with the animated film industry. Investment in technology and the unification and simplification of production processes must be a factor to some extent.  

Walt Disney Animation Studio has not released a hand-drawn feature film since the release of Winnie the Pooh in 2011 and there are no plans to return to hand-drawn in the near future, do you think this has impacted animators, animation studios and the mainstream cinema? 

There is far less 2d animation work available at any one time and far fewer animators to choose from when crewing.  

Animation has become so advanced in recent years, do you think we should disregard old animation techniques (light-box, cut-out etc.) to make way for newer, easier and faster animation methods? 

No technique should be disregarded. One might as well say there is no need to paint now that we have photographs. It is the job of the 2d practitioner not to ape the tropes of CG, but instead to make work which could only be created in the drawn medium, such as ‘Ethel & Ernest’ on which I was Art Director. The book from which the film was adapted is a perfect marrying up of text and illustration. We could not have made a faithful film of that book without using 2d animation. Similarly, the film I have just finished co-directing, ‘We’re Going on a Bear Hunt’ is an adaptation of a children’s picture book, which has to nod respectfully towards the original illustrations.  

What are your opinions on this quote?; “I think today 2D animation has a responsibility, much like painters had after photography was invented, to reinvent what it is. It can’t go after realism, because there is no point; it has to do something only 2D can do. In painting, we got Expressionism, Impressionism, Cubism and other modern movements because of photography.” 

See above

[PERSONAL] 25/11/2016 Presentation and Feedback

On the 25/11/2016, I presented my wok to my peers and tutors for feedback. In this presentation I wanted to put more information in than the last presentation, as the main goal of the last presentation was to get opinions of an ending for the film, however this time I am wanting opinions on everything overall. This presentation focuses on what I am animating, why I am animating, and how I am animating the video and shows all the recent work I have created to back up my video. I also gave out a sample of my draft 8 script as well as my layout test, below is the presentation:

25/11/2016 - When Dreams Became Data - Presentation from Jack Alexander Gray

I felt that my presentation went much better this time in contrast to last time, I was more confident with my idea and conveyed it well to my peers. I got a few different opinions on Max's design, they were curious on whether he would have colour, shading, rough drawings behind or just a line character. This was because I have multiple drawings of Max in a variety of finished styles, it made me realize that I was unsure on how Max will be drawn in the video. Sarah suggested to have the animator draw the line art for Max, however once he springs to life he gets his shading. I feel that this would be a good way of conveying that he is not only alive but also drawn.

One other thing I got from the feedback was a few more referencing techniques, it was suggested to try and record myself drawing Max, to get a feel on how I myself actually draw Max. I will try this and compare it to how I have drawn Max in Flash.  

Overall I am very pleased with the feedback I received, it was mainly positive and offered me some very good feedback, I will continue to produce my animation and I will begin to create my storyboards shortly.

[FILM] Winnie the Pooh (2011)

The last hand-drawn animated film produced by the Walt Disney Animation Studio, Winnie the Pooh was a fitting tribute to the most loved children tales by thousands. The animation was in the film was fantastic, as were the voice acting and the musical numbers. For a hand-drawn animated feature to come out during a time when CGI animated feature films are striving, it was a very brave move on Disney's part. One of the more notable things about the film however, is the length, the film pushes 70 minutes, and even for a children film, is considered short. Average film lengths are around 90 minutes, and Pixar have been creating 90 minute children's animated films for nearly over 20 years when Winnie the Pooh was released. The film may have been shorter than the average animated feature, however it was a very gentle and pleasant animation to watch. But then why was this the last hand-drawn animated feature to be released by Disney?

Nobody can know for sure, but we can speculate. The film did moderately well in the Box Office, although not the worst a Disney feature film has been, this could arguably be blamed on the fact that Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2 was released on the same weekend as Winnie the Pooh, which earned $483.2 million on the opening weekend, compared to $7,857,076 from Winnie the Pooh. Another thing to take note is quite possibly the overall story-line of the film, it seemed somewhat familiar to other Winnie the Pooh films (Pooh's Grand Adventure: The Search for Christopher Robin) and overall seemed to lack any drama. Just as the film begins to finally open up, it quietly comes to an end and you're left thinking "is this it?". Winnie the Pooh overall earned around $50.1 million, compared to CGI animated features like Rio and Kung Fu Panda 2's $484.6 million and $665.7 million. In this regard, it is understandable why Disney would compare Kung Fu Panda 2, Rio and Winnie the Pooh, thus leaving the animated styles as the big difference.

I don't believe that Disney have stopped producing hand-drawn animation because the medium is bad, it wasn't down to the animation, it was down to the storyline of the film, the length of the film and the fact that it had to compere with Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2 during it's opening weekend, which set a worldwide opening-weekend record with $483.2 million. Winnie the Pooh had bad luck, bad production and bad writing, resulting in Disney moving towards CGI for the near future.

[PRACTICE] Animation Test #4

I have recently been experimenting with animating paper animation using Adobe flash, one of the experiments was to create the illusion that the character I have drawn on paper being drawn using Flash. To do this, I had to draw the character first on paper, scan it, and import it into Flash. After importing, bit by bit I deleted little sections of the drawing until there was nothing left, I reversed the animation and it gave the illusion that the character was being drawn in Flash. Below is the example:

After creating this animation test, I wanted to animate a hand drawing the picture. To do this, I drew a hand in Flash, creating groups for each individual finger and moved the hand around the image to create the illusion that the hand was drawing the character, below is the example:

I didn’t want to delve too deep into this by having the hand draw the entire character, as I felt that this would be very time consuming for a test animation and if I were to use the footage, would be very long winded and drag out, so I decided to stick with the drawing of the head. I will continue to experiment with paper animation, I am currently in the process of creating my storyboard and I feel that these tests will help me when I begin to create my animatic. 

[PRE-PRODUCTION] Final Script/Layout Test

Now that I have a finalized script, I wanted to jump right into a storyboard, however one of the things I struggle with when starting the pre-production is getting the layout of the animation correct. To help with this, I created a very rough layout test, similar to how Walt Disney created his storyboards in the 1920s. However, I didn't want to create my storyboards in this way, I wanted to use a more modern means to create my storyboards. Below is the layout script that I created after finalizing my script:

Now that I have created my layout test, I can see how some of the scenes will play out. This will make it easier when I create my storyboards and when I am setting the scene. I will begin to create my storyboard shortly, now that I have my final script and now that I have a rough layout test.