The Art of Storyboarding

...I hate it. I hate it so much.

Hmmm.... storyboarding. Why do I hate it, Andy asks me. Well, maybe I don't hate all storyboarding. I certainly see the point of doing it, I understand its importance; how else to you ensure that everyone involved in a project is making the same film unless there is a detailed plan of how every shot should work?

The recent storyboard project we were assigned was deeply dull. I think this is probably because the script itself was pretty dull. Maybe that was the point? It's probably easy to design a creative storyboard for an exciting story. When faced with a script that you have no interest in, there is more effort involved in thinking up dynamic shots. There are of course many themes or genres you could add to the story; through the choice of shots, angles and zooms, the script could probably be transformed from horror to thriller to action adventure.

But I didn't do that, I struggled to get to the end of the assignment because the process of thinking up new camera angles made me very sleepy. I guess I'm not gonna be a storyboard artist. Another career to cross off the list.

"One of the great appeals of animation is that spontaneous ideas can be incorporated into the work at hand. It seems perverse to ape too closely the process by which live-action films are executed." Dave Borthwick, Imagine, Mar/Apr 2008

Exeter Animation Festival

A few weeks ago I went up to see Animated Exeter, with particular interest in the work of the Quay Brothers and an exhibition by a theatre group called Forkbeard Fantasy.

I first heard of Forkbeard Fantasy when they brought their play “Fall of the House of Usherettes” to Exeter’s Northcott Theatre in February 2006.  It was a piece which incorporated live performance and puppetry along with projected film and animation sequences, all brought together in an extraordinary creative and comic show.  It told the story of Bernard von Earlobe, a film archivist set on rediscovering the secret of Liquid Film; along the way the play references influences as varied as (obviously) Poe, Shakespeare, The Shining, Don’t Look Now, Georges Méliès and the Lumiere Brothers. 

Alongside their 2008 production titled “Invisible Bonfires”, which charted the history of the Carbon Weevil (or humanity), Forkbeard Fantasy put together an exhibition of puppets, props and videos from their back catalogue.  There was, sadly, very little from their “Fall of the House of Usherettes”, the exhibition seeming to focus more on interactive models which given that it was part of the Animated Exeter festival is perhaps understandable.  Certainly the day I visited there seemed to be a huge number of children enjoying the show.  Perhaps because of this audience, Forkbeard Fantasy seemed to have steered away from some of their darker humour.

tbc

Underwater OSTN

I worked on this project with Ben and I think it worked out ok.  From our initial ideas we chose to turn the letters O, S, T and N into characters, using the letter in each case to form the nose of a face.  Ben had an idea which involved our characters floating out to sea and being rescued by a sofa.  However, after we had created the storyboard and animatic we decided that it was too complicated an idea for the 10 second time limit.  

By this stage we had already created a water effect, made by Ben adapting a couple of Miro paintings which I put into After Effects and animated using an adjustment layer.  We therefore decided to stick with a watery theme, but simplify it down to just having our characters float down through the water and then transform into the OSTN logo.  Ben and I had each created a version of the characters and – although I think Ben’s designs are beautiful – it was decided that the simpler characters that I had drawn would work better on the sea background.  (Ben’s characters really were wonderful but they needed a plain white background to show them at there best and we both wanted to keep the background we had already made.)

I drew up the characters using Illustrator and Photoshop, while Ben created arms and legs in Flash.  We were then able to bring the characters to life in After Effects.  To add depth to the water scene Ben used Flash to create a shoal of fish.  I created bubbles in After Effects and layered them so they went both in front and behind our characters.   

The final stage was the sound; Ben recorded his friend playing the mandolin (?) and gurgling!  From the 30 seconds or so of sound, I edited out 10 seconds using Audition and added an echo and water effects. 

Sadly I was unsuccessful in getting the video to play on this page, so here is a still image instead...

I probably cried the first time I saw Finding Nemo

Once I had recorded a new sentence to use for the self portrait project, I started the lip synch process again. And again I made the same mistake, lining up the mouth shapes with the letters of the words rather than the sounds being made. Once I realised where I was going wrong, I tried to repair the animation. The result is not perfect, but I hope it’s enough to understand the “theory” behind the process.

Within Flash, I began making the scene a little more interesting. I found an underwater scene for the background and made the brightness increase and dim every few frames in the hope of creating a deep sea effect. I’m not sure how well this works, but it is using my very basic knowledge of Flash. I’m sure there are more impressive effects, but I would probably chose a programme like After Effects to create these.

I also added a fish from “Finding Nemo” (I think it’s the dad, I dunno, I didn’t pay that much attention to the film). Initially this was going to swim past, but it seemed more interesting if it just floated up the screen. Andy showed me how to use a motion path to make its movement a little more as I had imagined. The motion path seems like a very straightforward way to get good control over the movement of objects.

Finally, I added a sample of underwater sound effects. And it’s complete! (and this is where I would have it on show, except I have no idea how to upload it – sorry folks!)
____

Flash: I do like using this programme, it makes so much more sense to me that Maya. Having watched Justin use Flash to create beautiful, flowing animations, it seems to suit a loose style of drawing - it seems to be the closest thing to drawing freely in the computer. I definitely need more practice with Flash if I am ever going to realise its potential. However, at the moment I am trying to get my head around After Effects, which seems better suited my way of working; After Effects feels more analytical in the way you use it, whereas Flash seems somehow more intuitive. This could be me having entirely the wrong impression of Flash (or just too much time spent watching Justin create wonderful sequences in a seemingly effortless manner). I guess my conclusion is that I want to concentrate on After Effects for now and revisit Flash another time.

Flash and the Self-Portrait

I enjoyed working with Flash, I felt much more comfortable using the programme and found the extra notes on Moodle extremely helpful as I could scan through them as the workshop progressed.

I was not particularly thrilled at the idea of creating a self-portrait - or having to record my voice - but decided to keep it simple and impersonal. I drew my image using Illustrator, in the style of Julian Opie, whose work I admire for its economy of line, which despite its simplicity manages to communicate intention and emotion. It terms of using his style for my self portrait, I like to think it reflects my confidence in stealing from other artists and (as his work has a very flat, 2D feel) also reflects that I am essentially a simple, two-dimentional charecter.

Anyway, having created my self portrait, it was relatively straightforward to convert the Illustrator layers into Flash symbols. The simple style of drawing made it easier to create the mouth shapes I needed for the lip synch.

When it came to lining up the speech with the mouth shapes, it was a little more difficult than I first thought; I found I was using the letters that I knew the words were made up from rather than the sounds. I had also recorded myself speaking very quickly, which made the process harder again. It seemed like a good idea to record some additional sound and so using the M-Audio device (or “talk-box” as I prefer) I recorded a conversation between myself and my housemate Lora. In the end, I chose to use one of her sentences: “I probably cried the first time I saw Finding Nemo”.

Maya continues... is it getting on your nurbs?

The struggle with Maya continues; this week my thanks go out to Jacob who rescued me more than once! That said, there were brief moments in Tuesday’s session when I started to feel maybe all hope was not lost. What was that!? A faint glimmer of understanding? That might be putting it too strongly, but it’s just enough to stop me giving up. I’m still frustrated by my choice of computer at the back of the room as I am continually twisting around to see what is being demonstrated. Maybe - as someone recently suggested to me - that’s why we have chairs that can spin!

So, a little less negative this week I hope; fingers crossed that by the next session I have retained some of the information we learn this time around. The tuition seems a little slow, but I think it is inevitable when teaching a group of this size. I think I would personally prefer it if we had more intensive training sessions in smaller groups. I am annoyed with myself for not understanding what we are doing in Maya, I can’t quite make the connection between the tasks we are asked to perform in all the various modes, (object, vortex, whatever), and the results. I want to be good at it straight away, but at the present time I’m a long way from building a convincing chair.

With the presentation looming, I found it quite challenging to keep my mind on what we were working on in Maya at all. A little voice in the back of my head said “you should be doing more research; you’re letting your group down”. Oh well. I now think I know more about Halas and Batchelor than I ever realistically wanted to and it’s probably still not enough. I have always been aware that there’s a lot of information in the world that I’ll never know or understand, but even when you narrow it down to one specific area of study such as animation, then one studio, then one film…

Maya and other struggles...

So, this is my first real blog entry, it’s finally time to set type to electronic page.

I guess I’ll start with the Maya workshop we had on Tuesday, as it was the first Animation Practice session I’ve been to for a while. I’m familiar with using computers and was looking forward to receiving training in some new software, but found most of this day dull and frustrating. I think this largely came from the fact that the computer I am working at is situated too far away to either see the demonstration on the screen, or hear clearly what the tutor is explaining. This meant that if I missed even the smallest stage in the process it was very difficult to catch up. Luckily Richard was always on hand to help explain what I’d missed, but ultimately it meant the session was slow, stilted and maddening! I also have no idea what project we were set to complete for next week. Hopefully I can find someone to explain it to me before it’s too late! Little help?

I am very comfortable creating 2D images in Photoshop and Illustrator, but I struggle to visualise in 3D; my brain doesn’t hold 3D layouts or images very well. This is not to say I don’t want to work in 3D, but I think it will take a lot of practice to be confident with Maya.

___

I would also like to comment on the Wednesday Screening. As I mentioned above, I have missed several of the Animation Practice sessions and feel quite a long way behind the rest of the group. Seeing what everyone had produced was both inspiring and intimidating! The progress since the first project “Heavy Figure on Springboard” (which incidentally I am still working on – argh!) is amazing. Probably the one I liked the best was Cherie’s, which really seemed to be telling a story through the interaction between the two characters. I’m even more aware of the work I have to catch up!