Guidance and Gathering

This week was about absorbing and material gathering. I met up with Musa Brooker and talked about how to go about constructing my set, puppets and the logistics of making things move. He told me to build a mock mini foamcore version of my set, so we can figure out the placement and the wiring before constructing the real one. Also, he told me to make an asset list with all the puppets I need with replacements and props.

Mike Patterson showed me some great clips that my thesis reminded him of as well as suggested techniques like layering various filters or sand animation. One I always loved was "Allegro non Troppo" by Bruno Bozzetto because his animations has a unique style and the techniques are beautifully integrated. Bruno often goes over his initial animation with a second pass, allowing him to fully animate layers of paint and composite them manually. Other animations he showed me use presets which make things look deceivingly difficult but they are rather simple. Those I will keep in mind for post. Mike also suggested having the paper cutout of the character be on torn paper. In Visual Music class, I hope to learn how to efficiently time the music and flush out that second section as much as I can.

Yesterday I had the painting on glass workshop with Sheila Sofian. That was extremely eye-opening and mixed with Mike's filtering effects advice would be perfect for my film. I really love the hands-on, go with the flow process that involves paint. I will be layering and filtering paint on glass animation together to have it look like it's dancing to the music... FULL OF LIFE! Now I dont' need to worry about transitions so much because this medium automatically caters to it. What I need to do is experiment with it a couple times and then I can do several test shots within the next month.

I've contacted my dear friend and composer, Erene, and she's excited to see what she can do. I'm also ecstatic since she's a huge neuroscience expert and introduced me to the whole concept of phrenology, cognitive science. Her YouTube channel is here: http://www.youtube.com/user/erenemusik but anyway, lately she's been on a beat/electronica/ambience/remixing binge which will translate well with my second section.

My challenges this week have been getting to a supply store to get foamcore, fabrics, wire, paint of glass material and glycerin. Not having a car, and having limited time during the day, it's difficult. Mapping the second section keeps causing me grief, but I will have it complete in Taiwan. And after this main obstacle, things will get easier because this was the problem holding me back last semester as well. (however, this time, I have more of a concrete basis)

This upcoming week in Taiwan I plan to get organized with assets, schedule, procedure, materials and thumbnails (one of my weaknesses since I never sit down to figure things out, instead I just make creative things without guidelines). So having the plane ride there and back will give me more structure to how to approach the next step. Also I get to see the real dragonfruit tree that sparked this whole thing! WOO!

Rooster Turnaround with armature guidelines

Meat puppet

FOAM!

Mini Goals for this week

- draw turnaround for rooster puppet

- asset list

- a map of section 2

- another still

- mock roof

- finish Euclid's puppet body

- colour key

- better my animatic so composer is clear on the idea

AAAAAND.... BREAK!

Section 1 & 3 ROUGH Animatic

The export screwed up a bit - the real one is not this fast and does not have that weird scramble in the middle. But here's the idea:

Stop-Mo Sections of New Dragonfruit Drift Animatic from Jackie Chang on Vimeo.

Section 2 Lil' Breakdown

I know I want Euclid to exit at the rooster's eye and have an epic shot of the entire rooster - a zoom out from the eye. So based off that, I decided he will start in the lower left section starting at Domestic.

Here's a great reference for me. It even has sweet inkpen illustrations!

So I've typed it out officially (the diagrams are incredibly hard to read on online images) and will divide my sketches accordingly to fit one of the main headings:
DOMESTIC - continuity, amativeness, philoprogenitiveness, inhabitiveness, concentrativeness, adhesiveness, friendship, conjugal love, vitativeness
ANIMAL - destructiveness, acquisitiveness, combativeness, alimentiveness, secretiveness, cautiousness, sublimity
ASPIRING - firmness, conscientiousness, self-esteem, sublimity, cautiousness, approbativeness, conscientiousness
MORAL - veneration, benevolence, imitation, spirituality, hope, suavity
SELF PERFECTING - ideality, mirthfulness, constructiveness
REFLECTIVES - human nature, causality, agreeableness, comparativeness, language
PERCEPTIVES - time, tune, color, weight, size, memory, eventuality, locality, order, calculation, eventuality, individuality


Anyway, a real map is coming soon.

Hear Ye, Hear Ye... Euclid Puppet On It's Way!

My first armature. It took a long time to figure this out but good thing I'm taking Musa's Stop-Mo class. As you can see, Euclid has long arms, will have a large head and tiny legs. More to come!

Production Still

I decided to experiment with Gouache on an Acetate Paper that's compatible with paint. Then I added some inkpen on top. I had to do a good amount of post-work to make it look better. I added the boy digitally afterwards. I'm still trying to figure out a process that would be suited for animation.

A challenge that slowed me down was trying to scan a huge piece of acetate on my scanner. I had to scan it twice and then composite them. However, as you can spot, one half is cooler than the other... it was hard to get them consistent with each other.

Revised Production Goals - "Dragonfruit Drift"

09/21 - 15% - final animatic done, a map of section 2 taking us thru the journey, a promotional still, have a "package" sent to my composer - includes animatic, music samples and stills for them to start

10/26 - 35% - reworked animatic (if needed) with finish sketched out stills in section 2 that the animation will eventually hit, a mini test shot that shows how it will be animated in section 1, perhaps puppets complete

11/16 - 45% - composer has a rough mix sent to me, build set and puppets, start section 1

11/30 - 50% - composer has a pretty final mix, time animatic to music, finish section 1

More to report on this newborn

NEW TITLE (kindof): Dragonfruit Drift
OVERALL: An transformative journey inside a pipe's colorful brain.
SECTION 1 / 1 minute intro:
MEDIUM: maybe stop-mo/green screen background. or abstract watercolour with ink
Euclid sits on his roof. Roof has dragonfruit and vines. He grabs his toy pipe and holds it in front of his face. Toy pipe turns into bearded man face. Old man looks to the side. Rooster and worm tease each other. Worm eats the rooster and the old man grabs the worm by twisting his beard around it and throws it on top where it morphs into a brain. Boy is unfazed. The pipe handle extends and twists like a french horn into his mouth. The dragonfruit plant crowds his space creating a hub and traps him. Desperate to save himself, the boy blows the pipe, the brain lifts and lights up in colored sections (Phrenology). Brain explodes into paint.
-----
SECTION 2 / 2'30 minute middle: Everything flows into each other. But a reoccuring image is the rooster from before - the boy's main goal is the find and catch it. Throughout this "tag", there are 7 brain sections he travels thru, all depicting their "trait" in phrenology. Traits include "MORAL", "ASPIRING", "PERCEPTIVES", "SELF-PERFECTING", "ANIMAL", "REFLECTIVES" and "DOMESTIC. In the end, he realizes he was in a giant rooster all along. When he realizes this, it goes to Section 3.
MEDIUM: 2D EXPERIMENTAL SECTION/WATERCOLOR OR GOUACHE AND INK/CUT-OUTS
- NEED TO MAP OUT
----
SECTION 3 / 30 sec outro:
MEDIUM: maybe stop-mo. or abstract watercolour with ink.
Boy emerges from the flood of dragonfruit plant. We barely recognize him cause he's fully camouflaged. He has a dragonfruit head that he peels off. The fruit inside is full of paint. Last shot is him licking the last sweet fruit off his face with a "yum" face.

TOTAL TIME: 4-5 minutes
NO CASTING NECESSARY, NO WORDS, NO DIALOGUE, ONLY MUSIC AND SOME SOUND DESIGN.

DRAGONFRUIT DRIFTER SCRAPPED... for the most part.

I have a new idea. Over the past week, I've been checking out a lot of cool videos to inspire me. They fall along my older music video idea. Here are some of references and perhaps you'll get the direction I'm taking:








However, it's not completely scrapped. I'm keeping Euclid, his roof, his rooster and pipe.
I had an inspirational week rather than a productive one. The challenging part of this week was getting the motivation to work after cramming all of my energy for the critique on Tuesday. It's always empowering to sit back and reflect on what worked and what didn't with my last idea. Dragonfruit Drifter was my effort to make sense of everything in order to make something tangible... something i can just finally start and follow shot-by-shot rather than feel my way thru the work. I usually have plenty of scattered ideas spewing out my ears but to make one actually make sense is rare. I guess what lacked from it was an element of fascination. Rather than a creative outpour exploring my possibilities, it followed a rigid narrative equation. I had all these characters in my head but no story. At first, I thought that was a problem but now, all I really have to do is put them somewhere and make them dance and explore this place.
I think my biggest upcoming challenge is to secure the images in my head and storyboard... while keeping it free. I usually work in a stream of consciousness so things change day by day. For my thesis to work, I need to commit... but still allow for some change.

Rough Animatic w/ Scratch Voices

Dragonfruit Drifter - Animatic w/ Scratch Voices - Sept 7, 2010 from Jackie Chang on Vimeo.

Promotional Still

This is the approximate look I'm going for - watercolor/pen ink/unrefined

HAVE FUN ANIMATING THAT, JACKIE.

oh you know i will, sleep-deprived subconscious.

Dragonfruit Drifter - First Animatic w/ No Sound

Here it is! Unfortunately frames got dropped in the exporting process but here's the overall idea.

Dragonfruit Drifter - Animatic - no sound - september 7, 2010 from Jackie Chang on Vimeo.

Script Revised

After completing most of the animatic, the script needed some touch-ups and to be condensed. So here it is:

TITLE - Dragonfruit Drifter

STYLE – David Small style, Nicholas Weisz, Miyazaki except more experimental approach. Less clean, more unfinished watercolor look. Especially the background. And things transform into each other.

MAIN CHARACTERS -

Euclid - age 8 boy, rebellious, great imagination, wants adventure, hates the boring

Dr. Stan - pipe, sometimes obnoxious, Euclid's buddy

Mom - caring, loves her son, concerned for his safety, lost her husband.

McNally - free-spirit with no responsibility. drifter. armless - uses feet with dexterity and perfection. Wishes he had a family.

EXT. ROOF– MID-DAY

Euclid is blowing on his pipe on the roof. The rooftop is adorned with a pet rooster eating a reluctant worm, buckets, a bowling pin with a top hat and his dad's picture.

Dr. Stan: Whoa.

Armless homeless dude runs on top of the train, going the opposite direction. Running from the train conductor.

OS: Wowwww…

Jumps off and loops in the air, floats, and lands gracefully on a mushroom tree making many birds fly away.

Euclid: Who is he?

The pipe (Dr. Stan) in his hand, mesmerized, says: ...my brain just exploded.

Euclid takes his glasses off and gives a glance: Nope, still there, Dr. Stan.

Euclid lies back.

Dr. Stan: Wait Euclid! Did you not see that!? You could be the superhobo's armed sidekick. Go meet him!

Euclid responds: ...wouldn't that be something...

Euclid imagines the joy he saw in the jumping hobo and recalls it somewhere. Takes the picture off the bowling pin -- his dad has the same joy seen in the hobo. Cut to a bird's eye of him underneath a dragonfruit tree branch on a higher roof.

TRANSITION = dragonfruit tree silhouette shape turns into a faceless silhouette of a woman walking across revealing Euclid and his mom in town

NEXT DAY – EXT. STREET – MID DAY

Mom takes Euclid out for groceries. He’s carrying a large stone egg and has his toy pipe. People are bland and faceless.

Dr. Stan: Look!

Euclid sees homeless guy on the street, talking to animals. He waves back. Euclid tugs on mom’s shirt. Mom doesn’t care: Let’s go, come on.

Mom again: Euclid. Please!

Mom tugs Euclid away and he looks back.

McNally claps with his feet. Animal laughs.

TRANSITION = happy animal face turns into bummed out Euclid face at dinner

INT. EUCLID'S HOUSE - EVENING

Dr. Stan (continuous throughout the scene): You gotta go meet him, Euc! What if he leaves tonight? Huh? You’re gonna regret it forEVER. Just do it. Imagine his tales of adventure. Everything's boring here anyway! Your mom won’t even notice after dinner. What if you can join him and travel everywhere? This is your chance.

Shot of empty, undecorated dark house with Euclid and Mom eating a silent dinner. Euclid spins around his gruel. Another dad photograph being silly is on the fridge. The mom never makes eye contact. Mom’s face is blurred.

Mom (while Dr. Stan is talking): Get rid of that pipe, sweetie and focus on eating. Remember to chew. Euclid, come on. Why aren’t you eating? Are you even listening ?

Euclid reluctantly places it to the side where the pipe continues.

Dr. Stan (over top of mom's voice): Do it. do it. do it. do it. do it. You know you wanna. Do it. do it. Do it.

Euclid flips out: ALRIGHT!!

(at the same time bangs fist on table and the brain bounces out of Dr. Stan)

Mom looks down at Euclid and his toy pipe. Euclid looks up not sure what to think.

TRANSITION = Euclid escapes onto his ladder that appears behind him and climbs to his rooftop

EXT. ROOFTOP - NIGHT

Euclid shoves the pipe in the rooster's beak.

Euclid: Sorry Dr. Stan... you've done for today.

He grabs a dragonfruit off the tree and takes off.

Dr. Stan: Aw Euc--don't---

Rooster blows the pipe making him go euphoric.

TRANSITION = floating brains turn into Euclid carrying the dragonfruit.

EXT. STREET - NIGHT

Euclid shyly brings the dragonfruit to McNally and offers it.

Euclid: ... uh hi I'm Euclid.

McNally smiles, breaks it in half and gives Euclid the other half.

McNally eats his fruit with his feet. Euclid puts his hand in his fruit. McNally kicks the fruit into Euclid's face.

Euclid frowns. They look at each other with fruit all over their face. Pause for 5 seconds. Euclid tries to hold in his laughter. McNally heartily laughs. Euclid responds by letting himself laugh some more.

McNally leans forward: Grab on.

Euclid grabs on to his cape. McNally jumps on a roof and eventually jumps up to a tall mushroom tree and sits down. A stunning view of the bland town. Fireflies rest around the two.

McNally relaxed: Ah. this is nice... so kid, what brings y'here?

Euclid: ... looking for adventure.

McNally: Yer mum must be worried.

Euclid: ... meh. Hey, can I come with you?

McNally: Absolutely not, kid! Responsibility's not for me.

Euclid: I can help you carry stuff.

McNally: Ha! My two feet can outhandle anyone. But let me tell ya, if there's one thing that matters... one thing i wish i had.. it's a family that cared for me. that's real love.

Euclid: Mines so boring.

McNally: Not with you there, it ain't.

Train approaches.

McNally: Oooh! I better run.

McNally jumps on the train and lands.

McNally: Thanks, boy!

Euclid thinks. "Not with you there".

He smiles and waves back.

TRANSITION = Mushroom tree turns into him and his rooster and worm.

EXT. ROOF - DAY

Euclid is playing harmonica. His rooster and worm are dancing to it.

Mom offscreen: Euclid! Lunch!

Euclid brings his pipe to eyelevel.

Euclid: Dr. Stan, please don't talk over my mom anymore.

Dr. Stan: Oh. ...Sure.

TRANSITION = Dr. Stan shrinks into Euclid’s hand

INT. HOME - DAY

He stand by the doorway to the kitchen.

Euclid: Mom. Sorry, I didn't mean to scare you yesterday.

Mom: It's alright.

Euclid thinks.

Euclid: Hey... can I show you something?

TRANSITION - mom climbing up on the roof. Her face is no longer blurry.

EXT. ROOF - DAY

Mom: Wow…

Euclid sees his mom’s face and smiles.

Mom: This is magnificent.

Euclid gives mom a dragonfruit.

Mom looks back at the photo of their dad on the top-hatted bowling pin: And dad's here too.

The rooster and the worm also sit.

Mom places Euclid’s head on her shoulder.

Euclid shows her the pipe: This is Dr. Stan... he's my sidekick.

Dr. Stan: Actually, you're mine.

Pans up to the sky.

END

Some Thoughts

1. What was the most difficult part of your production process this week?

This week was full of storyboarding and putting those in an animatic. The hardest part about this is committing to a shot. There are so many possibilities with every line of script, deciding on which one would be best and in what order is especially challenging. Thankfully, I've been getting feedback and have managed to get a good amount done. Dealing with the daunting scale of this project is another struggle but taking it day by day and finishing small milestones keeps me motivated.

2. What was the most interesting, fun or successful part of your production process this week? Did you stumble upon a time saving technique? Did you finally master that walk cycle? Did you accomplish something you are especially pleased with?

When working on the animatic, I had a lot of fun but I put in too many frames. It actually looks like an animation rather than rough stills. To make my life easier, I'm going to stop worrying about movement so much as trying to show my entire project as a narrative and then going back, when i have time, to make things more clear. But the beginning of the animatic was a great practise in animating again! I made a basic train chase scene with running, handheld camera motion and lots of changing angles. Finishing that made it seem less intimidating in the longrun when I have to do it for real.