500 Words Review

Pre Production Process:

For me Pre Production started earlier than expected - During the 2nd semester of the 2nd year i started to develop the script which was based on my dog.
I started with a completely different idea, and continued developing it, because some elements were good and the potential was there.

After my dog died, it pushed me to think harder about what i really wanted to say and so the idea for the progressed script started to evolve and became what it is today.

It was hard for me to bring something so personal to the screen (especially a 4 legged character which isn't easy to animate - but because it's hard, that's something i'll be happy to do in animation).
I'm happy with the message and because it's personal, it's really important for me to do my best and push forward.

The Final draft is much more directed towards my moral, but I'm still not 100% sure it's the best i could come up with. I might play with the final edit in the end.

I enjoy every second of the process - especially the character designs and the artwork.
My dog was a female western highland terrier, so i looked at a lot of photos of her and tried to think about a good structure.

Because terriers got lots of hair, it's hard to see their shape, so when i designed Minnie, i thought that for me, it would be easier if i simplify her shape (remove most of the hair, but still leave a little bit: like the top of her head).
I really wanted to make an appealing design because she was so cute.
her facial details were something i worked on since the break, so i can get used to her features (small muzzle, long ears..).

With the guy, i looked at old singers because i love the old fashion look (Sinatra).
The guy wasn't easy but wasn't hard for me to think of in terms of design. I started to think about his design last year and came up with several characters and i looked at some cartoons and caricatures for references. Eventually i came up with what i have (upload soon) now, and it took me a few months.

The poses and the expressions are the best part. Makes me think again and again about structure and facial aspects. I keep improving these sheets all the time until the last minute. Even now when i'm doing key poses, i keep changing details sometimes and get to know the shapes better.

What i didn't enjoy so much was the Administrative issues.
I understand the importance of all the aspects involved in a production and i did everything i had to do to plan it carefully, but most of the time this term was spent on that instead of the art of making our film - which is crucial because it's all about the skills we need to bring this vision to life on the screen.

There were no particular classes that assessed us on colour, character designs, life drawing, poses and performance - by that i mean that we aren't dealing with art in school, but just with technical stuff (pushing buttons, software and Digital tools).

For me this is the most important thing in animation because our ideas would eventually have to be visual - and through these visuals we communicate (people have to understand what they see).
I think much could have been spent on the actual artistic development and skills (what makes good character design??, drawing and sketching, colour and mood techniques - experiment with different mediums, sculpture, principles of animation, structure, posing etc...)

Half of what we submit is artwork (Mood Board, Model Sheets, Concept Art...) and we're just supposed to hand it in, but there's not even attention to teach these in class, so i don't really understand how an Animation degree works without any teaching of art foundations ???

The assumption that we already know is wrong. There are ways to study these things: how to plan perspective, how to paint, to structure a character, life drawing for understanding of posing for animation (Thank you Jack for doing that stuff this year).
I don't know about others, but at least for 2d animation which is what I'm focusing on, that's what we should be dealing with when we study and that's critical for the success of the film.

Overall Pre Production was enjoyable and important for the next step. The storyboards were detailed and i found that it was good for the planning of the shots and the final compositions. Scriptwriting process is great and the story and character development as well.