Compositing test

For The Magpie, post-production will play an important role in making sure the animation blends believably with the background. For example, shots with a background involving a strong light source will be complimented with effects, applied to the overlaid animation in After Effects, to simulate the same light hitting the subject.

Here is a little compositing experiment using a generic park image from Google as a makeshift background.
I noted the general direction, and colour, of the light and shade, and tried to replicate it over the man. Largely, I would say this has been successful, but the tweaking will continue.

Magpie Development

A slightly overlooked character in terms of design is that of the magpie itself, which is stupid because he's the eponymous main character, linking the other characters together.
Fortunately, with the help of Estelle Sharpe and Gary Davies, a satisfactory design has been finalised.

The picture at the very bottom is the final visualisation, a design that I'd be happy to take straight into the animation process. Special credit must go to Estelle for coming up with the simplified design of the wing tips and the oval eyeballs.

Animation for The Magpie

Here are some early drafts of animation for my short film The Magpie. Extra attention is being paid to the man's walk cycle, as much of his personality is to be established in his walk-in entrance before he performs a little routine with the bird.

Animation for Pups

For Pups, I've mostly been rotoscoping Jake's 3D model of 'ball Pup', animating Pup and Jenny over the top as required. Here are some examples in animated gif form.

Shot List

Prop Research

After Effects test for Pups

This is a little test I cobbled together in After Effects to see how easy it would be to have a tracking shot that utilised perspective and 3D, both important elements of Estelle's opening shot of Pups. It was remarkably quick and effective - the final version will have animated elements made by us instead of googled photos, of course, but it shows how much of an impact After Effects can make towards creating a real feeling of atmosphere.

Plan view for the park

The camera for the establishing shot is in red. I wanted the path to be at such an angle as to warrant an establishing shot that would show some hint of a street behind the trees - perhaps the street in the earlier scene itself.

Using this plan, we can figure out the more cinematic camera angles that occur in the climax of the film.

Further concepts will follow, but here's a still from One Hundred and One Dalmations to give an idea of where I'll be going with this.

Further developments with the tall man

I've been developing the character of the tall man further this week. As his design was completely changed at a late stage, I wanted to dedicate a substantial amount of extra time to getting accustomed to his new features and personality. He's much jowlier now, his face elongated to exaggerated his more hangdog expressions. His eyebrows are thick and rectangular, able to give a broad range of expression to the face. He carries a lunchbox, which becomes the focus of his attention when he's sat on the bench, moments before realising the little boy's in peril. The lunchbox is a nice visual hint to the fact that he's a working man, perhaps bored and disillusioned with his job and of adult life.

It's taken us a ridiculously long time to realise how much the tall man of our film looks like the actor Walter Matthau! As soon as this bombshell successfully detonated, I set to work compiling appropriate facial expressions.

Finalised Walk Cycle for Pups

Updated background concept

Kicking it into fifth gear

Fifth gear's the fast gear, right? I don't drive. Never mind.

I've continued solidifying the aesthetic of the film. Firstly, I drew a plan of how the street environment would look, so Jake could model it in Maya. However, it became clear pretty quickly that what I was plotting out was bland, repetitive and devoid of any personality.

Actually using the theoretical 'inspiration' for the film's aesthetic, Disney's One Hundred and One Dalmations, for genuine, not-saying-things-for-the-sake-of-it inspiration, I redesigned the street. The improvement is plain to see.

Let this be a testament to the importance of good research.

I then set my focus back onto that of the man. Here's a quick character sheet.

Character Concept art for The Magpie

Not only have I been developing the characters, I've started to pin down an aesthetic for the film, one that I hope Jake can replicate in his 3D-rendered backgrounds. The style is very washed out and watercolour, but whatever level Jake reaches in his mission to capture it will be just fine, as it's unique-looking enough to look nice.


Having discussed the film with tutor Neil Housego, his innate knack for character design and shape dynamics bubbled forth and he developed a completely different style for the character of the tall man.
Instead of being lanky and bird-like, with a round head and no chin, he is bulkier, more sullen-looking and has a big red nose, indicating that he has a cold (to further warrant the handkerchief). His new design lends itself better to the idea of being downtrodden and miserable, which makes the final scene of the film, where he rescues the boy and consequently softens in his demeanour, all the more poignant.

Furthermore, a change in his appearance demonstrates a change in heart. Whereas he's initially made of lots of straight lines - smart hair, furrowed prow, deadpan mouth, upright walk - he softens after saving the boy. His hair, slightly ruffled by his rescue attempt, has more of a curve to it, his eyebrows are raised to a couple of compassionate arcs, and he smiles.

A few animation tests for Pups

This is an experiment with rotoscoping CGI,
to make the volumes of the ball consistent as it rolls.

Here, Estelle provided the keyframes,
and it was my job to make them animate smoothly.

This is more of a personal test, experimenting with extreme movements
so that animating the character of Jenny became more innate and natural to do

Version 1 of the animatic

The titles, they are a-changing

'Tall Tale', despite being a title I'm quite fond of, is not as relevant a title to the storyline as it once was.

Whereas the man's tallness was initially a key aspect of the story, it serves as much less of a catalyst now. Instead, the most prominent narrative thread running through the film is the continuous appearance of the bird - who is now a magpie.

Therefore, I am proud to announce that the new title, until further notice (it's pending approval from the rest of my team), is 'The Magpie'.

All posts regarding the film will be tagged 'Magpie', including previous posts, so that it will still be easy to find them amongst the rest of the blog.

'Ball Pup' turnaround

My most recent achievement is successfully imagining the texture of a 3D sphere from all angles. After quite a bit of trial and error, I managed to create a turnaround of 'Ball Pup'.

Pup, whilst in a big ball of clothes, will be animated in Maya as a very basic geometry in order to maintain a visual consistency as he rolls. When creating a texture to place on the geometry, however, we need to have some sort of idea as to what it will look like from all angles.

Storyboard V1

The quality of the images is a little low - I hope to remedy this when I find my good camera. I'll update this post accordingly.

Pups: Early background concept art, designs for Pup and a walk cycle

As well as Tall Tale (the title of which, due to story alterations, may change sometime in the near future), I'm assisting Estelle Sharpe with her film, Pups. I'm assisting with the animation, and a little artwork and concept designs here and there.

To help pin down the colour scheme and overall layout of a specific shot, I tried to visualise it in Photoshop (left). It's not one hundred percent in-keeping with the look Estelle was looking for, but it served to help imagine more clearly the world in which her characters inhabit.

In addition to that, I've been working on the character of Pup. There is a scene where he becomes wrapped up in a gigantic ball of clothes and blankets, and as it will be my job to animate the ball (with 3D assistance from Jake Longworth), I had to get to grips with the details of the character in this state of multi-layered over-insulation.

An early attempt to visualise 'Ball Pup'.
The number of segments has since been reduced,
and a rope made of knotted blankets was added to look like
the cloth is somehow bound together.

Developed visualisations. The small drawings at the top are by Estelle -
I used them as direct reference to maintain a very close similarity to her style.

When it comes to animation, I'll also be working on the other character, Jenny - whereas the role of Pup animator only falls to me while he's a big ball of clothes, I'm to be much more involved with animating Jenny. The first hurdle is her walk cycle. Jenny is a young girl and has massive boots, so it's a challenge to make her walk in a way that represents both these characteristics. The wobbly, swingy march I've developed (below) is a step in the right direction, but I think I need to tone it down a little to stop Jenny from looking like she has genuine difficulty walking. Also, her arm movements look like she's constantly shooing some small creature from obstructing her path.

Shoo, tiny elephant! Can't you see I'm wading through treacle?

Colour schemes for Tall Tale

As the storyboard is nearing completion, I felt compelled to rough up some colour schemes.
I intend to go for a slightly washed-out, autumnal palette, with plenty of browns, reds and yellows. In order to stand out, the characters will be more vivid in hue than the textures of their surroundings. The boy will wear slightly brighter colours than the man. Nevertheless, the entire colour scheme will be muted and browned to some extent.

Tweaking Tall Tale

Tall Tale is a story that is very much in a state of flux at the moment - aspects are being added and chopped off all over the place.

The story, as of the date of this post, is as follows:

A little boy buys a book about birdwatching. Eagerly clutching his camera, he dashes off to search for birds to photograph. He sees a bird on the shoulder of a very tall man, but it flies off before he has a chance to photograph it. The boy walks off screen, determined to find it again.
The tall man is momentarily pleased by the sight of a bird perched on his shoulder, but once he realises that the bird's gone to the toilet down the back of his coat, his mood darkens. We follow him for a little while, as a series of small mishaps, mostly regarding his tallness, make him more and more frustrated (this need only go on for as long as it takes for people to realise he's unlucky).
Defeated by the terrible day he's been having, the tall man sits on a park bench. He doesn't notice the boy run past, chasing the bird until he sees it perched on the branch of a tall tree. The boy determinedly climbs the tree and gets onto the branch, but loses his footing.
The tall man hears a cry for help, and looks up to see the boy hanging for dear life. He jumps up and dashes to his rescue, catching the boy just as he falls. The boy is very grateful and hugs the man, who feels better about his tallness.
The boy displays sadness about not managing to get a photo. The man picks the boy up, and uses his height to provide the boy with a safe means of photographing the bird. Once the photo's been taken, they admire the photo on the camera - including the bird, who flaps down onto the tall man's shoulder to look at it. Everybody's happy, until the man realises that the bird's pooped on him again.

Presenting Tall Tale

'Tall Tale' is a concept for a short animated film.

The story is about two people: a very tall, clumsy man and a very little boy. The tall man keeps trying to keep a job, and the boy keeps trying to photograph a beautiful bird, but both keep failing.

All the boy sees are boring pigeons, until a colourful bird (accidentally released from the pet shop by the tall man) catches his eye. After a little establishment of the tall man and his clumsiness, the film follows the little boy as he tries harder and harder to take a photo of the bird. Eventually, he sees it settle on a branch of a very tall tree...

Meanwhile, the tall man has exhausted all of his employment options. Dejected, he sits on a park bench. Suddenly, he hears a cry, and looks up to see the boy hanging for dear life from the tree. Just as he loses grip, the tall man reaches up and saves him from falling. The town, including all his former employers, see the tall man perform this act, and their opinion of him improves. 

As a final act of kindness, the tall man lifts up the boy so he can photograph the bird safely. 

The credits consist of little images of the tall man using his height to help people around the town, and his ongoing camaraderie with the little boy.

The film will be animated in Flash, with backgrounds rendered in Maya. Certain performances may be animated in 3D first, to ensure a seamless marriage with the 3D environment, and then animated over in Flash. Compositing will be done in After Effects.