20 PHOTOGRAPHS:

ARTIST’S RESPONSE GROUP PROJECT:

ELEPHANT AND CASTLE ARTIST’S BOOK GROUP PROJECT:

MOOD BOARD/ THEME INSPIRATION:

INITIAL SKETCHES AND IDEA:

PROCESS:

FINAL PRODUCT:

ANALYSIS:

As an artist who only really works with traditional 2d animation, 3d modelling was a scarily new experience. Through a lot of tutorials and perseverance, I managed to make something I was moderately happy with. My first initial idea and theme was based on one of my favourite video games, Kingdom Hearts. After looking at the examples of dioramas, my mind immediately went to all the small, floating models of islands that the game displayed.

After searching on the internet, I found one of the original islands and sketched out a similar concept. After breaking down the image, I figured that it may be a little too advanced for a first try, so I simplified it by doing the middle and most important island. I then began to look at ways to make it original and not a direct copy, so I looked up medieval houses for a theme for the island. This served as the groundwork for my modelling.

For the technical bits, I subdivided the bottom block in 2 and used the sculpting tool to drag and pull the shape as I desired it. For the house itself, it was a simple process of adding blocks and bevelling them for the outcome I wanted. There was a lot of playing around. I followed Luca’s tutorials for colouring and lighting, using the sky dome lighting tool. I went with a red and neutral colour scheme as that felt most authentic and close to both the medieval theme and the original Kingdom Hearts’ reference I was working from. To contrast it, I put green at the bottom in order to prevent a boring or monotoned colour palette.

MOODBOARD AND INSPO:

INITIAL FACE AND POSE DESIGN SKETCHES:

FINAL DESIGN + MORE SKETCHES:

ANALYSIS:

The character theme/prompt I chose for this rotation was ‘winter’. I used Procreate for all my sketches and final design. After having a look at Pinterest for vague inspiration, I decided i’d go with a black ice queen. When I think of fantasy and royal images and characters surrounding winter and winteresque literature, there are only white females. A main reason behind my interest in storytelling and animation derives from a desire to see more black women and people of marginalised groups in all types of media. I thought I’d begin with this portrayal of a powerful but beautifully delicate black ice queen, whos beauty exists in addition to her power, demonstrated through the whitr sparkles on her skin and her hands. There’s more to this mystical character, something I’m hoping a viewer would want to know or figure out by looking at her.

Final story:

You bore me to death:

Lights out. All alone. It’s just me and you. There’s no escape when it’s only me and you. There’s no refuge when I see those eyes. Those piercing black eyes, which somehow overpower the blackness of the very room, consuming me in all its ill intent. When you’re around, you suck the life out of me. You reach your long, twisted, and prickled arms into and around my throat, suffocating the breath and the words that can now never leave my lips. HELP. I want to say. HELP. You shut me up. HELP. I break down. You always have a hold over me. Why can’t I ever slip out of your grasp? Why can’t I ever free myself from those chains holding me hostage?

Oh, one day, I wish, I can stand up and just say. Look into those soulless, magnetic eyes and just say: ‘You bore me to fucking death’. That way you can leave me alone. That way the depression can finally end. 

Analysis:

I centred my piece around depression, something very real and personal in my life. I wrote it in second person to really highlight the personification of mental illness, as it feels like there’s a whole other person in the room when you’re alone and overwhelmed, someone whose sole purpose is to break you down. I explored the inner wishes, dialogue and feeling of freedom from the darkness.

This week, working with sound was a very fun and insightful learning experience. Beginning with our very first assignments, of drawing sound and recording sounds depicting a journey, my view and understanding of sound and its importance grew massively. I hadn’t been so hyper aware of all the various noises and sounds that are made from various things in our everyday life and paying attention to that opened up my mind to the many possibilities of sound.

For the final piece, in which we had to create three sound worlds, I reused some imagery from previously silent animations to now bring it in a different light. The first hand drawn animation of the rain and obscure scene of a cat holding up an umbrella for a girl was almost incomplete without the sounds of rain setting the scene. Instead of using actual rain, I filmed a cooking pot of rice where the oil and pan were sizzling in a way that sounded almost identical to rain, reminding me of the foley techniques used in films and media. However, the small tappings of the spoon in the pot and the sizzling do give it a more interesting feel than just ordinary rain.

The second animation was a stop motion piece bringing life to the intricate patterns of my culturally designed carpet. I found that the disjointed and jumpy stop motion shots created a sense of chaos, rush and disorientation. This was then reflected in the sound, created by some friends and I hitting, kicking and slapping a pole all simultaneously but also at different rates. I really enjoyed the chaos of this piece contrasting the quite mellow and somber scene of the rain falling in the first animation.

The final video was one of my first attempts at pose to pose animation over a year ago. I played around with objects shifting and transforming, which is what I then drew upon for the sound. Using the end of a spoon and my paper yogurt lid, I scratched onto the surface in a way that sounded like a noise ascending and descending, similar to how the shapes in this piece were growing and shrinking.