Okay - just a general point; I was really expecting to see all the content contained in a single OGR (as opposed to links) simply because I want students to start thinking about your body of work in terms publication and presentation in preparation for the Art Of aspect of your submission... I'm really looking for the Art Ofs to be beautifully designed, branded and thought about as book experiences - and not last minute 'powerpoint-style' exercises in meeting the brief. I want them to be celebrations of design, style and story. I want pride, charm and graphic design!
Okay, so a couple of suggestions as you move into the final stages of Storytelling:
1) I think you're missing a bit of establishing information in your early Act 1 set-up. You need an interior of the joke shop to establish for your audience some of the spatial relations important to your story. We need to see the interior - the shelves, a sense of the place; and we need to be shown the shelves on the top of which we have our chicken hero - otherwise we won't truly understand the 'epic journey' aspect of what comes next. You need to establish the shelves as high for the chicken, but not so high that your shopkeeper can't get the chicken down. A number of students have drawn up floor plans and layouts to help them design their interior spaces, and I suggest you do the same.
2) I think your chicken has charm, but I want you to drill a bit more into its design; for example, the feet are a bit too sketchy and provisional, and they don't credibly suggest they could support the weight of the bird's body. Please take a moment to have a look at some of the character design resources available to you on myUCA/Story&Commission/Learning Materials/Character Design Resources - especially the Loomis PDF, because the exercises in there will help you draw using solid shapes and in three-dimensions. I really want to see you changing up your method and soaking up some of the techniques available to you.
3) Squash and Stretch! Obviously your storyboard was drawn as much for you as for anyone else, but you also need to generate a client-facing presentation storyboard; for this storyboard, I want you to think much more about communicating your chicken's squash and stretch antics - you need more exaggeration in your drawings; think about 'breaking the frame' at moments of shock and surprise; think about those close-ups of the chicken, Meg - we really want to understand how it's feeling etc. and you should seek to achieve that through drawing and some of the simple conventions of illustrating storyboards.
4) Sound! Sound is going to play a HUGE part in terms of comedy and timing in your story; in the same way that you have to exaggerate your drawings to convey the rubbery, comedy world of your story, you'll also need to think BIG about your accompanying sounds. I'm encouraging all students to start gathering SFX right now and experimenting with the mix, so as not to leave this really important part of storytelling to the last minute. You'll also want to think about the non-diegetic sound; are you going to have an accompanying soundtrack - if so, is it going to help 'date' and 'place' your story? Is it going to be sea-sidey, or circusy, or....? As you move to prepare your animatic, sound design should be there from the get go.
5) Your title: 'The Contortionist Chicken' is a working title, but I suggest you think about something pithier; in the same way that 'Chicken Run' works in 2 ways (it describes an environment associated with the keeping of chickens and the idea of the chickens escaping from prison), I want you to resolve a title that satisfies and amuses in the same way. Once you've got your title, you can then identify some suitable typeface, and then this will help you begin to think about the overall look of your Art Of and all accompanying submission materials. In terms of titles, think about puns and synonyms; as in 'Capon Caper' or 'Chicken Hearted' or 'The Final Stretch' or... (anyway, you get the point!).
6) Finally, Meg - some words of encouragement: you've got a potentially fab story here, but it needs more attack, more colour, more showmanship, more joy! In the time remaining to you, I want to encourage you to honour this idea of yours - to bring it to technicolour life and really buy into the rubbery, toony, boing-boing-boing-ness of your narrative! Have fun with this, Meg - it IS fun after all!
Hi megan, here't the link I wanted to show you before - I feel that the design and layout of the doll shop in a way suits the idea of your environment. It's quite small, pixar like, quite creepy but cute in terms of the design. I was imagining the shop like this when you were describing it to me before, tell me what you think :)
OGR 09/02/2013
ReplyDeleteMorning Meg,
Okay - just a general point; I was really expecting to see all the content contained in a single OGR (as opposed to links) simply because I want students to start thinking about your body of work in terms publication and presentation in preparation for the Art Of aspect of your submission... I'm really looking for the Art Ofs to be beautifully designed, branded and thought about as book experiences - and not last minute 'powerpoint-style' exercises in meeting the brief. I want them to be celebrations of design, style and story. I want pride, charm and graphic design!
Okay, so a couple of suggestions as you move into the final stages of Storytelling:
1) I think you're missing a bit of establishing information in your early Act 1 set-up. You need an interior of the joke shop to establish for your audience some of the spatial relations important to your story. We need to see the interior - the shelves, a sense of the place; and we need to be shown the shelves on the top of which we have our chicken hero - otherwise we won't truly understand the 'epic journey' aspect of what comes next. You need to establish the shelves as high for the chicken, but not so high that your shopkeeper can't get the chicken down. A number of students have drawn up floor plans and layouts to help them design their interior spaces, and I suggest you do the same.
2) I think your chicken has charm, but I want you to drill a bit more into its design; for example, the feet are a bit too sketchy and provisional, and they don't credibly suggest they could support the weight of the bird's body. Please take a moment to have a look at some of the character design resources available to you on myUCA/Story&Commission/Learning Materials/Character Design Resources - especially the Loomis PDF, because the exercises in there will help you draw using solid shapes and in three-dimensions. I really want to see you changing up your method and soaking up some of the techniques available to you.
3) Squash and Stretch! Obviously your storyboard was drawn as much for you as for anyone else, but you also need to generate a client-facing presentation storyboard; for this storyboard, I want you to think much more about communicating your chicken's squash and stretch antics - you need more exaggeration in your drawings; think about 'breaking the frame' at moments of shock and surprise; think about those close-ups of the chicken, Meg - we really want to understand how it's feeling etc. and you should seek to achieve that through drawing and some of the simple conventions of illustrating storyboards.
4) Sound! Sound is going to play a HUGE part in terms of comedy and timing in your story; in the same way that you have to exaggerate your drawings to convey the rubbery, comedy world of your story, you'll also need to think BIG about your accompanying sounds. I'm encouraging all students to start gathering SFX right now and experimenting with the mix, so as not to leave this really important part of storytelling to the last minute. You'll also want to think about the non-diegetic sound; are you going to have an accompanying soundtrack - if so, is it going to help 'date' and 'place' your story? Is it going to be sea-sidey, or circusy, or....? As you move to prepare your animatic, sound design should be there from the get go.
ReplyDelete5) Your title: 'The Contortionist Chicken' is a working title, but I suggest you think about something pithier; in the same way that 'Chicken Run' works in 2 ways (it describes an environment associated with the keeping of chickens and the idea of the chickens escaping from prison), I want you to resolve a title that satisfies and amuses in the same way. Once you've got your title, you can then identify some suitable typeface, and then this will help you begin to think about the overall look of your Art Of and all accompanying submission materials. In terms of titles, think about puns and synonyms; as in 'Capon Caper' or 'Chicken Hearted' or 'The Final Stretch' or... (anyway, you get the point!).
6) Finally, Meg - some words of encouragement: you've got a potentially fab story here, but it needs more attack, more colour, more showmanship, more joy! In the time remaining to you, I want to encourage you to honour this idea of yours - to bring it to technicolour life and really buy into the rubbery, toony, boing-boing-boing-ness of your narrative! Have fun with this, Meg - it IS fun after all!
Hi megan, here't the link I wanted to show you before - I feel that the design and layout of the doll shop in a way suits the idea of your environment. It's quite small, pixar like, quite creepy but cute in terms of the design. I was imagining the shop like this when you were describing it to me before, tell me what you think :)
ReplyDeletehttp://vimeo.com/4749536