Evaluation

For this project I had to demonstrate the craft of stop motion, through a series of demonstrations and exercises designed to build upon my current understanding of animation. I was introduced into the technical and creative process of the stop motion filming with the guidance of industry professionals.

I’m actually very happy with how the stop motion turned out, the second time. Our first attempt turned out being incredibly fast, I noticed afterwards that I had missed out of steps in my walk cycle which made it look messy in the final animation. But in the retake both of out movements were smooth, both of our double takes can be seen clearly. And our positioning is better, our puppets are more central and less to the sides. Overall it turned out well. I was impressed with how the puppet turned out, I realised from the start it was going to be hard since she's mostly skin and hair which would be difficult to animate if not done right. But the fact that foam was cut into and shaped and painted created the malnourished look that I was going for.

I would however change the visibility of the syringes, as it's not completely clear what we're doing. I would bring them closer to the camera, I think we could have planned out our scene better. I felt like it was a lot of on the spot thinking, which with stop motion is a bad thing to do.

Our Second Attempt

Me and Alice decided we wanted to try and film our scene again, but this time I wouldn't miss out any steps to make it jump. And we would have dragonframe on the right settings so that it didn't come out at high speed. And I'm really happy with how it turned out. Both of out movements are smooth, both of our double takes can be seen clearly. And our positioning is better, our puppets are more central and less to the sides. Overall it turned out well. The only thing I would change if I could do it again, would be the visibility of the syringes, as it's not completely clear what we're doing.

Beauty Shots

Here are some high quality pictures of my finished model after filming for the second time, I was impressed that even after the amount of pins I poked in it and the amount I used it that it was still fully functional at the end of it. I was incredibly impressed with how the puppet turned out, I realised from the start it was going to be hard since she's mostly skin and hair which would be difficult to animate if not done right. But the fact that foam was cut into and shaped and painted created the malnourished look that I was going for.

Filming - First Attempt

Here is mine and Alice's first attempt, I say first attempt because this time around it didn't turn out the way we thought it would. We didn't have dragonframe on the right settings, and I missed out a few major stages in my puppets walk which made her very jerky. Too jerky for it to be good to look at. So we felt like it had to be done again.

As you can see the speed of the video is incredibly fast, we feel like this is because we didn't have the frames set to 'two's', and you can also notice the was my puppet jerks about.

Story Board

We thought it was best to create some form of storyboard for our short film, so that is what I did. It shows a very rough drawing of the interaction between our characters. And how long we want each scene to be.
It shows my character walking towards the middle of the scene, to then take a double take at Alice's puppet on the floor, my puppet heads over and notices he's injecting himself. So she take the needle and sits on the floor ready to use, while she does this Alice's puppet notices this happening so she stands up and walks away. Each scene lasting 2 seconds.

Painting and Clothing

I worked on creating the skin I had put together on photoshop, it was never going to look the same. I always figured it would look different, due to there being many factors of what could go wrong. Most of her was painted with the peach colour, but I added black in the parts on shadow and white were the lighter parts would be. I also decided to paint pupils on her eyes, where I was going to before. I did this because her eyes felt too alien like. 

The underwear turned out to look a lot bigger than what I wanted, but it was just because the hips on my puppet turned out to be bigger than I intended. Not that it looks bad because of this, Both the ribbon and felt came out looking really nice together. I'm very happy with how it turned out.

Arts and Crafts

I made more detail for my puppet by adding a spin and smoothing her out. I ventured out to a arts and crafts shop and picked up some bits and peices consisting of:

Paint:

• Dark Blue
• White
• Peach
• Black

So I'm able to create her skin colour 

Fabric:

• Patterned ribbon
• Felt (both a turquoise colour)

To maker her underwear, I would use the ribbon to make the straps and decoration on the underwear