2012 Bristol School of Animation, University of the West of England

Transcription

1 Production Studies - UADACP Tutor: Rachel Robinson - Production Bible compiled by Thomas Barth 2012 Bristol School of Animation, University of the West of England

2 Index Contacts Story Storyboard The Characters Concept Art Design Manifesto Inspiration Final Puppets Set Design Production Page 2 Page 3 Page 7 Page 13 Page 16 Page 20 Page 22 Page 23 Page 33 Page 40

3 Contacts Pamela Legg - Director, storyboard & concept artist, stop motion animator, assistant puppet fabricator Pam is the director of the Fowl Play production. Her idea "Fowl Play" had caught the team s attention and they decided to help her to realise her vision. She worked in making the story line, providing storyboards/character designs and concept art for our production. She also helped to animate some of the scenes. pamela.legg@hotmail.com Thomas Barth - Producer, stop motion & 2D animator, Photoshop artist, Foley artist & animatic editor Tom is the producer. He is responsible for arranging the production schedule, shot breakdown and animator shot list for the team to follow. He ensures everyone follows the schedule to meet the deadline, whilst maintaining a high production value. Apart from that, Tom also worked as an animator for the both stop-motion and 2D. As for the sound, he worked with the team to create different sounds using the Foley room. Thomas.Barth.TB@T-online.de Roos Mattaar - Puppet designer & fabricator, lead stop motion animator, sound editor & music composer, AE compositor Roos is a puppet designer. She built the puppet from scratch to the final design. She worked as a lead animator since she built them and understood the bird design. She is passionate in making music and composed the music for the film. She was editing the final sound mix, and together with Tom worked on the final video edit for our production. roos.mattaar@xs4all.nl Yasmin Jamil - Set designer & fabricator, stop motion animator, assistant puppet fabricator Yasmin is a set designer and fabricator. She is passionate in model making and sculpting. Thus, she is responsible in the making and dressing of the sets for the Fowl Play production. The film required a range of shots sizes, for which sets in a variety of scales had to be built. She also animated some of the scenes with the bird puppets as well as additional bird parts in front of a greenscreen, which was used in the fight sequence. j_ysmn@yahoo.com 2

4 Story Fowl Play features two chicks left alone in a nest who both have their eye on an innocent tasty fly. But their sibling rivalry has nasty consequences. 3

5 FOWL PLAY. EXT. ON TOP OF A HILL-DAY From viewing the title screen we pan down to see a tree in the centre of the shot. It stands alone with gently rolling hills behind. A small nest can just be seen on a low branch. We move in closer to the nest. The nest fills the whole screen and in it sits two fat sleeping birds. A purple bird on the left and a blue bird on the right. A buzzing can be heard and then in the top right of the screen a fly appears. The birds both wake with a start and look at the fly. Wide eyed they watch it fly to the top left of the screen, then back over to the right. Each bird is moving its head and neck in time with the fly to follow its movements. The fly moves low over the purple bird and the blue bird snaps at it. He misses and instead grabs the purple birds feather which is sticking out of the top of his head. CUT TO close up: The blue birds neck is in shot, his head reaching (off screen) to the left. A squawk is heard off screen. His head appears with a determined expression as he pulls the purple birds feather. It snaps away and the blue bird looks down. He's surprised to see the feather in his beak. He looks back at the purple bird off screen. CUT TO CLOSE UP: The purple bird is in shot. He looks up to where his feather use to be then back towards the blue bird off screen. The purple bird is angry and he narrows his eyes frowning. CUT TO CLOSE UP: The blue bird, looking concerned, turns his head and blows the feather away. CUT TO MEDIUM SHOT: Both birds in the nest. The purple bird is angry narrowing his eyes and swaying his head back. The blue bird is narrowing his eyes. They both raise their wings threateningly. CUT TO CLOSE UP: A still coloured image showing a close up of both birds looking angry, their eyes bloodshot and showing their teeth. The fly is seen hovering patiently. CUT TO CLOSE UP: 4

6 CUT TO CLOSE UP: The purple birds neck is in shot his head is reaching (off screen) to the right. A squawk is heard off screen. The purple bird slowly pulls his head back. He has an angry expression on his face and is gripping something in his beak. A noise like stretching rubber can be heard as he grits his teeth and pulls back on the worm like object. A pop noise is heard and an eyeball appears dangling from his beak. The dangling eyeball and the purple birds eyes look at each other as it swings below his beak. He then throws it up into the air off screen. CUT TO CLOSE UP: A side view of the blue bird is shown. He slowly turns his face towards us. He has one eye (his right) missing. He is not very happy. His beak is drooping down in the corners. His eyelids on his remaining eye narrow. He turns back towards the purple bird. CUT TO MEDIUM SHOT: Both birds in the nest start to lean their heads towards each other. CUT TO CLOSE UP: Both birds heads come together. Their eyes look angry. The blue bird shows his teeth. Both birds are pushing against each other. The purple birds eyes are narrowing and he shows his teeth. CUT TO MEDIUM SHOT: Both birds start to fight! A dust cloud starts to cover the birds. The birds can no longer be seen as the dust cloud gets thicker. Sometimes a wing or a foot pokes out of the cloud, or a torn feather appears and flutters down. The dust settles and the purple bird is shown lunging towards the blue bird. The blue bird is leaning back in the nest, his wings supporting him and his beak is open. The purple bird grabs the blue birds foot in his beak and pulls it back. The blue bird clenches his wing into a fist as the purple bird bites down. Suddenly the purple bird lets go and flaps his wings at the blue bird. A dust cloud starts to cover the birds again obscuring them from view. As the dust settles the birds are shown lunging towards each other. The purple bird has his wings raised behind him as he reaches forward and grabs the blue birds wing in his beak. At the same moment the blue bird grabs the purple birds neck. They pause there for a moment, biting and flapping their wings angrily. The eyeball then drops down and both birds freeze to watch as it hits the edge of the nest and bounces from view. They both blink then return to nibbling. 5

7 The purple bird pulls back and at the same time pulls a feather out of the blue birds wing. The blue bird raises his wing. A dust cloud covers the birds as they fight again. The dust settles to reveal both birds, having got confused during the fight, nibbling each others own body. The purple bird is enthusiastically nibbling his own wing and the blue bird is attacking his own leg. They continue for a moment, then realising their mistake, look at each other. CUT TO LONG SHOT: The tree is in shot with the rolling hills behind. The two birds are visible in the nest on the branch. The dust cloud starts again as both birds begin fighting. CUT TO MEDIUM SHOT: We pan down, following the fly to see the blue bird looking tired with his tongue hanging out of the corner of his mouth. He's panting. The nest is revealed to show the other bird is dead, his head lying back over his body, his skeletal wing hangs down over the side of the nest and his ribs are showing. Feathers from both birds are scattered around the nest. The blue bird is still watching the fly. CUT TO CLOSE UP: The blue birds head is in shot. He leans forward as the fly hovers just out of his reach. His beak opens, his tongue hangs out of his mouth. He slowly licks his beak. He then lowers his beak and takes a last look at the fly. He gasps. CUT TO MEDIUM SHOT: The fly still hovers above. The blue birds head is drooping, his eyelids are heavy; he continues to pant. His whole body is shaking and his wings are torn and hanging down limp at his sides. He then throws his head and his wings back, his eyes close and then he collapses forward over the side of the nest with a thud. He is dead. The fly happily zig zags down to the blue birds dead body and settles for a moment. As soon as he settles another higher pitched fly sound is heard and a second fly appears from the left side of the screen. The second fly settles on the dead purple bird. The two flies spot each other. In a second they zoom towards each other both buzzing loudly about to fight. THE END. 6

8 Storyboard Shot 1 - one landscape shot of tree in the hills Shot 2 - birds asleep; woken up by the fly and synchronously following it; blue bird pecks in direction purple bird Shot 3 - blue bird pulls feather out; looks at feather and back in direction purple bird 7

9 Shot 4 - purple bird looks up realises feather has gone; looks back to blue bird angrily Shot 5 - blue bird maintains eye contact with purple bird; trying to look innocent; blows away feather Shot 6 - feather still blown out of frame from shot 5; choreography to be finalised in dope sheet Shot 7 - confrontation of both birds, painted by Pam in acrylic colours 8

10 Shot 8 the fly buzzing happily; blue sky background and one small leaf sticking in Shot 9 - purple bird with tin on head; starts revenge blindfolded (got changed during productions) Shot 10 - purple bird picking out eye; slinging halfway round head; letting go in surprise Shot 11 - blue bird (has eye missing): looks in direction purple bird towards camera back to the left angrily 9

11 Shot got added later to make a cut to shot 12 possible the confrontation begins Shot 12 - confrontation continues; blue bird more angry than purple one; head feather can emphasize this Shot 13 - fight scene - choreography to be finalised in dope sheet; falling eye with rig 10

12 this idea of the twisted necks was dropped in favour of a shot of the birds fighting themselves Shot 14 - tree seen from the distance with heavy fighting in the nest Shot 15 - half dead blue bird (has eye missing) looking exhausted and scruffy; looks up to see fly Shot 16 - half dead blue bird s last attempt to catch fly but realises it is hopeless 11

13 Shot 17 blue bird takes last look at fly; exhaustion shows clearly then collapses over the nest edge; the fly settles down and begins to fight with another, second fly shortly after that enters the frame In the very first storyboard, I wanted to keep the images and the staging simple as the focus needed to be on the birds actions. That storyboard however had a lot of extra bits such as fly close ups and extra feather pulling scenes that were eventually cut because of time restrictions. Also, it was agreed that the tree design was not very good and so was later changed. The final storyboard I sketched the new tree design using Yasmins model as a guide. I think the new design is much better, almost Japanese like. There is much less feather pulling in this storyboard and getting straight into the action. It has also changed who is getting their eye pulled out. Even in this 'Final storyboard' things were cut at the last minute. The tin can which is thrown over one of the birds was cut in the final film as it was agreed that it did not make sense and that the story did not need it. - Pam 12

14 The Characters 13

15 The purple bird is just as curious about his surroundings as the blue one but he is also lazier. He is the more intelligent one of the two. He has a hot temper and all too keen to start a fight and can easily get really nasty really quickly. However despite his keenest to fight he is actually not that good a fighter. The blue bird is very curious about his surroundings and always on the look out for something to eat. He is a bit stupid and has a mischievous personality. He is the gentler one of the two. He tries, but fails to keep the peace in the film. He has a very endearing child like quality to his character but he can be just as deadly when it comes to fighting. The fly is a noisy, buzzing tiny fellow who manages to be just out of reach for both birds throughout the film. His hunger however is just as big as that of the birds. drawings by Pamela Legg 14

16 The behaviour of the chicks changes from a gentle sweet setting to a vicious scene (below). Picture 1 first character painting for pitch in acrylics both images (1 and 2) by Pamela Legg Picture 2 final acrylic painting for shot 7 of the film the characters show their darker side 15

17 Concept Art Picture 3 - First turn around sheet by Pamela Legg Picture 4 bird surprised by Pamela Legg 16

18 Picture 5 birds getting angry by Pamela Legg Picture 6 birds preparing to fight by Pamela Legg 17

19 Picture 7 birds grabbing each other s wings and neck by Pamela Legg Picture 8 the dying bird by Pamela Legg 18

20 Picture 9 the dead bird by Pamela Legg 19

21 Design Manifesto Our 90 second dark comedy short aimed at young adults features two (baby) birds left alone in a nest, who do battle with each other. The Design of the film which starts as cosy and friendly is slightly at odds with it's violent and gory end. The environment and characters have been constructed to have a cartoony feel to the film and while bird like in appearance, they display human like characteristics for comic effect. 20

22 Picture 10 final character design Pamela Legg by,,the final character design, I think this final design is much better than the original and is even more comic looking! It's design had to change as the old design was a bit flat and would not be very effective as a stop motion puppet. The shape of the head changed as originally I had the eyeballs sitting on top of the head, but after Roos's animation tests and advice it was decided to have them in-cased into the head. This actually made them more easy to control when animating and did not take away from any comic effect. The legs, although added to the design were not always attached to the birds while filming and were mainly used in the fight scenes. The tail is something that was also left out in the final puppet as it was agreed that it was not needed. - Pam 21

23 Inspiration We found these images above useful because they shared the same textured look that we wanted to achieve in our final puppets (various sources from the internet). Range of prototypes and maquettes Through a variety of maquettes and prototypes, we were able to develop final versions for both birds that not only moved convincingly, but also looked appealing. Samples for the final skinning 22

24 The Final Puppets 23

25 The following pages display the final scale drawings for the technical construction of the bird characters, and their final shapes, plus an expression sheet that shows a selection of the varying expressions we were able to achieve with the finished puppets. Although the design of the puppets did only undergo small changes from the initial drawings and paintings created by Pamela, a lot of maquette making for material and shape and prototyping of potential technical solutions was needed to get to the final solution that gave us the full range of movement necessary while still keeping the costs low. The initial technical drawings I made for the armature of the birds were very complicated. I really wanted to dive into more advanced puppet making and was willing to spend much time on that. I had already designed and even prototyped some complicated mechanisms for moving chests and stretching necks when we decided as a team that this was going beyond what was needed to make these characters work for this film. The final puppets are much simpler, but they still were a challenge. The simpler and cheaper design allowed time to prototype and test and abandon concepts before moving to the final design. Roos The final puppets are made using aluminium wire, polymorph, K&S and red hard foam for the armature, a range of materials for the skinning and finally a layer of foam sheet cut and carved feathers to give the birds their final look. As we need two versions of the birds - where they are dead versus dying in the end there are 4 characters in total. One the dead purple bird - is technically a prop as it does not need to move. The heads are re-used, as well as one tie-down rig for the blue bird. The main characters have detachable wings while the dying blue bird does not. The main blue bird has legs as well, as they are needed during one scene. The birds do not need to walk or fly, but are attached to a moveable rig to allow them moving and shifting through the nest while still being steady and secure. The heads of the birds are made out of a variety of materials as shown in the annotated scale drawings. A replacement system is used for both the beaks and the eye-lids to allow for the wide range of expressions we need these birds to perform. The head feather is detachable and animate-able as well. The different beaks were sculpted by Pamela, using plasticine. The plasticine allowed us to besides replacing the beaks also animate and change the shape slightly to make everything move smooth and convincing, and easily add elements like a tongue. The replaceable wings were of good use where extreme pose changes were needed and also to animate the wings separate on rigs for the fight cloud scene. The first thought behind this design was to be able to replace the wings easily in case of breaking. 24

26 Picture 11 final scale drawing of the purple bird by Roos Mattaar 25

27 Picture 12 final scale drawing of the blue bird by Roos Mattaar 26

28 Picture 13 final scale drawing of the skinned puppet by Roos Mattaar 27

29 Picture 14 final version of the blue bird puppet by Roos Mattaar 28

30 Picture 15 - final version of the blue bird puppet (half-dead) by Roos Mattaar 29

31 Picture 16 - final version of the purple bird puppet by Roos Mattaar 30

32 Picture 17 purple bird final puppet (dead) by Roos Mattaar 31

33 Picture 18 character expression chart by Roos Mattaar 32

34 Set Design We wanted something that looked striking and several tree photos were used as reference before a final design was created by Yasmin. Initial set design options drawn by Yasmin Jamil Various tree samples sourced from the internet 33

35 The Tree Picture 19 scale drawing for final tree used in the landscape shots by Yasmin Jamil 34

36 Picture 20 - scale drawing for final tree with material annotation by Yasmin Jamil 35

37 Fowl Play Production - Production Studies - UADACP Tutor: Rachel Robinson - 15/01/2013 The Tree Trunk A closer look at the textures of branches and trunk of the tree for ideas (various internet sources). Picture 21 - scale drawing for the tree trunk extension for the long shots by Yasmin Jamil 36

38 Picture 22 scale drawing for the tree trunk extension for the long shots, in the station by Yasmin Jamil 37

39 The Nest An agreed design similar to the 'nest bed' image in the bottom right hand corner as made (sourced from the internet). It would also compliment the texture of the birds. Picture 23 scale drawing fort he final nest used in the film s medium and long shots by Yasmin Jamil 38

40 Picture 24 The final set as it appears in the stop motion station 39

41 Production 40

42 Picture 25 first production schedule to show the amount of days to animate (blue) by Thomas Barth 41

43 Picture 26 Final production schedule broken down by individual team members by Thomas Barth 42

44 Picture 27 - shot overview duration and responsibility chart page 1 by Thomas Barth 43

45 Picture 28 - shot overview duration and responsibility chart page 2 by Thomas Barth 44

46 Picture 29 - shot sheet for animation, with timings from the animatic compiled by Thomas Barth Picture 30 example of a dope sheet for each individual shot to be animated by Thomas Barth 45

47 Picture 31 the production pipeline for Fowl Play by Thomas Barth 46

48 Picture 32 production pipeline timetable part 1 by Thomas Barth and Pamela Legg 47

49 Picture 33 - production pipeline timetable part 2 by Thomas Barth and Pamela Legg 48

50 Picture 34 proposed industry budget of ,00 by Thomas Barth 49

51 Picture 35 Actual budget with expenditures by team member by Thomas Barth 50