Motion
The Brief
A live brief with Wessex Museums, to engage with narratives written by Thomas Hardy and design storyboards, undertake test and animatics to produce a short motion sequence, 45-60 seconds. It is important to consider the soundtrack from the outset as a crucial creative component for the sequence as a whole. Therefore, being aware to copyright issues and get clearance where appropriate.
Wessex Museums is a thriving consortium of four principal museums across Dorset and Wiltshire that tell stories of Wessex from the prehistory to now, under; Dorset Museum, Poole Museum, The Salisbury Museum and Wiltshire Museum. The Thomas Hardy exhibition will be on display across the four museums, with each museum exploring a different aspect of the landscape of 'Wessex' (Hardy's fictional world based on Dorset and Wiltshire). Within each landscape theme sit two sub-themes, looking at the way Hardy's worldview was influenced by the landscape around him.
Audience & Themes
A key aim is to introduce and help make relevant Hardy's Work to new audiences, particularly young people, while not alienating Hardy's existing audiences.
Our group was given the book Jude The Obscure, which focuses on women's equality and religion and would be exhibited in The Salisbury Museum.
Storyboard
"As long as the world changes"
Adapting our initial idea, 'Hardy's modern day woman', we based our final narrative on this quote "as long as it takes for the world to change", taken from Jude The Obscure movie. As the motion sequence will show her going through time, from the Victorian era to the late 20th century, seeing the world change around her visually and through sounds. Introducing key events in woman's history, whilst she stays exactly the same in the midst of the hustle and bustle.
Animatic
To get a better understanding of the flow and pace of the sequence I made an animatic. This allowed me to visualise the various components that will happen in the motion sequence, such as; the transitions, the timing, and the sound, and make final changes before the actual production.
Illustrations
My main role in the group was to illustrate the character, background and buildings mostly throughout the motion sequence, as I had stronger skills in illustration and would show consistency throughout the video. In addition, as it was my narrative that the group went with, it was much easier for me to visualise my ideas and pitch it to the group. However, in the end both me a Cassie (my team member) provided the visuals.
Character Development
Developing the character is what I struggled with, as there were a lot of elements that I needed to thoroughly think about, such as; the visual style, historic accuracy and how easy it will be to animate her. It took the group a while to finalise on the character, which left problems further down the production, i.e: her ratio compared to the background and her subtle movements to make her feel more present.
After Effects
Even though my main role in the group was the illustrator, I also wanted to animate a small section of the video, as it is a key skill that I want to acquire for myself. I learnt how to animate the pocket watch starting and finishing scene; using different layers and the 3D attribute on after effects.
Critical Evaluation
Looking back on this live brief with Wessex Museums, I was able to explore new skills and ways of working, for instance: group work, Ben's After Effects workshops and working mostly in the computer labs on campus. In addition to developing better time management and pace to get the project completed in time to present to the client.
I enjoyed learning about and implying motion as a form on graphic communication, and I thought that Ben's workshops were structured really well, engaging and interactive in the sense of having a file ready for us to animate alongside Ben. In comparison to other computer lab workshops, I felt more engaged in Ben's teaching style and the pace of his workshops.
I was able to work with new people in my class, therefore be able to get to know others that I haven't yet spoken to, in addition to learning new skills they might have that I don't. One of my group members was more familiar to after effects than I was, but his skill/ interest in after effects enabled our group to experiment with more advance motion layouts, i.e: 3D and circular motion. What I really valued in the group was how we all had roles which were more suited to our skill set, yet still had the opportunity to practice/ develop our skills in other mediums. I was more comfortable in illustrator, yet I was still able to animate the beginning and last scene with the pocket watch.
This was the third time we had a group project during the graphics course, and first time I had more of a leadership role, in terms of; pitching my idea, sharing research, sorting out roles and coming up with deadlines for each task. I found it more challenging working in this group, as there were little communication with some of my teammates and most of the team worked from home rather than in studio, which made the team feel a little more disconnected in comparison to other teams working in the studio together.
Overall, I'm not as satisfied with the final outcome in terms of the illustration style and how it all comes together. However, I am proud of our concept and techniques we used in After effects, as I believe that we pushed ourselves technically in motion.