Group communication

Apart from the times when we were in college, we couldn't easily communicate with each other, as we all lived far away from each other. To counter this, we set up a Facebook group to ensure easy communication for the entire team.

This was incredibly useful for organizing times and dates for filming. We also made use of a Drop Box to share files around. Again, this was useful when checking animation clips with other members of the team.

Poem 2 Animating

Since I was the most practiced with animation software, it was my job to animate the character in flash. This provided some unique problems that I had to solve.

We learnt quite quickly that SWFs (Flash's main export) wouldn't work with After Effects. This would mean we would have to use GIF files to get the character into the composition.

Another problem was the lack of transparency in the GIFs. Flash did not have the capabilities of exporting a GIF with a transparent background. We came up with the solution of making the background bright green. This would essentially act like a green screen for us, that we could key out in After Effects.

Finally there was the problem of the length of the GIFs. I began work with the assumption that After Effects would automatically loop a small GIF, this was not the case however. This would mean I had to lengthen the GIF files to play for longer, but even then some problems come up.

Throughout the animation I employed a technique known as boiling. This is where the line of the character is constantly wobbling, even when still. I did this because the most important aspect of animation is movement, so to see something completely still would look wrong. Boiling ensures the animation keeps its energy, even when the character is still.

Overall the character animation took about a week to collectively finish. As it was close to the deadline I rushed some of the later animations, but that is ultimately my own fault.

Poem 2 Storyboard and Animatic

Alex drew up a storyboard for us to use in the animation.

Once again, Alex got, his friend Adam to produce the music for us. It was a lot more important for us to get the timings right for this poem as animation is a lot more time consuming than filming.

Alex produced an animatic using the storyboard.

Island Film (almost complete music) from Adam Fergler on Vimeo.

Poem 2 Ideas

With Poem 1 in the stage of editing, we decided to start on Poem 2. We all agreed before choosing a poem that we wanted to do an animation. We also wanted to do something simpler than our first poem. We all decided to do the poem 'Isolated' by Zenam Bi.

Zenam Bi

Isolated like the emotions I have held for many years.

The cold weighs hard on my bones.

As the dark clouds begin to gather,

quiet surrounds the air.

The rural space echoes with stillness.

The picturesque image engraved in my mind.

Like a single tree embedded in a field,

The wavy grass hangs around to help ease the loneliness it feels.

The sheep wander aimlessly in this desolate sphere. 

This time, we decided to come up with ideas together as a team.

The roles for this poem were changed slightly, Alex would edit the film together, Sophie would provide background illustration and I would do all the character animation.

We wanted to keep the animation as simple as possible, so we decided to have a simple character and keep it black and white. Quite quickly we realized the drawings were similar to the art of Limbo.

The art style is very similar to want we wanted, the character is even similar to one we designed. The feeling of loneliness is quite profound in Limbo, which also fits our film well.

Poem 1 - shooting

On the 16th of January we went to York to get the shooting done for our first poem. We started around 10:30 am.

Me and Tom where there for using the camera and setting uo the positions of the actors and camera. Alex and our actress Luxi Zhou were also there to act out the scenes and make sure the scenes fit with the storyboard. Sophie was there to help out with everything and to set up the location for a later shot.

 

We spent the vast majority of the day filming the montage at the beginning of our poem, where the couple are happy together. This worked out well as we needed these scenes to be in the day time and the later scenes to be darker.

We were originally going to have the Alex and Luci change clothes for different scenes, to give the illusion that this montage was going over different days. However, on the day of filming it was very cold and needed to wear a lot of layers at the time. We decided to keep the clothe changes to a minimum due to the weather.

 

We managed to get interior shots in a coffee shop fairly easily although the first time we went it was far too busy for us to film in. e returned a couple of hours later, after having a lunch break to film this scene.

Since we were not going to have any dialogue in the Poem, the actors could talk about anything they wanted during filming, as everything was going to be muted. This allowed for some naturally looking acting.

We filmed happy scenes right up until sunset. We planned to have a timelapse of the sun setting, with the city in the foreground, however we all agreed that York didn't fit the bleak look we wanted for that timelapse. Tom would do the timelapse himself at a later date.

We then went to Sophie's house to film the final night scenes. By now it was 5:30 - 6:00 pm and very dark. We underestimated how dark it would be for this scene and the shots we filmed were very hard to see. We needed more scenes in a lighter time of day anyway, so we agreed to film the night scenes the next day in Leeds.

We once again all got together in Leeds to film the last scenes, we went into the city center, around 4:00 pm to film the sad scenes of the film. Leeds is a lot more busier and bleak than York so it fit better than if we filmed them in York. We used Luxi's home as a setting for the last scene. This time we rented out a light to help make the scene visible. This time it ended out a lot better than the filming in York.

Poem 1 Inspiration

Our first video was about forbidden love, so we researched similar videos for inspiration.

one step forward (award winning 48 hour film project) from ben crowell on Vimeo.

At first I was quite confused with this video but still intrigued. It features a very belated man going backwards through time. Throughout the short film we are revealed how he got so messed up and what ridiculous things he had done. At the end it is finally revealed why he is so happy: he had just successfully proposed to his girlfriend.

It is a very heartwarming film which keeps you interested through to the end. by making the film go backwards the audience is left guessing as to why he is so happy so continues watching.

As a group we toyed with the idea of making the video be in reverse order, to keep the viewer interested, we decided not to however. Our film would also be a lot sadder than this film.

Be Near Me from John X. Carey on Vimeo.

This film fitted a lot more with the emotions we wanted to show. In this, a montage of happy memories shows, while being juxtaposed with much more sadder scenes at the end. The difference in colours between the memories and present day are very clear, making the switch between scenes all the more noticeable.

Sophie also produced a mood board to fit with the video we're making.

Poem 1 Animatic

Before we could film the scenes for the poem, we needed a more clear idea of the timings of each scene.

Using his storyboard, Alex made an animatic for the poem. Alex also got his friend Adam Fergler, who is music student , to produce the music for both the poems for us. This was very useful for us as we didn't have to worry about fitting the edit to pre-existing music.

Untitled from Adam Fergler on Vimeo.

Animatic by Alex. Music by Adam Fergler 

Poem 1 ideas & Storyboard

As a group, we decided to look into the poem and Analise it in great detail. We took out key details from the poem we found interesting. The most interesting themes we got from the poem is that of a forbidden love story and the city being a negative influence.

We then decided to separately come up with some ideas for scenes, so we could get a more clear idea of what we wanted to do.

 

I liked the idea of the city being an evil influence and tried to think of ideas for that. I drew out scenes of a skyline with a timelapse, static going over the screen and a faceless businessman. The static would symbolize how unreal the city can be to real life and the faceless businessman being a personification of greedy corporations. Ultimately we didn't go with many of these ideas, though we did utilize the timelapse with the city skyline.

We decided to focus a lot more on the forbidden love aspect. Both Alex and Sophie produced a test storyboard for the poem. We looked over both and decided that we were playing on the religious side of things too much.  Overall we went with an edited version of Alex's storyboard for the final storyboard.

Storyboard made by Alex.

Poem 1

We have all been put together in a group and each given ourselves roles (Ryan, Tom: Camera Alex, Sophie: Storyboard Tom, Daryl: Editing) There will be some overlap with the roles but I think this will be alright.

We have been given a poem to produce a short two minute film inspired by it. The poem we have been given is 'Outline Your Implications' by Razia Afzal.

Razia Afzal

Outline Your Implications

Force feed your diminishing, decadent desires.

You stitch and outline every lie in an idealistic insane manor.

Outline each implication, and re-enforce your own version.

Characterise me and state me, within a controversial, concealed category.

Freedom of an open-minded human being ceases to exist.

Breed the birth of analyzed emotions.

Hindered, lavished love does not level with her silk satisfaction.

Expectations are tightly sealed, within this hopeless century.

The city promotes carnage, which is tormented with ridiculed rage.

Welcome fiends, to the branded mimicking millennium.

A person could bleed you dry and squeeze the last penny, from a boneless, breaking body.

An impulse of greed is every follower’s Religion.

She sustains and conceals a faint finished memory of the love with a foreign man.

But loving him was felicity, breaking every boundary within her.

The magic, lust and love were another fantasy carving a sin, within her mechanic al memory.

She must obey and command to follow the system.

A virtualised afterlife abolishes her love for a ruthless man.

She preys on the innocent men.

They cherish each kiss and tarnished touch.

An empty hole tightly tugging, her harmonic heart strings.

He predicted every aspiring aspect of her frail future.

She takes the long route, but yet she never discovered her own self-identity.

The high demand in the public’s aspirations grows and grows, till there is no space for gossip galore.

Negative perceptions are sprayed within the air, and replenished with agony.

False lights are signalling the negative vibes across the channel.

Lie once, and again, but your prediction was a complicated framework lining, every eventful aspect again.

The Astrologist will re-create the foreseeable future, to the girl again. 

Already we have been discussing as a group where we can go with this poem. We are quite intrigued by the love story in the middle of the poem. We will develop more ideas.