Comic Project

A few months ago I started a comic based project, the projects premise will be kept secret for now. But for now this post is to display the prototype template of possible future covers of comics.

The prototype cover is based on some of the early comic covers from Marvel Comics. While there isn’t much physically on the cover such as an art piece or sketch the main focus was to make usual for more than one comic idea.

The two boxes in the top left of the comic are based on the marvel comics logo that was often placed on the comics to show who the publisher is, this is still used today but it depends on the artist and the company. From this I have based my original AMT Animator and re-purposed to be AMT Comics a play on my own name and in honour of the famous comic publisher Marvel. The second box focuses on the date of when the comic was either published or went on sale, I my prototype’s case the day I start working on the comic. The signature in the bottom right of the comic is my own logo to show I was the artist behind it.

Year Overview: Year 3 Blog Content

This post contains links to all my work and is divided into the two categories of my Course Work, Independent Practice and Creative Futures: Pro Practitioner.

A quick warning about this post all the links work but for some reason when no mouse hovers the actual post, the Creative Futures: Pro Practitioner section looks like there are no links and when it does all the links light up and so does the text, just click the links  and it should take you to the desired post. I apologise about this I have gone of the link software several times and I don’t know what is causing this.

Independent Practice:

My Independent Practice process started with me deciding what I would do as my main project. I draw up some brainstorms to help me come up with ideas for my project as well as what I could possibly do within these projects during the process of making them.

Brainstorm 1,

Brainstorm 2

Once all my ideas for this project were presented clearly on a piece of paper, I began to decided which project I wanted to pursue for my final major project as long as it stay within the brief that we were given at the beginning of the year. The project I had chosen for my final major project was Bubble and Squeak, I created these two characters last year, but I wasn’t really happy with the way they had come out last year, so I decided to redesign them and create a new episode of Bubble and Squeak. Since I started a new project had had to come up with some new objectives and aims for said project:

Bubble and Squeak Aims and Targets

I started to then come up with several potential narratives for the animation, these scenarios where simple ideas that popped into my head during this creation process to find a suitable story for Bubble and Squeak to follow in this new animation:

Narrative Idea Inspiration,

Narrative 1,

Narrative 2,

Narrative 3,

Narrative 4,

Narrative 5,

Bubble and Squeak Narrative Ideas Development 1,

Bubble and Squeak Narrative Ideas Development 2,

Bubble and Squeak Narrative Ideas Development 3,

Bubble and Squeak Narrative Ideas Final Ideas 1,

Bubble and Squeak Narrative Ideas Final Ideas 2,

Bubble and Squeak Narrative Synopsis,

Once I found a suitable narrative I began to redesign the characters Bubble and Squeak putting them into various scenarios to see what sort of reactions that they would get involved in and how they would deal and react to them. This includes of course Bubble’s sudden change of species after I began to realise that him been a fish severely stunted the animation and it’s narrative:

Squeak Redesign Ideas,

Squeak Idea’s 2,

Bubbles Character Rethink,

Bubble Species experiment,

Bubbles Character Rethink, Crab vs Snail,

Bubble Redesign 2

Bubble and Squeak Sketches,

Bubble and Squeak Sketches 2,

Bubble and Squeak Animal Motion study,

Bubble and Squeak Sketches 3,

Bubble and Squeak Sketches 4,

Once I chosen the species Bubble would become I began to write up potential story boards to help make the narrative of the story that I had chosen and developed a lot easier to understand. These storyboards went through several different versions of the same story as well as different ones.

Storyboard 1, Storyboard 2, Storyboard 3, Storyboard 4, Storyboard 5,

I began to do tests in Adobe Flash to see if it was suitable for this project, I eventually found out that this was bad idea as it seemed to drain the life out of the story, the characters and the animation.

Flash Test 1,

Flash Test 2,

Flash test 3

I began to experiment with the line reader to create a stopmotion animations with hand made puppets of Bubble and Squeak the first few steps of my project were a little rough as I was still new to stopmotion animation.

Stopmotion Test 1,

Stopmotion Test 2: Bubbles,

Stopmotion Test 3: Colour,

Stopmotion Test 4: Colour 2,

Stopmotion Test 5: Squeak Asleep,

Stopmotion Test 6: Squeak Asleep 2

Once I grew confident enough to use the line reader I decided to use it and stopmotion to produce my final major project since I have never really used any other means of animating other than Flash so it might be a nice road to go down this year:

Bubble and Squeak Early Takes

This was one of my early takes at creating Bubble and Squeak via the line reader and stopmotion animation after my experiments, so their was still a lot of room for improvement, my later work see down below shows that I started to improve both in my understanding of the technology and the animation style.

Bubble and Squeak Opening,

Bubble and Squeak Climbing Prototype,

Bubble and Squeak Climbing Prototype 2,

Bubble and Squeak 3D Background Experiment,

Once I started to get the hang of this new type of animation I also began to compose more complicated scenes with my puppets as well as putting together my older animation clips to see how well the animation came together with some sound effects.

Bubble and Squeak Narrative Experiment,

Squeak Close up Experiment 1,

Bubble Close up Experiment,

Squeak Close up Experiment 2,

Bubble Close up Experiment 2,

Bubble and Squeak Climb Sink Part 1,

Bubble and Squeak Climb Sink Part 2,

Bubble’s Tap Attempt 1,

Leaky Tap Animation,

Bubble’s Solo Climb and Attempt V2,

Bubble and Squeak High Five,

Soaked,

Squeak Solo Climb and Fail,

Look at the Tap,

Soaked V2,

Squeak complains to Bubble,

Once I had done most of my scene I began to realise that I needed to also create my credit and opening sequence so I began to design design the Title Card and Credits in order for me to record this last sequence.

Title and Credits Cards Design,

Opening and Credits Animations,

Eventually I posted up my combine all my clips and sound affects to produce my first final version of Bubble and Squeak:

Bubble and Squeak V1,

Although after watching the completed video I realised their was still corrections to be made.

Bubble and Squeak Final Blog,

Bubble and Squeak Final Youtube,

During the process of creating Bubble and Squeak I also researched several different animation technologies, visited sites of exhibits from Hull City of Culture and done several sketches to help improve my overall art skills. As well as Develop my image in the art industry with creating my own business cards.

Animation Technology Research 1,

Animation Technology Research 2,

Animation Technology Research 3,

Animation Technology Research 4,

Google Web Designer 1,

Google Web Designer 2,

Independent Practice: Adobe Photoshop Practice 1: Line Work Notes,

Logo Ideas 1,

Logo Ideas 2,

Logo Ideas 3,

Logo Ideas 4,

Business Card Idea 1,

Business Card Idea 2,

Independent Practice: Lines of Thought Workshop,

Hull City of Culture: Opening Exhibits 1,

Hull City of Culture: Opening Exhibits 2,

Hull City of Culture: Opening Exhibits 3,

Hull City of Culture: The Propeller,

Hull City of Culture: Poppies Waving and Weeping Window

Independent Practice: Drawing Practice,

Independent Practice: Drawing Practice 2,

Independent Practice: Random Sketches 1,

Independent Practice: Random Sketches 2,

Independent Practice: Random Sketches 3,

Independent Practice: Random Sketches 4,

Independent Practice: Random Sketches 5,

Independent Practice: Random Sketches 6,

Independent Practice: Random Sketches 7,

Independent Practice Human Anatomy Research and Practise,

Independent Practice: Human Anatomy,

Creative Futures: Pro Practitioner

My Creative Futures: Pro Practitioner project started with me trying to decide what I could do for a potential client project and who I could find as a client for said project or in another way a client who would provide me with a project for the third year course.

Client Project: Ideas,

Client Project: Women of the World or WOW!,

Now that I had decided what project I doing for a client of my choosing was, I was going to have to understand more about the women of Hull that were famous and I decided that 10 women would be a good number to help keep the length of the animation decent and interesting.

Women of the World or WOW! Women of Hull Research 1,

Women of the World or WOW! Women of Hull Research 2,

Women of the World or WOW! Women of Hull Research 3,

Women of the World or WOW! Women of Hull Research 4,

Women of the World or WOW! Women of Hull Research 5,

Once the women were chosen I began to draw up story boards of idea for potential narratives for this project. The ideas that I first created for these storyboard were only basic and I would later come back to design or develop new ones later on, some of the later on storyboards are after I started to do all animation redesigns for the women. These redesigns of these animations toke place after story board 3.

Women of the World or WOW! Women of Hull: Storyboard 1,

Women of the World or WOW! Women of Hull: Storyboard 2,

Women of the World or WOW! Storyboard 3,

Women of the World or WOW! Storyboard 4,

Women of the World or WOW! Storyboard 5,

WOW Storyboard 6,

The links below are my different ideas for the new animations, as well as some of the inspirations for them included:

Women of the World or WOW! Design Ideas 1,

Women of the World or WOW! Design Ideas 2,

Women of the World or WOW!: Phone Research,

Women of the World Maureen Lipman/Phone Sketches,

Hull City of Culture: Opening Exhibits 2,

From here I began to animate my project:

WOW Animation V1,

Women of the World or WOW! Animation Prototype 5,

Women of the World or WOW! Animation Prototype 11,

Women of the World or WOW! Animation Prototype 17,

Women of the World or WOW! Animation Prototype 24,

Women of the World or WOW! Animation Prototype 30,

Women of the World or WOW! Animation Prototype 35,

Women of the World or WOW! Animation Prototype 41,

WOW Animation Changes,

WOW Animation Changes 2,

Once my main animation was finished I began to look for a potential client who would be willing to show my work to the public:

WOW potential clients for my project,

WOW potential clients for my project: Maritime Museum,

WOW potential clients for my project: Kadromah94,

WOW potential clients for my project: Kadromah94 part 2,

Independent Practice: Human Anatomy

This post is to show all the work I have done experimenting with a white board marker and A3 paper.

A collection of drawings that I did in my free time as an experiment with a white board marker. The aim of these drawings was not only to experiment but also to show that my understanding and ability to draw human anatomy had improved. Some of my best examples are the drawings of the man on a side angle , since I have started to add more finer details to the sketches making them look more life like. The only downfall with all these sketches is that while they do look somewhat human in nature they all have been drawn incorrectly, the mistake that I made on all the sketches is that I have placed the eyes to high up on the head, which is a common mistake. Why this is is that naturally the human eyes are lower down the head near the centre more than the top, this because the top area of the head is often covered in lost of hair hiding the rest of human head the essentially blank. Even though I made mistakes with these sketches I still feel like I have made some progress with my human anatomy studies and sketching of them.

Creative Futures: Pro Practitioner: Client Project WOW potential clients for my project: Kadromah94

One of the other locations I investigated for my client project was the media cafe the Kadromah94 located at 94 Alfred Gelder Street Hull, I went to investigate this as a potential client that would be able to host my project since it host a wide range of Media based events. When I visited the cafe, I asked a member of staff if I could talk to the manager of the establishment. I was asked why and I told them that I was a third year Animation student at Hull School of Art and Design and that I was looking for someone who could host one of my works to public as it is part of my course.  I was given a email address that the manger prefers to be emailed and that he is all ways busy so this is the best way to reach him. I email the manger of the Kardomjah94 once I got back:

I received a response two days later requesting that I send a MP4 format of the file and that I should try Humberfilm. Once I received this email I began to trying to find a way to converted my file for famous women of Hull into a MP4 unfortunately SWF files and FLA files can’t be tranfered into these formats without loosing actionscript3 which is a key component to my Famous Women of Hull Project, so my Tutor Gareth suggested that I do a screen recording of it and send my client that instead.

Independent Practice – Final Major Project: Bubble and Squeak: Bubble and Squeak Full Version V2

This post was to show the improved version of the Bubble and Squeak Animation:

This version of the Bubble and Squeak has more sound effects such as more water dripping and longer Squeaks from Squeak. This was done to remove the mistake from the previous version which suddenly went quite during key moments of the animation, which also helps show how annoying the leaking tap actually is. These mistake were sounds like a sound track to go through the entire animation not just the opening and credits. The sounds also missing was the tap tripping when not on screen that was the easiest fix of all but the one that I added to ad bit more was the other character cheering with their natural noise to the other character to highlight their sense of character and their relationship as well as to show that this is a average day for them.

Independent Practice – Final Major Project: Bubble and Squeak: Bubble and Squeak Full Version

This a post of my final version of Bubble and Squeak including sound and Music effects, that are either of my own creation or are Royalty Free:

I made the final version by gather all my chosen clips and scenes from my recording sessions and gathered sound effects before transferring them to Adobe Premiere Pro and then dragging the desired videos and sounds to their correct place. I also cut several of the scenes and moved them around to get the best quality out of all the clips. The final version of Bubble and Squeak was worth it, the puppet I made each had their own personality and story which helped bring this project to life. The story is so compelling and from the people from the target audience that I have shown from my Tutor Janis to a few fashion students have all enjoyed it and said it is a cool bit of animation that looks like a long time was spent on it. The only down fall is that some of the scenes suddenly go quite so I will need to fix that as soon as possible, maybe add the soundtrack all the way through, I know that the tap stops dripping at some points so I will look into that.

Independent Practice – Final Major Project: Bubble and Squeak: Bubble and Squeak: Opening and credits

This post is to show the opening and Credits ideas I had for Bubble and Squeak:

The font idea for the opening title card and the credits came to me when I was thinking of a unique way to introduce the animation as well as end it. The entire thing is hand drawn in Adobe Illustrator with the brush tool before before copied and pasted several times to make new words and letter. The style is also used to high Bubble and Squeak’s relations ship as well as the mischief that they get up too.

Independent Practice – Final Major Project: Bubble and Squeak: Bubble and Squeak: Squeak Complains to Bubbles

A post that was based on another suggestion of my tutor Janis:

Notes on this scene in post below.

Independent Practice – Final Major Project: Bubble and Squeak: Bubble and Squeak: Soaked

This post is is another attempt at the soaked scene that I created earlier on found the in the post flooded:

This scene was created specifically after the failure with the flooded bed and food bowl scene, this time the animation focus more on Bubble and Squeak’s reaction to water the excess water has done to their property. While Bubble isn’t too affected by the water since snail thrive in wet based environments, Squeak isn’t too pleased, which is why he pulls a face at the food before throwing a temper tantrum and explains his solution to the problem. This scene highlights Bubble and Squeak relationship and shows how close the characters are to each with Bubble been willing to help his friend solve the water problem and make us feel a connection to these characters.

Independent Practice – Final Major Project: Bubble and Squeak: Bubble and Squeak: Look at the Tap

A  post with animation clip that was a suggestion by my Tutor Janis to help extend the Animation of Squeaks Climbing the sink: