Putting Animation Together

Based on feedback from my supervisor I decided to put the first part of the animation together first which would be the beginning of each story when the women share what happened to them. I did this so I would know if it worked as one animation. If it did not I would have my project as 4 separate videos. Here is the rough cut:

link: https://vimeo.com/127985851

I was very happy with how it turned out and showed it to fellow classmates and they agreed it worked. The vision was going ahead.

I started by looking at my word doc that had all the scenes split up in writing. I had each story color coded too so it as easy to find. I then went through my animated stories and cut and chopped where needed be. I then placed them all in the correct order in Final Cut Pro.

I went through it many times to make sure the transitions flowed together.

I then touched up any audio that sounded off. When I put them all side by side I made sure they were all the same levels, as were the sound effects and background noises. When I showed the finished piece to my fellow classmates some feedback I got was that by the time they got to the 2nd scene of the 4th story (Brain Injury) they had forgotten what happened her. So I proposed to to a flashback before the scene started. The flash and flashback effect was looking too gaudy for me so I went with a fade to color before the snippet where the rock hits her head, then the 2nd scene follows where she talks about having surgery. After showing this to classmates again they approved.
The end scene is where each woman says their inspirational part at the end. I decided to finish up with some kinetic typography over the table scene. It was originally looking to messy so I grabbed this pink sheer square from the intro scene and placed the text on that.

I made the text in After Effects and exported it with a RGB and Alpha setting so it would be transparent when I brought it into Final Cut Pro.

Story 3 – Stretch Marks

Link to video: https://vimeo.com/127778966

I started off with scene 1 with the opening of the schools door. I first applied a mask on either door and the surrounding building. The mask would not allow the doors to move inwards just swipe to the side or up so I used keyframes to make the doors open. I then went ahead with the locker scene. My illustrator file appeared very blurry(below) so I edited it and it was still very blurry. The image quiality of the origianl image was too poor so I reverted back to my previous graphic of the locker scene. I used real flooring and walls to tie it in with the rest of the story’s style. I placed this underneath the door layers and keyframed it to move and change in size as the doors opened.For the school scene, I firstly added in some background images that my sister took of her classroom. I think it adds realness to the scene. I created the spinning globe in blender. It was nice to use another program apart from After Effects and Illustrator. I dug out my 3D modellling and animation notes to help me along.I then brought the rendered animation into After Effects and put a circle mask on top. From here I matched it up to the globe holder. The lighting in the background image matches up to the light in the globe.

For the school uniform in the bin scene I just applied the bone tool to the tie to make it flow in the wind as if it was hanging of the side of the bin. I used pen strokes and the trim paths effect to create the cracked mirror. I really like the way this turned out. 

I used keyframes to get the clothes moving. I played with some sound effects to make it sound like people changing, I am happy with how it turned out. The Bebo message scene was done using kinetic typography and the typewriter effect.
The cubical scene starts off with us seeing feet behind the door and a bag beside the feet. We are then shown the character.

I used numerous sound effects for this animation. I downloaded most of them from www.freesfx.co.uk/ , which is where I get most of my effects for the animations.

Supervisor Meeting 8/5/15

At the meeting today I got some feedback on my designs for the 3rd story.

The following images are graphics for scenes in the 3rd story. Some feedback I got:

They are a different style to my other stories. There is a lot of drawn elements and not enough photograph elements like my last animations. I can add photographs for the walls and floors. I will also play around the the locker scene at the beginning so it looks more realistic.

Story 3 – Stretch Marks Storyboard

Story  3 – Stretch Marks

I guess my insecurities started in my early teens just as I started into secondary school. Not every teen goes through puberty easily and I unfortunately was one of them. My body started to change so quickly, that as a result my skin couldn’t keep up and so resulted in a severe case of stretch marks. A small few I could cope with but I ended up with them all over the majority of my body. Everywhere from my stomach, hips, arms, chest and thighs.

It was so hard for me, especially around my friends who were all skinny minnies. P.E class used to be torture for me. We had a communal changing room where everyone changed in front of one another. I was so self-conscious in case any of the girls saw my body that I would change in a toilet cubical.

I ended up being bullied about my weight and appearance. I began to shy away from socialising. My friends would all be heading to the teenage disco, whereas I would be staying home. No confidence and afraid what new nasty comment would be said.

When I left school and started college I left that part of my life behind me. I began to feel good about myself again. I’m now at a point in my life where I’ve accepted my insecurities. Appearance isn’t always everything. It’s what’s underneath that counts.