Research and Development - Colour Palette

Looking at old colour photos of New York City from the 1950's, I have noticed how unsaturated they are. They remind me of lomography photos. Here are some examples of colour I might use for my film.

Colour Ideas

Research - Firework Display Photo Shoot

At the end of my film, we see a firework display in the background of the reverse establishing shot to signify not only the end of the film but emphasise the 'happy' ending for the protagonist, Betty. Because I am still not 100 % as to whether I'll do my backgrounds in Photoshop / Illustrator or Maya with cell shading and composite them into After Effects, I used Bonfire Night as an opportunity to take some photos of a local firework display. Unfortunately I didn't have my DSLR at home so I had to use my phone. Luckily, the camera is pretty good at capturing high speed object so I managed to take some good reference photos for when I come to animate my own firework explosions in 2D or adjust the attributes of the firework dynamic in Maya.

More Character Development

Betty the Waitress

I have found Betty's design to be more of a challenge to get right than Williams'. After speaking to Neil on Tuesday, I've found my design style for William (who is now finished) to be quite different to what I've been doing for Betty. Neil also said they look like characters from two different worlds so it's quite distracting to look at them and see how they'll interact in my film. For this reason, I've had to really simplify Betty's design to fit in more with William's'.

UPDATE:

I've been struggling to simplify Betty's design down, especially her body shape, so I decided to go back to character inspiration. I found Linda Flynn-Fletcher from Disney's Phineas and Ferb to be useful in realising how so few lines can get across a woman's body shape.

Something I have noticed however, is Linda's 'mum' hips make her look older than say what Betty's age is. Betty is 25 and she doesn't have any kids or is married so I don't think she'll have as quite defined hips as Linda above does.

Lindana however, when she becomes a pop star, appears younger and less 'mum'. She looks more youthful and full of life than Linda above.

William the Businessman

Betty and William together

I decided to do a quick sketch of the two characters together. I think they work, but Betty needs to be simplified even more.

Character Design - The Waitress - Development

Betty is proving to be the hardest of the two characters to get right. I've struggled to draw her perspective so I modelled her quickly in Maya to see how she will look from all angles. This design works well and is now in the same style as William so they look like they're from the same design.

Story Development - Rough Animatic

I've finished putting my storyboard into a rough animatic. It's taken me a little longer to finish than I thought it would, but I think the timing is there. I wanted to nail the timing of each scene down first before I went ahead and produced a cleaner version. At the moment it is just over 3 minutes long. I feel this a little too much for me to animate, so I am going to edit it further and cut anything that's not essential to the story or dynamic. Although my film has a lot of quick cuts and repeated animation, it it still a lot to do.

There a few tweaks I need to make for my final animatic to make everything read better:

- Few extra panels to make it clear what's going on in some parts for example, when he asks for the bill towards the end

- Animate more things e.g. the objects floating around Betty's head when she imagines what she buy with a huge tip

- Tighter fade in's and out's, especially the end of the montage sequence in the middle where we see Betty concentrating

- I may get rid of the scene where he orders dessert (coffee and cake) about half way in as it's a sequence that's not needed as it doesn't add to the story or characters at all. If I cut this out, it would take off 13 seconds of screen time

- I will also re-do the drawings of the characters in their final design form so it's even more clear what's going on. I think the style of drawing I've down for my storyboard and this animatic doesn't suit the story or pacing of the action (they're not zany enough unlike the final designs)

- Finally, some sound effects

Colour Script