Masi's 3D Computer Animation Blog

This is an alternative storyboard that I tried for the first half of the story, the idea here is to strictly focus on the character. To make it more suspenseful and dramatic the very first shot cuts right to the action and we follow the character from then. However I abandoned this idea in favor of the previous storyboard uploaded because the camera work here is reminiscent of video game camera. The angles of the previous story board camera shows the body movement and action more clearly, it’s more readable and cinematic.Some of the shots in this version of the storyboard lacks continuity, in shot 2 he is running from left to right, in following shot he is running from bottom of the screen to the top and in shot 6 and 7 he is running from right to left. This can be confusing and lacks continuity.

Modeled basic props and the first shot of the storyboard, set up the camera identical to the frame in the storyboard. George’s feedback was to try a panning shot and end the shot with the puddle visible, use rule of thirds and bring the horizon line down a little bit.

Experimenting with reflective surfaces in Maya replicating transparent water effect as well as figuring out the camera angle for the second shot of the storyboard where the character is running past the camera. In this first attempt the camera is static, after analyzing it I concluded adding a tracking shot after the character runs past adds drama to the scene. This will be added in the following week as I develop this further.

The setting will be a a forest, with minimal human presence. These are some images from various games that are visually similar to the world of this project. Ruins and broken structures that are part of the scenery showing that the area has been uninhabited for a long time.

The main character will be a young boy, surviving on his own in a forest. His clothes will be simple and handmade, tribal design, made of animal hide, and natural fabric.

Instead of a humanoid monster as was displayed in the storyboard last week the second character will be a pet animal, a large pet either a cat or a dog. I really want to emphasize the bond between these two, they have survived on their own for a long period of time and as far as the viewer is concerned these two are the only two living beings in the world. The bond between them is very strong.

The first storyboard idea as per this weeks assignment brief, the idea behind this storyboard is playing with building up tension and subverting expectation. For my FMP I want to focus on body mechanics and animation, for this reason I chose to work with only one humanoid character to really focus on the quality of the animation, this storyboard idea was developed with that in mind.

Below is the second storyboard idea. This storyboard also explores building tension and subverting expectation, albeit at a slightly humorous way.

The idea behind this storyboard is a man walking into an alley and keeps climbing up until he reaches the top of a water tank on a rooftop where he finally sits down. His motive is hidden until he reaches the top where it is revealed he was looking for a quiet and peaceful place to have his lunch, but right before he takes his first bite a crow flies by and steals his lunch. Again the formula here is build up tension, and through some kind of revelation release tension and subvert the viewers expectations.

Idea 3 below

This idea is inspired by Ernest Hemingway’s novel the old man and the sea.

I did not fully storyboard this idea because by this point I had decided to further develop storyboard 1 and due to other course work decided move on as this was taking too much time. The rest of the story is that the old man is swallowed by the fish and in the belly of the fish meets other fishermen like him. Each person tells their story of how they just like the old man had gone out to the sea, caught a giant fish and ended up in its belly. Listening to the others the old man realizes that they all ended up in their current predicament because they were to stubborn and unable to let go and change direction when met with adversary. Suddenly everything starts spinning, a hole appears above them and air is sucked out, everyone grabs onto something and they yell at the old man

“grab onto something as tight as you can otherwise you will go”.

“Go where?” The old man replies.

“To the other side, dummy!”

“What’s on the other side?”

“No one knows, none have returned!”

The old man decides to let go and is sucked out through the hole by the air current. The old man wakes up at the shore and realizes the hole was the fishes air hole and if all the others had let go they too would be on the beach with him. The End.

This idea is too narrative driven and for my FMP I want to focus mostly on animation quality and animation fundamentals, for this purpose I decided to go with storyboard 1. Storyboard 1 shorter and concise, it allows me to focus on quality rather than quantity and since I’m not a generalist and strictly want to animate storyboard 1 is a more appropriate project to focus on.