Ronnie Leah, BA (Hons) Computer Animation Arts, UCA Rochester.

  Reflective statement Overall I am very please with my work this project. I feel like I connected with this project more than the previous two as all the ideas where my own and I was not told what to do apart from include the three objects. I feel like I incorporated the three objects, Hospital, Magician, Briefcase, in a really unique way and did my best throughout to ensure I looked at every type of possibility. I spent a lot of time just researching in order to understand what it is I'm creating and always looked for a way to make my story better. I am proud that I was able to take three seemingly irrelevant objects and put them together to form a narrative which is in my opinion very strong. I love being able to look back at my old ideas and being able to see what processes I went through in order to come to the final product. It feels good to finally have the end result in the form of the previz as it represents all the hard work I put into the project. I also feel I finally m...

 Today I brought all of the elements together in order to create the previsualization for my story. Previzulizations are block out animations, detailing what is going to happen before full production of an animation begins. From completing the toolkit 1 tutorials, I have been able to practise using the camera and animating, so I felt prepared to do the previz.  Using my animatic as a reference, I attempted to recreate my drawings in 3D. The majority of my time was used to setup the characters and camera, so that the scene played out similarly to the animatic.   Once I had play blasted each of the shots, I then stitched them together using Adobe Pro Create.  Once all of the scenes were put together, I put the video in audition and applied the same sounds as my animatic. 

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  I downloaded the characters from the resources and took their textures into photoshop. This allowed me to draw my own rough textures for both my characters. While not perfect I feel it does the job quite effectively. I also modelled a cape and hat for the magician which I attached to his skeleton. 

 The hospital did not need to be very complicated as it is only seen for one shot from one angle.

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 Once all of the drawings were done for the animatic, I then screenshotted each frame and imported it to premier pro. I then set each frames time to 1.15 seconds which brought the animation to 1 minute 56 Animatic with no sound Once this was done I exported the silent animatic and then imported it to audition. I then used the website Epidemic Sound in order to get all the sounds for my animatic. I then placed the appropriate sound at each frame in the animation. Once I was happy with the initial sounds, I then went through and added the sounds of the outside world seeping through. I added screams in random places and changed the audiences clapping to make it sound off putting.  Finished Animatic I am really happy with how the animatic turned out and am relieved it fits within the targeted 2 minuets. I feel like I have made the most out of that time with a story which has been carefully thought out. I glad to see the whole story finally come together and feel as if I have achie...

 Now that I had created the final storyboard, it was time to create the animatic. I did this by adding additional frames to the final storyboard. The green arrows represent movement in the frame and the red arrows represent the movement of the camera. 

 Like before the act will begin with the curtains opening and the sudden explosion of smoke. The magician will be reveal clutching his briefcase. He will put the briefcase down and begin to take out a dove behind his cape. As this is happening the camera will pan around him. He will throw the dove into the sky and the camera will follow. This shows the audience (real) what sort of environment they are in. The camera will pan back around to reveal the magician taking something out of his briefcase. It will be a large table which wouldn't actually fit in the case of that size. He will begin moving it around in the air as if its levitating. He will then begin to spin and eventually drop the table while continuing to float in the air.  The camera is going to pan around and reveal his assistant. I like the idea that she appears suddenly. He expects her to be there even though she really isn't, through the many time the two have completed the act together. I changed it so instead of...

 I realised after drawing my first storyboard how hard it is to convey so much infomation in only 2 minuets. I decided to refer back to the how to structure a story slide from the beginning of the unit (Act 1)   Begining          Capture the attention        Introduce problem (Act 2) Middle               Provide tension                Present obstacle (Act 3) End                    Provide closure                Resolve Problem At the most I have 40 seconds for each section. I previously counted the time for each slide in the storyboard and got 112 seconds. This allows 8 seconds of correction as well as the additional 15 seconds your allowed to go over by. Although its a rough guess it still shows its possible to fit my entire story into the section.  I st...

So far the basic story is about a magician performing his act in a massive theatre full of people. I need to incorporate his assistant somehow and then its slowly going to transition to a mental assignment. This is the basic story which I will now flesh out in storyboards.  To begin the storyboard I first needed a routine for my magician to follow. I started by firstly watching magic routines online in order to understand what sort of things happen. I know that I want some of the tricks to include the assistant and I also know the tricks have to be quick as I only have 2 minuets. I then listed a load of magic tricks which followed this outline. Pulling napkin out of sleeve (quick trick) Saw women in half (potentially dangerous and involves assistant) Levitation (quick trick) Tying assistant in water tank (potentially dangerous and involves assistant) Bird from cape I then attempted my first storyboard.  Next to each frame I put the rough time I thought each frame would take wh...

Before beginning the storyboard for my own work, I completed the like - for - like storyboard. I based it on the first two minutes of the Joker film which I previously researched.  By completing this it has helped me to understand how to set out my storyboard, how to show camera movement and also how to pace the story. I can now begin with my own storyboarding. 

 For each of the designs I tried to keep them similar to the magicians clothes. I then took the boots and tights and bowtie from the first image and the suit jacket from the third image. I think this combination worked really well and I am happy with the final design. 

  I now want to design the clothes the magicians assistant will be wearing. I firstly got a selection of images as inspiration.  Like before I drew three versions so I am able to pick out the elements I like the most.