Chracters

In the beginning of my short film there is a person who watches Tv before switching off and turning lights of in kichen- this will suggest they are going to bed so the fruit and veg can come to life. At the end they will also make another appearance when they open the kitchen  door in the morning and eat the carrot left out, before leaving the room.

The person who will play this role will be my sister. For the first scene she will were PJS to show its night time. she wont need to talk for any of the scenes she will be in which makes it easier as she will not have to remember a script.  In the morning when she comes down her hair will be slightly messed up as if she has just woken up and she will look confusingly at the carrot before shrugging and biting it.

This link takes you to a powerpoint i produced, explaining the differnt main chracters, their costums, who will be played by who and how I plan to crate each chracter so they have personality and chracter. The main characters

Target audience

My film is going to be an animation comedy thats aimed at families and teenagers who like watching short comedy clips on the internet and you tube. It will be aimed at families becuase its suitable for little children to watch and they will find it funny.the adults and teenagers will get the romance story and how the apple is out for revenge. so there is something for every one. Also in my questionnaire I conducted, I found that most people watched animation films with their families and friends. In my short film there will be a romance story which will appeal to the females and a fight/action scene that will appeal to the males.

one of the shots in the fight scene

This is a sketch of one of the shots during the fight scene. I come up with the idea that during the fight I will focus on individual fights that take place during the big one like in the films with fight scenes. This shot focus on a chase sequence and around it I have wrote about it.

 

 

 

sketches for each scene

These are some quick sketches I have made to go along side my shooting script. I drew them to remind me what I want certain shots to look like and the expressions the objects should have at certain points. I did not draw out any sketches for scene 1 where the person goes to bed as I have already done a story board for this.

shooting script

This is my shooting script, listing the different shots for the parts of the film. When it comes to filming my animation this will be a big help to look at as I have noted down the story briefly, then what camera shot it will be shown in.

Scene 1– Durring this part the camera will remain on a tripod and will film the character getting up and switching of the TV as a wide shot. Then as the person walks out it will cut to a medium close up showing the person walk out of the door way and out of the cameras shot. Then it will switch to other shot from a different angle as the person walks down the hall,- this is done in a long shot.  character is shown in the kitchen door way in a medium close up shot. In this shot we will see the character turn and make a move to switch the light off before it cuts to an extreme close up of the finger switching the light off (room goes dark) then in the dark you see the door close in a close up.

scene 2– camera pans around the dark kitchen in about 10 shots. near the end as it pans around the lights suddenly come on (when edited this is when music will start). There will then be a wide shot, in which you see something moving in the fruit bowl. the camera slowly zooms into a close up where you see an apple appear and start to shuffle out of the bowl. Having touched the ground, the apple now has an angry face which is shown in a close up, before he looks up and the camera follows his gaze which leads to the flash back.

scene 3– this scene looks at the apples flash back and all starts with a medium close up of the apple with a pepper outside on a date. The medium close up stays the same untill the apple leans closer for a kiss, then it cuts to a close up of his face. However then it cuts to a close up of the peppers face (shocked expression). The camera then pans around from the peppers point of view and stops on the base of a carrot before tracking up the carrot and stopping on its face for a short time. As the carrot winks it switches to a close up of its face (about two shots) then it cuts to a close up of the peppers face showing her reaction to the carrot. Then in medium close up the pepper shuffles out of the frame, then quickly switches to the bewildered looking apple shortly. In a long shot the pepper and carrot walk of into the sun set. the next part is done using a medium close up and shows the apple alone a crying.

scene 4– flash back finished it cuts back to a close up of the apples angry face. then into a wide shot as the apple goes over to the veg box and in a close up knocks against it with his head. This wakes up a carrot who in a close up pops his head up over the edge of the box. It then cuts to a point of view shot, looking down upon the cross apple as if we were the carrot. Then in a wide shot the carrot jumps down from box.

scene 5-this scene is about the apple and carrot coming face to face. it starts with an over the shoulder shot that is from behind the apple looking at the carrot. then there are a number of close-ups of the carrot then apples face, this happens a few times with a lot of fast cutting, before stopping on a close up of the apples face ( when editing I will put a whistle here) then it cuts to a medium close up of the apple with fruit appearing behind him responding to is call. in the next medium close up you see the carrot who smiles as his veg gang emerges from behind him there will be a few close-ups of the vegs faces. then there is one more close up of the carrot and apples face before you see them running towards each other in a medium close up.

scene 6– In a medium close up the carrot knocks over the apple who we see fall to the floor. It cuts to a extreme close up of the apple on his side on the floor but goes back to a medium close up of the apple getting up and his fruit army charging for the carrot behind him. After the fight starts there will be different shots of fights taking place, like in films with fight scenes they don’t have just one shot filming the whole thing but close up on individual fights that take place during the big one so this is what I will do.  In one of the fights there will be a medium close up of veg chasing some fruit, fruit and veg fighting and in other there will be some being pushed of the work top. I will make these short fight sequences mostly as I go along as it depends on how much footage I need and what fruit/veg I have to film.

scene 7– we see in a wide shot the carrot grabing the pepper in the of middle of the fight and they run out of the frame. They get to the sink (medium close up) and see its full of water in a close up. luckily there is a wooden spoon (shown in a close up) and in a wide shot we see them run across it with one close up half way though of mrs peppers scared face. when they get o the other side of the sink they (in a medium close up still) run across to the kettle and hide behind it. there is a close up of them oth behind it.

scene 8– The carrot and pepper are still hiding. Then there is a pint of view shot of the pepper looking at the carrot, behind the carrot we see the apple approach before it cuts back to the peppers shocked face. The carrot sees and in a medium close up we see the carrot turn around to face the apple. Both have really cross faces but before they can do anything suddenly an alarm will sound (I will edit this in) there will be a close up of the clock to show the audience where the alarm is coming from and they see its 6.00. all the fruit and veg are very shocked first we see in a wide shot the pepper, apple and carrot all wide eyed and mouth open, then there will be different close ups of other fruit and veg all looking shocked because its 6-o-clock which we latter see is the time the person gets up.

scene 9–  In this scene we see all the fruit and veg run to their bowl and box the were in before ( this will be shot in a medium close up, low angle shot and close up from different angles. It then focuses on the main characters (apple, pepper and carrot) as they run back. it will show them near the box and fruit bowl so I don’t have to show them running back over the sink. The apple gets into the fruit bowl the pepper close behind him (Close up) when suddenly the there is a extreme close up of the door handle moving (edit in sounds later to go with it) it switches back to the medium close up of the fruit/veg looking shocked before in a close up the apple helps the pepper up the carrot however in a close up is forced to play dead on the work top next to the box. The person walks in and you see shuffling slippers in a close up. then it tracks up the person yawning  a (medium close up)

scene 10- is the final scene in which we  see the person walk over to the box looking confused. Then there is a point of view shot as if we were the person looking down at the box seeing the carrot out of the box. It then cuts to a medium close up of the persons shrugging and reaching down to pick up the carrot. we see the persons had in a close up picking the carrot up then switching to a medium close up the person bites the carrot, just before the carrot is eaten we see its face reappear and look terrorised before he’s munched on. As the carrots being eaten there is a close up of the mouth (eating noises to go with the action will be edited in) before in a medium close up the person walks away leaving the kitchen. as the person leaves it switches to a close up of the fruit bowl with the apple and pepper sat together the apple smiling.

Story board for the beginning of the film

This is my story board I have drawn up for the beginning part of my film. In the story board I have drawn and wrote about the main shots during this scene- I could not write about all the shots I am going to take for it as it is likely to be over hundred.

The first wide shot will be the first part of the film. This shot will flash on after the initial title of the film. In the shot the audience will see the character watching TV shortly, before they switch it off with the remote and get up to walk out. During this scene there will be no music just the sounds of the Tv- the sound will start before the audience actually see the first shot.
Before the second shot goes on the character stands upand starts walking, then it cuts to the second shot which is a medium close up the the chrater just walking out of the door way. The character will look tierd and will be in a dressing gown so this should tell the audience that they are going up to bed. In this second series of shots there will be no music as non digetic music would not go with whats going on.

The third picture on the story board shows the chracter as they walk down the hall. This will be a long shot and will show them walking all the way down it before to switches to a medium close up from the front of them. As the character walks down the hall I may have some footstep sounds as thisd is what people would exdpect to hear.

Then in the fourth, There is is extreme close up of the persons hand switching of the light switch. (digetic sound of a switch acompanys the action)then the pictures that follow are darker to show the light switched off. – by now the audeince should get the idea that the chracter is going to bed.

The shot after that switches to a wide shot of the door closing- sound of door creaking shut. Then finaly I will take photos that pan around the kitchen thats in darkness. As it pans around showing the kitchen quite music will start, the music will be lively and mysterious suggesting to the audience that suddenly something strange is going to happen http://youtu.be/3FWq17CT6Cs

Gulp. The world’s largest stop-motion animation set

on the news tonight I saw this, a story on the west country news. It was about these people who have made a stop motion short film on the beach, taken with a phone. It’s called Gulp. And it’s the world’s largest stop-motion animation set, shot on a Nokia N8.

Although I am not considering doing a stop motion animation film on a scale as large as this, it is still interesting looking at the things people have done with stop motion as it adds to my understanding of stop motion but also gives me more ideas for my own.

Once the news on this had finished I went onto YouTube and watched it fully (click link to watch it) http://youtu.be/ieN2vhslTTU
Its actually really good, it features a fisherman in his boat who catches a little fish, which gets eaten by a big fish then the fisherman gets eaten by an even bigger fish. Then inside the fishes tummy you see the fisherman with a flaming torch in the dark on top of a spiky bomb that blows up and send the fishing man back to the top of the sea again before he disappears just as quickly as he
appears in the beginning leaving just his clothes in a floating boat. I think it is a good story line, as it makes sense and its fascinating to watch especially since they done it in the sand as you have got the moving drawings and the fish sculptures that move along. The music that went with it, suited the film as it was jolly. The fisherman did not speak but you could tell by the sounds he were making what was going on and how he felt.- using no dialog seems to be a repeating occurrence in stop motion animation films which persuades me even more that not putting dialogue in my film is the right thing to do and will work as I have seen in all of the films I have watched so far.

What was even more amazing in the film was not only the scale that it’s done on but the facts the pictures are taken from an ordinary mobile phone that was placed from the top of a crane as I saw in this short documentary how it was made on YouTube- http://youtu.be/fza5QdTfyxs. watching this after I saw the film showed me how they done it and all the work they put into it, also the amount of people required to make this film that’s less than 2 mins long! what shocked me watching this film is when the person who plays the fisherman said “over the course of the next 16 hours we will of about shot 20 seconds” it just goes to show how much footage you need to produce a short amount of film and it took even longer for them as they had the extra challenge of using a phone and the large scale it was at. what was also interesting in the documentary was how they shot the man in the boat as he was lying down but when you watch the film from above it looks like he is standing which I thought was clever.

Expressions practise

http://youtu.be/GCcZZ6jrGfQ-

This links to my practise with expressions for my film. With an apple I used clay to create facial expressions, then changed them around to get different emotions such as anger, sadness, happy and shocked. I done it to test if clay was suitable for creating the facial expressions for the fruit and vegetables in the film.

In this short trial I tested a few expressions that often will appear in my film, these are sadness, happy, shocked and cross. I think using the clay actually went quite well as it was easy to mould the shapes of the mouth and to slowly change a happy mouth for example to a sad one. it was also easier than using paper as I done in my fist animation practise (the short life of paper) And when I have finished with the fruit it can easily be taken off and stuck to another so it could save time.

visually i think it looks good, as unlike paper its not hanging off in places. It also looks like the clay that’s used in real animation films so mine conforms to those in a way. When you watch the clip you will see that the expressions run smoothly from one to another quickly which is good as in my film the expressions will change quite suddenly and quick at times.

 

Stop motion animation advice

Before I started my animation I wanted to find out some helpful tips and advice to help me with mine. So I looked at a website called Photojojo. On this website I looked at a part all about stop motion. It gave advice on differnt ways you can make inanimate objects move, what equipment you need(tripod, digital camera, editing Software, and a lot of time!) What was intresstin was the helpfull tiops it gave to help people edit it on i-movie which is the Software we have at school so reading this will be a big help so when it comes to editing photos and uploading onto i-movie.

These are some tips that sound helpfull and will do when it comes to shooting my own film…

• if you make a mistake while shooting, delete that picture on your camera and take another. This will save you from having to edit your film later.
• make sure that whatever movement your object makes is done slowly over several frames.
• you can expect to shoot around 10 photos for every second of film.
• Since you won’t be printing these photos, you can set your camera to the lowest size image setting. This will let you fit more images on your memory card at a time
• Don’t forget to save your project often as you go along,

This is the website I looked at-http://content.photojojo.com/tutorials/stop-motion-digital-camera/

film research

This is a collection of clips taken from a CBBC show called Ooglies Even though its targeted at children I have found it very funny and have show me the sort of things I wish to do in my film

… Is about different objects that have googly eyes and follows a short funny story about them that normally ends up with a sad but very funny ending. The objects don’t talk but make sounds and noises that sound like they are talking. I think the editing and filming used is excellent, as the objects sometimes are flying through the air and balancing on the edge of things- they might of used string but you cannot see anything it just looks like the objects are really doing that which is the whole point of stop motion animation to amaze people. The editing that’s been done  makes the slide transition really fast and unseable. The lighting in the different short stories stays the same and you don’t get any shadow or light changes- in my film I will have the problem of getting the lighting right as the light gives of a different look at different times of the day, also I will most likely cast shadows on the objects I am using. I will proberly need  to edit the photos after so the lighting is the same in each

In Ooglies, there are a number a food related stories that are done using fruit and veg. Watching these were interesting as I could see how they were used to show the story and how the facial expressions were done. They used googly eyes in the film that changed for example you had half eyes for cross and the females had long eyelashes- I could put eye lashes on my pepper
in the film.

having looked at Ooglies I have thought up a few more funny parts to the storyline I can add to my film, I have also got more ideas about the expressions and eyes the fruit/veg will have and the sounds that I am going to use. so it was worth looking at this short film and I would say that this has been the one I have most enjoyed watching and I will use it as inspiration allong with elements of the other films to make my own.