Monday, March 10, 2008

Research material

These are some pictorial research that I have used which will go into my animation.

things like patents, electrical blue prints, and things that I am not too familiar with like the human nervous system etc.

All images are found with google images.

notes:
-I did some research for cartoon character mouth expressions for my character.

-I needed some reference for human internal system because I though it would be cool to have a picture of the human internal anatomy, but the brain replaced with the electronic chip.

-Some of the southpark research was because I felt like following their animating style because it would make production time shorter.

-I needed some ideas for a chip design and I came across a nice yellow one which I liked.

-Did some research on patent awards and the patent logo.

-I wanted to know how a big yawn looks like for my character. So I did some research on that and found freddy doing a nice one.















*Storyboards

(1)














(2)















(3)














(4)

Finalised Story Line

After brain-storming I change the storyline and finalized it to become like this!

shot1
You see an old man's face.. as the camera zooms out you realize it's the man's photo used in a funeral. and you see a man with his back facing the viewer sitting down and looking at the coffin.

shot2
the camera does a 180 degrees and you see the man from the front, and he is holding a box. With the deceased man in the coffin in the foreground.

shot3
the man, with a sad expression. blinks a few times and looks down to his box.

shot 4
camera looks down to the man's POV. sees the box from the top view.

shot 5
the man gets up and walks out of the funeral area. After he leaves another man who is in the funeral service walks pass and closes the coffin. the shot becomes black.

shot 6
from the black shot suddenly a door opens and you can see the man walking into a dark room.. as he walks into the room holding the box the door closes by itself and it become black again.

shot 7
suddenly the light turns on and the walks towards a table which is in the foreground and places the box onto the table.

shot 8
camera is from the door aiming towards the back of the guy at the table. The guy then proceeds to open the box and remove the content inside, placing them beside the table.

shot 9
the shot then show the views what are the contents from the top view (or the guy's POV) as he is looking at the contents. you can see many papers, notes, but the things that stands out is 2 photos on the top. one is a photo of the deceased man and the wife with the baby. (the baby is the man now) and the other photo on top overlapping is a photo is the dad and the son having fun.

shot 10
closer shot of the photo of the man and his father when he was a small boy.

shot 11
the man breaks into a smile. reminising the happy moments he used to have with his father.

shot 12
He gets curious with a piece of paper below the photos and lifts it up to take a proper look. As he lifts it the photos slide away and reveals a chip below them.

shot 13
The man picks up the chip and takes a good close look at it. (low camera angle of the guy holding the chip. )

shot 14
He looks to the other end of the table. which has some books and a little robot sitting there next to his room window.

shot 15
closer view of the robot

shot 16
The guy looks at the chip. Ponders for a while and looks up again at the robot. Mainly because he recognises the chip can be inserted into the robot.

shot 17
close up of the robot. the guys hand comes into view and pushes a button on the robot's torso.

shot 18
close up of the robot's head. the top part of it's head lifts up. the guy then places the chip into the head.

shot 19
robot head is in the foreground and is shadowed. The guy watches as the top part of the robot's head closes automatically. He watches to expect what to happen next.

shot20
No response from the robot. camera angle: robot's front view.

shot 21
The guy keeps looking on.. blinking a few times.. (same camera view as shot 19)

shot 22
Still no response to the robot. camera cut back to the front view of the robot.

shot 23
same angle as shot 19 again. this time you can see the guy is obviously tired from waiting and exhausted from the long day.

shot 24
camera angle. 3 quarter side view of the room from the window. the guy takes a big yawn.. and walks out of the screen.

shot 25
he walks back in his pajamas and goes to his bed. after going under the covers he flicks the light switch next to the bed and everything turns black.

shot 26
from dark it slowly has some light in the room. the robot suddenly comes alive.

shot 27
camera angle is above the guy sleeping away soundly, and has kicked the blanket away from half of his body. suddenly the shadow of the robot looms above the guy's body.

shot 28
camera angle of the robot looking at the guy from the front view. since the light is coming from the robot's back, the robot from the front view is totally black except for it's face which is a blue light. the robot looks at the guy sleeping.

shot 29
camera angle from the top view looking at the guy. the robot pulls the blanket back up to the guy's upper torso.

shot 30
side view of the guy sleeping. the robot stands above the guy and stares at him for a while. then jumps off onto the mattress and crawls into the blanket to 'sleep' next to him.

shot 31
camera cuts to a long angle shot of the whole room. suddenly a strong gush of wind blow from the window and blows all the papers from the bow all over the place and floor.

shot 32
camera slowly pans through the papers and photos on the floor. showing a story unfolding of the guy's family story. they were a happy family, and the father was a successful robotics engineer who invented the robot next that the guy has till now, after the father won a patent for it the mother feel gravely ill with a terminal disease. The father having so much love for the wife he did all kinda of experiments to fuse human consciousness and memories into electronic chips in hope that one day he maybe able to revive her.

shot 33
camera angle is low and is aiming towards the bed. it slowly zooms in.
as it slowly zoom in you see bit by bit that the face of the robot is revealed to have the facial features of the mother.
final part the robots face is really close to the camera. 'she' then suddenly opens her eyes and looks straight into the camera.
everything turns black.
End.


*concept of this story is port human. but the underlying message is how people wish to preserve the memories of those whom we have loved but lost so suddenly to unforeseen circumstances. This goes out to my friends who have lost parents, relatives, pets, and my grandfather. Life goes on, but the happy memories will always stay*

Sunday, March 9, 2008

Rough storyboards & comments on my story.

1.

2.


3.
4.

The story is pretty 'dark' to me, which is something I dont usually do. (unless I am wrong on this, haha)

I am not sure what came over me to make up this story, but a lot of the inspiration came from the manga and anime's like 'Battle Angel Alita' & 'Ghost in the Shell' which I used to watch when I was smaller. Both the contents of these titles focuses heavily on post human themes, like for instance 'Battle Angel Alita' focuses a lot on robotic technology replacing organic flesh and blood, and where 'Ghost in the Shell' consciousness is free to travel through cybernetics and occupy and run various machinery.

Must have been in an emo mood to make this story plot.
Oh well lets see how it goes from here. =)

(Will post scanned storyboards and the re-edited storyline soon!)