Time planning - April review

We've got less than two weeks left to finish the project, and we have majority of the scenes done, I don't think we'll get it completely finished, because some scenes are hard to do and take longer to animate. 

My thoughts now are to continue to animate as much as we can next week to get it finished, but as I've already started doing, I'm doing post production stuff just so we still have completed sections of the animation for the trailer, if we don't get the whole thing finished. then we have some good quality finished scenes that will show the standard that the finished film will be. 

By next Friday, there will be no more time for animating, as I want to focus on getting what we have completed in post production and getting the press pack together ready for submission.  

Post production - Candle effects

The opening scene in Zero has a close up of a candle, which makes m think adding digital flames to the candles on the set would look okay. I looked at how the candle in this sequence moved and tried to copy the motion, and adjust to my animation.



I drew a rough flame shape and assed a gaussian blur to it, to get it the nearest to a flame I could.

there were a lot of option for me to play with, opacity, scale, rotation and skew, which all contribute to the movement of a flickering flame.


I remembered from the after effects induction that the closer the key points, the quicker the motion, so when the character gets up, a flame would naturally move with the breeze created by the action, so i kept adjusting the key points till I was happy with the movement.

I'm very pleased with the outcome, it doesn't draw attention to itself, it's just a nice subtle motion, which I think looks natural in the scene and it realistic to that world.

I now need to add a flame to any other scene with a candle stick in. 

Day 8 - animation process

This was yesterday's set up, we're at the scene where the character gets up from the desk and walks over to the fireplace. I also took the opportunity in the morning to re-do the walk scene where he goes to sit as the desk that I did the day before, so I learnt from what I remembered about not moving his too much, to slow his actions down, and move his right arm as if swinging. This won't be included in the animation, as there is nothing similar to it, but will be good for my showreel, and possibly trailer because it could introduce the character? 

He does move a bit faster that I would have wanted him to because he is elderly, but I do like the pulling back of the chair and going to sit down, I think it reflects the motion of an older man doing the same action.

For this shot I moved the bookcase on the back wall to next to the doors, I did this because there is a lot of empty space behind the character, and the room is meant to look busy and cluttered.

I had Ciara helping me yesterday which was really good, because it was an extra pair of hands to press the capture button, and she also gave me feedback while I was working, which helped make the scene a lot better then it probably would have been compared to  animating by myself. 

I also had to use the rig to support the character in the two shots I did, which meant going though the photos and removing it. I did this by taking a black shot without the character first or when the camera angle changed, and simply put that image as a bottom layer so I could erase the rig in the top layer.

I also had the problem of his eyes falling out, so I digitally edited this in photoshop too. 

Poster research

As part of submission, we need to create a poster for our final film. I've looked at existing stop motion poster to see how the layout is done, and what kind of imagery they used. for some they have used key still from the film, other they've come up with something that represents the film on a whole.

four ours a still could look nice, there are a few scenes which have stills to give the audience an idea of what the film is about. a still with the monster's shadow would be a good poster I think. 

for a strap line, I quite like that some have reviews on them as a main description, like with Anomalisa, 'the most human film of the year' and it doesn't star a single human. describes the film so well, that that would have probably have been their strap line anyway. 

This poster, clearly aimed at a younger audience, vibrant, busy, lots to look at. and they've included a pun to signify this is a humorous film.
















Colour plays a huge part in the tone of the film, for Mary and Max, the significant colour red is represented, and black and white tells us it's a sad story, the character looks lonely at his desk and the rest of the world is blacked out.














This poster is a bit more warmer, but it still has something dark about it, it tells us it's set in a older time, and the type style suggests it's a got something creative about it.

These three posters have lots of similar qualities, with the title at the bottom, with strong image drawing you to the middle of the page, quite minimalistic with imagery, so it gives you an idea of the tone of the film without giving away too much.


for our poster we need to consider colour, type and tone. I think the colours similar to The Maker would set the scenes of a victorian era, and like Mary and Max, most of the character's time is sat at his desk, so this could be a key image for us too. We can take a few shots that we feel expresses the character most and pic and test how the layout comes together.

Screening test feedback

Today we had our work up on the big screen to see how it worked at a larger scale and see how the sound and everything worked.

the sound was very quiet, which can easily be increased and we also had comments about there been too many panning shots and not enough close up shots to the camera. 

reasons why we don't really have any major close ups is because the character's expression is in his body due to him not having a mouth or eyebrows. also as the narrative talks, the objects behind have some significance, so is good for visually showing what the narrator is saying.

We could definitely look at cutting back some panning shots. but for now we want to get more scenes done so we have some actually animation to show. 

Day 7 animation process

The next shot on schedule was the shot to transition to the flashback scene, Callum wanted a close up of the pen at a slight heigh so he could digitally add a drip of ink coming from it. We discussed which side would be better for this, and finalised at this angle, where you can see his and in more detail.

Callum took a still of this shot as he just simply wanted the ink drop to be moving.

While this angle was set up, I tok the opportunity to do some animating for my showreel/portfolio.

I changed set up because it was so difficult to get to the character this way so took out the window wall, which abled me to move his eyes. However, because of the character's size, it's so fiddly to get in an move them, his glasses would move a lot or his eyes would even fall out. I wanted to have a go at creating more expression wth his movement but was very unsuccessful. 


It's hard to move his head without moving his whole body, and I regret not making the character a larger scale to have more surface to work with. So my puppet making is not quite at it's best yet, as I've discovered this puppet has lots of faults. 












I did do a walk scene where the puppet interacts with the chair, pulling it back and sitting on it. However all of this footage cannot be found, in the folder I had thought I set it to save, so unfortunately a bit of a waste of a day for me with no footage to show and evaluate. Tomorrow I will try to remember what I needed to correct and do the walk scene again, but better. 

Day 6 - animation process

This is the process of the animation at the minute. A few thing need to be added in digitally like the monster's shadow.

The last shot we did could be altered abit with timings, and some of the panning shots could be darkened to match the other shots.

the lighting sound effect also stops suddenly which could be looked at.

the next scenes to do are the ones I've put a title in, just to clarify the time we have to do them.

Day 5 - lightning in window and close up

Callum managed to salvage the footage I filmed yesterday, for the back shot, he 'time remapped' the section where I said his reaction to the lightning could have been a lot more sudden and faster, but the edditing Callum did made it look okay. He also fixed the close up scene of the character looking out the window, by using one of the frames I took and creating a clipping mask in order to move the eyes, which I really like and it saves us time fiddling about with being super carful not to move the puppet and his glasses to much.




With a shot he had done last week, Callum put together all of the clips that made up the scene we were working on. We adjusted the timing of the clips within the 11 second we had, to make the scene flow nicely. I do think this can still be editeded a bit, the cross fade could last a little less, and the lightning flash could be a little less white and bright as in my opinion it doesn't look that realistic.  the audio also need to be brought forward as he jumps before the lightning visuals or sound.




We then got on with the next bit where again he is writing by an animated shadow of the monster apears on the wall behind. We filmed 2 second with the theory that we could loop this action to save time with animating. however this meant that the focus shifting from the character to the wall would have to be done digitally. Sylvia said it would be much quicker and better to do in camera which I agreed with, so go onto doing a 2 second test to see if this was the better option. 



Close up in focus check you can really see the different in the depth of field in the first and last shot, however in a video sequence, it doesn't show as well, one thing we could do it the digital option doesn't work, is bring the character and desk closer to the camera to really emphasise the focusing. I'd focus on the character for a good few secconds before beginging to adjust the depth of field, this scene is 15 seconds long so plenty of time to change the focus across.

Day 4 - Window with lightning shot

I started off with the next shot we had discussed to do. I wanted to be able to move the camera and zoom out as I panned up the windows for the flash of lightning but before I even started I could tell I would move the camera as I wasn't able to tighten it to stop it moving side to side when I rotated it to pan. so I shot a a set frame. I could have done a wide shot and zoomed digitally, but it really doesn't have the same effect as moving the camera itself.

In that scene I need to make his jump when startled by the lighting more exaggerated, and lift his head up with that jump instead of bring it up slowly after.

I then moved to the next camera angle. I could have really used an extra pair of hands because due to the limitations of the laptop which is attached by a wire, and the position of the camera looking through the window. I needed to be on the other side of the camera to move the characters eyes, as I was relying purely on guess work or what view from the camera I had to place the pin to move his eyes, this did not work very well as I moved the character too much and knocked his glasses creating a scene I was not happy with so stopped for the day. 

For this scene I wanted the character to be frozen for a bit, to hold that he has being disrupted from his thought, and then slowly look back to his page to continue writing.

Day 3 - animation process

Here is the timeline of the film so far, there is a total of        1 min 42 seconds so far, which is aproximately half if the animation done. 

The bits I've circled red are sections that I think aren't really needed, in introduction is a black screen for a couple of seconds which I think needs to be removed, just so the audience don't get bored straight away waiting for something to happen. The section at the end, could be used for credits, there is a decent amount of time to add this here.

I do think the animation is coming along fantastically, it's looking really good with the footage we have so far. Were getting there with it but I do think more time needs to be spent actually getting on with it, and communicating more so we both know what scenes need to be done next and how they are to be done. because sometimes I need spoken confirmation on what is happening in the animatic visuals, even though the voice over is very descriptive which gives me an idea of what I need to be animating, both of us need to go through it before we start the scene.

Day 3 - panning shot

Today I started best I could with finalising footage for the opening scene, I worked from the animatic to see how much footage we needed to film in order to complete it. 

With this shot, I moved the camera to pan this shot instead of filming in a wide angle, this saves time because I didn't have to animated the character all the time, just when he came into shot and in my opinion it also looks better because panning in a wide shot somehow looks a bit unrealistic and flat.

Because the footage I filmed of the set turned out quite descent, with just minor editing to do like colour correction, I started to put these clips into the animatic, and arranging them to fit with the script text and animatic.

I then animated a scene where it pans across the the character at his desk, only when I had completed animating I realised it looked too similar to the scene we filmed on day 1, I discussed this issue with Callum, and he said we can use it for a scene where lighting strikes against the wall later on in the animation. 

We revered the clip, so it panned from the character to the wall where Callum added a flash of lighting where the monsters shadow apears, which will introduce the character.

Day 2 - overhead panning shot

Callum had a go at animating this scene, and as he'd never animated in stop motion before, I talked him through how I animated the previous scene. He really started to get the hang of it by his final second, and started really thinking about how you'd write in real life to make the puppet's actions more realistic.  

I think we'll continue to take it it turns, but with Callum doing the post production effects, I think it's only fair that I do more of the animating so the work load is equal. because his skills at adding in effects onto the rendered scenes, are a lot better then my digital skills.

DAY 1 - dragon frame set up with first scene

Today was about finalizing the set, with the lighting and green screen. I added a light for a moon, which Annabeth had discussed with me that it would provide some extra light and shadow. The clear filter added a soft glow which looks realistic.

I spent the morning doing test shots, getting used the animating with the camera and practising with dragon-frame again. This was a good idea, because we were able to look at my shots to figure the timings and how fast the camera and character should be moving. There was also a bit of a problem with the high res images appearing black, this was because the shutter speed was too high which also effected the aperture. Annabeth helped us get the camera at the right exposesure, and told us always to work with the lighting in after effects, as what you see with your eye, is different to what the camera sees, so the set had to be over exposed in order to get the ambience we wanted for the scene.

Set before light adjustment

Set in real

set after light adjustment

Frame tracker and discussion notes

We decided to shoot in a wide frame so we can zoom in and pan across to the character, because the image files are quite large, it is okay for us to do this as it will still be a high quality video.

Callum edited the render by having it pan across to the character, and applied a strike of lighting in the background, one thing to comment on is that we could ease the motion when stopping at the character, so make it a little smoother.

Camera tests and edits - free hand

Because I couldn't get where I wanted, or close enough to the set with the tripod, I hand held the camera, which I knew would have a shakey effect, but wanted to mainly test for composition.

I can get the angles I want with free hand, but the isn't a good idea due to the amount of shake, which the warp stablizer struggled to fix. 

I feel like the speed and fluidity is here with this edited clip, I like the outcome of this one.

Camera tests and edits

This shot was created by having the camera stationary and using the lense to zoom out. the shot is pretty smooth, but the tripod doesn't allow to get any closer, so I edited it to make it seem like the camera is closer. This shot works really well, and would look good for the opening shot.

This shot was done by tilting the camera vertically to pan up and down the bookcase, again I like the shot but it had to be done as smoothly as possible, slowing the clip down made it apear smoother.
One thing I notices was the staircase, if we were to use this shot, I'd move the staircase to avoid catching the top that leads to nothing.

This short worked extreamly well, by rotating the camera horizontally, it pans across the bookcase very smoothly, I didn't need to edit these shots at all, as I was happy with how they turned out.

Here I was moving the tripod round as it's on wheels, however this is really not smooth and I really disliked how jittery it was. the tripod is quite large to handle, which is why this method didn't work. I applied the stabilizer effect which helped the movement, but it is too slow, which I'd now have to export out the stabilized clip then edit the speed.

Lighting tests

With the new light set up, I did a number of tests to see which setting worked best for what we wanted.

for the left hand light, the settings I had were:

Full brightness + close + 3200K (Yellow light) This was too bright and created a spot light kind of effect which was not what we wanted

Lights - too bright white

The second test included the settings:
Half brightness + close + 3200K (YL) Which created a very similar effect to the first, just less vibrant.

The third test:
Half brightness + close + Full (Green Light) Created a warmer and softer glow that I thought was effective, I fully opened the barn doors on the light to let the light spread as much as it could, and this optioned seemed to be the one. 

lights - softer glow

Me and Callum then discussed about adding the filter film originally there, over the light which then gave the effect we wanted. which create a central light that acts as a chandelier in the room.

Set lights with orange film

equipment set up - health and safety

From the feedback we got in the presentation, it was said that the lighting was too vibrant, so I changed this by using the Dedo lights instead of the ones that had been set up. 


I used these lights last year, and loved them because you can control so much with them, for example, how bright the light is and how sharp the light is, so this now helps with the eery look that we wanted.

I also had a tidy up in the room, maximizing our space, making sure it was easy for us to get to the set, and looking at a health and safety point of view, I put the light tripos on the floor where there is less change of them falling over if knocked. I also put the camera lead under the table so that it is no longer a trip hazzard.

Set up before

Set up after

Monster puppet

I'm Struggling to make the monster, he's quite a large character and has similar qualities to a dementor, meaning it's got to be flowing but positionable. I've look at the Corpse Bribe veil which has really think wires in it, and that is the way I was going with this. However adding wire into the seem of the sleeve proved to be very difficult, the shape didn't look right and I tried numerous ways of trying to go about it.

Because the monster doesn't make and appearance till the very end, I'm going to com back to it when we start animating, becase we're both a little worried that we're falling behind, so I want to continue getting on with other tasks.