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Digital Media Design: Final Major Project

Proposal:

For my Final Major Project I propose to produce a 3-4 minute animation to an existing song, creating a short small narrative that reflects the piece of the song i.e. aggressive, calm etc. The animation will be primarily be made in flash however the backgrounds will be made in Photoshop to give more detail. The track I have chosen is quite an aggressive piece and I hope to reflect that in the animation by making it action-orientated and a fast pace to the story. My initial idea is creating a character that gets lost in an unknown world and is hunted down, and the outcome is for the character to escape. I feel this would work with the track as the piece starts slow which could be the scenes of exploring a new environment and the track then takes a more aggressive turn where the enemy could enter. To achieve this I will begin first by creating a storyboard marking the various changes in the track and draw out the scenes at these points. The animation will be a mix of both tweening and stop frame animation all made up in Flash, any additional effects will be added later using AfterEffects. The inspiration came from an artist called Danger; he is both an artist and an electro producer creating dark, 8-bit sounds which make it feel like club game music. His artwork reflects the music he produces creating worlds and scenery that feel like they are from a game world. The artist Daft Punk also used music to create a new world and story in the animation by teaming up with animators of Toei animation to create Interstella 5555, each track is a different part in the storyline and depending on the pace of the track the scene of the animation would match the pace. I hope to achieve a similar effect creating a short story that relates to the track in tempo and dynamics.

Here are some images and videos below of animations and artwork I found as inspiration:

Danger Artwork

The artist Danger both incorporates all his designs and imagery with his music, even at live shows he has animations playing and dresses as one of the characters in his illustrations. His inspirations stem from 80's film and video games and you can tell by both the imagery he creates and the 8-bit music.

Daft Punk Interstella

Daft Punk Interstella is a visual feature length animation for Daft Punk's Album discovery. Each track is a chapter of the animation and helps create a narrative. The general story is about aliens being captured by humans to create new, popular popstars and the humans profit from there success. The animation changes as the mood and dynamics of the music changes, it works effectively too, both mediums complement each other.

The film "The Pick of Destiny" was created around Tenacious D's album and creates a storyline using the tracks. In between each song their is film which gives it a more musical feel, storyline with songs added along the way. The film interprets songs interpret the lyrics and style of the songs and creates visuals to match this, it comes across effectively.

Monkey Journey to the West is an adaptation of an old chinese tale. Gorillaz member Damon Albarn and also the artist of Gorillaz, Jamie Hewlett both had input in recreating this chinese tale as a stage production. This animation was for the beijing olympics and used the characters from Monkey, the animation was named "Journey to the East". The play and animation has a heavy focus on music, only this time round the music was used to help the narrative unfold, using varied dynamics it helped the viewer realise the old chinese tale. I really like Jamie Hewlett's style of animation, he has also added effects that also show hints of the chinese art style for example the water as flat shapes.

Another animation made from a song. I really like this animation as I felt the mood and feel of the animation matched the song both have dark, brooding feel to both the song and animation. The style worked well too and the overall pacing of the animation suited the music well.

Finished Project

BEATBOT - Cutter from Andrew Seabrook on Vimeo.

Digital Media Design: D&AD

For this project I chose to do the E4 Monday Night Movie Ident, this requires a 30 second ident and one 5 second sting.

Brief:
Create a TV promo for E4 publicising their Monday Night Movie Strand.

Target Audience:
E4’s audience are young and savvy.They come to E4 for a good dose of escapist entertainment. Some of it is brand defining, high quality and innovative – shows like DeadSet, Skins and The Inbetweeners,whilst some of it is good fodder for when you want to chill out – a classic episode of Friends anyone? E4’s viewers have a strong relationship withthe channel but increasingly spendtheir time media stacking – watchingTV whilst texting, or hanging outon social networks. It is harder and harder to getviewers’ attention…

Sources of inspiration
I've watched some of the current E4 movie night idents on TV and have noticed that E4 in general has a recurring theme. It usually has wacky, obscure humour that is targeted at teenagers, 16-30. The outrageous british voice sums up how bizarre and comical the channel really is. Below are two E4 ads that use odd but also witty content.

The current E4 Movie Night ident uses a very cartoony style yet also looks like a design for a tshirt. It is exaggerated and entertaining to watch, I feel that is what E4 is all about wacky, new but overall just fun to watch. The first animations I picked out are from a website that is primarily for flash artists called Newgrounds.

The first animation is from an artist called Chulaid/Adam Philips. Below is one of his most recent animations and also the process of how it makes them. I really like this style of animation, primarily frame-by-frame with effects including blurs, lights etc.

This video shows a brief overview of how he animates, using a basic storyboard to animate from and then create the artwork over the top. This is a time consuming way of animating however if done properly can achieve a really nice art style.

Another animator from Newgrounds, is Egoraptor. He is incredibly popular for his simplistic, over-exaggerated animations, with a mixture of tweens and frame-by-frame it is a simple graphic approach to animating.

I also found animations on a site called Aniboom.com, much like Newgrounds, however also has a lot of 3d animated submissions. Here are a couple of animations that caught my attention using different styles and techniques. Below is animation that is similar to the newgrounds animation only this has a more cut-out style. Using vector shapes, it looks like its made up in illustrator, it gives a really clean cut graphic style and really works well animated. It also has what looks like textures used for the clouds however which looks a little separate from the style however seems to work well in the animation.

Watch more cool animation and creative cartoons at Aniboom

This animation also has a similar style although uses more gradients. It again also seems to use a small amount of textures, the graphic style with added textures, much like the one above. Overall a really nice animation to watch, the music also helps navigate through the animation using a slow tempo song that has an almost underwater feel and matches the theme. Implementing music is something I wish to do within my animation. For the E4 animation the music would be a little more upbeat and also a little quirky.

Trichrome Blue from Lois van Baarle on Vimeo.

This animation uses a hand-drawn style of animating with a small use of 3d implemented within it also. It looks frame by frame and has a rough sketchy feel to the animation, it also feels a little jerky but overall works nicely especially with the various effects used throughout.

Second Wind from Ian Worrel on Vimeo.

I feel that these style of animations would be a strong style to convey the E4 Monday Night Movies. E4 uses bold colours and graphic shapes and by using bright strong colours and basic graphic animation it will go hand in hand with the logo.

This animation really reminds me of working within Flash using the onion skin layer. The layer effect in flash shows the previous frame and allows you to draw the next frame with detail and accuracy. This however has been redrawn and painted on walls, an incredibly long process however looks fantastic in execution.

After looking at some examples I decided to sketch out some rough ideas and narrowed my work into three initial ideas.

The first idea is to have a character approach a wardrobe. The character then enters the wardrobe and exits as different iconic film characters. For example superman, king kong, jack sparrow, indiana jones etc. To give it the wacky E4 humour the last scene would be with the Indiana Jones character and a boulder falls out the wardrobe crushing him in a cartoon looney tunes style.

The second idea is a character going to the cinema only to find it's overpriced and is unable to see a film. The character then walks home and enters house. Character then takes various snacks (relates to the guilty pleasures). Character sits down, turns on TV and watches E4 Monday Night Movies and the Character is content. The idea behind this one is that E4 is there for free whereas the cinema is overpriced, you'll still enjoy yourself with E4' s films.

The last idea is similar to the idea above however this idea has the character walking along and turns to see an E4 Monday Night Movies poster. He then notices its on an E4 cinema building. He enters, and has no money for a ticket. The staff points at poster that says "Free Entry, Free Snacks". The character in an excited manner grabs popcorn and icecream. The character enters cinema screen room in excitement and seats himself near the front. The characters view is then obstructed by a man in the row in front with a huge afro. The E4 management shaves off the afro and the main character is content. E4 logo appears on cinema screen.

Out of these 3 ideas the 3rd idea is already more developed than the other two, I feel that this idea is the stronger of the two. So I began to develop this idea and start sketching out some characters.

Finished Result
I also implemented music within the animation just to give it the extra E4 feel, using an slightly funky, slow tempo track. It slightly reminds me of a Gorillaz track when played back as the Gorillaz music videos are also unusual and wacky, music can really help express and accentuate the style of the animation/video. Overall I am pleased with the finished result!

E4 Ident from Andrew Seabrook on Vimeo.

Evaluation

For this project I was to promote and create a short ident for E4’s Monday Night Movies. I began first by looking at E4’s current adverts and the overall style. I also looked at other various animations; mainly Flash hand-drawn animations as I felt that it matched E4’s style and theme. After gathering some research I began sketching out some ideas and storyboards, once I had the character and storyboards drawn out I began animating.

The flash animation is mainly composed of a mixture of tweening and frame-by-frame animation. The drawings are also painted within Flash and help give it a cartoon feel. I used the colour and theme of E4 throughout the animation to give it a strong sense of identity and felt that this worked effectively. I also implemented a minimal backing track to give it an even stronger theme.

Overall I enjoyed this project and felt that it was successful in promoting the Monday Night Movies.

Digital Media Design: Design for Interaction

Our latest brief we have been set is requiring us to design and develop an interactive product. This could be an interactive website, game, interactive art piece, a non linear storyline or an installment. The aim is to to explore and create something original that creates interaction with the user.

First I began to look at the various ways we can interact with technology.

• Touch Screen
• Use of Narrative
• Gaming
• Motion Sensors
• Haptics (rumble features in controllers)
• Simulators
• Forums and chats (msn, yahoo messenger etc)

Interactivity is more apparent in different mediums in others for example there is interaction when looking at an art piece, but this may not seem too obvious. When playing games immediately interaction comes to mind as it engages the user.

What is interactivity?

Interactivity is a common thing, we interact with people and objects everyday, whether its simply conversing with someone to using a computer. The area of interactivity im going to explore is person to computer interaction, a dialog that occurs between a human being and a computer program. There are many ways now we communicate and control computers as we use computers so frequently, whether is checking email or buying train tickets, using computers has become very important. A good example why human to computer interaction has also become more apprarent is the iPhone. We would originally just use phones for its one purpose, to communicate to another over long distance, however now the mobile phone has many more functions. The iPhone can use internet, take pictures, run games, play music, video etc. Years ago we would use a different device to do each of these things now it is all available on one single device.

Also more recently consoles have taken a different turn, originally consoles would be controlled by using buttons however now all consoles are trying new and different way to make a more fun and innovative way of playing games. Nintendo Wii was the first big console to rely totally on motion sensor control, older consoles such as the snes did try to use different methods of controlling however wasn't very popular due to bad functionality. Only recently have the other consoles begun to implement new interactive ways of playing as the Nintendo Wii did so well in the gaming market. Playstation 3 released a new Eyetoy and the Xbox 360 will soon be releasing Natal a full body motion sensor.

Xbox 360 Natal: Milo

PS3 Eyepet

EyePet interaction from antjeverena on Vimeo.

The new Project Natal is really pushing the technology forward with the all-sensor control, this will enable people to immediately play without having to learn controls.

Arduino Boards

"Arduino can be used to develop stand-alone interactive objects or it can be connected to a host computer."

Arduino Boards have become very popular when creating new and interactive projects, the can enable to code and have control for motion sensors, lights, movement etc. I found a website that showed some of the top examples of using a Arduino Board and some of the results are truly spectacular.

http://hacknmod.com/hack/top-40-arduino-projects-of-the-web/

Here are some examples I liked:

Both of these are run by using Arduino boards to process the information, by using the program "Processing" you can function many different things. The first one, "The Lazer Harp" i really liked changing the way you interact and play with an instrument. By replacing the instrument with lights you can wave through creating sounds makes a fresh and innovative idea that could be developed further and possibly change the way we play music, there are plenty of music controllers but this one looks fun to play with and also not too complex, it's immediately obvious how you play with it.

The second idea, "Etch-a-Sketch" clock also caught my eye. The arduino board reads the time and feeds the information to the Etch-a-Sketch, it then draws out the time.

Touch Screens

"A touchscreen is a display that can detect the presence and location of a touch within the display area. The term generally refers to touch or contact to the display of the device by a finger or hand."

Touchscreens have been around for a while its only till recently they became more public in the 90's. They were first developed by a company called "Elographics" in the 70's and became popular in the 90's. We've been using them ever since at train stations, self service checkouts in supermarkets. The games company Nintendo decided to make a touch screen based handheld that is controlled by using a stylus. This handheld proved to be very popular as people crave for new forms of interaction.

Here's an example of where touch screen control is going. This product is a touch screen table being developed by Microsoft, it works very much like the iPhone though with some additional features. The touch screen table has a feature where you can place a mobile phone or camera onto the table and it automatically connects with the device displaying pictures and various other details, a very simple and efficient way of file transfer. The table could also be used commercially, for a restaurant as it has features such as bill payment, and menus which would bring on a whole new take of eating out.

Interactive Narrative

Narrative can also be a form of interaction and has been around for a while. Books I read years ago as a child had interactive narrative, the Goosebump series for example, the story would be split up randomly on different pages, as you progress through the story you can make decisions this would lead to a different page and each route you take there is a different ending for each route. However when talking about digital artefacts and games Interactive Narrative is still new and upcoming. A games company called Quantic Dream's is developing a game that is creating a lot of hype. The game is called Heavy Rain and has been described as an "interactive drama" the game plays out like any other game however depending on what decisions you make the story and ending outcome differs. This is new to the gaming scene as most games play out as a strict set linear path.

Heavy Rain

This is just one of the character's storylines, if this character dies the story continues, this is also new in gaming.

Digital Media Design: Viral Ad

For this project I am to produce a Viral Advert for a company that produces a new equivalent to bottled water. Aquapax is an eco-friendly and aware company that produces drinking water sold in cartons that has been proven to resist any substances that could possibly pass through, plastics on the other hand can be contaminated. The water is from Hoher flaming spring in a german nature reserve and is better drinking water than both Evian and Volvic.

I have first begun by looking into what Viral Ads are and what they achieve.
" marketing techniques that use pre-existing social networks to produce increases in brand awareness or to achieve other marketing objectives"
When I think of Viral Ads what first comes to mind is videos on Youtube, amateur videos that have been bought by large companies and spread over Youtube and later appear on TV to gain high popularity and viewings. Here is an example I found of a Viral Ad:

This video has achieved over 4,000,000 hits, usually videos like this that are either funny or shocking tend to get attention. Here is another video of a viral ad however this one conveys a serious message:

These videos become virally popular as people spread these videos over YouTube and the more entertaining or shocking these videos are the more views the videos will recieve. It is the type of videos that are uploaded where people will comment saying "Is this video real?", these adverts are bought by companies and linked to their product to get plenty of attention.

I began first by thinking of ideas of how I could somehow relate a funny viral ad and the product, Aquapax. The carton is an alternative to the plastic bottle and is better than one in many ways. I though of using the plastic bottle as something that would make it look lower than the Aquapax or using the plastic bottle for something comical. I began to sketch out some ideas and came up with the idea of using plastic bottles as a "board" (see images below). This concept came about when I was exploring YouTube for inspiration, i saw some badly filmed footage of people riding on a small plastic bottle, and thought I could do better by actually making a board. The storyboard goes as follows: The rider is with friends, takes aquapax bottle and drinks, starts riding plastic bottle board, trips and falls off, friends run towards boarder laughing, caption appears. The caption I decided to go with in the end was "Plastic bottles are dangerous to the environment..." and as i fall off the next part of the caption fades in, "...and to yourself".

I enjoyed producing this piece of footage however I scrapped the idea as I wanted something that looked more appealing, I felt that it was slightly lacking so I went back to the drawing board..

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