Pineapple Head Design 2

 These are some colour designs for the Pineapple head who the protagonist will talk to. I am quite happy with the colours of the Pineapple and i toyed with changing the skin colour to a more ridiculous hue, but i don't want to make the pineapple heads look alien because that could impede the message somewhat, i just want them to appear a bit weird.

 As you can see I tried two different sorts of clothing choice. One is a bit inspired by the film the Island with Ewan McGregor and the other is actually a tad inspired by a picture of my girlfriends brother wearing one of their mums coats.

 This one is a bit odd and just came out when i was switching between the two after they were both done. I felt it had an interesting look to it and could be potential clothing for the main pineapple head.

This is just a little sketch i did of the pineapple head in a similar style to the sketchy version i did of the main character Jason.

Protagonist Design 2

These first two pictures i experimented with shading a bit. As you can see in the first one i focused more on the light illuminating parts of the picture, whereas in the second i focused more on the shadows on him. I do like some of the bits of the first one such as the hair and collar but the second one i prefer overall. Though i feel maybe trying to make the shadow a tad lighter and also do some on the hair as well.

For these two I changed his shirt colour to see which one would work best. While the white works better for a fancy shirt the sort of shirt i am going for is more the sort of shirt either you could wear normally or you would wear if you were working for somewhere like BnQ. In my eyes the green shirt seems more like something you could wear casually, whereas the original light blue is more work shirt style. I don't know which one i prefer though.

 For these two i did a bit of experimentation with the skin colour of Jason. The first was a more yellow tint to his skin, and the second i just sucked all colour out. I don't think the absence of colour works looking at it, the fact that it matched his eyes puts me off a tad. While i do like the yellow and also looking at it makes me question if the normal skin colour i have done is too dark, i feel that trying to give Jason a normal skin colour will make him more normal looking to suit the character. Though a slightly yellowy hue could be used for the pineapple heads, though that could clash with their pineapples.

This is an alternate style for Jason i drew, What gave me the idea for it was when i was colouring in the normal Jason's hair and used a scribbley style for his fringe. I opened a new photoshop file to try and do his hair all in that scribbley style and ended up coming out with this version of him. It has kind of charmed me actually, this style being the final way I do the piece isn't out of the question.

Title ideas

The idea i have for the title at the moment is "Jason and the Pineapple heads" This would mean that Jason is the name of the main character. I like the idea that the name would stick in peoples heads due to the way it sounds similar to Jason and the Argonauts, i wouldn't want people to expect something similar to Jason and the Argonauts from my piece but hopefully the fact that its pineapple heads will tip people off to the fact it is a light hearted piece and not really connected to that other than a similarity in the names.

Protagonist Design Ideas

The first thing i wanted to design was the face of the protagonist, I felt the body would be rather similar to the pineapple man design but the face needed to show what i wanted to express with the character.

I felt the short hair would work to be the most normal style of hair making him look like a person who is quite normal. Him being reasonably normal in his usual life is important to maybe at the end give him a bit of reflection on what he thinks is normal. Maybe the pineapple head could question what he thinks is normal as he did to the pineapple head, that could be good.

I tried a few styles here, on a bit more rounded cartooney, another a little more anime/Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker inspired with a stronger jaw and the third is a bit of a combination having big cartooney eyes but a bit more of a normal proportioned face.

I'm still mulling over which design I prefer. I also have to think of what clothes i feel will work best for the character. I have to keep in mind the idea of simplicity when designing the clothes, I'm thinking maybe a collard shirt maybe giving him a going to a day job feel, a little Shaun of the Dead style.

I sketched up versions of them in a work shirt, i realise the second designs left arm could be a little longer but i can just deal with that if i draw him again. I think the work shirt could work well, it looks a little bit polo'y in picture 2 but for the more rounded style of the character look i think it works. While i like the shirt in the first picture i feel the long sleeves don't work where the character is concerned and also it is a bit too ruffled and crumpled looking to fit in with the more cartooney style i think.

I am still not sure which design i prefer, they both have their ups and downs. I feel design two looks a little more cynical whereas number one has more of a blank confusion look to him. there are points about both that i like but i think my personal choice is design two.

Rhyming Style

I was having a look to see what sort of poem structure Dr Seuss used for his poems as i very much like the rhythmical rhyming lyrics that make his work so characterful and wish to use that for my film.

Looking into it I found Dr Seuss used the anapaest style. This style sounds like this, well at least when it is using Tetrameter.

The Assyrian came down like a wolf on the fold

And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold

And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea

When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.

As you can see it has a nice rolling style to it, and i feel that will suit my production well. Hopefully I can write something really interesting using this style. It will be a challenge writing in such a way as i have never done any official poetry, and have only rhymed on a casual basis. I also wonder how well this sort of rhyming will work for a back and forth conversation as there will be between my main character and the main pineapple hat wearer with whom he speaks.

Making my Character

http://www.creativebloq.com/character-design/tips-5132643 This is a link to a really good blog post about character design which i was looking at in research for making my protagonist character in my FMP.
The thing i really need to think about which i made a note of earlier and this post reinforces is pinning down who my target audience is, who am i trying to make relate to this character.

Looking at it, I would say the people i am probably aiming at is people of my age who also remember fondly Dr Suess's work, i want it to also appeal to an older audience as well though.

Granted the writing and general subject matter should appeal to a wideish audience. I'm not sure if i will have any swearing in it yet, it depends on how i write it, i think though if i do have anything that would be a swear it will probably end up being a fun swear substitute because i like those and that tends to be the way i write scripts usually. I also find they are a lot funnier than a real swear.

But anyway while the script will be open to a wider audience i have to try to make sure the protagonists character design is a fitting match for my target audience, making it as easy as possible for them to see themselves in his position as to soak up and internalise the message i am trying to get across.

I also have to focus on what aspects of the character I am going to exaggerate and how much i will do so. As the blog post says it will be the part of the character i will focus on most so i am going to have to think of what will be the most focused on part. The eyes could potentially be a part i will be focusing on as i would imagine he will be looking around a lot to see all the weird stuff that is going on and i imagine they will also be reasonably expressive, so that could be a good starting point.

As the post said though keeping it simple is important and i agree with that on multiple levels. First i don't want it to be too complicated for animation purposes but also simplicity is very often what makes a character so strong, they only focus on the main aspects of the character really making it clear who they are and what there like via there design alone meaning having too much clutter on them could bog down that straight forward display of character you can get by visuals.

This is a good display of some strong and simple character design. Each one of these characters you can tell who they are and make a pretty good estimation of what there personalities are like just by looking at them, and they also keep it simple.

Look at the first character Johnny Bravo. His big styled hair, shades, large upper body and rolled up sleeves make his character rather easy to gauge and combined with his pose make it obvious what he would be like if you met him.

Then lets take a good opposite in number two, Dexter. Looking at him, his thick spectacles, rather dorky looking ginger hair, gloves and science coat and his head being almost the size of his body shows he is most definitely a scientist. But then take into account his stance and his facial expression and he seems much more confident and scheming.

Keeping in mind the importance of simplicity and the need to be able to read what a character is by a glance will be important when I am designing the protagonist for my FMP, who i still need to make a name for let alone a visual design. I however do know how the character will act, mainly because he will be acting similar to how I do in a rather blackadder style of sarcasticness I'm thinking.

Inspiration Research

I really like this short animated film. I feel the musical style and comedy at the beginning work very well, i feel like having something like that in my FMP could be a good idea. Some sort of constant musical track going over the top and tying everything together so it almost seems like a big spoken word poem/song. Definitely something to think about. Also unrelated to my FMP the fight scene around the end is extraordinarily cool, very impressive how they made an engaging fight sequence without really showing anything.

This film has a nice rhyming narration similar to how i would like to do it. While in this film that characters don't speak in my FMP i would like them to speak but i think i will have it so all the voices are done by the narrator but obviously he does voices for them so its quite story book style almost. Also i liked the sketchy art style they had in the beginning and was actually a tad disappointed when it went to full 3D. Also on a personnel note, this films moral lesson seems to be never let your guard down and let someone in emotionally or they will hurt you... I don't think i really agree with that but still i liked the animation despite the message seeming a bit odd to me.

This animation is done on much more of a flat plane, cut out style similar to the animated exeter ident i was the editor for. It also has a score as aposed to any narration or dialogue from the characters aided by the character expressions and movements to show what the emotion of the scene is. Seeing this has made me definitely sure the cutout approach is not what i want to go with for my FMP. Not because it looks bad or anything of that sort, just because while it fits this piece rather well i feel it wouldn't quite gel with what i want to do. I was quite impressed with the amount of expression they got out of side on silhouettes and i have to always remember to keep in mind strong emotional poses.

I really like the way in this film they really show how sometimes the simplest things are the most effective. All this person needed was five characters and a box on a big balanced platform to make an engaging and rather dramatic story. Also i feel this piece really does a good job with the poses to get the right emotion witch characters with very little to tell one from the other. This doesn't really have a lot to do with my FMP idea but it has so charmed me i really felt i should put it in. I will keep this simple ideas are sometimes the best idea in mind when coming up with the finer points of what will happen story wise in my FMP.

Looking into the source of 'Normal'

I have been looking into the message I am going to purvey with my FMP trying to find other films or animations that have been based on the same message and also general articles and such about questioning what is normal and questioning what normal actually is in general.

I haven't found any films as of yet which deal with that subject matter but i have found some interesting articles to do with it, mostly on psychology sites and places of that ilk.

Quite a few of the articles are to do with mental health, and while they are interesting they don't quite cover what i am going for. They were more exploring mental conditions, whereas what i am looking for is more the communal, society norms that we just accept despite them not being natural and sometimes not making a whole lot of sense. This article was a really good one, it addressed exactly what i am trying to confront, explaining about how the idea of normal comes about. Granted it doesn't challenge normal or have any particular message urging you to sit back and consider what your normal is and why it is, but it still does address very interesting points about our social normal and how we end up making those connections.

Pineapple Heads Design

These are two potential looks for the people with pineapples on there heads in my FMP. The first one looks more solid, his proportions are more accurate while still being stylised. While the second is a more curvy more cartoony style version.

I will expand on there design more experimenting with colours and different styles of pose. The second one at the moment feels more alive to me though that is probably due to the fact i drew it in a pose as apposed to the first one who is drawn straight facing you.

The Style

The art style of the animation I am not too sure about as of right now. I like the Adventure Time style, which wile simplistic i think is effective and something in that vein could suit the style of narrative i wish to convey.

I also like the style of an old cartoon i used to watch as a child called Courage the Cowardly Dog. Its style has a slight asymmetrical ness to it that i quite like.

Introduction to Research and Development... sort of

For this particular module the aim is to develop a project proposal which we will carry on into our third year. I want to over the course of this module, pin down an animation style and look my piece will have when i come to produce it in the third year. I will also be looking into research sources for the narrative elements.
In the end I hope to have a much better idea of what my piece will look like stylistically and how i will be going about animating it.