Where I Get Ideas and Inspration From

I was keen on coming up with an idea/story for this self initiated brief, but to pluck an idea out of thin air is hard. For me, I have to have some kind of connection with it, be it very small or huge, it helps to keep an all around focus on the subject your basing you work on and stops you from going off track. Its not just about having a connection either, its about being passionate about it, if I'm not passionate about it, why am i doing it.

To make sure I'm telling something which I feel strongly about and are interested in, I read and listen to stuff I feel strongly about and are interested in, i don't go out of my way to read a biography on a football player, because it doesn't interest me!

I enjoy listening to music (like everyone on the planet) but for some reason i've acquired about three or four books on different artists which talk about the meanings of the songs and where the inspiration for the songs come from. This, believe it or not, is what i find interesting! And reading these sort of books got me to read 'Someplace Like America'.

I like what Bruce Springsteen writes about and to find this book which gives real life examples of what he writes about was fascinating to me. It gave me a whole new view of America.

It also opened my eyes to the author and photographer of this book. Dale Maharidge has done so much work surrounding this book, not just what you find in the book, but he did these video series on youtube, which gave me more information which wasn't in the book.



So my idea stemmed from my love for music and my interest in finding out more about the songs i listen to. This is my way of getting inspired and coming up with ideas.

A Push In The Right Direction

One of the main problems with my animation is that I have signs in the shape of arrows which show the way 'forward', but once it had been pointed out to me that they feel a bit out of place I started to see it my self. Its not just the sign, its the quotes that's on the signs as well which feel out of place.

I got pointed in the direction of billboards instead of signs which I thought would be quite a nice idea, its still inkeeping with my idea and story/ statement of the piece plus there bigger and more threatening than a tiny sigh with an arrow on it.

Brazil, what a film. I got told to watch the bit with the long row of billboards, but I figured I hadn't seen it in a few months, so I watched the whole thing again for kicks.

The idea of using billboards is such a nice idea, especially when looking at the 1950s ones which are there to advertise a better life style etc...

Now I just have the problem of what should go on the billboards. Do I put pictures on them? Do I put words on it? Do I keep the quotes I had initially?
Speaking of the 'quotes I had initially', I came to a conclusion that only the short ones work in the animation. the long winded ones suck eggs. Heres the animatic, if you want to see the signs and quotes...


Here's a style-frame which could get round my problem...

Watching Television

Final with sound...


Cleaned up....


Rough version...

Three Days at Kilogramme Animation

This was a totally different experience to the LOVE Creative visit, I went from being with people I knew to just me.

Unlike LOVE Creative which is more graphic design advertising, Kilogramme is all about animation, and I feel I benefited more from that. Its only a small group of people who make up the company but they all were very kind and gave me some good feedback on my work!

So over the three days with them I got feedback on stuff which I'd done at Love Creative and also work which I worked on whilst there (which was the stuff in preparation for Uni).
I got some really good tips off Dave Ridges about how I could make the backgrounds of the 'seasons' animation better...

he made me think more about layout within the composition and gave me some useful tips on how to draw the eye into a certain section of the frame. from looking at my initial frame above, to the one below, you can see what Dave did to the piece to try and improve the composition and give it depth.
Really like of the idea of putting some sort of bushes or grass etc at the bottom right and left hand sides though, It keeps your eye central to the screen.

This also prompted me to buy a book called 'Dream Worlds' which Dave initially gave me to read at kilogramme....but I thought it was such a good book, I went home and bought it!





As well as the 'seasons' work I also worked on an animatic for the self initiated project from uni. Heres the animatic I've ended with (for the moment)...



Here's a maya test I did a few days after my time at Kilogramme...it took a while to do as I havn't used maya in a while! gives a sense of how I want it to look.

I'm wanting to add textures to the train, but we'll see.

Five Places

kilogramme
Suppose I should do this one first. I've done thousands of posts on this company already, but uni's making me do another one....

This is a place I'd be more than happy to work at, its a really nice company with friendly people working there. The studio consists of five people, the two main people in the company are Claire grey and Jon Turner and the other three are freelance; Sam Jones, Craig Knowles and Dave Ridges. There based in Manchester.
In terms of work, they do lots of animation in flash...mainly a flash animation based studio really, but also do 3D work, using 3D Max.

Anyway...here's there show reel, again
Links to the other Posts on the studio...
Link 1
Link 2
Link 3


the neibourhood  
Another place I'd be more than happy to work at. When we went there seem'd like there was a lot of people working there and from hearing about ste getting a job there and matt doing freelance work, it seems like they...well...employ freelancers and full time people there! You know, getting people in when they have a high amount of work to do etc
When we were there for that brief we did back in 2nd year, we talked to Jon Humphreys (Creative Director) and Sarah Baker (Studio Director)...

Heres what it says on their Vimeo...

'We work with clients across advertising, design, broadcast, architecture and beyond' 
Pretty Wide range of stuff going on in the neighbourhood! Heres their Showreel....



milkytea
This is a place I found out about a while back (when looking for companies for this type of exercise in the second year)
What appeiled to me was the variation of work they do, on there website they list their services;

Concept Artwork
Storyboards
Character Design
2D/3D Illustration
Visualisation
Photorealistic Rendering
2D/3D Animation
Interactive Design
Interactive Asset Creation.

They have a 'recent' project nominated for a BAFTA and EMMY award

Their clients include;
Lloyds TSB
BBC
Sony SCEE
NHS

Same sort of stuff happening here at milkytea,  full time people working at their studio in Liverpool and at the same time also hiring freelancers for specific projects. here's their BLOG and their 2010 showreel...




the pond
they have some nice work, a guy called Sean is the creative director as well as Tina (no second names given)
Here's what they say about themselves on their WEBSITE,

'a creative CG Animation company with a passion for narrative, imagery and visual style.'

It's all 3D stuff at the pond...heres their christmas animation...


humdrumm
It specializes in animation for television, games and the film industry. It 'big player' is Richard Drumm (what are the odds!) It has some nice pieces of work which are all 3D animated.
Client list include...
Lego
realtime uk
kilogramme
ea games
disney
warner brothers interactive entertainment

Here's there WEBSITE