Ok, so i and talked with Ed tonight at the Animex Lounge and told him about the changes to the animation.

With the latest revision of the shot list he said that now i have an animation that works, im still unsure on the ended and i got the feeling that so was he but i'll do the blocking for the animation and send him a link and hopefully he will get back to me with what he thinks about it.

When i go onto the animation stage (again) i'm going to follow what i have learnt at Animex in the production techniques and the plan of action as it where that the big companies use in there projects.

Anyway, i just wanted to let you have a quick update on what he thought about it and what i im going to be doing.

He did say that i should try some different comedy as we have all seen the almost falling off a ladder and swinging to gain control act before so i need to use something that hasn't been done before (well, lets just say over used....something new is impossible ^^).

I'll be working on this after next week as i need to go on hold in production just while i get my CCA sorted as its a little far behind and needs to be done.

Anyway, till next time keep safe and keep visiting.

Well im not regretting do this during the lecture im in as the guy speaking is talking about everything im trying to work on at the moment and telling us how to do it really well. I'll just have to steel the notes of people ^^

Anyway i've now got a new and hopefully final script/shot list, i'll be running it past Ed later today and seeing what he thinks but i hope that things are ok with it.

If he does find a major problem with it i may need to just carry on with it and then in the next project take on board what he has said as its getting close to the end of the project and i will need to hand it in soon.

So my new one is this, let me know what you think.

Before you read this (just encase you haven't read the other posts) i'll set the scene.

So the animation is set in 1890's france at old circus, a young man called Émile is going to dive from the 60 foot call diving board.....The animation is in a black and white color sytle and using comedy referance from Charlie Chaplin, Harold Lloyd and Laurel and Hardy.


So here is the new script/shot list......

Start with shot of poster of the high dive act.

Émile is leering over the wooden pool noticing how small and shallow it is.

(The look on Émiles face will tell the audience what he is feeling)

He puts his hands out and taps a leaf that is floating on the top of the calm water.

He finds himself struggling to lift his head and look up at the top of the ladder where the diving board awaits him.

When he feels he is ready for the climb ahead he places his foot on the ladder and in a very nervous state starts to work his way up to the top.

He continues to climb but with each step it becomes harder and harder to go much higher.

Émile suddenly finds himself looking down and comes to realize how high up he is.

(The focus on the camera skews as taking reference from the effect that Alfrid Hitchcock established in his movie Vertigo)

He quickly grabs hold tighter and pulls himself closer to the ladder so that there are little more than a couple of millimetres between the ladder and his body.

He gathers his confidence and keeps going still remaining close as he can to the ladder.

His footing gives way and he almost falls, while holding onto the ladder with one hand he struggles to get himself back in control.

He squirms around trying to get his hands back on the ladder (using Charlie Chaplin, Harold Lloyd and Laurel and Hardy).

He manages to regain control and keeps on climbing.

He soon makes it to the top of the ladder but still struggles to compose himself and pull himself over the top and onto the board.

He takes a deep breath and pulls himself over while remaining very low and close to the board.

He takes hold of the railing at the top of the board and slowly rises to his feet, as he does this see finds that his legs have turned to jelly and he is unable to stand up very well.

He tries to hold his legs and make them ridged so that he can stand but this doesn’t work, he soon manages to take control, get himself together and stand up straight.

He walks toward the end of the board still remaining as low to the board as he can as he gets closer to the edge.

As he looks over the edge of the board his vertigo takes control again and his eyes widen and face becomes expressive of a man feeling sick.

He knows he needs to do this dive so he moves back to the ladder and crosses his heart so has a little prier to god.

He runs to the edge as if to do a big extravagant jump but as he gets to the very end he slows down and jumps off holding his hat and his nose and tucks his legs in.

So this will be shown to Ed later today and i will let you know what he thinks about it.


Anyway i will leave it at that and i will write more later.


By for now

Well i've been thinking about this a lot all night, since my last post and since Ed had his talk with me.

I now feel that although this animation is moving to a place that i wasn't planning on taking it at the start it could still be brought back but while still using the advice that Ed has given me.

So my new story is that Émile is the only character now, there is no bird (although i may go and do an animation including a bird at some point....as i like the idea for it, i just dont feel it would work in a silent black and white movie style i could be wrong), we only have Émile and his act of jumping from the 60 foot tall diving board.

He is still nervous about doing this act as his fear of heights is taking control of him, but he knows that he has a job to do and he must overcame this fear to do his job.

Using what Ed said i've made sure to include a conflict and a thought process.

The conflicts are Situation and Self, situation because he has a job to do but its on a very high level diving board and it is terrifying to him and self because he knows he needs to do it but his vertigo is stopping him.

Ed talked about how your character needs to have....

Action----------Obstacle------------Objective 
At the start Émiles action is getting himself ready for the dive, his objective is to dive off that board and land in the water his obstacle is his fear or the heights he will be at.

When he starts climbing a new action takes place and he is now climbing the ladder, the objective is still the same as before (to dive off into the pool) but his obstacle now is that vertigo is starting to take effect and its causing him to lose balance.

He continues up with the same Objective....(the objective wont change until that objective is complete or a new objective is found), Obstacle at this point is that his footing slips and he almost falls causing a new action of grabbing the ladder and pulling himself closer to it and wrapping his arms around it.

Now as i'm still working on this since Ed only just talked to me today and im not a writer im an animator, so im not sure on how to end it.

I do feel that i follow the rules set out quite well and i dont feel that there is one point in that animation where i wouldn't be able to pause the scene and ask that character "what are you doing right now", this is what as animators we try and create and i think i may have managed it (finally ^_^).

So i did a quick Character Profile as the title of the post might have already told you so this is what i have.

Name: Émile
Age: 22
Gender: Male

Height: 6ft 2"

Diet: Vegetarian (for health reasons).

Dreams: To be able to support his family and make sure they never struggle for anything in life and to make his mother and father proud.

Health: Energetic and lively, great physical and mental health.

Social Statues: Lower middle class, never has been or strives to be in a position of power.

Ethnicity: White.

Cultural Heritage: Comes from a family of French circus acts including high dive acts, tight rope acts and human cannon ball acts.

IQ: An Educational IQ based on a home schooling but a very high knowledge in performances in the circus.

Education: Home schooled by the people who work around the circus but didn’t learn much due to their basic educational knowledge.

Adrenaline Moments: Feel from the high wire when a small child which caused him to develop a fear of heights.

Sexual Orientation: Straight.

Physical Stature: Tall, thin and spindly.

Income: Low wage of around 240F.

Profession: Circus performer

Favorite Music: French accordion music.

I feel i can look at this list and see everything that is needed to be known about the character without any problems.

I'll write out what i hope to be my final script/story tomorrow during lecturers and then show it to Ed again and hopefully get a better response off him...(one that doesn't make me feel like shooting myself lol), but im sure it will be ok.

At the end of the day, and he said it himself......what he says is his opinion, just cos its coming form Ed Hooks doesn't mean that the word is law and you can't do it as an animation.

Everyone has different tastes and likes and dislikes......if we didn't there wouldn't be any variety, so what might be something that isn't that great to me might make the person sat net to me laugh there head off....its all about personal preference...("you can't please everyone, but its worth a try").

So i will update again once i get a reply from Ed.

Also i will be hopefully showing some work at animex party tomorrow, sadly all i have is my showreel from last year but its worth a shot at sticking a image portfolio in there and seeing what they say.

Anyway till then i'll leave you all and go get some sleep as its an early start again tomorrow.

Good Night World.

Well i piched my idea for FYP to Ed Hooks today and it wasn't to keen on it....although after he explained why it made a lot of sense to me.

Basically he said it would be better if i removed the boss character so that Émile had one objective all the way through the animation and i shouldn't have the photo as part of the animation as when he gets to the top of the board and the wind takes the photo he loses the power in the animation and the photo gets it as its the photo thats making him dive not himself.

So i went back to the script during the break and worked out what i could do, with the help of my mates in the Students Union while having food i got some new ideas and pitched them to the people around me and asked what they thought, a lot of them didn't work but there was one that seemed to be a strong candidate for an animation.

So i wrote this out and showed Ed again....

Start with shot of poster of the high dive act.

Émile is leering over the wooden pool noticing how small and shallow it is.

(The look on Émiles face will tell the audience what he is feeling)

He puts his hands out and taps a leaf that is floating on the top of the calm water.

He finds himself struggling to lift his head and look up at the top of the ladder where the diving board awaits him.

When he feels he is ready for the climb ahead he places his foot on the ladder and in a very nervous state starts to work his way up to the top.

He continues to climb but with each step it becomes harder and harder to go much higher.

Émile suddenly finds himself looking down and comes to realize how high up he is.

He quickly grabs hold tighter and pulls himself closer to the ladder so that there are little more than a couple of millimeters between the ladder and his body.

As he reaches the midpoint of the ladder a small seagull swoops down and starts to get in his way, he shoos it away and it flies off so he continues to climb.

Not long after the first time the bird comes back and starts to get back up to his some old tricks and once again Émile shoos him away.

He soon makes it to the top of the ladder but still struggles to compose himself and pull himself over the top and onto the board.

He takes a deep breath and pulls himself over while remaining very low and close to the board.
He looks up and notices the same bird perched at the end of the board as if he was waiting for him.

Slowly he begins to rise to his feet, holding onto the railing so not to slip and fall.
He edges close to the edge of the board in hope that the bird will fly away but it flies up and starts to pester Émile once again.

Émile tries to shoo away the gull for a 3rd and hopefully final time but in the act of doing so he slips and lands on the board causing him to be flipped in the air and propelled to the water below

So i showed this to Ed and once again he went over it with me and showed me what needed changing and improving, he said that although the bird works for another conflict i now have 2 stories, the story of the bird and her protecting her nest at the top and the story of Émile trying to do his act.

Also im taking away the power from Émile again and giving it to the bird as its the birds fault that he fell off the board not Émiles own chose.

So now im stuck with 2 ideas and both would be incomplete if i removed the other character from the plot, i like the idea that the bird is looking after her nest and eggs by trying to get Émile to leave her alone, this is something that might be usable and i might be able to get away with this.

Another option would be to have Émile and no bird at all or family or boss, i simply have to give him a fear of hights and that will effect him....using influences from Alfrid Hitchcock's movie Vertigo.

I know that this animation was set out to be a humorous animation with a little slapstick and playing on the characters emotions and this is no longer the case, i'm just finding it harder and harder to do this.

My housemate and i just came up with another option while i was writing this, maybe Émile is a magician and his Dove from his act has gotten out of the cage before the show has begun, and perched itself at the edge of the diving board and he's got to go get it.

I really dont know anymore.....i feel lik this animation is going a little out of hand right now and i really need some one on one with somebody, i mean im not an script writer or a story writer im an animator.....i find it hard enough to write let alone wirte a script.

I would love nothing more then to be able to come up with something tonight and go to Ed tomorrow and show him it and for him to say..."that works, you've got it...but what if....." i would be really happy if that was the case and i would feel like i have created something that can be really well worked on.

All i can do for now though is look at the script, look over the notes i made in his class today and try and come up with a story that has everything he talks about in it.

I know what Ed Hooks says isn't the be all or end all of everything but it does mean a lot to me what he thinks of my work, maybe its because of the way i see him or maybe its because of the things he's done, all i know is if i get something that Ed really really likes i might have a shot in this world as an animator and that would be by dream on its way to becoming a reality.

Anyway i best go get to work on this new script i guess as i also have meeting with Chris on Wednesday ....although depending what i will be showing him is all down to what Ed says about the work i have.

Maybe a 2D blocking pass of the new script...if there is one by tonight might help things a little....we'll see.

Bye for now peeps and keep well and keep animating ^_^

Well its taking me a while to work out what i want the final peace to look like but i think i might have nailed it down this time ^_^

During this week as i said before is Animex week, this is where a load of people from different companies in Animation and Games all come together at Teesside University to talk about what the company does and what they look for when hiring as well as other things.

Well during one of the lecturers i found myself inspired and needed to write down what i was thinking, turned out what i was thinking was what animation for my FYP will look like.

Anyway i ended up writing out 3 pages and im hoping to show the god that is Ed Hooks and get his thoughts on it.

Hopefully he will like it but if not he might be able to give me pointers on what i need to improve on.

So here is what i wrote.

Start with shot of poster of the high dive act.

Émile is leering over the wooden pool noticing how small and shallow it is.

(The look on Émiles face will tell the audience what he is feeling)

He puts his hands out and taps a leaf that is floating on the top of the calm water.

He hears a sound and sharply turns around to see his boss standing behind him and ordering him to start the act.

(Although his boss is half the height of Émile, the boss shows greater power and authority through his body language where as Émile is closed off and in a protective stance)

Émiles head drops and his body gives the impression of a school boy being told off by his teacher.

His boss leaves and Émile begins to get himself mentally prepared for the climb.

He finds himself struggling to lift his head an look up at the top of the ladder where the diving board awaits him.

When he feels he is ready for the climb ahead he places his foot on the ladder abd in a very nervous state starts to work his way up to the top.

He continues to climb but with each step it becomes harder and harder to go much higher.

Émile suddenly finds himself looking down and comes to realize how high up he is.

He quickly grabs hold tighter and pulls himself closer to the ladder so that there is little more then a couple of millimeters between the ladder and his body.

He reaches into his pocket and pulls out a small A5 size photo of him and his family, he looks at it for a while and soon finds the inspiration and courage he needed to keep on going.

(This is so what the audience will have the idea that he is doing this for them, so what they have money)

He puts the photo back and continues climbing, suddenly his footing slips and he almost falls, this shakes him up and bring back all the fear and worry that he started off with but with the image of him family still fresh in his head he continues.

He soon makes it to the top of the ladder but still struggles to compose himself and pull himself over the top and onto the board.

He takes a deep breath and pulls himself over while remaining very low and close to the board.

Slowly he begins to rise to his feet, holding onto the railing so not to slip and fall.

Making sure to stay balanced be moves closer to the edge but soon regrets doing it as he sees how high up he is and how faraway it is from the bottom.

He stumbles back in fear and grabs the railing so not to fall.

After a short time he recomposes himself and pulls out the photo of his family again, but this time it doesn't help him, he still can't do it.

But within seconds of him taking it out the winds of the high heights pick up and blow the photo out of his hand.

He runs after it but within seconds of him doing so he soon realizes that he has run off the edge of the diving board and is on his way down to the water below.

(or is he ^_^.....funny is he missed, as for him falling, the camera will stop at the diving board and he will fall this is so that the audience a) dont witness the death if there is one. b) The audience can come to there own conclusions of what happens at the end. and c) so what the animation runs to the time limit set at the beginning of the project)

Well as you may remember from my last post i was going with Chris this week.

Last Thursday he contacted me and said that it may be better to have the meeting on Tuesday or Wednesday of this week instead, sadly i believe that me and Chris both forgot about this and ended up not having the meeting at all.

In some ways this is a good thing as its helped me get more done and work a little harder.

So in the next meeting (whenever it may be) i'll have more to show him and get hopefully more feedback.

Now on to next week, over next week there wont be any updates or work being done (well not as much as current) as its Animex week at my University, this means im going to be working on Almost finished work that i have yet to complete so that i have a show reel at on Wednesday at the latest to show to the speakers and visitors to the university, i wish that i was further with my FYP so that i could show this but due to major computer issues and problems with time management i sadly not at the point i should be by now, its starting to effect my other modules as well a little so its starting to become serious.

Taking time out for Animex may not be the wisest choice but its the better choice in my opinion for my future.

Anyway i thought it best to let you all now what will be happening.

In the mean time i've just uploaded some new images from my texturing work, its just 3 of the texture images i made to use in my FYP but its still something that might be work checking out.

Well, till next time have a great time and i hope to see you at Animex if your going ^_^.