Evaluation

End of Module Student Evaluation

BA (Hons) Illustration

Module Code: OUIL503 Responsive

Name: Molly Halson

Student ID: mh259901

Please identify where the evidence for each of the learning outcomes is within your submission and how well you feel you have met the learning outcomes. Please also grade yourself in relation to the learning outcomes using terms: poor, satisfactory, good, very good, excellent (Note - This is so that the team have an understanding of how well you feel you have done. It is not an indication of the actual grade you may receive.)

Learning Outcome	Evidenced where? Blog, Visual Journal, Roughs, Final Illustrations, Storyboards, Development Sheets etc.  (No more than 75 words)	Your grade Using words: > poor, satisfactory, good, very good, excellent
5A4:  Make appropriate use of a range of research methods to investigate a topic and produce work relating to the critical, cultural or social context of art and design. (Knowledge & Understanding - Research and Critical Awareness)	Blog, boards	Good
5B3: Generate ideas, concepts, proposals, solutions and/or arguments using the language, materials, processes and techniques of a designated discipline. (Cognitive Skills - Problem Analysis, Problem Solving)	Blog, boards	Very Good
5C3: Respond to set briefs or proposals in a professional context. (Practical Skills - Visual Quality and Conceptual Development)	Blog, boards	Satisfactory
5D3: Exercise self-management skills in managing their workloads and meeting deadlines/apply interpersonal and social skills to interact with others. (Key Transferable Skills, Organisation, Communication and Evaluation)	Blog	Poor

Summative Evaluation (See Evaluation Guidance on next page for more information)

I really struggled with a lot of this module. I definitely found it hard to make and keep my own deadlines and juggle this module along with all the others. I’ve always struggled with my time management and being thrown into a very self-directed module (and year) has been a huge challenge. I’ve also been struggling with depression over the last couple of years, and so that has been affecting my motivation throughout. I am trying to control this better though. I really enjoyed SB2, as I loved my collaborative partners and we were able to solve problems and disputes maturely and diplomatically. I found that having two partners made me work harder and keep to deadlines better as I didn’t want to let them down. I wanted to practice my digital skills more in this module. I thought I would do this by doing Illustration Friday every week, or maybe the film society too, but I put too much pressure on myself to make them perfect and ended up just doing what I know best – pen. I need to push myself more and step out of my comfort zone. I regret not doing a more substantial brief, as I believe that I could have created something I was proud of, had I tried harder. However, I did experiment more with animation and digital in SB2, and although I’m definitely still learning, I’ve also learned some new skills! And hopefully I can take those on to future modules.

SB3 Project Report

SB2 Design Boards

SB1 Design Boards

D&AD NAS submission complete!

NAS Final Animation

Luke's Story from Molly Halson on Vimeo.

I did rush this as I only left myself a week to animate, but I'm still proud of what I managed to do in that week!

I used the NAS colour palette they specified in the brief guidelines, and tried to emulate an RPG feel with pixellated textures made from Adobe Capture textures, scanned from objects around me.

Overall, I think I captured the essence of Luke, and I hope it portrays what I hoped it to - that autistic people are really just like everyone else, with goals and hobbies just the same.

Adobe Capture + animation aesthetics

I found the app Adobe Capture today and I've been using it to make textures that I think will be useful in making my animation! Since I'm trying to mimic the Zelda games, as Luke mentioned he liked them, I think it will help make a game style or RPG look.

This is some of the visual research I did, and some of the textures I made from things around the room.

These are the colours NAS specified. I'm going to focus mainly on blues and greens.

Animation storyboarding + notes

Character Designs NAS

NAS collab audio files for animation

All three of us have now completed our audio files for our animations!

I found condensing the 13 minutes of interview down to be a challenge! There was so much that I wanted to include, and if we had more time to animate and the brief allowed us to have more than two minutes of footage, I would have included more.

But I think I managed to capture the essence of Luke and communicate partially how he experiences the world in a way that others will be able to empathise with - which is what we're hoping to achieve.

My procrastination actually came in handy for this part of the project, as both of my partners completed their audio files before me, so I had a theme to work towards. I knew what they'd chosen to include and the kind of messages they were getting across, which made it a bit easier to narrow down Luke's words.

They also both chose accompanying audio tracks which sounded vaguely similar in tone, and although I knew I wanted something which sounded quite adventurous and whimsical, I was able to match to tone set by the songs my partners chose.

With The Light - NAS research

As part of my research I ordered this manga comic about a family of a child with autism - it's been quite insightful, as although I was very young when my brother was born, I do remember some things being similar to my family's experience when my brother was young.

The book discusses the stigma and challenges not only the people with autism face, but their families, so it might be quite a useful angle when approaching the animation?

NAS collab research - The Reason I Jump

My mum gave me a book to read called The Reason I Jump by Naoki Higashida, a boy with autism who was 13 at the time of writing the book.

He would be considered quite severely autistic, as he is unable to speak and used a computer, and alphabet grid and a transcriber to write the book.

This book has been very useful in my research, as it gives me an inside perspective from someone who actually has autism, about how people with autism experience the world, and what they want people without it to understand about them. This has been invaluable considering the aims of the brief are to portray autism in a more positive light, and our specific aim as a group is to normalise autism and show people with it as perfectly functional human beings.

This book is also helping me to create my audio file for my animation, as I've been feeling overwhelmed at the thought of condensing 13 minute's of Luke's interview to about 30 seconds. The book is constructed as a Q&A format; so Higashida answers common questions he faces about his autism and tries to communicate why he does things differently to what people might expect.

This has caused me to consider what I personally want people to understand about autism, and what I think Luke wants people to understand, based on his interview.

Again, I think just discussing his hobbies and daily life and normalising autism is the way forward. I'm feeling more able to pick out important bits of the conversation to form a 30 second narrative about a normal guy, who happens to have autism, who wants to be understood a bit better.

I hope that our target audience - people who don't really know what autism is or have an experience of it - manages to identify our aims through these animations.

Choosing a song

Luke mentioned the Zelda games in his interview so I'm trying to find a song that kinda matches the theme tune - whimsical and adventurous in tone.

Meeting with interview candidates NAS

We held an open call for people with experience of autism to come and talk to us so we could record their personal experience and get a soundtrack and a focus for our animations.

6 people showed up - 3 with autism and 3 with experience of autism (autistic siblings). The interviews ranged from about 7 minutes to 20 minutes.

Luckily, as there are 3 people with autism and 3 of us in the group, we decided to use them as it was more personal and we want to show that you shouldn't treat people with autism differently. We all picked one person who we felt we could animate, based on visual cues they gave in the interviews. I chose Luke!

Moby New Statesman Brief

I did this brief very quickly in the midst of all the other work I'm doing. Quick roughs/ideas:

I wasn't too happy with the final thing. It was very rushed as I did it in the early hours before the deadline, and I could have adjusted it after but I didn't really want to. I do like the colours though, and want to try this colour scheme out again at some point.

Life, Animated - autism documentary research for NAS brief

A documentary about a boy with autism who grew up using animated Disney movies to learn to communicate.

Relevant to the brief we're doing and our response to the brief.

The trailer on YouTube also has a lot of positive comments/reviews from people with autism themselves, which shows that this documentary is well-made and representative of the experience of autism. 

Key points:
Owen found the exaggerated expressions and emotions in Disney movies easier to understand than in real life. This is because autistic people often have trouble reading people's faces. It might be useful to use this info in our own animations when we create them!

Collab Meeting Minutes

National Autistic Society brief - collaboration?

I'm drawn to this brief because I have personal experience of Autism - my little brother (18 years old) is autistic, so I have access to his first hand experience as a source of research, as well as my own personal experience of how it affects/has affected my family and I.

I also have a friend who has an autistic little brother (14 or 15 years old I believe), so that is another point of research, if I manage to find an animator who wants to collaborate on this brief.

There's a growing amount of resources on autism, not only to educate about it but also showing the experience of having autism from the perspective of autistic people.

Illustration Friday - Aquatic (unfinished)

I haven't finished this one. I've been struggling a lot with depression over this last year and I'm finding it really hard to focus on responsive

Film Society - Grand Budapest Hotel

 Research - lots of pink. I want to focus on character

 Again, I wanted to do this digitally, but I didn't leave myself enough time.