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.

Music Videos

The music video that inspired me to change my project proposal was for the song Let's Go by Stuck in the Sound, animated by Alexis Beaumont & Remi Godin.



I was inspired by the really emotive narrative, and realised a music video (or storyboard/6 scenes of) could be a perfect way for me to tell stories, as well as provide an opportunity to build my animation (GIFs) skills and digital drawing skills. The events of the narrative also correspond to the sounds of the music cleverly, for an example: an explosion when the chorus starts.

Other music videos with good stories/visuals:


Animated by Boneface


Animated by Rory Kerr and Paul Ruttledge

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

OUIL505 Proposal

Leeds College of Art BA (Hons) ILLUSTRATION	Level	05
OUIL505 ILLUSTRATION 2: Applied Illustration	Credits	30
Module Brief  Title: Product, Range & Distribution

STUDIO BRIEF 1: Project Proposal

Project Rationale

What do you intend to do and why?

I want to create a set of illustrations that form a narrative set to the song Resonance by Home, which has the potential to become and animated music video. I’m going to do this because I have a passion for music, and the format of an animated music video incorporates that passion into my practice. I chose this song specifically because I find it emotive, and it is instrumental which presents more of a challenge to create imagery, as there are no lyrics to inspire me, only sound. I want to create the illustrations digitally, as I haven’t experimented enough with digital media although I like it, and considering these illustrations would be potentially distributed digitally in a video format. I will apply my illustrations to a range of band and music merchandise.

THEMES / SUBJECTS

GENERAL THEMES: Music Individualism Conformity SPECIFIC SUBJECTS: Character & Narrative

PRACTICAL & CONCEPTUAL APPLICATION

SPECIFIC DISCIPLINARY AREA: Animation Music videos Character & Narrative AUDIENCE/CONTEXTS: Music lovers PRODUCTION/Distribution Methods: YouTube, Vimeo, merchandising sites like MerchNOW

CONTEXTUAL REFERENCES

ILLUSTRATORS / DESIGNERS / STUDIOS: Eat the Danger animation studio Boneface – illustrator/animator Distributors of band merchandise like MerchNOW

CREATIVE SKILLS

I want to develop my digital skills using my graphics tablet and Photoshop. I have been starting to use these methods more during level 2 but I want to develop them further. I will also develop my storyboarding skills, and apply my skills with visual narratives.

KEY TEXTS

Home - Resonance https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8GW6sLrK40k Queens of the Stone Age – I Appear Missing https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9OfBcjyxKY Music video animated by Boneface Stuck in the Sound – Let’s Go https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52Gg9CqhbP8 Music video directed by Alexis Beaumont and Remi Godin Courtney Barnett – Dead Fox https://vimeo.com/172404474 Animated by Rory Kerr and Paul Ruttledge http://merchnow.com/

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?