While going through the principles of animation again and analysing examples of how they are implemented in films, we were tasked to take a scene from line test drawings from the film The Prince of Egypt and analyse how the characters were animated. The scene I chose to analyse was of Rameses’s father Pharaoh Seti talking. During my analysis of his movements, I specifically focused on aspects such as how he transitions between different poses and the smaller bits of his body actions that changes with each pose.
For my final film, I wanted to create something that combines elements from all of the different tests that I had done. The idea that I had came up with was to make an animation that depicts anxiety. Because I had gotten feedback to make use of a medium other than animation paper since I had been using it for all of my previous tests, I decided to try creating shadow puppets instead. With this idea, I wanted to do something that also visually depicts a head like my Sound of Silence test. The idea that I came up with was to create a shadow puppet of a head of myself that would open up to reveal a monster or demon that is symbolic of negative thoughts or anxiety and is visually inspired by the Indonesian masks I got inspiration from in my last test.
Sketches I did to depict how the head would open up and the design of the demonic face underneathStoryboards I drew for how the head would open up
Initial Test
To create my shadow puppets, I made them out of paper that I drew on and cutout using a craft knife and afterwards I put the cutouts on a light box over a rostrum.
The cutouts of the shadow puppetsThe shadow puppets over a light box while being shot on a rostrum during filming
The results of my initial test was very successful as I was able to depict the visual sequence I had planned out and I was successful in working with the shadow puppet method. The feedback I received for this was to continue experimenting with transformations and to try implementing the pattern animations I had done in my previous test.
For the final animation, I decided to add a walking sequence to make the animation longer as well as to have more visuals to play around with. I decided to have the character walking in the beginning and passing by rows of shadows staring at him. As he continues walking, the shadows increase in frequency as they pass by him. This is to depict anxiety and the feeling of being judged or perceived by everyone around you which results in overthinking. To show the shadows passing by, I planned to cut out a row of identical heads that would rush past the person as he was walking which would be a way for me to play around with repeating patterns as I had done in my previous animation.
Storyboards I had drawn
To further extend the animation, I also added more to the sequence of the character’s head opening by having the character turn his head side to side to depict him struggling with his emotions. I also had him struggling to keep his head closed as the demon face tries to pop out and the demon face trying to keep his head open before he closes it again to show the conflict that he is fighting with his inner turmoil.
Cutouts I had made of the character’s head turningThe cutouts of the shadow puppets during filming
Final Film– Maelstrom
Feedback I had received on the final film
I would say the outcome of the film was highly successful as I feel I had done very well in making use of shadow puppets as a medium and properly depicting the story that I wanted to depict. I had gotten very positive feedback on the visuals and the effects it had on the story which I feel adds to the success of my final film.
For the Sound of Silence assignment, we were tasked with creating an animation that depicted our interpretation of what silence sounded like using audio we recorded with a microphone. I had the idea of recording the sounds of machines running as I felt that machines running by themselves without human interference was a way of interpreting what the sound of silence would be. So, I recorded the sounds of the washing machine room in my accommodation and the sound of a microwave running and the sound of the vents in my bathroom before settling on using the sound of a microwave.
Initially, I had trouble coming up with ideas on what to visually depict with the audio I had. The idea that I first wanted to depict was of a sort of thinking machine and I played around with ideas of a machine creating art.
Mood board I created with ideas of machine influences. Inspiration ranged from machinery such as the Titanic’s engines and the funnels of steamships, the character designs from the show Arcane, streamline steam engine designs, the character Brainiac from the show My Adventures with Superman, guardian enemies from Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, and various portrait paintings. Journal entry of initial ideasIdeas I played around with of a machine creating art
With the idea of a machine creating art however, I felt that I was straying too far from the original sound of silence task and it was not going to become relevant anymore. So, I decided to rework the idea and instead find a way on focusing it on myself. I then came up with the idea to depict how our minds function sometimes independently of ourselves, having a constant flow of ideas and thoughts that are being created in the back of our heads, often with us being unaware of them. With this, I created an idea for an animation of myself that would have my head opening up to reveal a machine head that represented my inner thoughts.
Sketches I did playing around with how to visualise a machine head inside myself
The final animation was made using a light box and animation paper again like the previous tests. I felt this test was especially successful as I feel I was able to translate my ideas very well onto paper and I created a final product where the audio and visuals work very well together.
For this test, I was inspired by the magazines that I had taken pictures of during the Into the Woods assignment and wanted to create something that was influenced by graphic design elements. This test was done on animation paper and a light box that was used.
Mood board I made of various visual influences I wanted to make use of, such as graphic texts from a travel vlog by Youtuber withlovelinh and the magazine covers I had taken pictures of for Into the WoodsJournal entry of my planning for this test and my reflection of its outcome
Materiality Test
For this test, we were told we could animate in any way we wanted as long as we began and ended with a square that was drawn onto the animation paper using a small metal square that we were given. Following making our animations, we would then combine it with the animations of two other classmates.
For my animation, the story I wanted to depict was that of an experience on public transportation and the feeling of being overwhelmed by the people you are on the train or bus with. The animation would begin with a square in the middle with a character of myself wearing headphones. Afterwards, other squares would emerge on the paper of different individuals on the bus or train that are making noises in some way and more of them would appear more frequently as the animation continued. Following this, the square with myself in the middle would grow larger to depict myself feeling frustrated with the people around me. The square would then grow to cover up all of the other smaller squares that had appeared before shrinking back down to the same size as it was at the beginning of the animation.
When combining my test with other classmates that I worked with, we were also tasked with coming up with a way to create transitions between our animations that would play with the materiality of the test. For this, I came up with folding my animation before unfolding it to reveal the next frame for the animation of the person after me.
I felt this test was quite a success because I feel I did very well to create an animation that worked well to transition seamlessly to the animation of the other people in my group and I feel I was able to create a test that was creative while still working within the bounds I was told to work in.
Flower Mask Test
For this test, I wanted to make an animation that was inspired by Indonesian culture, particularly Javanese shadow puppets and batik patterns. I planned on making a batik style flower that would spin in the centre of the frame and visually transform into a mask. Meanwhile, there would be rows of triangular patterns that would move vertically while the flower in the centre transforms.
Mood board I made of shadow puppets, masks, and batik patterns that I wanted to make use of in my test.Journal entry for the planning of the test and the outcome
This test was quite successful in playing around with visual elements, building off of the first test I had done which had tested moving around words and other graphic elements. With the success of this test, the next step was to find ways to take what I learned from these tests and transfer them to materials other than animation paper and light box for my final animation.
In the first step of my progress, I began drawing my main key frames.
Between the first and second steps of my progress, a major change I included was the addition of more poses between the first and second flashback scenes where Kaya is initially talking to the camera. At first, I didn’t many poses aside from her having her hand out. However, I was told that she needed to have more acting and more time for her to have mouth movements. So I added an additional pose of her raising her hand to her head and I shortened the first flashback scene so that it would immediately switch to her talking after she says “no” during the flashback.
I also added more poses while she speaks at the end as I was given feedback that her poses were not exaggerated enough. So I redrew her pose to have her shoulders and hips slanted to be more expressive and I had her sticking her neck out as she holds her hands out to emphasise her annoyance with the situation.
Sketches I did to figure out how to exaggerate her posesReference image taken of me as the reference for the poseThe additional poses I added
In the third step of my progress, I was given feedback that she was still moving too stiffly so I added more poses to make her more expressive. I was advised to make her express more anger due to her being in the situation of having nearly had her phone stolen, so I decided to exaggerate her actions by having her leaning forward and gesturing to herself. I also added other movements such as her shrugging and shaking her head as she holds her hand to her head.
Sketches for additional poses I addedReference picture taken of myself for the poseAdditional poses I added to make Kaya more expressive
In the fourth step of my progress, I had finished with my key frames and began drawing my in between frames. To make the character movements smoother, I added arcs to the arm movements to help figure out what in between frames to add between key frames.
Arcs I added while drawing in between frames
By the fifth step of my progress I had begun colouring the animation and I continued to improve my in between frames by adding a boil to the characters when they were standing still.
The first flashback scene having been coloured
By the sixth step of my progress, I had finished drawing the in between frames and continued colouring the animation, moving on to the scenes where Kaya is talking in the present. For the scenes when she is talking at night, I created a separate colour palette at for her at night time where the colours are darker than her palette when she is in the day time in the flashbacks.
A scene with Kaya talking at night with her darker colour palette
By the seventh step of my progress I had finished doing the base colours of the animation.
Coloured scene of the robber in the second flashback sceneColoured scene of the robber and the policeman at night
During the finalising of my animation, I refined the colours by adding a low opacity layer of blue lighting to make characters in the night scenes appear darker so that they look like they are in a night time setting. I also added further details to Kaya by adding her loose hair strand and the green eyeliner she has as part of her character design.
Kaya before final colouring and lightingKaya after lighting
I further refined the colouring by adding blue lighting for the scene with the policeman and the robber so that the characters appear to be lit by the blue siren lights of the police car they are standing in front of.
The robber and policeman with night lighting and lighting from the police car
When interviewing people, the question I asked to people was “What is the funniest interaction you’ve had or what was the most funniest experience that you’ve had in London?” which I felt would prompt more interesting responses from people. The audio that I chose was from an interviewee whose story was that she stopped a pickpocket from stealing her phone by catching him during the act.
Storyboarding
During the initial planning of the animation, the main scenes that I visualised were of the robber pickpocketing her raising his arms as he is caught and of a scene where it is revealed that the main character is talking to a policeman who has caught the robber.
Rough initial sketches of what poses I visualised the characters would have.
During the storyboarding process, I intended the story to be an interview of the main character speaking that would have flashbacks to the robber that she is talking about before the scene would transition to a reveal of the policeman and robber listening to her story. Initially, I planned the animation to open with a scene of the robber sneaking up behind the main character before zooming in to his hand trying to reach to her phone. However, I felt that this scene would be too much to animate and instead, I changed it to a single scene of the robber behind the main character standing still which would be easier to transition to the next scene of the main character turning around to catch the robber.
Animatic of the storyboards
Background Designs
For the design of the backgrounds, I wanted the setting to be the average London street with corner shops and walls with graffiti. To design the backgrounds, I took inspiration from pictures that I took during walks in places such as Clapham.
Photos that I took on the street in Clapham that were used for inspiration.
For the art style of the backgrounds, I took inspiration from the background designs of the show Steven Universe, especially with the style of sketchy line art and lighting.
When drawing the backgrounds, I initially planned for every scene to be set during the day time so I drew every background as being set around the afternoon.
Background drawings I had drawn
However, I received feedback that the scenes where the animation switches between when the main character is being interviewed in the present and when it is a flashback to when she stopped the robber were hard to differentiate and could be confusing. Because of that, I tried different methods to differentiate the scenes, such as potentially making the flashback scenes be in black and white or being coloured with a different lighting before I settled on making the flashbacks set during the daytime and the main character talking set during night time.
The backgrounds for the scenes where the main character is talking in the present being set in night time
While colouring the backgrounds, I also did several tests with the character in the environments to see if they fit in well with the setting or if they contrasted enough or not, as well as to see how the lighting would be on the characters.
Background tests of the first flashback scene in black and white and in normal lighting (Top left and top right image). Background tests of the last scene when the character is talking set at day time and set at night (Bottom left and bottom right).Background tests of the main character talking in the present set at daytime and set at night time
Other changes I made to the backgrounds following feedback were blurring parts of the background so that they don’t take away focus from the main character.
Character designs
Main character – Kaya
For the main character that is being interviewed, named Kaya, I wanted to go for the design of my character was that of a fashionable teenager or young adult with an expressive and sarcastic personality.
As the person I interviewed for my audio was Southeast Asian, I wanted to design a character that was of Asian descent. Thus, I looked to taking inspiration from the designs of characters of Asian descent, particularly Jentry Chau from the series Jentry Chau vs The Underworld, and the character Rinna from the series Win or Lose. I also took further inspiration from actor Greta Lee as an initial reference for designing the character’s face. While designing the main character’s clothes I sought to give her a streetwear inspired aesthetic, particularly with baggy jeans and wide shirts or sports jerseys go give her a casual look.
The mood board I created for the design inspiration of the main characterSketches I did for Kaya’s designThe initial designs of the Kaya and expression sheet and mouth sheet.
For the initial design of the character, I originally had a more detailed design with elements such as a star and stripes on her shirt and details of pockets on her jeans. However, I was advised that these elements would make the character too detailed during animating her so I was advised to simplify the design further.
Final character turnaround for Kaya
Robber
For the design of the robber, I had in mind from the beginning of depicting the robber in a stereotypical robber for comedic effect. When designing his character, I sought to find ways that incorporated elements of his design in interesting ways, such as having his mask and hat merge together and have the line of his cap function as his eyebrows. When designing his body, I wanted to depict him as a sneaky robber so I designed him with a lanky body. I feel that his design was quite successful in having an expressive character that communicates the robber’s personality to the audience. I also feel that his design is a good contrast to the police officer’s design as his lanky design contrasting with the police officer’s stockier proportions would help to depict the difference of power between the two.
The stereotypical image of a robber and actor Jonathan Fairbanks were used as references/visual inspiration for the robberSketches of the robber I didCharacter turnaround and expression sheet I did for the robber
Policeman
Designing the policeman, I focused on making his design accurate to the uniforms of what London policeman wear to make both the character and the setting recognisable as being London. While designing the character, I used actor Omar Epps as a reference when drawing his face and facial expressions. When designing his body, I looked at examples on how to exaggerate his body proportions to give an air of authority or power to him, using character designs from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Mutant Mayhem as reference due to their characters having exaggerated proportions. Thus, while designing the cop, I focused on having him have a wide and stocky torso to give him an imposing figure, and I gave his head angular features to make it more expressive and have a more interesting shape.
Mood board for the inspiration for the policeman’s designSketches of the policeman I didCharacter turnaround and expression sheet for the policeman
X Sheets
X sheets done for the mouth movements in the animation
In this exercise, we were tasked to write our thoughts freely without any planning or any revision and to see what naturally comes out.
For this first practice, I ended up writing about how I perceive the world as an artist, particularly with how I analyse things in my surroundings such as locations and people to find inspiration for my work. Following this, we were told to pick certain words that stood out in our writing and write another entry focusing on those words.
Two words I had chosen were ‘react’ and ‘interact’ which were originally written in regards to how I notice the way people’s personalities interact with each other as part of my observations of the world around me. I chose these words to write deeper into as I feel there is a lot to go into in regards to how I believe relationships are formed as a result of two different personalities reacting to each other.
Media Landscape
For this exercise, we were tasked to take and combine images from magazine scraps and form them into a story together. The instructions were to use metal squares provided to cut out squares out of the images provided. However, I misunderstood the instructions and instead cut out the images not as squares but as their own individual visual elements and ended up creating a collage of my own interpretation of the task. While putting the images together into a narrative, this was the collage of images I created:
I ended up creating a narrative with the theme of ambition and technological progress, as depicted with birds and flight representing a higher goal for humanity to reach and the buildings as the norm/status quo that they are trying to change with the rocket being a symbol of humanity rising above its limitations to reach its ambitions. The following is a journal entry I wrote on the themes I depicted in my collage:
Into the Woods
For this exercise we were tasked to wander in a library and find interesting books that seemed obscure or had been long discontinued. By finding books that were dated or had not been read much/had not been read for a long time, we were to find sources of inspiration from more unique perspectives and understand how ideas changed over time.
Book 1:Advertising and British Art by Walter Shaw Sparrow
I initially chose this book as the look of its worn-out spine stood out to me among the rest of the graphic design books it was placed with. I thought this book would have been interesting to analyse as being a historical book on graphic art would provide an interesting look into what art used to be contemporary and how design trends have changed since then.
Below are my notes on my observations and thoughts about the book as I skimmed through it.
Book 2: Beauty in History by Arthur Marwick
This was the second book I chose to analyse as I felt that a book covering beauty trends throughout history would provide interesting information on how societal and cultural values change over time.
Below are my notes on my observations and thoughts about the book as I skimmed through it.
Book 3: Form magazines
I chose to analyse this series of magazines next as they caught my eye from the bookshelf, particularly with how several of the issues were compiled as loose pages in a folder instead of as individual issues, having long deteriorated from their original state. Upon further digging, I came across a whole collection of the magazines which ranged from the 1940s to the early 2000s. Analysing this magazine series provided me a chance to compare and contrast how the visuals had changed from the earlier publications to the more modern ones with the influence of new technology and design trends. It further provided a look into how cultural and societal norms that the magazine covered had stayed the same or changed throughout the magazine’s lifetime.
Below are my notes on my observations and thoughts about the book as I skimmed through it.
Pseudonym
For this exercise, were tasked with creating a film review for a fictional film by a fictional film director. For the fictional film, I chose to use the plot of an actual story that I am working on for a personal project about two siblings who start a revolution to overthrow a military dictatorship on a fictional island in Southeast Asia. Thus, I was able to use this exercise to provide a critique for myself for what are the possible strengths and flaws my own story writing could have. For the fictional director, I came up with the name of Nguyen Van Khanh to have a director that would be of Southeast Asian descent such as myself and would have used his experience and knowledge of dictatorships and the struggle for democracy in Southeast Asian countries to provide the inspiration for his story.
In our first week of our Monochrome elective, we first began learning and experimenting with patterned animation. We started with tracing charcoal on paper over an electrical sockets to create black and white patterns that we then created a stop motion animation with.
This was the first of several patterned animations we would make as we would then be tasked to observe our environments to find more repeating patterns we could film. First we filmed patterns we could find inside the LCC campus building.
Following this, we were then tasked to film something that was “boring” or “ugly” which I responded with by filming rubbish bins on the street in my neighbourhood.
From these initial tests we were able to gain an initial understanding of the experimental mindset we were going to have while creating our films. From this we were able to understand how find different sources of inspiration where we wouldn’t normally look for it for our work.
When we were designing our characters Ember and Nova, we went through many different versions of how we wanted the character to look. With the characters being space spirits, we were unsure of how much we human or non-human we wanted them to appear.
While creating character designs, I sought inspiration from the character designs of Jayce and Viktor from the series Arcane during which they appeared in an astral form and the character design of White Diamond from the series Steven Universe.
The character designs of Viktor and Jayce were used as inspiration from the series Arcane. Image source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tyV6saTnGz4The character design of White Diamond from Steven Universe was used as inspiration, with the shape of her head particularly influencing the design of Ember. Image source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-da9kcQ10s
With these visual inspirations, we decided upon characters that would have a mostly humanoid look but with minimal facial features.
Ember and Nova’s initial appearance in scrapped storyboards
Something we considered while designing our characters were whether the characters should have visuals or designs on their bodies or whether the bodies should be blank as we had feedback that audience might not be able to differentiate the characters enough.
Sketches I drew of alternative designs for Ember and Nova which featured intricate designs on their bodies.Alternative designs that another group member did which initially imagined more human and more intricate designs for Ember and Nova.
While more intricate designs could have potentially been more interesting, we decided to go back to the initial, more simple designs of the characters as additional details on their bodies would have been distracting and unnecessary. To solve the issue of the audience not being able to differentiate the characters enough, we decided to make use of different colours for each character to make them distinguishable.
Final character turnaround of Ember that I drewFinal head turnaround of Ember that I drewFinal turnaround of Nova that I drewFinal head turnaround of Nova that I drew
Background design and Animation Process
For my scenes, which were mainly the first ten seconds of the film, and afterwards, the kissing scene between Ember and Nova, I used different influences to create the visual design of the backgrounds.
For the opening scene I animated which included multiple shots of the black hole, I sought to emphasise the danger of the void by depicting the black hole as having violent, powerful energy. To do this, I animated the accretion disk/the bands around the black hole as having multiple swirling lights to emphasise the franticness of the black hole. I also depicted the characters as being dwarfed by the black hole to emphasise the size of it. I also chose a blend of dark red/maroon colours to depict the space around the black hole to create an ominous ambience for the environment.
Establishing shot of the black hole that I animated.Close up shot of the black hole I animated which features the main characters being dwarfed by the black hole.
While creating the look of the black hole, the visual appearance of it was inspired by the black hole featured in the film Interstellar.
To animate the black hole, I took visual inspiration from the animated video What if you fall into a Black Hole? by Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell, particularly with how the video animates multiple coloured bands of light spinning rapidly around the centre of the black hole. I chose to depict my black hole in a similar manner with lights spinning around the black hole’s accretion disk to emphasise the chaotic energy of the void.
Black hole visuals from What If You Fall into a Black Hole? by Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell were a source of visual inspiration for how I animated the black hole. Image source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QqsLTNkzvaY
When animating the characters trying to resist the pull of the black hole, I had to find a way to visually convey that they were trying to fight back against the black hole. To do this, I decided to depict the characters as trying to slow down how fast they are being pulled into the black hole. I animated swarms of asteroids flying quickly both behind the characters and in front of them which contrasts against the slower speed of the characters. This helps visually convey that other objects being sucked in rapidly and the characters flying slowly because they are trying to slow themselves down.
While animating the scene of the characters being sucked into the void of the black hole, I sought to depict the visuals as being overwhelming, as well as having a feeling of rapid intensity as the characters are being dragged into the void without any control. To do this, I animated the black hole as having rapidly spinning lights of different flashing colours with a void in the centre that would become larger and consume the characters. I also animated the characters as moving rapidly around the screen and further into the centre to depict them as falling in a chaotic void.
The scenes I animated of Ember and Nova being sucked inside the black hole.
While animating this scene, I took inspiration from the animation of the opening sequence of the series Jentry Chau vs The Underworld, where the protagonist, Jentry Chau, is depicted as falling into a rapidly expanding void. I used this to provide me with a visual understanding of how the characters could appear while being dragged into the black hole.
I also took inspiration from Arcane, particularly the scene where the characters entered the Anomaly and the visuals depicted them being warped and distorted. I used the visuals from that scene to influence how I animated the characters inside the black hole by also having my characters be warped and stretched as they entered the void.
Along with animating the characters being sucked into the black hole, I also animated the characters embracing each other and kissing later on after finding each other inside the black hole.
Concept art I drew depicting Nova approaching a trapped Ember inside the void.
While animating Nova approaching Ember, I had the webbing of the black hole twist and stretch as Ember tried to get closer to Nova. This secondary movement I had done helped to show the characters interacting with the environment around them and thus enhance the scene.
Before the scene where Ember and Nova kiss, I added an extra scene that depicts a brief moment where Ember and Nova look directly at each other and Ember rests his head on Nova’s hand. The addition of this scene was to provide greater emotional emphasis on both the relationship between the two characters and the distress they feel in the situation.
When animating the two characters kissing, I initially had trouble figuring out how to animate it as we needed to show the characters merging together into a bright flash. I tried to find different ways of how to show them bursting into light and having their outlines disappear before settling on having them fully turn into white and having the white expand to the corners of the screen after that.
Animation tests
During the animating of a few scenes, we initially had trouble figuring out how the transfer the rough look of the scene from the animatic to the final version of the film. Because of this, I did a couple of animation tests to help my partners figure out the appearance of their scenes.
Animation test I did of Nova moving inside the black hole
Animation test I did of the black hole exploding at the end
The black hole exploding was particularly trick to figure out at first as we were unsure of how to make it lose its form. So for this scene, I thought to take inspiration from both the appearance and the animation of the Anomaly from Arcane as I felt the warping spherical appearance of the Anomaly would be a good example to visualise how an orb could lose its form.
During the visual development of the film, we faced a few different challenges, most notably, having different group members having different art styles. Because of this, having the characters look visually consistent throughout the film was a significant challenge as different group members visually interpreted the character in different ways with the points on Ember’s head particularly being a challenge for others to draw consistently. We were able to solve this issue by having using character reference sheets so that we all understood how the characters should be drawn, and I also shared with my group members the brushes, the brush size, and the colours I had used to draw the characters so it was consistent throughout.
The story we created is that of two space spirits, named Ember and Nova, who are in love with each other and save each other from a black hole.
Character turnaround of EmberCharacter turnaround of Nova
Throughout the development of our story, we went through many different versions of the story as we initially struggled to have a clear development of the story.
Our initial story was to simply create a visual sequence of two space spirits in love with each other who dance and kiss, forming a star together. However, this initial version of the story lacked an in depth storyline and was merely visuals which would have resulted in a weaker story.
Because of this, we were advised to deepen the story of our characters and create a more engaging story. To do this, we began with creating lore for our characters, providing a backstory for who they are and what drives the story. We created the story of the characters being space spirits who had been separated for ages and were finding each other again. From this, the story evolved to them facing obstacles in order to be reunited together. The two characters would be finding each other, braving a meteor shower in an asteroid field before having a moment of calm and nearly reuniting. As they are about to embrace however, Nova is sucked into a nearby black hole that Ember has to save her from before they finally reunite and are able to dance and kiss.
We found that this initial story was too long however and would not be feasible to create within the thirty seconds we were limited to for this project. With this in mind, we decided to condense the story to only having them being sucked into the black hole as the primary conflict of the story. In this version, the story would open with Ember and Nova seeing each other while circling around a black hole and would approach each other. As their hands are about to touch, nova is suddenly pulled into the black hole, leaving a shocked ember to take in what is happening before dashing off to rescue them from the black hole. In a tense scene with them reaching their arms out to save each other, their hands would slip before they managed to grab each other’s arms. Ember and Nova are then able to save each other and pull each other away from the black hole to embrace and dance before merging into a star together.
It was this stage of the story that we would begin storyboarding it as we were initially most confident with this version. However, we received feedback that the story lacked enough of a struggle. The story was resolved too easily by having Ember simply try harder to save Nova from the pull of the black hole. We also received feedback that Nova being pulled into the blackhole and needing Ember to rescue her made the character lack agency as she was unable to do anything by herself. With this feedback, we decided to change the story again to make it more concise and have both characters have more of an equal role.
A scrapped storyboard that would have initially depicted Ember and Nova’s hands slipping while trying to save each other. This was cut to make the story more concise.A scrapped storyboard from an initial version of the story in which Ember rescues Nova from the black holeA scrapped storyboard that initially had Ember and Nova embracing after escaping the black hole.
Final story version and final animatic
In the final version of the story, we opened the scene immediately in the middle of the conflict as both characters are already trying to escape the pull of the black hole. The story begins with a focus on Ember’s perspective who is trying to save Nova but failing as both end up sucked into the void. From there, the story switches to focus on Nova’s perspective who wakes up inside the black hole and finds Ember trapped in the void. The two characters meet and embrace together, kissing and merging together. They burst into a flash of light which destroys the black hole and leaves a star behind.
The final version of the story features a few major changes from the previous versions we made. A significant change we made was that the story opens immediately in the middle of the conflict and as the two characters are trying to save each other. Beginning the story in the heat of the action allows us to provide a concise telling of the characters’ backstories as by showing that the two characters are trying to save each other, they already have a relationship and are connected to each other. Another significant change we made is that we have the characters fail to save each other and are sucked into the black hole instead, as well as embracing each other while trapped in the black hole. This allows us to subvert the audience’s expectations as the characters resolve the conflict by accepting their fates together instead of having an easy solution to escape the conflict. Also, with this version of the story, we were able to have both characters have equal active roles. The first half of the film shows Ember’s efforts to save Nova and the latter half of the film provides Nova with an equal role as she seeks out Ember to comfort him. With this, we were able to have both characters try to save each other rather than only having one be dependent on the other to save them.
