"Snowfall" - My Statement of Intent

Statement of Intent: Capstone Graphic Novel Project

For my Capstone, I will be creating a graphic novel. Monica Larson will be my director on this project. I am very interested in graphic novel to big screen adaptation (either live action or animation), so I would like to make a video of my illustrations with the character’s voices, sound effects and music added.

My graphic novel is “Snowfall.” The story centers around the fantastical and frightening adventures of a girl named Snow, the abandoned daughter of a fierce ice monster whose reign of terror has nearly brought the world they live in to its knees. When a powerful, but desperate politician learns of Snow’s existence, he sets after her to exploit powers he believes her to have. Snow is on the run now, encountering Gods, creatures, and new friends. Joined by Rigby, her goldfish, Strongheart, her guard dog and a rare bird named Bertie, Snow must overcome her fears, control her strengths and face her mother in a final battle that threatens to destroy them all.

"Snowfall" Character Concept Sketches

“Snowfall” has been taking shape over the last few years. The story deals with themes of family (particularly adoptive family), sacrifice, power/corruption and courage. I’m planning to work with Comic Life and draw the illustrations myself. In my final presentation of my work, I would like to also include concept sketches and a small “making of” type video elaborating more on the story, characters and how I put together the graphic novel, as well as a video featuring illustrations with voice, sound effects and music. I would edit the film in iMovie or After Effects.

This story is influenced strongly by dark fantasy films, such as “Return to Oz,” “Pan’s Labyrinth,” “Never-Ending Story,” “The Fall,” and “Spirited Away” as well as classic fantasy tales like “Alice in Wonderland” and “Wizard of Oz” and Greek mythology. The story is also influenced by memories from my own childhood and life experiences. Though this story features a child as the main character and has elements of magic and whimsy, the story also has some very scary/adult elements in it. This book would probably be best suited young adults. Once I finish with this project, I would like to look into sending this off to be published (my fantasy would be for it to be adapted as an animated or live action movie.)  

Graveyard Analysis

I find After Effects to be a complex program and, as newcomer to this branch of film-making, I have found it challenging when working on of our projects so far. So when it comes to working on this project, I realistically see all aspects of this film (masking, rotoscoping, day to night, etc.) as being potentially difficult for me, but if there is going to be one thing that I think will be the most difficult, it will be the adding the green-screened zombie to the graveyard footage. 

I think that this scene would not only be technically difficult, but I am worried about getting the zombie footage to look natural against the graveyard footage, so it synchs up well together and giving the zombie enough room to move around in. I don’t want there to be a lack of space and my zombie’s arm just disappears off frame or goes through where a tree or a headstone is.   

When it came to storyboarding my project, I tried not to make the scene with the actual zombie too complex for me to work with, but there is a enough there to give it some visual interest.

One problem that I noticed with some of the footage and my storyboarding is that there is a lack of space for the character to move in. I will have to really work around that to make the footage of a character moving within the space seem natural. I will probably have to tinker around a bit and work on panning and zooming in on certain areas to make it seem as if there is more space.

However, if this is a problem that I really can’t work around, my storyboards can always be re-worked to accommodate my work. No reason to make it more difficult in this project.

All things considered, though, I am really interested in the horror genre so this type of project is right of my alley and with Halloween coming up, I look forward to working on this project.

Ray Harryhausen

Often artists, animators and filmmakers will reference their own body language and facial features when creating a character to make the movements more realistic, sophisticated and something that the audience will be more willing to buy into. Adding even small gestures and expressions can convey character and personality, which is especially vital to a character that has no dialogue, like, say, a dinosaur or a skeleton warrior or a six-armed octopus.

Ray Harryhausen, one of the greatest visual effects creators in film history, built his entire career (and legacy) on the understanding of what would bring fantasy and imagination to life on the big screen in the way that was real for the viewer.

Ray would throw himself into his work, often acting alongside actors and directing on set though the sequences he had already storyboarded and would be animating later. Directors often would disapprove of Ray working on set, unsure of why exactly he was there. Ray would work in place of where the monster would be and provide direction to the actors, who would be working with little more than a drawing and Ray’s direction.

Caroline Munro remembers working with Ray on the set of “The Golden Voyage of Sinbad.”

“Working with Ray Harryhausen was the most amazing experience for me. I was a very unknown actress and had never worked with his stop motion animation. There was nothing to work with. Ray used to us these wonderful drawings that he’d done. He’d say, ‘Now this is what you’re going to be reacting to, but it’s not a drawing. It’s a real life huge, enormous creature.’”

Munro continued by adding that during one sequence where her character faced one of his fiecersome creatures, “His eye-line was a stick so he’d have this stick and on the end of this stick, he’d drawn this eye, which for me was the centaur’s eye and Ray would wield the eye.”

Martine Beswick, actress in "One Million Years BC" recalls an instance with Ray on set. “I remember one scene when these pterodactyls were coming over us, and we didn’t know this, we didn’t see this, but Ray got onto a flat bed truck and drove in front of us while we in our little wet, skimpy pieces of leather brandished our spears at these things.”

Harryhausen’s dedication to bringing his vision to life shows through not only in his work on his many models and drawings, but in his directing and acting. Ray’s gift for breathing life and character into creatures built his career and his legacy.

Week Two

As the last day of my second week at Motion Masters comes to a close, I want to reflect on the projects that I have been working on so far.

Monday was mostly office work. I worked on writing up the distances of possible shooting locations from each other so that I could map out which locations were closest together. This will make it easier to map out shooting days based on how close everything is. 

Tuesday was very busy. Motion Masters is working on an educational video about communication “”do’s and don’ts.” One of the segments involves what to do in a professional video chat. The location we traveled and filmed at was our talent’s house.

My coworkers, my fellow intern and I set up in the kitchen and filmed for several hours. On this shot, I got a chance to work primarily with the lighting equipment, which is something I don’t have as much experience with, so it was really a very rewarding feeling to feel that I knew what I was doing. 

On Wednesday, I pitched my idea for a company promo to promote Motion Masters. My idea takes a quote from the company’s website front page as inspiration. The website is very clear on the importance of story-telling to get your idea across. I connected the idea of clients telling stories to fairytale characters (stories of their own) coming in to “tell their stories” by pitching ideas to Diana Walko, our CEO. 

I sketched out several little storyboards the day before so that my coworkers could see what I meant when I described certain shots. While I wrote up a script, I know that visualization is very important and I like to draw out what I am thinking. Getting all of the ideas on paper in a sketched out form is just as important to me as writing it all down in script-form. 

Today’s shoot was at the Capitol Market in Charleston. I got a chance to work with the company’s Red camera today. This camera produces footage with a cinematic quality to it. We are shooting for a documentary about the state and some of the most beautiful places to visit here. The Capitol Market sells all sorts of flowers, trees and other greenery you could want as well as fruits and vegetables.

My coworkers and I set up the camera on the dolly and did quite a few tracking shots of the long rows of flowers and food. My fellow intern, Jillian, and I got to take turns pushing the dolly and focusing the camera. At one point, Jillian even climbed onto the dolly (which is not very large) and was focusing while our coworker pushed it.

I also handed out release forms to the people that were on camera, put away the camera and tripod, and helped set up the van.

This has been a very busy week at Motion Masters and I look forward to the projects that I will be working on in the coming weeks. 

A link to the Capitol City Market website: http://www.capitolmarket.net/

Motion Masters: Back Again!

“MotionMasters is your creative partner in telling tales in print and on film, video, the web, CD-ROM or DVD, and you’re in good company when you work with us. Hospitals, advertising agencies, tourism, higher education, financial institutions, government agencies and manufacturers…we’ve been showcasing our clients’ stories since our founding on Groundhog Day in 1987. See more at: http://motionmasters.com/#sthash.siB2WPWi.dpuf” 

On Monday I began my second summer of interning with Motion Masters, a video production firm in my home town of Charleston, WV. Because last summer was such a fun and educational experience, I was happy to return to work with them!

Motion Masters specializes in conceptualizing, creating and filming advertisments, documentaries, educational films and much more. I really enjoyed interacting with my coworkers and the assignments that I was given to work on.

I was taken on many shoots to film. Motion Masters creates commercials for the local theme park, Camden Park, and I was taken along to help in the production of a new commercial. The crew and I drove to the park and filmed our hired “family” to run around the park. We needed footage of the new attraction, “The Rattler,” and I was happy to take our new GoPro camera onto the ride and get POV shots of people riding the ride. I ended up in the final edit of the commercial, as well as on their facebook page with my fellow intern, Bennet: https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10152147442449022&set=vb.56846824021&type=2&theater

I also was on camera a few other times, when an extra was needed in an educational film. I was filmed typing and in other scene I was being “interviewed.” When I wasn’t on camera, I was behind the scenes, sitting in on editing, picking music tracks and sound effects for videos and helping out on more video shoots.

My favorite thing about working with Motion Masters last summer was that I was given my own big project and a lot of creative freedom! I was assigned to create a promo video for the firm. I spent weeks storyboarding, looking up props and costumes and auditioning dogs. Seriously! Here is the final product: http://motionmasters.com/unleash-your-creativity/

I was also director, writer, location scout for that project, as well sitting in on the editing process. It was such an exciting experience to work as a director. Working with the actors (human AND canine) was my favorite part and something I hope to do again.  

I am really looking forward to the projectst that I will be a part of this summer and I will write about my experiences this first week in my next blog post.

Check out the Motion Masters website here: http://motionmasters.com/

Motion Masters Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/MotionMasters/56846824021

The Sound of Star Wars: Attack of the Clones

The documentary on the sound design of "Star Wars: Episode II" was really very interesting. As a film maker, I love watching behind the scenes featurettes. Seeing what it took to make the final product (and what a laborious process it is), only teaches me and makes me appreciate the film even more. 

I think the most interesting part for me was seeing the objects used to make sound effects. I love the use of objects that you would never suspect to be used, like an antique air raid siren that was used to make sound effects for the speeders in a chase sequence near the beginning of the film or the squishing up of a grapefruit to make the effects of the centipede creatures that crawl along the floor. I've seen documentaries on the original Star Wars trilogy and I think it's fascinating seeing how the sound designers utilize everyday items and stock effects to create iconic sounds like Chewy's growls, the lightsabers or the lasers coming from the X-wings and TIE fighters.

I also am a huge fan of Frank Oz and to see him do Yoda's voiceover was a real treat for me. He's such a talented actor, puppeteer and director, that just even getting to watch him perform was exciting and interesting for me. 

I learned a ton about the process and work that these sound designers put into creating the sounds for just one scene. The work that is put into just even little details in a sequence, like the movement of a machine or footsteps or background noise is astounding and, again, makes me appreciate the hard work that the creative team does.

As far as critiquing the documentary, I don't have much in the way of constructive criticism. I think perhaps it could have been shortened a little in places (some of the interviews were a little long I felt), but overall, I think that this documentary is well made, informative and interesting, especially for a Star Wars fan like myself.

Editing the Digital Signal

                 One of the main points in chapter one is that, while sound acts on physical principles, it has psychological effects on humans as well. The point that Alten is making is that we, as humans, perceive sound in a way that we understand on an emotional level. In my MIDI project, the beginning of my project is supposed to sound dark and confused, full of static, with bits of sound clips and special effects playing as if a radio is being tuned. In particular there is a brief sound clip with a violin playing. I liked the ominous effect of the sound and kept it in to contribute to the confusion of the opening.
               In chapter seventeen, a main point is: "an effective interactive-sound design creates an immersive environment through which a user can travel and explore." As I was designing my MIDI project, I wanted to create an environment for the listener of my song. I had a concept that the beginning would sound like a space ship taking off, with the pilot turning the radio on. This would lead into the song as if the station had been tuned to it. With the sound effects that I selected, I attempted to create an environment for the listener of my project. 

               In chapter twenty-four, Alten points out the importance of production values. Production values: "relate to the material's style, interest, color and inventiveness."  Good production value draws you into the project and move you. With my MIDI project, I attempted to create a sound that came across as a professionally made product with decent production value. Because I was working with free resources, I felt a lot of creative freedom to create something that was creative, stylish, interesting and inventive.