'Cliff' Production Blog 9/04/2011

Once again I have avoided updating for a few days. This is because as work becomes more intense there is more need for sleep, also i had uni on friday so there was less work to take note of.
First off, yesterday I officially completed 2 minutes of production.
This means i have two minutes of animatic developed into polished/ish animation. The reason i got a minute completed in one week is because i have stopped putting in as much detail in some of the artwork and also the animation itself. There will be less inbetweens and not as many shadows for the rest of the film.
Reasons for this are

• They slow production down
• They were useful for starting off the film, hopefully getting people excited for the rest of the story. Once they are in the story they will not notice this lack of detail.

Something else that is speeding up production is that i am reusing backgrounds. Some backgrounds are just a green field i can place right in the background. Eager obvserves may notice it in almost every shot following the introduction.

When i worked on the sunset scenes it was important to turn my animations into graphics so I could easily darken them.
Since then i have used this technique to brighten, colour and darken characters and sets through production. In the night time scenes i did for Cliff stuck at the bottom of the ditch, i made him and his surroundings much darker. This means i can just use the colours i usually use for the clothing and backgrounds and then change them slightly for the mood. This is a very useful way to get through drawing different settings.


Here Tam is showing her emotional side by reminding Cliff that he does not have a mind. Both characters are lit up slightly in yellow to show the sunlight glaze over them.

When Cliff falls down the hill he gains a small cut on his knee. I decided to show the pain it gave him, so the audience has even more sympathy for this small voiceless boy.


The image above is when Cliff finds his way out of there, he sees a tall green plant. He then uses it to shake, to get Tam's attention above.
As the picture shows, i used the blur tool to bring the plant in focus for the audience. To show it's relevence on screen and for the story.


- Nathan Viney