1st week back home

This week Luca and I worked on animation and artwork respectively. Scott sent over a couple of bits of animation (before leaving for Annecy) for the apple in shot 3a and 4, which Luca modified to make them work in the film. Luca than continued with the animation of the apple.

We're really busy and it's been a lot of late nights, but it's all coming together dare I say. I have been working on the wondrous plant in shot 6. (See above picture) It's made up of photos of roses and compasses (for the centres) all modified, cut up and reassembled in Photoshop. For the leaves I've used eyes from religious icon paintings, and for the trunk I drew a shape freehand on the computer and then overlayed a texture of peeling paint on wood that I like. I'm quite pleased with it. I also completed the umbrella tree design and the advertising sign, and Luca hopped off apple animation duties for a bit to design and create the rainbow in Illustrator.

We were thinking about the title this week, and decided that it should be on the branch that the apple sits on. So I scoured the Dafont website and selected some free fonts that we really liked. I then tried them out on the branch in various different colours. So we now have our title, and it's all very exciting.

Everything is set for the sound recording session on Tuesday. Barney is travelling down to London on Monday after work, and we are booked in at 'We Write Music' first thing in the morning. After that I'll go to see Chris to do a session on the SFX, so then we should be almost there with the sound. Cool.

Our last day working in Caerleon

I worked on the vegetable patch, the clouds, the skull and the salmon cigarette cards; and Luca continued animation.

Scott came in for a bit to do some animation. He is going to try to do some for us over the weekend.

We are going to see the student show tonight, and then we're driving back to London tomorrow.

Thursday - Producing

We decided that we need a more powerful computer to render on back in London so I called Slinky about borrowing one. They agreed to help us out, so that's great. We'll probably pick it up at the end of next week.

I spoke to Christopher about the sound and I will probably go round to his after the recording session, on the 10th, to fine tune the sound effects.

The students are really busy with setting up their show, so we are just ploughing on.

I continued with the umbrella plant and the vegetable patch, and Luca carried on with animation of the apple.

Music update

Today I called Barney, and Oli at We Write Music to try and organize a recording date in London. We need to record the two guitars and mix them together. Then the sound effects (created by Christopher Wilson) will be mixed in with this. We have pencilled in first thing on Tuesday the 10th of June for the recording session.

I designed the Zebra today, and Luca continued animating the apple on the sea.

Vicky continued animating the fighting crabs. Scott came in to give us the animation of the apple in shot 2 - the neon signs.

Guess what. . . we worked in the evening after dinner.

The mountains

Today I designed the mountains. I found some old maps online and altered one of them, then I drew the mountain outlines in ink, scanned them in and composited everything together in Photoshop. I am quite pleased with the result. I also drew the orchard graphic in ink; and prepared these pieces of artwork to go into After Effects comp. Vicky started animating the fighting crabs.

In the evening, we carried on working. . . . I feel that this is going to be a nightly fixture in our schedule this week! I painted more of the sign, and Luca continued animation and compositing.

Back to Wales

We arrived back in Caerleon at 2pm-ish, got our stuff up to the room and headed over to E6 to start work.

I continued sourcing material for the 'wonders' section designs. And Luca carried on with animation. There aren't many students around today because they are starting to set up their graduation show. But we just need to push on with things.

After dinner, we sat and worked in the room for a few hours. I worked on the advertising sign - painting it up. Luca animated the first seagull.

More of the same, from the shed

Today we continued where we left off yesterday. I made the ocean liner look a bit more sophisticated, as the first design I did looked a little bit too children's book-ish, and we want to avoid this if possible. I elongated it, making it less rotund and put some 'windows' along the side. For the seagull, I made two different drawings, one for shot 4 at the port, and one for shot 6 'the wonders'. The bird in shot 4 will be animated using the puppet tool in After Effects and so is just a flat illustration; whereas the bird in shot 6 is a bit more sophisticated, having separate wings to give it a slightly wider range of movement. Of course everything animated in After Effects is 'cut-out' but the puppet tool is a new feature which can add a bit of a new dimension to things-it's worth taking a look at.

Luca continued with animation on the apple.

Tomorrow we're off to a wedding in Italy for a few days. And then back to Newport to find out if there is any gossip form the May Ball.