Scene 8

This scene was difficult not because of the animation itself but rather than many different elements in it that needed to work together at the same time. I can see why animated TV series often have so many production errors at the time of broadcasting, it's surprisingly easy to forgot something when you have so much to worry about at once.







I started with the kite since that's the main focus of the scene, ensuring it appears to get larger as it fills the screen before disappearing.



I then started on the hair, making it into a symbol layer so the frames would loop throughout the scene without me having to copy/paste them several times. I did the same for the coat and hat.





Next I started animating the string and key, which proved to be trickier than I expected... I found it difficult to get the string to follow the correct arc while appearing to get closer to the screen, so that took a fair bit of trail and error to get right.



Once I was satisfied with the string movement I animated the key, making sure it flicks out properly as the end of the string moves. Finally I added the kite tail, which follows the same dynamics as the string but was a lot easier to get right due to it being shorter and visible for fewer frames.

Scene 7

Due to this scene being a mostly static shot (in terms of character animation), I spent a lot of time animating the hair in order to make sure it flows as smoothly as possible in the breeze so the audience will have something to focus on while Tizz is just staring at the sky. To be honest I probably spend too much time animating the hair... but I think it really paid off as it looks like it's flapping gently rather than blowing wildly like in the other scenes, which took a lot more care, attention, and frames. The coat was easy in comparison.





Next came the body jerk as she's overwhelmed by a sudden gust of wind (the one about the blow the kite away). Again had to act this out myself several times to get the feel of it, including pulling numerous slow motion facial expressions int he mirror which must have made me ook quite demented. I think what I've done works, but it looks like it stops a little abruptly with the hair and coat blowing rapidly int he wind to compliment it... Though I'm fairly certain from all the times I've acted it out that it she doesn't require any further bodily animation, so I'll just have to trust my instincts and wait until I have time to add the rest of the hair to see the shot fully working.

Scene 6

I started simply tweening the pan of the background to get the timing of the sot right with the music.



I decided to add a slight bounce in time with the music to the end of the camera pan to make it seem as though it's being filmed with a hand-help camera, or perhaps even through the eyes of the viewer (as when you suddenly throw your head back, there's always a slight recoil). I think this makes the scene feel lot more genuine and less stiff. I also tweened he basic kite movement, again to work out the timing and exact path I wanted it to take in the sky before animating properly.



The animated kite. I exaggerated the curve on it as it's blowing upwards to give a sense of perspective, as well as the power behind the surge of wind carrying it.



Next I animated the body trowing the kite upwards, then the clothes and hat blowing around it.



Added the hair, string and the kite tail whilst on the ground. FOr the string I purposefully made the parts that connect to the kite waver slightly to try to give a sense of depth (I want the string to seem like it's beneath the kite from that angle) and to make it seem as thought he wind's affecting it separately.



Last but not least, the kite tail. I found animating the tail and the string a lot more difficult that I thought it would, as i had to ensure they each flowed from side to side with different rhythms and timings sue to their different lengths and heights in the sky. I soon learnt that while they move similarly, they both obey two very different laws of physics.

Scene 4

Despite seeming like a relatively simple scene, this shot proved to be a complete and utter pain in the backside, mostly due to the issues of timing and camera movement. I had to listen to Stefan's score constantly while animating to ensure that I timed the sudden camera movement up to her eyes perfectly with the dramatic change in music. This proved to be a challenge but also a great learning experience for syncing and working with sound in general.



For the counting lip movements I imported the video reference of me counting and rotoscoped the lips, then went back and made adjustments to the shapes, exaggerating the moth in order to fit with my far more cartoony character.



I then adjusted the positions of the lips for each frame to match up with the bobbing up and down of the head.



Added hair and eye movement to show the change in the tilt of the head as it moves up and down.



Scales everything up to the correct zoomed in position on screen to match the storyboard.



Animated the surprised blink of the eyes and the camera shoots up to focus on them.





Animated the smiling change of expression as a symbol, allowing me to easily tween the camera pulling out at the same time.



Finally added the arms, string, and key, making sure to animate the key slightly as she tightens the string around it.

Scene 2

This short scene wasn't too difficult to do, though a little more time consuming than I initially though due to the extra care and attention I gave to her facial expressions due to this being a very close up shot. I also did't want the hair to seems stiff and lifeless, so I made it bounce as she looks back to exaggerate the sharpness of the movement. Personally I'm pleased wit the outcome, I love how something as simple as a little secondary animation to the hair can bring a whole new depth to a shot. It really shows that a little extra effort can go a long way.



The scene fully coloured.



Fully coloured with background. All the backgrounds for my animation are courtesy of my awesome background artist Roshni Kakad, a second year from my course who is helping me as part of her Professional Practice module. I sent her all of my research concerning environmental concept and we had a lengthy discussion about my ideas and exactly what I wanted to achieve with the visual style, and I'm pleased to say she's responded exceptionally well. Her lovely painterly style is exactly what I wanted to take the edge of the hard colours and outlines of Flash, making the entire animation look a lot more aesthetically pleasing I think. Having her work on the background will save me a lot of time I can use for animating, which is naturally the area I most want to focus on, and I also really love her use of colour.

Scene 1

Easily the longest and most painful scene in the entire film, this opening shot took me about a month to animate fully. Ridiculous, I know, but the amount of time and effort I spend on all te little details in this shot will hopefully make it all worthwhile. I really wanted to give it my all as this is the opening sequence; so it not only serves as an introduction to the plot but also to Tizz as a character as well. I want her to capture the hearts of the audience from the moment her face appears on screen, so I spend days working on her facial expressions alone. Looking back there were plenty of opportunities where I could have gotten away with just holding one facial expresion for a few seconds (she's only staring at a bottle, after all) to save myself time, but I wanted to breath as much heart and soul into her as physically possible. Such a close up shot demands attention to detail, I has to ensure her face never distorts, that her eyes track the bottle as she moves around it, that her hair always falls and curls correctly around her face and on the ground, that her body movements are convincingly realistic despite being confined to such a small screen... These are all things I thought about constantly.

One of the main challenges I face was when she moves around to the opposite side of the bottle. This seems simple in theory, but in practice it was actually quite difficult to pull off due to the proportions of my character. While it's perfectly plausible for her to be able to do what I envisioned with her design, it isn't possible for a normal human (at least not an inflexible one such as myself) to physically crouch and move in such manner. And since I can only understand such movements well enough to animate them convincingly by acting them out myself... you can see my problem. Thank full I managed to get through it thanks to a mixture of trail and error and sheer perseverance on the acting front, and I'm pleased with the result. I wanted her to seem curious and cat-like as she moved around the bottle, which I think she pulls off quite well. This scene really showcases her quirky and inquisitive nature.



Started by tweening the bottle into the shot to get the timing of the 'camera' pulling out.



I used the frames from my run cycle for the feet running in the background to save a bit of time. I then started animating the body and face first without any clothes or hair to ensure I got the actions and expressions perfect. I believe facial expressions and body language are the two most important aspects of character acting, hair and clothes are nice but secondary in comparison.













I think animating the body first was extremely beneficial when it came to animating the clothes, as I could easily see were the coat sleeves should fall without having the guess where the arms were inside and such. This made drawing realistic clothing folds much similar and in turn helps my my animation that bit more believable.



Here I decided to try giving her a cheekily determined expression wit her eyebrows furrowed as she pushes herself up, but I soon decided I didn't like this idea... At this stage she hasn't fully formulated the capturing lightning plan, she's still very much in the moment of discovery and I don't want her to lose the look of sweet awe and innocence just yet. I think if I did it would detract from scene 4 when we see her smile deviously after the lightning first strikes, that should be the moment the audience first realises she has something big in mind and is not just your ordinary everyday little girl.



The hair was especially tricky for two reasons. One, curly hair is hard. I thought my character's long straight hair from SS1 was difficult to animate, but it was nothing in comparison even though Tizz's hair is much shorter. The curls make everything complicated, especially in terms of weight, thickness, and how the curls should rub along side each other. I want her hair to seem like is has a good body to it, it needs to appear thick and fluffy with decent weight. I tried to present this by always drawing the locks full and round rather than having lots of thin little strands flying away on their own.



Here's the final scene in colour.

Run Cycle

Since she'll be running downhill I didn't want this to be be an ordinary upright run cycle, she needs to look panicked and desperate and like she running all out, perhaps even struggling to keep her balance a little from the speed of running downhill. With that in mind I adapted a basic run example from the Animators Survival Kit to fit Tizz's needs, only making her center of gravity a little lower than usual so she looks like she's running closer to the ground. This will also compensate for the lack of arms to balance her, as she'll be clutching the bottle in both hands. I tried to make it look as though her head and shoulders/upper body are swinging left and right as she runs to supplement this as well.









I also took the time the make her mouth open and close a little so it appears she's gasping for breath as the cycle loops.