Design Practice

Final decision.

I realised I can't ponder over this forever and I need to make a final decision.
Although all the lyrics may not be completely appropriate, I feel that the title sequence using the Paolo Nutini song would keep the audience attention more than the MGMT song would.

Therefore. I am going to finally properly export my title sequence using 'Pencil full of lead' - Paolo Nutini.

Musical choices...

After realising that I didn't like the music or think it was completely appropriate anymore, I went on to think about what music would be appropriate?
Taking into account my title sequence subject 'Top 10 Celebrity stories of 2009' I thought it would be more 'fitting' to use a track that was released in 2009 to give it more context.

I looked at a few sites such as:
Spotify's Top 100 Tracks of 2009
Itunes Top selling singles and albums of 2009
NME 50 Best tracks of 2009

From these, I listened to a few different songs and chose some that I thought might work and put them with my animation...

'Boom Boom Pow' - Black Eyed Peas

I chose this one mainly because it was such a well known track of 2009 and the beat might have worked with the animation...however...

...after putting it with the animation, I doesn't work as well as I expected - Its too 'hard'?

'Pencil Full of Lead' - Paolo Nutini

I chose this because its upbeat and therefore, goes with the tone of my title sequence.
I do think it works quite well, but its quite lyric heavy...and not all the lyrics are particularly appropriate; but I do think the last line 'Nothings gonna get me down' is fitting as the subject is about tabloid stories and celebrities always claim they won't 'let the stories get them down' (Jordan in particular...)

'Paparazzi' - Lady Gaga

Once again, another iconic track of 2009; The nature of the song - Paparazzi, fits well with the subject matter however I think the song worked better on paper in terms of lyrical content (See below video) etc, than in reality...it doesn't flow as well as I'd hope with the title sequence.

Lady Gaga - Paparazzi
We are the crowd
We're coming out
Got my flash on it's true
Need that picture of you
It's so magical
We'd be so fantastic, oh

Leather and jeans
Garage glamorous
Not sure what it means
But this photo of us
It don't have a price
Ready for those flashing lights
'Cause you know that baby I-

I'm your biggest fan
I'll follow you until you love me
Papa-Paparazzi
Baby there's no other superstar
You know that I'll be your-
Papa-Paparazzi

'Don't Stop' - InnerPartySystem

Not particularly a huge track of the year, but it was released in 2009. I really expected this to work with the title sequence because of the tempo and lyrics especially; in terms of lyrical content (See below video) I think this one works best, however...once again, I'm not sure about it as a whole.

InnerPartySystem - Don't Stop
The road I walk is paved in gold
To glorify my platinum soul
I'll buy my way to talk to God
So he can live with what I'm not.

The selfish blood runs through my vains
I gave up everything for fame
I am the life that you adore
I feed the rich and fuck the poor.

I got, you want
It's just, don't stop
I got, you want
It's just, don't stop.

This is entertainment
Lives are entertainment
You are down on your knees
Begging me for more.

'Kids' - MGMT

These were quite a big success in 2009, and this song was originally released in 2008 but it found more success in 2009. Admittedly, with the lyrics its not exactly relevant however the section of the song I have used has no lyrics, and overall, I think this probably works best with upbeat tempo, the melody is contemporary and recognisable and works with the pace of the title sequence.

Final Title Sequence (I think)

Finally I've put it all together and initially...I am really happy with it (Although the good quality exported one for the DVD is jumping all the time?? Hmm.)
BUT! I'm not sure about the music anymore?
I'm gonna 'listen' around for a better soundtrack, I'm just glad I completed the animation side of it in enough time to realise that the soundtrack could be better!
*Also, Originally the magazine was completely static when it had zoomed into one of the stories but it seemed 'boring' and...still, as it was, so I simply added some slight movement to it and I feel this makes it more visually engaging.

Final storyboard

Final Title sequence decision...

While playing around on After Effects last night and looking at some of my storyboards...I was thinking about my final title sequence and the fact that I had decided I was going to show the animations for each story in descending order of the top 10...

Then :
I turned on MTV last night and it had a 'top songs of...' type of show on and the title sequence showed vector images of some of the artists but Not particularly in the order that they were in the top 10 which made me think about other similar shows and they don't usually show them in order, probably so it doesn't give too much about the show away, for example:

In this title sequence for 'Most Annoying people of 2009', Lady Gaga appears first but she isn't the number 1 most annoying Or the least annoying on the countdown...

So :
I made the 'executive' decision that I will Not show the stories in order on the title sequence I will 'mix it up' a little.
...and for this, I need to update my storyboard :)

Test Pieces -

After effects tests pieces for seperate animations and the headline/title.

VMA’s / Kanye story opening;

Tiger Woods;

Tiger woods Women;

RATM ;

Lady Gaga;

Writing and headline

Top 10;

of 2009;

Flashing headline;

Christian bale development;

Final Christian Bale;

2D to 3D to 2D Rationale -

Brief -
Reproduce a 2D drawing in 3D and then reproduce that as a 2D photograph.

Who needs to know?
General public - but probably not church-goers.

What do they need to know? -
A hat is exclaiming on a church.

What will they respond to? -
A3 photograph.

What research is required? -
Primary - Churches and hats.
Secondary - 2D to 3D to 2D?...

Scale/Frame/Format - Eye Chart feedback -

Issues Raised -
Maybe don't as many rows - bottom ones are less visible. Could just have 5?

Action to be taken -
Could take away a few rows.

General feedback -
- Looked digital - impressed that it was handrawn.
- Good choice of colour.

Eyechart #2 - Final

My final decision was that I didn't really want to print out my final (unless the hand-drawn one looked Awful) but I feel my decision to hand-draw it was appropriate to my object - a biro as it is a drawing tool...therefore I went with this.

The composition printed on 4 A4's to trace;

It was quite a time consuming process, obviously a lot longer
than it would have been to draw one, scan it and copy and
paste it (i'm not saying this a bad way to do it by any means!)
but I am pleased with my end piece so I feel it was worth it (I hope)

This need re-photographing but it illustrates
the final piece...

Although I am happy with the piece...I can already predict that my feedback will be that a lot of the lines aren't readable from 20ft; this is my own fault...but I still like it :)

Eyechart #1

Soo...my object that I got from the randomiser was a Biro. Quite a nice, simple, recognisible object.

I took a few photos to decide how I wanted the
pen (i.e. lid off...lid on top etc.)
I didn't spend long with lighting and things but I was
simply documenting the shape of a pen...

I created vectors of a couple of the pens...but as I mentioned in my research post, I thought I wanted to move away from vectorised images...but I tried it out anyway...but I'm not gonna use them...

From my photo of the pen with the lid on top, I created a few different compositions that I intend to print off and trace:

When I first did the above 2, I was a little dis-heartened as I thought 'is this all I can do?' but then I rotated the origina image and played around with it and was a lot happier with what I could do...

I think the examples above do still stick to the conventions of an eye chart in terms of scale etc. but they are a Lot more visually engaging than the first 2 layout examples.

However, after some deliberation...I decided the composition and layout below is the one that I will work with;

Final Crit.

'Scene' -

From the last crit, I took the advice to play around with the colours and background/tablecloth on my 'scene' for the animation; For the colours I took inspiration from the Juno title sequence as I think the subtle, rather than vivid in your face colours really work there and in this instance, I feel it still reflects a celeb magazine as it is represting last years stories (old stories) so the colours are 'worn'.

(* there is only supposed to be one slice of toast of the plate but
when I saved it as a jpeg. all the layers showed up...)

(Original)

- The animations will go into the grey areas seen on the magazine, apart from the top right hand corner where - due to the animation I'm using, it has to go on top.
- As it is evident, the full title for the proposed programme isn't seen on this screen shot - This is because it is 'written' at the end in a similar way to the following animation but (obviously) a lot more 'polished' - It will read 'Top 10 (Celeb stories) of 2009'

Animations -

The quality is...quite awful because its youtube and I didn't export them at the highest resolution.

Tiger Woods test -

MJ test -

Chris Brown and Rihanna test -

Brittany Murphy test -

SuBo test (for some reason this is
playing really fast...it isn't meant to and won't
on the final lol)-

Jordan and Peter test -

Kanye West storms VMA's test -

RATM and Joe McElderry test -

(There are earlier posts on my blog which kind of show what I am doing with the Lady Gaga story and Christian Bale story but I haven't exported more tests yet)

Music Choice -

DVD Interface -
I wanted to keep my interface pretty simple as it isn't seen for a long time, it is just used to direct the audience around the DVD but it still reflects my design direction.

I'm still kind of undecided as to whether or not to include the star strip (seen on the first image below) - I could animate this coming across and make it more visually engaging, but I don't know if it would be appropriate.

Below is a rough mock up of how the start menu could look - The typeface is the one which I used on my title sequence, however in this case i'm not sure if its too informal?
I intend to play around with the colour of the type and possibly add textures similar to which I used in my title sequence.

The sequence of images below shows how I intend to show progression through the sub-menus (i.e. When you click on 'Top 10' it takes you to another menu etc.)
Its a simple idea but I think it works quite well, is light hearted and quite funny.

So...5 Questions I would like response to:
1- Do you think my music choice is appropriate to the subject matter?

2- Do you think the mixture of animation styles will let the sequence down?

3- Are the colours on the magazine layout working, as apposed to my original more vivid colour pallette?

4- Is the typeface used for the DVD interface appropriate or too childish?

5- Are the DVD interfaces too simple?

Thankyou...x

Storyboards for screen shot stop frames...

Screen shot storyboards of some of the animations I will do using video screen shots:

Michael Jackson story;

Newspapers I will use for end of Michael Jackson animation;

Subo;

After effects experiment...

So, quickly just to see if it worked - After I had prepared one of my images with seperate layers etc. I took it into after effects to try something out quickly -
it has worked exactly how I had hoped; to look a little like a dummy/puppet, as I feel its quite humorous...on the final, type (words etc) will be coming out of his mouth...

Stop frame...

For some of the animations for the seperate stories I intend to use stop frame animation using stills from existing videos, so it will somewhat look like a piece of video footage but ultimately...it won't be.

The videos that I will use as reference / to take stills from will be:

Chris Brown and Rihanna perform at 2007 VMA's