Approaching the End, Animation Troubles

So here’s the first animation I completed. This took a long time not because getting the practical animation done was difficult, but because it took a lot of trial and error to get the output of a final .gif. However, it is very hard with how high resolution all my materials are to get a reasonably sized gif, especially as gifs as a whole are being fazed out in favor of mp4 video and the like. As such, I’m considering just exporting the final animations as videos and embedding them on my final project page.

I am quite happy with how the animation looks when it runs properly though! The Godzilla one is coming out well too.

Font Choice Rough Drafts

Here are some preliminary rough drafts with font choices and coloring! Definitely going to work on layout more too. I do think Ashbury Light, the serif font is working pretty well.

LOTR Posters Progress

I’ve finished the vector graphics for the LOTR posters! Though I’m considering making a single poster with all three, depending on how the layout ends up looking. Click to cycle through! The three are the brooch from Fellowship of the Ring, the Palatier with Sauron’s eye looking through from the Two Towers, and the Crown of Gondor from Return of the King. Now to work on coloring!

The crown was definitely the most time consuming. I didn’t even come close to including all the details but I think this is an effective balance of keeping details from the original while preserving the more minimalist style of this project.

Final List of Movie Coverage

It’s been a bit and I had a few revelations about movies I’d like to cover for this project. Furthermore, I may have to evaluate total number of posters, as the trio of LOTR posters may be more time consuming. That being considered too however, I don’t currently have plans to animate those ones either though, which will cut down on total work time.

At the very least, these are what I’d like to get done:

1. Spirited Away

2. Lord of the Rings Trio — potentially all three on one ultra wide canvas.

3. Hellboy

4. Godzilla

Still six in total, but I may have to scale back my ambitions with Hellboy and Godzilla depending on remaining time. I do very much want to address each of these as this is a relatively final/accurate list of truly formative movies for not just my current taste in pop culture but also just me as a person. There are times when I think about what I like about a certain modern movie and I can trace what I like about that all the way back to one of these four. I’m also looking forward to mapping out my thoughts on these movies starting from when I was young going all the way up to now.

I’ve made good progress on the vector art for the lord of the rings trio, after which only coloring and type will be left. Posts of the rough vector art coming soon!

More Progress Updates

I’ve more or less finalized, at the very least, the pool I’ll be drawing from for the final five or so posters/pieces I’d like to make. Not included yet, because I just realized: Godzilla. Hugely influential on my childhood and it’s currently seeing a resurgence so I’d definitely like to make something Godzilla-themed. Guys in giant rubber suits cinema was totally under appreciated in its heyday. Another I’m going to strongly consider is the work of Junji Ito, a horror manga artist who is totally underrated outside of niche online communities and has some of the most terrifying and outlandish art.

Rough Timeline of Project Goals

• Critique 1: Feb 21

  • Final list of media I’ll be creating the poster for

  • Two, maybe three rough drafts of posters

  • Rough outline of what i want to write about for each

  • Rough idea of the general layout of each page

• Critique 2: March 28??

  • Five to six rough drafts

  • More finalized versions of the last ones

  • Have 3-6 unique layouts for final pages to vary things up

• By Final Presentation (last day of class)

  • At least six visuals pretty much done -- some fine tuning ok

  • Writing more or less done for all of them

  • Assigned each poster to a layout and have a more or less final layout done

• By Final Week:

  • All visuals done

  • Writing edited and done

  • Layouts finalized and prepped

Who I'm Aiming For

Who It’s For

People of my parents’ generation.

Audiences in their mid to late 50s have often received a very strong education in traditional forms of media. They lived to see the birth of films and tv shows that are today considered to be indisputable classics. I’d hope someone of this demographic could get exposed to other mediums/genres and hopefully be convinced of that medium/genre’s worth — such as animation, video games, etc (an important distinction being that many pieces of those mediums are not created equal, just like movies and tv shows — and that distinction is necessary to draw out the most worthwhile ones). For example, I recently showed an animated film, Your Name to my parents this past winter break. The movie became the highest grossing film in Japan, and was even in the running for best Animated Picture at the Oscars in 2017. My parents aren’t the type to normally watch an animated film without convincing. However, I was able to describe the movie in a way that emphasized its value narratively, with or without the medium through which that narrative was told, so they gave the film a chance. They ended up enjoying the movie for what it was, and were actually amazed at the fidelity of the animation. Even if it won’t make animation a regular in their queue, I’d like to think I had a positive impact on them. 

People my age who haven’t had visual media as an emphasis in their lives previously.

A prime example of such would be my girlfriend, who I’ve been dating now for a little over a year. Where I grew up in a family with my mother as a media journalist, I received a relatively broad experience in movies and television, and took a personal interest in other media. For my girlfriend, she never had this emphasis in her upbringing, and as a result, her experience with films and tv is quite limited. I’d like this project to be a potential entry point for people who haven’t been that into movies, tv, etc. previously and could use this project as a starting point for them to explore what they may be potentially interested in. 

People 5 or so years younger than me.

Those who are teenagers now have a completely unique perspective on entertainment. They’ve grown up with persistent access to social media and video platforms like Youtube. I feel that this has skewed their interest far towards more short-form and immediate sources of media. If possible I’d like it to be an entry point to develop interest in mediums that are driving and inspiring the creation of the media they’re currently consuming. 

Drilling Down More, Developing Ideas

Further Definition

My project idea could work either as a short book/zine or a webpage/app. Essentially, I’d like to create a collection of tributes — so to speak — of pieces of media I feel ascend past their standard boundaries. The best comparison I can think of are the books that are titled 1000 books to read before you die on the more complex end, and your basic top 10 lists on sites like Buzzfeed etc. Ideally I’d like a strike a balance somewhere between the two, with more in depth writing, perhaps with a longer form analytical element than a throw away article, but with more of a visual option than a purely text based book.

If this project were in physical form, I’d imagine it as a classy coffee table/art book. The visuals would ideally be mostly if not all my personal creation/interpretation that I feel best represents each piece of media. I spent the entirety of last semester creating a mock print publication, specifically about social justice issues pertaining to Native Americans. This piece contained my own original writings and original/heavily edited images of others in conjunction, and it’s a medium I have built some confidence in, but would like to explore more. I’d like to make something that’s approachable and digestible, and adds value beyond what media pieces I’m talking about already provide, by either creating something visually or textually engaging.

Effect I’d Like My Project to Have 

I’d like people to walk away after viewing my project a bit more open minded about media, and being less discriminatory about medium or genre. For example, some view films as an entirely passive experience — they sit in front of a screen, it talks at them for two hours, and they leave.

Often, a certain subset of audiences will leave that theater dissatisfied if that movie didn’t directly and unsubtly explain every plot point and theme. This often disqualifies many more unconventional films as enjoyable for a large portion of the population. I’m not so arrogant to think that I’m going to revolutionize the way people watch movies, especially when the least amount of people in years are actually seeing movies in theaters, but I would be totally satisfied to give a few people an expanded view. I’d like to use the visual aspect of my project to further reinforce this interest. If I can create something visually engaging to partner with (hopefully) convincing writing, then the likelihood of a person making the effort to check out that piece of media is greater.

Once again, I realize how pretentious this goal may sound, and I’d strive to keep the writing as un-condescending as possible — essentially I’d like this project to be equivalent to saying, “Hey, check this out! I saw it the other day and think you might like it because of x, y, or z”. In other words, I’d like it to be a gentle nudge from a peer’s perspective towards something potentially unappreciated. 

Inspo Collage

This collage represents some of the pieces of media I’d like to work on as part of my initial project ideas. Many of the images are not official posters or art, but fanmade ones. These are almost definitely beyond my personal artistic ability but some of the design choices, primarily towards a more minimalistic approach, are more of what I’d like to aim for. I’d like to pick out what stood out to me from the story, or what I believe to be significant, and turn it into a design that can wholly represent that piece of media.

Project Topic Ideas and Goals

Project Topic Ideas

So far, the primary idea I’ve considered has been a sort of multimedia hall of fame. I’d like to pick out some of my favorite movies, music, tv shows, books, or video games and produce a multi-faceted reflection on it. I’d like to create some sort of visual, whether it be a poster of my own creation, photography that relates, a timeline, or even a video on that piece of media. I’d like to then accompany that visual aspect with a piece of writing that expands/explains the how or why that particular piece of media became important to me. This could also lend context, if necessary, to the design aspects of the visual element.

I’d also consider something along the lines of comparing my experiences living both in NYC and Los Angeles, their differences and individual merits, if I could do so without coming off as pretentious or naively privileged. I could also include my time spent living in London in the Spring of 2018, as another point of comparison. Something more grounded and personal, going beyond the superficial aspects everyone is already aware of. I want to avoid digressing into unoriginality if I pursue this idea, and especially avoid sounding like “wow, travel is just the best #wanderlust”. Perhaps I could do separate sub-projects for different aspects I want to compare, utilizing videography, photography, as well as photoshop/illustrator, and writing to express what I hope to portray. This was a period of time where I was forced to become far more independent than I was used to, across the country from my established support system.

I can imagine creating some combination of these two -- there are a few cases where these two ideas overlap, and I could go in depth with how that overlap made those particular experiences were unique.

Goals

I’d like to produce some work that I can potentially place in my portfolio. I’d like this project to display the skills I’ve developed in college and represent my potential. At the very least, I want this project to portray that I am proficient if not skilled with: Photoshop, Illustrator, Premiere, After Effects (maybe), and InDesign -- as well as writing.

Primarily, I’d like to utilize the skills I’ve developed thus far in college, to make something creative, as before I had these skills I wouldn’t have been able to express myself as creatively -- at least visually.