Happy New Year's Eve!

Happy New Year's Eve!

Unfortunately, I am still stuck on my dissertation. However, it should be happily finished soon.

Working hard!

See you next year...? lol

Some of my early on story/plot inspirations ~~

At one point I was considering the story format of this book (below) and thought it somehow tied in here. McCaughrean narrates the story as a description of what the children imagine but how the environment actually is as well. I found this quite curious at the time...

I was watching some trailers - some made by fans - which essentially summed up the entire plot in just a few minutes. Helpful for short, concentrated story telly as well as an inspirational source for some experimental character designs.

As the hole story is based on an internal world, a dream, this film I watch a few years back is undoubtedly another ingredient for my own story telling and such~

Closing of the First Term Progress Status ~~

I hope everyone had a great Christmas yesterday~

With the closing of the first term, I have several things that can be posted accumulated together now.

Emily has gone through many changes and she has now ended up looking like this:

Of course, there will be some more finesse in the final make-up in terms of line work and shadowing. I ams also pondering over some filter alterations I may consider for the final DVD format. For now, this is the face of my project.

There are other changes that I will be considering taking on board. The animatic, from the feedback I have received, needs much more work in order to iron out all the kinks and make the overall story much more rounded. Currently, I understand I need to look for a sound designer forthwith; so I shall begin doing so in the New Year.

Coming soon: 

• experimental puppets
• 2D format tests
• more animatics

Half Awake: About the middle

Over the past few weeks I have been contemplating what it is exactly that happens in the middle. I have a beginning, a sketch of a middle, and an end. I just need to fill out the sketchiness a bit better.

So. Here are some of the ideas that have been thought out for the middle.

1) Using hospital sounds throughout, using various means to let these sounds in.

2) Using sounds of the crash and how she ended up in a coma as the sounds throughout.

3) Using a first person perspective and have no character in her dream world.

4) Providing point 3 is used, have it in stop motion but use a pen camera to go around the garden.

5) Providing point 3 is used, show who the character is using reflections and shadows.

Result of the mulling-it-over process:

I want the audience to really connect with the little girl, Emily. She has been through some pretty horrific stuff for her age. But to really do this properly, I think there is a time were we need to forget Emily as a separate character, but show the viewer that they are Emily.

From here, I am thinking of outlining the specifics in a rough/thumbnail storyboard into next week.

Story & Sound Requirements:

1) In the beginning we don't know what has happened. We don't know there has been a crash, or a comatose induced state for our character/avatar at the outset.

2) We see the little girl in the bed and get some sign that it wasn't good, but see it out of context with the dream world state.

3) A minute in these two things come together so we can focus on the rest of the plot I've got for the audience.

4) From when we first see the little girl in the bed, a metronome beat of the heart monitor is heard throughout.

5) The little girl plays solitary games, on the swing, skipping stones and hopscotch.

6) When she leaves the swing there is a grinding noise similar to the crunch of metal from the crash.

7) Moving between activities brings her across the path to the large house that's really dark. From it she can hear noises from the hospital.

8) The noises gradually keep getting louder and she covers her ears, she can't avoid hearing them anymore. The heart monitor is laced in as well.

9) Suddenly the noise stops and she takes her hands down. It's quiet. The almost muted sound of the heart monitor gradually becomes louder again.

10) She takes a deep breath and smiles, an indication she has overcome her trauma.

11) The sounds from the house indicate the machines are about to be turned off, so she starts running toward the door.

12) Just as her hand closes around the handle, the plug is pulled and the heart monitor stops.

13) She falls through the dark doorway. Everything disappears in a flash of white. Screen blackout and silence.

14) Emily wakes up in the hospital.

END.

This is what the story is looking like now. I'm much happier to have it fleshed out a bit better, and have something more concrete for the middle.

The Plot Lines

After talking to Ged last Thurday about my quite incomplete first draft of my story involving a little nine year old girl named Emily, a car accident and a coma, I have rewritten my idea several times in order to find out exactly what it is that happens in the middle of my story.

Below is the original story version (1.1) followed by a collection of others from brainstorming ideas for the ever evasive middle bit.

Story Version 1.1

Shortly after her birthday, the little girl is leaving her Grandmother's house with her parents. The drive home is long and the sky is growing darker. Her parents are murmuring softly as the car quietly pulls up to a junction, waiting to turn left.

Bright piercing lights explode through the cabin as the car is slammed forward. Metal crunched and screamed and glass laughed as it flew forward through the air, glittering in the headlights like fairy dust. White mushroom clouds bloomed around her, bloomed and disappeared.

She felt the breath being squeezed out of her lungs, the back of her seat pushing her forward against her jammed seatbelt. She hurt a lot, and she was tired anyway so she closed her eyes. Her mum would put a plaster on it in the morning, she told herself as she fell asleep.

All is black and with noises of paramedics, sirens and emergency resuscitation procedures, fading to the sound of a machine screaming dead line. Then absolute silence descends.

In a place where dusk dwells, over a garden of gravel and paved paths, with low lying hedges and shaped bushes, wild grass and a dry dusty fountain, a little girl is playing hopscotch. The sky glows a perpetual saffron and amber.

At the end of her trail, the little girl looks up at the building nestled in the middle of the garden. It seems to stare back at her dully with its many windows, rows and rows of windows, but no doors. She blinks and moves onto the next part of her game, seemingly involving her moving around the garden and checking behind things, though whether she is the one being chased or the one doing the chasing is unclear.

A wind blows, whipping through her hair. Perhaps she hears some words in the wind, perhaps only murmurs. She scowls and turns away.

Meanwhile, a middle-aged woman is arguing with a younger man. She doesn't like his self-assured attitude or his careless brassiness. She finds it unsettling, and she has things to protect from him.

"Please doctor," She pleads. "Even considering such a thing is preposterous."

He looks at her with bored eyes, smirking. "There has been no change in her condition for a very long time. Please, we cannot keep her as she is. It's a waste of resources and there is nothing up here anymore - " he tapped on his temple, " - for her to be kept around. I understand she is on the donor register, too."

It isn't the first time this conversation has happened. She had been spoken to about this occasionally for many years, but recently this new doctor was really pushing for her consent. Now, she was asked every time she visited, and sometimes twice or more each time.

"My answer is no," she insisted.

"We can't keep this up forever," the doctor said, cocking his head to the side. "It's not fair on her, either."

Anger flashed up, by was quelled immediately by guilt.

The doctor smiled when she looked away. He knew he'd won. Now all he had to do was kill all hope and get consent. There was an operation he was aching to do; the only missing piece was one fresh heart. He'd already checked - it was a match. And if he did the operation - if everything went well - he'd get a pay rise, a promotion, better respect and influence. Maybe he could even be accepted by one of the better private health care services. At least, it would be the beginning toward that.

"I'll give you a week," he informed her. "I'll get the paperwork together. You'll have to sign a few forms and such. Then you'll have to say goodbye."

He turned on his heel. Just before he walked out he tossed the final blow over his shoulder like a barbed grenade.

"Although, really, she is already gone."

The little girl looked around uneasily. She felt nervous and she didn't know why. It annoyed her. She hopped from foot to foot, clenching and unclenching her fists, considering. There was nothing in the garden to scare her. It wasn't too dark, either. She was being silly, she decided.

All the same, she wandered back onto the main garden path with the rows of cone hedges to her right and the fountain to her left. She started walking toward the main building.

[Skip to the end]

Emily ran, searching for the door. The way out. She knew it to be close. But she couldn’t find it.

“We are going to shut the machines down now,” the doctor explained. “Have you said your final good byes?”

She ran along the never ending maze of corridor. The door had to be in here somewhere.

“Yes, doctor,” the woman sniffled. She placed a hand tightly on her husband’s shoulder. He reached up and squeezed her hand. “We’re ready.”

Finally the corridor straightened out after yet another flight of stairs. There was the door at the end.

The doctor reached for the power switch. “Good-bye, Emily.”

Emily’s hand wrapped around the door handle.

The doctor pushed the switch. The machine went dead.

Emily was blinded by a flash of light.

Arm outstretched, reaching for something that was no longer there, Emily realised she was no longer where she thought she was. The arm extended in front, though it responded, was too long to be her own. Her hair slipped forward and she reached to tuck it behind her ear, but it was much longer than it ought to be.

The doctor stared at her baffled. She had sat up just as he had pushed the button. He saw her eyes open before he pushed the button. And now she was examining her hair. What was going on?

“Emily?” The mother breathed, eyes wide in wonder and disbelief.

“Welcome back, kiddo,” the father said gruffly.

So it was happening. She was awake. And he wouldn’t get the organs he needed for his payrise and promotion. He wouldn’t get his prestige and rise to private doctor. Angrily, he turned sharply on his heel and left the room.

Story Version 1.2

• Little girl gets into a car accident and ends up in a coma.
• Emily creates a world of her own where she plays by herself in perpetual twilight.
• Doctors feel that there is no hope for her to recover in a vegetative state and pursue getting permission to turn the machines off.
• Emily plucks up the courage to go into the dark house of voices to find the way out.
• Doctors get the begrudging permission of the parents and the machine gets turned off but Emily wakes up just in time.

Story Version 1.3

• Car accident, coma, garden world where Emily is playing.
• Nurse comes in and talks about various things that become distorted as they filter through into her dream and becomes something else i.e. character plants, quirky objects etc.
• Doctor comes in and his words filter through also, making her dream world sky dark and creates a monster.
• She seeks shelter in the house from the monster.
• Her mother’s words create a door in the house and Emily wakes up.

Story Version 1.4

• Car accident, coma, garden world where Emily is playing.
• Emily keeps her distance from the house with many windows.
• Doctor’s words create a storm in her world making Emily move toward the house to go inside.
• She sees scenes from the crash through the windows as well as the audio of her hospital room.
• Emily smashes a window and climbs through, waking up.

Story Version 1.5

• Car accident, coma, garden world where Emily is playing.
• In the middle of the garden there is a greenhouse with only a small sapling in the centre.
• The tree grows larger and more warped the more the doctors push for permission.
• The sky breaks into a storm with permission granted.
• A hollow in the tree trunk provides Emily’s escape.

Story Version 1.6

• Car accident, coma, garden world where Emily is playing.
• Various fantastical characters appear from the garden and give her various tasks to complete.
• Once complete a door appears in the building.
• Doctors finally get permission to turn off the machines.
• Emily waves good bye to the characters and jumps through the portal waking up.

Story Version 1.7

• Car accident, coma, garden world where Emily is playing.
• Doctors push for permission to turn the machines off.
• The garden constantly shifts, paths changing with increasing frequency leading Emily closer to the house in the woods.
• Doctors finally get permission to turn off the machine.
• Emily faces the house in the woods and opens the door and jumps through the mirror in the middle of the room, waking up.

Story Version 1.8

• Car accident, coma, garden world where Emily is playing.
• Doctors are pushing for permission to turn of the machines.
• The doctors’ words cause the plants to shrivel with acid rain and dry destroying her world.
• Doctors finally get permission to turn off the machine.
• Emily takes shelter in the house, finding the way out at the same time as the world outside falls apart.

Story Version 1.9

• Car accident, coma, garden world where Emily is playing.
• Doctors are pushing for permission to turn off the machines.
• Despite the sun being hidden by clouds continuously the shadows are sharp and grow larger swallowing up the whole garden.
• Emily takes shelter in the house where the only light is now coming from.
• The Doctors get permission.
• Emily finds the source of the light as coming through a keyhole of a door which she opens, waking up.

Inspiration for Graduation Film

Below is the painting I bought in Salzburg, Austria, which lead to the idea for my graduation film.

While staring vacantly at my recently acquired art piece sitting in it's frame on my desk - wondering what story I was going to tell in my final film - looking at the place I had been but weeks before suddenly devoid of the throngs of people I began to wonder several things. The first, is what would it take for that place to be deserted at that time of day; what would it be like to be there by yourself; and what if you didn't really notice that the people were gone.

Deciding that you'd have to build some kind of imaginary world to occupy yourself, I released that it could only be a child lost in a never ending story in their head, constantly changing and evolving; shifting like the reality in dreams. But if a child is wondering around there by themsleves, were are all the adults - the child's parents in particular? And why does the child not notice?

Thus, these questions and their answers are how I came up with the story.

Overall plot (roughly):

A little girl gets into an accident when she is nine years old that leaves her in a vegetative state for nearly a decade. While she is asleep, she plays and occupies her time in a world inspired by the picture above, denying all other possibility for existence, just her in her world where it is never day nor night. But because it has been so long, she is beginning to question the world she has encased herself in. With the doctors on the outside trying to shut down her machines, will she manage to find the way out before it's to late?

Yes, probably.

Set Building

concept sketch

After an initial concept design, I had some sort of idea of how I wanted a portion of my set to look. With this image in hand, I set about coming up with the integral tree which has a hollow in it's base that a small child may hide in if they did so wish.

tree in progress

I had collected a small mountain of recycling by this time: cardboard and other things which I thought may be useful. Especially, so, when the whole project is coming (as always) entirely out of my own pocket. What I did buy for this (so far) is around 160m of garden wire, kitchen roll, and PVA glue.

Taking up the entire kitchen table, I'm sure it annoyed my housemates as well as amused them at what I was doing when I set up camp. They all could recall the days when the used PVA and kitchen roll for school projects. 

It's front heavy so I had the PVA put in the back to help it stand.

It looks really weird.

While making the tree, I was also busy making other things. A prototype figure, sewing together the ground and such to name a few. I thought to purchase a hand held sewing machine, however it needed four hands to operate it. As such, it ended up being completed entirely by hand.

Checking what will be seen from a ground level shot...

Deciding which piece of fabric will go where...

Finally, these two things were done, and I could do some mood lighting experimentation to see how it was all looking. Thankfully it all pieced together quite well.

The river has been wound on too...

I think this one was with two lights, a daytime shot so there was a lot of light pollution.  It looks alright though.

With these done, I then had to make sure I had the rest of the set was done also.

The seat of the chairs.

Rosie's bedroom...

The kitchen...

The two drying...

The back of Rosie's bedroom (the cereal box) and the base for her mattress (the green thing)

 Meanwhile, upstairs other things were in the works, too...

The seats without backs around the freshly painted table...

Lining up the seat backs...

Half the seats done...

Now just to add paint...

The letter and envelope. Written in font size two.

You can actually read it. Hopefully it will help explain the story without loads of dialogue.

Hand painted plates.

There were a few other things which I have not photographed made, such as the mushroom and the other trees. But you will get to see them, in the photographed animatic or in the finished piece.

Concept Art for Rosie like an Apple

A lot of the concept art that I have done is integrated into my storyboard; I find it easier to just draw out a frame as close to how it would look as I can but a little less than perfection for time's sake. Here are some pictures I have done out for some concept art for the faeries and environment.

Above is a rough picture of a faerie I drew up on Photoshop  one that Rosie might converse with when she is asking a wish from the faeries. I know I didn't need to add the lens flare, but I really like flare at the moment, so I really couldn't help myself. Also, I did a more experimental version that looks quite eerie and less friendly, which I think may fit with my general opinion of faeries as well as the strange haunting presence they have in the story. Further, as it's a darker overall image, there is no lens flare.

I also ended up colouring in one of my initial concept design pieces, where Rosie is running down to the water edge where all the faeries have gathered. It does need some more work done to it, though.

Rosie like an Apple: Storyboards

Light streams through the bedroom window....

Rosie wakes and stretches....

Getting up, she head downstairs...

Where she takes her seat...

She swings her feet under the table...

She smiles at the smell of egg and bacon...

As Grandpa makes breakfast...

They eat happily together....

Until the post comes.

Rosie runs to get the post....

And hands it to Grandpa...

He opens the letter...

While Rosie wait's anxiously...

Grandpa is taken aback by the letter....

Rosie excitedly demands to know what it says...

Grandpa is troubled how to say what it says...

"I'm sorry, Rosie," he says, ""but your parents..."

"They won't ever be coming back."

A silence falls....

Rosie feels alone....

She talks a walk out of the house, beyond the garden wall...

It begins to rain...

Rosie seeks shelter in a tree hollow where she curls up and remembers...

Her dad throwing her in the air....

And catching her before she falls...

Her mother gently chides and fixes her hair...

The happy days from before....

Small lights break the darkness...

The lights gather around Rosie....

One of these lights comes to rest on her knee...

Rosie looks up....

And finds a faerie there....

She follows it outside...

To the edge of the brook....

And spies the mushroom...

All the faerie lights gather there...

Rosie is amazed...

And watches as they fly over her head....

And they guide her home...

A faerie light shines outside....

As Rosie goes to bed....

And falls asleep....

The next morning...

Rosie wakes...

Gets out of bed....

And quietly...

She leaves the house...

Running down the path to the brook...

But there are no faeries...

Rosie is disappointed...

But she decides to sit and wait...

And wait....

Until dark when they may appear again...

Rosie notices they have returned....

They spread out in every direction....

One crosses the brook...

Flies close...

Then whizzes by...

Getting up, she follows one to the edge of the brook as it flies away...

Another crosses the water...

Passes behind her...

Then past the hollow tree...

Comes back around....

Flies across the path...

Into the trees....

Turns....

And goes back to the path again...

The the far side of the hollow tree...

Back onto the path....

Back toward the brook...

Rosie hold her ground....

Remains in the one spot....

As it flies around her....

Before their paths cross...

"I wonder....faerie," she asks...

"Can you grant me..my wish...?"

"A deal with the fey is not for free," the faerie said.

"Do you have anything of worth?"

Rosie gazes up at the apple glowing red-gold in the last sunlight...

She climbs up....

To the weaker top branches...

She stretches to reach it....

She's on the tips of her toes....

A slip....

So close....

But the apple...

Is so distant still as Rosie falls and blacks out...

She opens her blurry eyes and sees her parents...

"Rosie..." her mother says softly....

"Rosie..." her dad calls....

As they fade to white/black, "It's all right now." They reassure her...

Rosie wakes on the ground where she fell...

Unhurt, she gets up...

And runs back inside to Grandpa....

Grandpa sheds a tear.

End.