Term 2

This term was mainly taken up with dissertation, especially for myself and Dan R who seem to write slower than Dan C and Jake- curse them :p. Although I thought I was doing well in it, after a tutorial with Kieran, he told me that to get a better grade I needed to research differently, which led to a lot of all night studying sessions with Dan R as he worked on his too. Hopefully it was worth all the effort that we went to, but as we wont know our grades for ages, there’s not much point worrying about it. This is not to say that no work on this project was covered this term, far from it :) (we officially have no lives, hehe).

The first objects that I modelled were the carts that transpost the girls around the ride. The cart with the rounded front is for Lee and Cho, whilst the flatter fronted one is for Kitty.

Lee's cart:

I was aware that the carts would be in around 90% of the film, and in many close shots, so they would have to be modelled well with no shortcuts taken. Although now that the models are complete and I feel I could model them quickly if I were to remake them, when I first began I found it a bit challenging and came up with some hideous results when trying to build the model out of a solid cube. I realised that before I could begin the modelling I should take a moment to think about what I was doing and reassess my design. The design I was working from was a quick pencil sketch that I had made in term one, and showed only the side of the cart. After making some rough sketches, I realised that the best way foreword both aesthetically and logically was to build the cart out of separate objects like it would be in real life as opposed to trying to build it out of one object and extruding sections etc.

Above shows some of the construction proces of the cart. You can notice some changes in the design as I modelled, for example a bumper around the cart. I had always imagined the cart with a bumper, but once it was on the cart, I felt it was out of place and didn’t seem to fit into our Victorian theme, so it had to go. The cart was also appearing too big and needed resizing. Although I had measured the width to fit Cho in comfortably, it was maybe a bit too comfortable as when I added the proxy model of Lee into the cart, it looked ginormous. You can also see the way the cart was modelled out of separate sections on one side then mirrored across to complete the other half. Not wanting the cart to obviously look mirrored with every bump etc symmetrical, I used the lattice deformer to bump and dent the cart unsymmetricaly.

Once Lees cart had been completed, it was now the turn to construct Kittys. Kittys cart had to be more compact from the front as the end of the film has an embracing sequence between the girls over the two carts whilst they are inside them. To construct Kittys cart, I duplicated Lees and then pulled back the front, again using the lattice deformer. This however crushed the previous floor, wheels and front bolts and they had to be reconstructed. The lattice tool was once again used to make sure that the model didn’t share the exact same bumps etc as Lees cart. Two panels on the front also had to be completly re-modelled as this design did not include headlamps.

Dan C also needed environmental proxy models to be built so that he could begin the animation in more detail. A proxy model is a quick rough model, made to the correct proportions so that they can be replaced later in the scene by the real models. Using this method, Dan could blockout the animation which he could use both for the animatic and the final animation whilst we worked on our models. I created proxy models of the actual ride, the helter skelter and the big wheel.

Dan R also created some proxy models, and combined with mine, and Dan C’s proxy models of the characters, were placed into the scenes that we would be using for our films.

As a group we huddled around a PC, as we did when creating the blockout environment, and decided where objects would go in our new proxy environment, taking turns to position objects. As before, it took some time whilst we discussed what would look good where and why.

Director decisions:

Whilst we worked on our individual tasks, I made sure that I was kept updated with all the work the others were producing, and made sure to show them mine for their feedback also. Usually we work together at Uni, but this term due to the dissertation, it meant that it was more convenient to work at our separate homes, where it was less distracting and we could concentrate on writing. I had to make some slight directorial changes to Jakes and Dan C’s work, but nothing major: Jake sent me some screenshots of the character Kitty he was creating where I suggested that her nose round the sides needed to be more defined. I also didn’t feel that her teeth were quite right in style and Dans and Jake agreed. After a few attempts Jake created teeth that much better suited our overall film style :)

The only thing of Dans that I wanted to alter was the shot where Cho gets her bum stuck whilst going through the fence as I felt it needed more exaggeration. It wasn’t a big deal, and as time was short it didn’t need priority. However, I told Dan that if there was time at the end, I wanted that pose exaggerated. Its not even the end of the project and he managed to find time to fix it for me :D

The medieval room also had to be axed. This wasn’t a directorial choice but more of a group realisation as we could tell that with the dissertation taking up so much time there just wasn’t going to be time for this room. The room also wouldn’t affect the narrative at all, so off it was axed!