A Time for Change

I've found that one of the strangest things about making a film is that all the while you are learning new thing about the process and structure of filmmaking itself. Then again, I'm pretty sure that's the point of "Animation Projects". Since starting the winter semester, I've been taking Animation Concepts Lecture and Studio. Upon looking at some of the films and points in those classes and after doing some of the projects, it's made me look at Lovely School (LMSFLG was too long to type. :() in a different way. I'm going through my original storyboard and reworking a number of shots, such as the reveal shot of Alice and Dirk and more particularly the area around the big "Oh my gosh we're animals" reveal.

I'm also seriously considering reworking the ending, because story-wise it seems a little rushed and compressed. I feel like Mrs. Laidee (The principal) should show up sometime earlier. It's times like this that I wish I could extend my overall goal of the film being about 2 and a half minutes long, but somehow I feel like that would be cheating. So, I'm going to try to rely on background elements to tell parts of the story! Perhaps, in the hallway scene when Dirk's trying to subdue Alice, the regretfully empty hallway wall behind them could ... have the principal's office door on it. Or maybe a huge painting of her or something. I feel like I have to do something there though. There's a lot of empty space in both the film and the background. And rather than to put nothing or things not essential to the plot.. I'll put things... totally... essential to the plot.



Moving on, I've been fiddling around with the sound for the film. I'm not exactly musically inclined, but I have a little bit of experience with instruments. Mostly the piano and the flute (not so much). I do LISTEN to a lot of music at least, more specifically soundtracks to games, movies, tv shows and other things. Realistically, I don't think I'll be able to produce an epic musical score that will drive people to tears. But at least it will be a bare-bones something that will capture the mood I want for each segment. Perhaps during post-production I can take it to someone who knows a lot more about it than I do and they can at least know what kind of music I want. Or maybe this could be my chance to experiment. (I kinda did experiment in garage band and made this really weird... remixy... song... thing.)



I'm glad to see the film sort of coming together now. I'm not sure why, but at first I was super excited, during the middle I got a little frustrated and reluctant and nervous, but now I like the project a lot more again and I want it to become something awesome. At times I regretted picking this subject/plot/etc because for some reason I had this idea in my head that all student films had to be somewhat pretentious and deep and epic and stuff. Then I sort of realized that I liked this choice because I have always been a fan of cartoons, stories, comical silliness and things over all. I fell in love with animation and comic books when I was young, I still love them, and I hope that I'll forever love them and I want this project to remind me of that when I look back on it 20 years from now.


...


But what am I going to do for my Senior film?


....


D'oh. I'll worry about it later




[Revised Opening Shot Background]


In other news, I decided to switch image hosting sites. Imageshack, what I've been using previously, is nice and all but I learned it's not really all that great for archival's sake. Photobucket is a more reliable choice, I suppose.




Edit BLARG. I accidentally deleted the template I had made... Oh well, I guess this calls for a new (and probably better) one!