Finished!

Well the first episode is finished! But actually it’s not the first but the second episode. I’ve decided to animate the second one because that was more exciting than the first one (the suspense is building in each episode, the 6th one has the climax). So as a series of six the 2nd one is finished and I have the material to start animating the first one.

There were no updates the last couple of months because it got so close to a finished I would give too much away and my animation wouldn’t be a surprise anymore. One thing I’ve learned is to take breaks from your work. This way you don’t lose the big picture and it stays fun. The last three months were busy! I was working everyday on my project and that wasn’t maybe a smart idea because now I’ve seen it too much.

I’ll put the first few seconds of the animation online. But the premiere will be during the Postgraduate Degree Show on Friday 14 August from 6 to 8pm! I still have a few tickets for free for the opening night so if you want a few just email me. After that night the exhibition is open from 15 to 30 August, Monday till Thursday from 10am till 6pm, and on Fridays from 10am till 5pm. Due to personal circumstances I won’t be there during the opening night but I’ll be back the 19th and you could find me at the exhibition, happy to tell some more about the animation.
I’m also selling my DVD for 5 pounds. It has the full animation on it and special features like storyboards, first animation tests and animatics. Just mail me if you would like one or visit the exhibition where you can buy them directly from me.

I’ve been extremely lucky I’ve got so much help from so many people. Many of them weren’t even in the same country but we still managed to collaborate. My voice actors are from England and the composer of the tune is from Holland for example. Without them I wouldn’t have got so far like I am now. I’m really thankful!

Patricia Delso Lucas - Cinematographer & Producer
Jonathan Alan Barraclough - Screenplay
Nikos Karavas - Sound Design & Instrumentation - http://www.nk-sd.com/
Alfons Veldhuis - Composer Tune
Julia Luther - Runner
Bas Hesen - Title animation - http://www.bashesen.blogspot.com/
Andy Macpherson - Colouring Assistant - http://www.armacpherson.blogspot.com/
Maarten Boot - Colouring Assistant - www.kartonfilms.nl
Steff Lee - Lilly - http://www.stefflee.com/
Rachinta Platts - Mum - www.rachintaplatts.com

and

Neil Kempsell
Donald Holwill
Alan mason
Karen O'hare
Kate edmonds
Frank Gresham
Madevi Dailly
Johanna Wagner
Jeremy warder
Yubing WU
Maarten Boot
My Parents

Have Your cake and eat it
21c strathearn road
edinburgh eh9 2ab

I’m proud of what I’ve had accomplished and I definitely learned a lot while making this. It’s a great feeling working with so many people that are enthusiastic too and finding solutions for problems that look impossible to solve. I’m moving back to Holland this September and I’ve got a few next projects in mind so I won’t get bored. That doesn’t mean I won’t go back to Scotland anymore. In fact I’ll be back for the graduation ceremony in November and 2010’s ECA Animation Show. ‘Lilly knows it all’ is part of that show. I’ll keep in touch!

Draft

Now with some coloured parts *gasp* Thanx to Andy, a 4th year animation student at ECA

Again it's messing up the whole format, argh!

Final Draft

This is the final draft for my animation. meaning the movement and timing won't change anymore (unless you let me know I've made a terrible mistake :p). Now I can start tracing and colouring it.

Important! I'm still looking for people who can do sound for this (environment, foley etc). If you're interrested or know someone that might be please get in contact with me! n.volbeda@gmail.com

Titels

I just wanted to show this test render. It's the proverbs (episode titles) that are shown in the beginning and ending of every episode. Bas Hesen made them in Maya for me and I'm so happy with how they look. It's a Dutch proverb tile and you can read more about the concept here.

Draft 16 April

I still don't know why it's not showing the 16:9 size instead of the 4:3 size, hmmmpfff.

Possible movie posters

I prefer the pigeon one.

ink

first inked version to check how long it will take me. 25fps

Draft Animation

I'll be updating this one with new shots. I also don't understand why it's changing the size of the video :s It's supposed to be 16:9 instead of 4:3.

[update April 8th] I've added some new drafts to the video. I'm doing the difficult important shots first and they have been really a pain in the @*$&%.

Shooting

The week before shooting
The shoot was planned in the weekend and I had one week to get all the props for my animation. I was concerned about the cake I needed for episode one. Tuesday I looked on the internet for cake shops in Edinburgh and all the prices online were super expensive! They easily asked 90 pound for a cake. I printed out some addresses and went out to find them.
I had to wait at the first shop because the cake lady was talking about a wedding cake with some costumers. I looked around and they had some nice examples. When it was my turn I asked her if she could do something like my sketch and how much it was. It was expensive to make it and when I told her it needed to be done by Friday she told me she couldn’t help me with the cake. But she knew another shop that might be able to make it for me. When I went there they were closed…
I had one address left and it was a long walk. I almost wanted to try it and make it myself but decided to go anyway. The shop was called “Have your cake & eat it” and I thought well that’s a good start. Inside I showed my sketches, my project and they were quite happy to do it! That it had to be finished by Friday wasn’t even a problem. I managed to make a deal with them; they gave me a discount on the cake and I put their contact details in my credits and they get a DVD. In the shop they have a screen where they can show the animation to the customers and at the same time it’s good advertisement for the both of us.
I got the cake on Friday and it looks really wonderful!

I also got a message late at night from Patricia. The apartment was double booked! We tried to sort it out with the other person and we finally came to the deal that he has the apartment for Friday and Saturday to shoot and we use it Sunday. But in the end the other guy said suddenly that he needed it Sunday too and went offline.
The next day Patricia tried to book the equipment for a longer period but everything was booked till the end of May! (School has not enough equipment obviously). In the end she managed to make some arrangement and now we could have the equipment Monday and Tuesday too. So we booked the apartment for those days instead of the weekend. Later I heard that guy didn’t book the apartment in advance at all. He just said he wanted it that weekend while we had it booked two weeks in advance so he was horribly rude by saying we needed to change our plans.

First Filming Day (Sunday)
I went to Patricia’s to pick up the equipment. Turned out that it was 3 suitcases (one of them big enough to hide a person in it!) and a huge bag. The two of us had to carry it to the flat and I thought we would could do it easy. But everything was so extremely heavy lol. We were lucky it was sunny that day. When we finally got to my flat we saw it started to rain! O_o We had to shoot outside in a car during the daylight so it sucked. After a while it stopped and we went down to clean the car. Julia, my flat mate and owner of the car, helped us. We were almost ready to shoot and it started to hail! We needed to put the camera back in the case quick and hurry to keep everything safe. The next try it stayed dry.
We also did 3 more scenes in the flat and we finished late that night. I was so tired!


Second Filming Day (Monday)
This was just one scene in the apartment we booked. Julia brought the equipment in her car to the apartment. This time Patricia and I filmed the kitchen and the shooting went quick. We were finished in 3 hours and managed to do everything in daylight.
Patricia already digitalized the footage from episode 2 and Wednesday we shoot episode 1 (the one with the cake). At first we had the equipment till Tuesday but Patricia couldn’t film that day so we changed it to Wednesday.

Third Filming Day (Wednesday)
We started very early with shooting because we had to do it all in one day. That morning there was some ice and while I was walking to the apartment to shoot I almost slipped a few times with the cake holding in my hand 0_0 I had only bought one but I arrived safe.
We changed the room into a living room and started our final shooting day. Everything went smooth. The tripod was a bit lame but that was it. Used a lot of fish lines and in the end I had to destroy the cake which was very difficult for me to do. I loved it so much!
Suddenly we were done and after doing our victory dance we packed everything and changed the room back into the way it was. During the packing I got injured, something with a bamboo stick and a finger that kept bleeding haha.
We called Julia and she came to pick us up with all the equipment. I walked home with the remains of the cake. I’ve tried some of the cake and it was so sweet, almost too sweet :p

Patricia digitalized the footage and she discovered there was dirt on the lense while we were shooting. It’s weird because we both checked every shot before shooting it and the whole day we didn’t see anything. I watched the footage myself and you can see it really good. There was also too much light, everything was too bright. Also a thing we both hadn’t see while shooting. Now we have to shoot the entire episode all over! That means I also have to buy another cake :(

At least I can work at the second episode because that footage is ok. The next shooting we’re going to fix all the problems and even do it better than last time!

Another animatic

[Update 9 Feb] The second rough animatic of an episode. This one changed a bit in the end. The first ten seconds are introduction music. I don't put a lot of effort when I'm drawing my storyboards. It's just a very quick process. I keep updating this. For some reason youtube makes everything lighter and uglier.
Also checked out a house were we can shoot the animation and it's great!

Children making proverbs

Look what I've found on the internet:

A first grade teacher collected well known proverbs. She gave each child in her class the first half of a proverb and asked them to come up with the remainder of the proverb. Their insight may surprise you.

Better to be safe than....................Punch a 5th grader
Strike while the .........................Bug is close
It's always darkest before............... Daylight Savings Time
Never underestimate the power of..........Termites
You can lead a horse to water but........how?
Don't bite the hand that................. looks dirty
No news is................................impossible
A miss is as good as a...................Mr.
You can't teach an old dog new............math
If you lie down with dogs, you'll.........stink in the morning
Love all, trust..........................me
The pen is mightier than the..............pigs
An idle mind is..........................The best way to relax
Where there's smoke there's...............pollution
Happy the bride who.......................gets all the presents
A penny saved is..........................not much
Two's company, three's....................the Musketeers
Don't put off till tomorrow what..........you put on to go to bed
Laugh and the whole world laughs with you, cry and.......you have to blow your nose.
None are so blind as......................Stevie Wonder
Children should be seen and not...........spanked or grounded
If at first you don't succeed.............get new batteries
You get out of something what you.........see pictured on the box
When the blind leadeth the blind..........get out of the way
Better late than.........................pregnant.

Animatic 1

[Update 5 Feb] The first rough animatic of one episode. The first ten seconds are introduction music. I don't put a lot of effort when I'm drawing my storyboards. It's just a very quick process. I keep updating this. For some reason youtube makes everything lighter and uglier.

Team

This project is quite big and difficult to make. I’m happy that some people want to help me realizing this animation and hereby I introduce the wonderful team behind the animation:

Animator & Director: Nicole Volbeda
Producer & Camera: Patricia Delso
Scriptwriter: Jonathan Baracclough
Music for the title: Alfons Veldhuis
Sound: ???

I still need someone that can do the sound in every episode. Music, background, folly etc and if you are interested or know someone that would be, please contact me: n.volbeda@gmail.com

Critical Study

I also need to write a critical study about my practise. This is what I've come up with and I could need some help with resources. So if you know something that has to do with this stuff (a name, book, show, anything) please let me know ^_^

The main topic of my studio research is that I want to know how children think and how far I can stretch the limits creating an animation that’s nasty but still is at the same time fun and harmless for children. My end result is a mixed media animation series suitable for children on this topic.
I’m interested in this particular theme because I find the whole macabre side in humans interesting and it’s fascinating that we are capable of doing things that are horrible. That combined with my love for kids which have no sense of right and wrong is the reason why I came to this project. In this case I take the villain out and give him his own show.
The theoretical area’s I’m going to explore are social and psychological and maybe also cultural. Social because the medium television is social and psychological because I’m going to dig deeper in thoughts of people. I’ve also come across some cultural differences about how to handle children between the Netherlands and the U.K. Some stuff in the Netherlands is allowed for children to see while in the U.K it would be banned from television.
My resources are people that have the same philosophy as me like the Dutch people of ‘villa achterwerk’, Josh Whedon and some philosophers which names I never remember. They share the same vision as me; that not everything has to be sweet especially the stuff for children. I give the bad and horrible example with my animation, an example how children shouldn’t behave (which still is an indirect lesson to children). It’s a celebration about nasty children.

Scripts

After trying to write the episodes myself I got totally stuck. There were so many details to think of so many problems I couldn’t solve that I’ve decided I wanted a scriptwriter to help me.

During one of the Napier meetings I’ve met scriptwriter Jonathan Baracclough. After explaining my project and the whole idea behind it he wrote some fantastic episodes. You can read the first three episodes here, they’re not in order and some small alterations are made to adapt it into an animation.

[update 10 feb] 4th script added. The links are broken and I will find a way to fix them soon.

1. Know your enemy. written by Jonathan Baracclough
2. The squeeky wheel gets the grease. written by Jonathan Baracclough
3. To the victor go the spoils. written by Jonathan Baracclough
4. Say something nice or nothing at all. written by Jonathan Baracclough