Target Audience

"In marketing and advertising, a target audience, or target group is the primary group of people that something, usually an advertising campaign, is aimed at appealing to. A target audience can be people of a certain age group, gender, marital status, etc"

"Is the term usually used to describe groups in the community selected as being the most appropriate (eg; primary purchasers, users or influencers) for a particular advertising campaign or schedule. The target audience may be defined in demographic or psychographic terms, or a combination of both."

Okay so I was having a chat with a few people yesterday trying to decide whether I should go down the route of using primary school children as my target audience.

At first thought I had a good idea which I began to try and develop through my thought process and then get some images down on paper to help me discover the best way in order to go about this project. I came up with a concpet which I would use childs voices in my animation to state facts about the Slime mould throughout its duration. I was thinking about using a cartoony style which would be more appealing to the primary school audience because at that age it is all about the visuals, they are what helps get the message across.

A really good example of an animation which helps children learn is the 'Muzzy' language dvds which help small children learn a language in a more fun and less boring way. However, After all this thought about choosing primary school children as my target audience, I personally think that it would benifit me more to choose a higher level of education and put this animation towards them.

So after much thought yesterday evening I have decided that my choosen target audience is going to be GCSE students. At this age I remember finding some of the subjects dull. If the teachers were to give us our work in this form, I seriously think that the learning outcome would be much different.

Below is a quick example I put together about you target audience. In the top part of the image you can see a group of children plus an image of Alien. When making the film Alien, Ridley Scotts marketing directors would not of aimed this product at this generation. They would have been more likely to have aimed it at boys in thier late teens and young men.
The second part of the image shows the same children but with an image of the power rangers. When they decided to make the power rangers it was aimed at children in this age region. I also think that they added female characters in the programme power rangers as a way of having girls as thier audience to.

Probably a really bad diagram but hey, it shows what it needs to along with minor explanation :)

Slime Mould - Time Lapse Videos

Another part of my research that is goind to be critical throughout this project is the time lapse in which the Slime Mould grows. The many videos which I had gathered for this post are in place as a demonstration of how the mould grows and how fast it goes about its process.

This first video below which I found on Youtube shows how Slime Mould begins to grow. over the 23 seconds of this video we are able to see a short cycle of how quickly the mould begins to spread over time. 

 

Slime Mould - Colours, Textures, Shapes and Sizes

I have been looking at videos and images of different types of Slime Moulds to see thier colours and textures.
Just have a look at the images below, some of the Slime moulds look like berrries, whilst some of the others look like creatures you would find in the ocean. There are so many shapes and sizes and these images only scrape the surface. 

Slime Mould - Diagrams of a different perspective

I'm not going to be able to achieve a good project unless I look at a lot of research from start to finish. In this post I'm adding up lots of different diagrams of the cycle of the slime mould becuase many people have drawn them from a different point of view.

As you can see there are a lot of different diagrams on how the slime mould cycle works. Slime mould has an important process which I will discuss in further posts. This is here for my benifit to see how peoples perceptions of slime mould can effect thier drawings of it. 

Fantastic Voyage(1966)

Released on the 14^th of October 1966 in the UK, the film Fantastic Voyage was a brilliant science fiction film which is full of stylistic colours and lighting.

The film begins with a very important diplomat which has had an attempt on his life. In order to save the man, a group of scientists are shrunk and are injected into the man to take voyage on a mission to remove a blood clot from his brain and exit his body within an hour.

In 1967 the film was nominated for and won two film Oscar awards. One of which was for its outstanding art direction, set decoration and colour. The other award which can really be seen throughout the film was for its best effects and special visual effects.

 

The film really shows off the subject of Anatomy at its best. In my opinion the film makes the subject of science really interesting and fun to learn. When entering the mans body, we see plenty of lush colours which really catches the audiences eye.

These images above are from the film. They both show the different art direction of the film. In the top image of the two, all of the colours are really bright and give you an appealing sense of feeling. In the second of the two images you can tell that the scene is more dark and eerie, you know something bad is going to happen to the crew.

Amoeba Concept Idea

Okay, this might look a bit strange at first sight but it's only because i'm trying to work out whether to go the child route for this animation.Within this project it is so important that I find out who my target audience is because this will effect the style and message of the overall animation.

So this image below is just a quick render of an Amoeba I made in Maya today. It is very simple but it needed to be made because I needed to visualise what a cartoony Amoeba would look like in an animation.

I know some people may look at this and be thinking 'what is this?' but its there to show development, a starting point to help me decide whether im chosing the right route and not the wrong one. I have always struggled to resolve an idea and this is why this project I refuse to be defeated :)

Spore Origins

"From tide pool amoebas to thriving civilisations to intergalactic starships, everything is in your hands."

As I think that my target audience is going to be between 8-10 years olds, mainly people in years 5 and 6 of primary school. I was thinking about using a style similar to spore to make this two minute animation. However, I don't know whether I will be able to  rig a character properly as I'm still a novice. Therefore I will have my characters/environment a bit more cartoony than others.

Just have a look at the style of the game Spore which is in the video below. The whole point of this game is to begin from an amoeba and work your way up through the cycles of life by eating other organisms, allowing you to evolve.

Scenario 2 - Intro to Slime mould

I have been doing some research all day trying to come up with a plan of action into which scenario I want to use for my animation. I said in the first introduction of this project that I was thinking that 'Slime Mould' might be a good route to start. I was interested to see how things like mould, plantes and fungi tend to reproduce without 'making love'. What I really liked about the process of the mould was the way it got from the pod too becoming an ameoba and the whole cycle after that.

"slime mold: a naked mass of protoplasm having characteristics of both plants and animals; sometimes classified as protoctists"

"Slime mold or Slime mould is a broad term describing fungus-like organisms that use spores to reproduce. They were formerly classified as fungi, but are no longer considered part of this group."

I thought to start my research I would research some images and videos of the process and to see the differences in the moulds. For examlpe, I want to look at the different shapes and colors too consider different styles for my animation.

The video above is a quick clip of some clips to do with slime mould and fungi moulds. If you have a minute have a look because I think this stuff is pretty amazing, also the track that goes with it is pretty good for this particular video.

This next video is also rather extrordinary. The music in this video also plays a massive part in setting off the mood of this video. Something which I really want to do in my project is show the spore rising up above before unleashing its spores.

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Briefing Scenarios

So I have been on the website MyUca earlier and downloaded the images for the different scenarios which we can choose to base our projects on. Just have a look below, for some reason a couple of the images have turned black and white so ill try and sort that later once I have had a proper look through them later.

Unit 6 - Introduction to Commision

Wow, what an introduction to a project. My first impressions are that this one is going to be a major test. I think I should be ok if I can quickly resolve a story structure. Hopefully by the end of tonight I will have a basic idea for a story which I will add up on the blog hopefully for some feedback. If I can get this done then I really rekon that I have a good chance of completing this project in an non stressfull way.

Right, I'm just going to give a quick explanation of what I will be doing over this week as an introduction to this project. Firstly I'm going to have another look at the brief and break it down into sections so I can understand it better, then later I will look on MyUca for an explanation of each of the projects and hopefully pick one by the end of the day.

I already have a rough idea of what one of the projects I would like to use for my animation. I thought that I could show the Asexual reproduction process of the 'Slime Mold'. Peter was saying in the briefing about picking a few of the stages from one of the cycles and then show how they work.

I was thinking of using the process of the 'Slime Mold' and starting from the 'Meiosis' process were the stalk/Pod of the 'Slime mold' releases its spores into the air. I then was thinking about showing the spores hatch were they begin to release Amoebas. Lastly I want to show how the Amoeba grow by feeding and then becoming the 'Slime mold' which it started with. Just a thought thats in my mind at the moment but I was thinking that I should try to get everything down thats on my mind otherwise how am I going to resolve anything in the outcome.

Anyway, just to conclude this post. I am looking forward to this project and the challenge it brings. I hope to be posting soon about any updates and research I may have gathered.

Alan - Finished Maya Shortcut

Hey Alan, just thought it might be a little easier for you if I were to put links to each post to do with the Maya tutorials into this one post. Below are all the tutorials for this animation project, hope this helps:).

Rigging Week 1 - http://acbailey88.blogspot.com/2010/03/maya-animation-week-one.html

Small Rigging and Mech Leg - http://acbailey88.blogspot.com/2010/04/maya-tutorials.html 

The Three Walk Cycles -  http://acbailey88.blogspot.com/2010/04/three-walk-cycles.html

And thanks again Alan, look forward to the next ones.

The three walk cycles

So these are my three walk cycles which are composited into one video. I just want to say that I really enjoyed these tutorials and I look forward to the next.

Unfortunately I did have a few problems playblasting. One minute it was fine and then the other it just wouldn't work at all. Really quite annoying, however I did manage to get around it by using the programme fraps to record what I was doing in some of the scenes.

The scene I used the fraps with was the double bounce walk cycle. All i did was changed the playblast speed in the timeline and then just played it from there whilst using the fraps. I just hope its alright.

Just one more quick thing which I noticed, I think now looking at the donwpose walk cycle I may of exaggerated the hips swaying a bit much but as I look at the last ones I can see I have improved but anyway thanks again Alan.

Maya Tuts - Parts 2 and 3 of Character Rigging

So Jack showed me this really neat little site were I can record whilst I'm working. Unfoutuantly it only records for thirty seconds unless you pay a certain amount of money. I'm not going to do that so I have put it into premiere pro and made a quick little video of me moving the rigs limbs etc.

This first video is a completed part two of the tutorials, A finished spine rig. In the video I try to give some examples of how the rig moves, hopefully it makes sense. This one below was completed a little while back but I wanted to show it as a quick video instead of images like in my last post about the rigging of the legs.

Spine Rigging - 



The last installment of these rigging exercises should come either later this evening or tomorrow as youtube is taken hours to upload my videos for some reason.

haha, here is the final video of the rigging for the hands and arms, it only took two hours to get onto Youtube.
One thing I will say about the video is that when I was doing it I decided to shrink the joint size whilst filming the hand section so it would be easier to see the fingers in motion, other than that I am very happy with the final result.

Arms and Hands -

Unit 5 Final Anamation

Okay guys, here is my final one minute animation which in the end I am rather pleased with. It has taken some time to finish but im just proud of actually handing it in and it being what I consider my best piece of work so far. I hope in the next project, which is going to be a major test for me, I will be able to complete it still improving.

Okay, just a quick reminder, the animation below is about a Myopic matchbox, myopic which is another word which means short sighted. He roams along a dining room table unaware that he is causing any trouble. I wont say anymore, just that im glad this project is over and I look forward to giving updates on the next one :)

Unit 5 Anamatic

Here is my Anamatic for my myopic matchbox which I should have put up a while back.

Update on work...

So by now I'm getting to the stage of actually going mad. Although I have finished my drawings and most of my other work, I am still going mad. Sleep is a major issue at the moment because everytime I try and sleep at night my body will not let me. It's become that bad that I went out last night, bought a bottle of brandy and tried to drink myself to sleep, but oh no, not even that worked.

Anyway, sorry for the rant guys, I do feel really good about this project because it has been my most rewarding one. I can honestly say that I have put in the effort this time which will hopefully be seen in my final animation. Things have gone wrong and have needed change but hopefully they will not effect my animation too much. One of the things I am a bit worried about is a still shot I have in my animation. After the matchbox knocks over one of the candles I have a still shot of the curtains on fire. I could of animated it quite easily but I wanted  something different, a mixture of both, well one in this case.

Well anyway people, look forward to the crit, hopefully see you then. Hopefully this will be an improvement on my others as I think I've turned a new leaf :)

Maya Tutorials - Rigging

Below is a video which shows the walker Mech leg once it has been rigged. Below this are the Rig tutorials which were set for week four, the eye balls, The can pass and the tail.

Walker Leg

Here is the first tutorial from Maya on week four, the first of the tutorials is the rigging of the eyelid. I have quickly play blasted the images for a quick blink demonstration.

Eyeballs

 Can Pickup

Found this a good exercise, however in the video it cuts out half way. Hopefully when I get back from work I will try to extend the time so you can see it pick up the can in both hands.

 The last of these three rigging tutorials I did as a video so I could show the different bends whilst using the Control. Even though I imagine that the codex for what I used in this tutorial would get more complicated, It is something I would like to do in the future. I think i am a bit strange because I don't actually mind rigging, well not yet anyway :).

Spline IK Tail 

Winsor McCay - 1914: Gertie the Dinosaur

In 1914, the talented Winsor McCay created Gertie the dinosaur which proved to be very popular amongst its audiene.

Megs ball tutorials

Below are the three ball animations which Meg gave us as a tutorial

Bouncy Ball


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Hard Rubber Ball bounce 

Below is a tester sheet of how I planned out my hard rubber ball bounce and below that is the bounce itself.

 Message to Meg - I'm not sure if this is my computer that is not showing the rubber ball as clearly as it should, but in case it doesn't show as well on your screen it plays a little clearer on youtube for some very strange reason, so  maybe you should try having a look on there. Otherwise I'm not sure what to do.

Bowling Ball Bounce/Roll

This is the third and final ball bounce of all of the tutorials, this time I have went over the ball in pen just to show the bounce more clearly.

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Storyboard final

I don't know who has been looking at my blog lately but I've been having some minor problems with the HP piece of rubbish which i should call printer. However after a battle with me and technology I finally got it to work in some sort of fashion, well for about an hour i mean :). Anyway, moving swiftly on, I was worried people were beginning to think I was lazy because my blog was lacking a few essentials but after making the scanner work I can finally put up my storyboards which I did in my sketchbook a few weeks back.

Just a quick recap, my story is about a Myopic Matchbox. In more basic terms, Myopia is a disease amongst a persons retina making them 'short sighted', or Myopic. Basically my story begins with my matchbox walking along a dining room table lighting candles. Pretty simple you may think but the story has a more subtle funny side to it.

In the first act the matchbox establishes itself as a myopic, I want the audience to know about whats happening in the animation but I don't want the matchbox to know any of the havoc he may be causing. If you want to know anymore I suggest a quick look a some previous posts which give a more defined explanation of the story.

Warning! This is not an animatic, this is my storyboard, the animatic should be up either this evening or tomorrow depending on my essay, as I would like to finish my bibliography and editing/spelling.

Winsor MCcay

 Winsor MCcay was an American Animator born in Michigan on the 26th of July 1934. He is said to be one of the best cinema animators of his time.

winsor MCcay, this was a very talented man who was the creator of the character Little Nemo. MCcay was one of the first known men to actually try to turn animation into an art form. He created "4000" drawings each showing differet movements of Little Nemo which would later be added together to make a complete animation.
After he was complete, MCcay showed it at the Hammerstein Theatre in New York in 1911 were it became a massive hit.

Emile Cohl

A couple of years after Porter and Blackton had released 'Humorous phases of funny faces', French cartoonist, Emile Cohl decided to show his first animated film at the Follies Bergeres in Paris,France.

The drawings were done in white on a black background. It was about a young women, a jealous lover and a policeman. A wierd combination you might say, But the thing that Cohl did best was to give soul and heart to his animations. He even gave things like the lampposts and houses thier own personalities, emotions and movements.

One of the most recognisable animations that Cohl did in 1908 was called 'Fantasmagorie' which is seen in the video below. The similar style is also seen in this animation, white drawings on a black background.

Blackton and Edison - 1896 - 1906

In 1996, a newspaper cartoonist called James Stuart Blackton met up with inventor Thomas Edison who at the time was experimenting with moving images. In the interview, Blackton did some remarkable quick sketches of Edison, Edison was so impressed by the speed and skill of Blackton that he asked if he would like to work with him on a series of drawings which would later be photographed by Edison. In 1906 the pair officially released 'Humorous phases of funny faces', which can be seen in the video below. 

People have been known to find one part of these "3000 drawings" to be the most comical. When the man blows his smoke into the ladys face, obsuring her, people rolled up in fits of laughter making it an instant hit amongst the audience.

The Candles

So I've been looking at how to animate a flame in some of my scenes throughout the animation and have found a few examples on youtube which I think might help later on. Also I wanted this post to be were I gathered some of my reference images for 'Basic' candles and thier holders just so I can have a look to find a simple but effective design.

The three images above are just a few basic examples of some dining room candles pieces which I have used for reference to create a basic set for my animation.
Below are two videos of a candle flame, these are in this post because I wasn't quite sure what I needed to do to create a nice looking flame once the candle was set alight.

Dining room table research

Well just want to add some reference images up to the blog to show a dining room table. You always have to have a set/scene and for my Myopic matchbox it is a dining room table. I will use the matchbox to walk along the table from one end to the other trying to set different candels alight. However, the images below are only reference images and are not going to be what I use in my final animation. This is because I don't want to overcomplicate things by adding drawings which aren't relevant to my story.

You can see that each of the tables set ups are too complicated for what I want but they still give me a sense of perspective and what kind of items you can expect to see on a dining room table.

The Praxinoscope - 1877

Next came the praxinoscope which was created/developed from the Zoetrope by a Frenchman called Emile Reynaud in 1877. "He was the first to create short sequences of dramatic action by drawing on a thirty foot strip of transparent substance which was called 'Crystaloid'". This new development on the Zoetrope was the pathway for what would later come in the future amongst the animation timeline/industry.

The image above is the Praxinoscope in action. After Reynaud developed the Praxinoscope in 1877 he went on trying to change it for use in theatre.

The image above  is just a reference to show what the Praxinoscope looks like and how each invention has developed over the years. This one has a light on the top to illuminate the still images once they are in motion.

The Zoetrope - AKA Wheel of life

The Zoetrope like the phenakistoscope, is another invention that works by spinning and producing an illusion of action from a number of still images which are spun in rapid succession. The word Zoetrope is said to have been a greek meaning 'Wheel of life'. Even though similar inventions had been previously made, the Zoetrope “appeared in the USA in 1867 and was sold as a childrens toy”.

 In the image above is an example of what a Zoetrope actually looked like, once the images were slotted into the cylinder you would spin the object to allow it to create motion. 

This next image is something I in particular found very interesting, The image below is from the Sony Bravia adverts. In this advertisement, they use Brazillian football star Kaka, by taking still shots of him and inserting them into a gigantic modern Zoetrope.

Above is the image but below this text I have added the video to give you and idea of how it works and that we still use past animation techniques even to this day.

King Kong 1933

King Kong – 1933

The movie King Kong was released in the USA on the 7^th of April 1933. The basic story is about a beautiful and young blonde women who becomes the victim to an incredible beast. A gigantic ape living on the mysterious “Skull Island”.

One of the major themes of the film is based around the struggle for survival. When Carl Denham brings back the ape into civilisation, the ape finds himself in a struggle against the urban civilisation and the industrial technology. When the ape finally escapes his captives, he seeks out the blonde beauty and takes her by force to the very top of the empire state building. This is one of the more sad scenes of the film. When Kong looks into the eyes of Ann Darrow and realises that he will never win her heart, he gives up and lets himself die. This is where one of the most famous lines of the movie is spoken. When Kong is laying at the foot of the empire state building the police lieutenant mentions to Denham that the aeroplanes were the ones to finish Kong off,but Denham replies, it wasn't the aeroplanes that killed the beast, “it was beauty that killed the beast”.

Updates...

So you haven't heard alot from me over the past week because I have been a busy boy. I have finished my anamatic and have started the task of making my final animation. All I really need to do now is upload the work onto my blog once I can get my scanner to work, if not I will just do it monday morning.

Anyway, for those who don't know I will just explain what my final story has actually turned out like because I didn't really explain fully once I had refined it.

In Act one you establish the character as the myopic matchbox. He walks along the table knocking things over unaware of anything he is doing.

In the second act you start to see what the matchbox is trying to achieve, In this case the matchbox is trying to light some dining room table candles. However, me and Phil thought it would be good to switch acts and add a small twist to the story. Throughout this act the matchbox lights the candles with no problems, only nearlly causing devistation to the room.

In Act 3 I am using the same scenario is in act 2 but showing it from the audiences perspective. What do I mean by this, in act 2 you see the matchbox sucessfully achieving his goals and lighting the candles in a correct and decent manner. In act 3 we see what the matchbox is really capable of, a whole mass of disaster. In act 2 he lights what he thinks to be the main candle center piece but actually he is lighting a plate of bangers and mash on . It will end with him walking out of the cameras view at the end of the table followed by the destruction he has caused.