Experimental Video #5: Story & Character Design
STORY:
CHARACTER DESIGN:
Our character design was heavily inspired by Thom Yorke's - LAST I HEARD (...He was circling the drain) directed by Paul Thomas Anderson. All the figures in the crowd remain faceless and almost lack individuality and they all seem to all move as one. They all seem to move at a reduced speed enhancing the dream-like effect Anderson wanted to create.
We really liked the idea of keeping the figure simple and feature-less. This would mean we would have to focus more on the body language of this character. We decided to keep it as a human-like figure. But we had the idea of slightly distorting it... maybe make its figure elongated and hunched over. This is because we want the Ghost to look as if it is drained and tired, as if it has been through and seen a lot.
Thom Yorke's video was black and white which meant that there was great contrast with the light and shadows on to the figures. This meant that at some points instead of the figures being silhouettes, they were all contrasting white faceless people.
This image really stuck with us and triggered an idea of having a glowing, white ghostly figure as our main character. We hope to achieve this through animation by having the background of the animation black. Therefore, leaving the only visible thing to be the character. Once this is projected on to the dark set of the paper buildings. The character will illuminate each building as it passes each one. We would possibly have the character encounter some other things within the animation.
Design No.1
For my first character design, I focused on having a plain human silhouette. We have chosen to keep the figure genderless as the gender does not mater to the story. In addition, I also kept the figure clothes-less to highlight the naturalness of life and and not define the ghost's character too much. My main aim here was to mess around with the tools on photoshop and see how I could make the figure appear ghostly.
I started by drawing out an outline of the figure. I realised I kind of started backwards as I should have made the background black first and then drew the figure in white. However, it was too late and I was too committed. Instead, I filled in the back ground black and then using an air brush I filled in the figure white. I chose the air brush tool as I didn't want it to be harshly coloured in. Furthermore, I wanted to have that glowing effect of an apparition. I also realised for the concept design, I wanted to add some form of shadow to highlight that the figure is 3D to make it more realistic. To achieve this I shaded the the back half of the figure as if the light was hitting it from the front.
After figuring out the basic effects I want to use, I then needed to develop the look of the character itself.
The things we wanted to focus on are having the figure more elongated and hunched over. We want it to look tired, withered and worn away, with a sombre expression in its body.
Design No.2
I had a go at making it hunched over to seem tired and withered and I messed around with the smudge tool to create little ghostly, wispy effects (not very clear in the screen shot though).
However, I felt that the figure still looked too healthy and strong. I really wanted to capture a withered, alien like feeling to the ghosts figure.
Before I started the third design, I wanted to gather a bunch of different artworks to inspire me in order to do another design to fulfil these descriptions.
ALBERTO GIACOMETTI
Giacometti's style of sculpting the human anatomy is very alien-like. I imagine the long slender bronze figures to be very precise in the way they move, a little slow and careful. There is a lightness in this figures walk. I would quite like to recreate this feeling within my character. So far the first two designs seem a bit too sturdy, heavy and healthy, a bit too alive. Where as Giacometti's piece seems so floaty. The man seems to be walking with purpose and is striding to get there.
ANTONY GORMLEY
Gormley's work really stood out to me as he uses human form to explore man's existence in relation to the world I particularly like his piece Field (1991). This installation piece is made up of 35 000 terracotta figures. The piece was made by men women and children.
They were asked to be hand sized, easy to hold, to have deep eyes and to have the head in proportion to the body.
He wanted to reflect on the power humans hold, as a mass they are responsible for the future of the world. This directly reflects on to our story as it is because of the humans that such an area became abandoned. Humans took things too far, wanted so much control that eventually they lost their grip on that control, resulting in disaster.
I really like the simple shape of these figures with only deep hollow eyes, this makes them look slightly curious or shocked which i think is quite sweet. Each created by different hands, yet as a mass, they belong together. Though they are only sculptures they seem to me to be silent and so still.
THE MACHINIST 2004 Dir. Brad Anderson
The main character in The Machinist is Trevor (played by Christian Bale) who is an insomniac and hasn't slept for months. I am really interested at looking at him as he, much like how we want our character to be, is weak, drained and is essentially a bag of bones. Due to him basically starving himself, he is long and thin, ribcage visible, hip bone visible.
He looks lost and hopeless, as if he has given up on trying at all. I don't necessarily want him to look starved but I am more focused on the idea of reflecting that idea of the after life. I want his figure to reflect the abandonment of the city. Once serving a purpose.
1984 - GEORGE ORWELL (both film and novel)
Whilst thinking about how I would want to portray our character, I found my self thinking about the character of Winston from the dystopian novel and film adaption 1984. He was a hard working labourer of strict totalitarian regime, someone who was forced to submit to the world around him and was brainwashed to the destruction of it. He was described as "smallish" and "frail figured". I think our character too like Wilson was in awe at the wonders his world could create, that he became blinded by the destruction it had caused until it was too late. And now he does not want history to repeat itself.
Design No.3 - Final Design
I was quite pleased with the third design I did for the character of the ghost. I really reflected on the character of Trevor from The Machinist. The Ghost appears to be in motion, wandering. I really elongated the figure as I found this was more helpful to make it thiner and in proportion(ish). I struggled towards the end with shading both back arm and back leg as I had no reference as to where the light would be hitting. But i was not so worried by this and turns out I was quite pleased with the outcome.
Throughout this process of character designing and developing, I really learned how to use photoshop in a more thoroughly which is exciting as I previously had never done any form of illustrating digitally.
A Ghost with some unfinished business now exists in an underworld (filled with distorted, upside down buildings) beneath his once vibrant town. Every once in a while, our ghost ventures out from the chaos of the underworld to explore his old home; once successful and striving for greatness. But it’s not what it seems. Streets rather like himself; ghostly, worn and quiet. The people he once knew are all gone. Whether they hide away in their homes or simply aren’t there anymore is what our ghost does not know. He still emerges from the underworld every so often, looking for answers and rather enjoying the peace. He does not want the underworld to become like the real world- Industrial and polluted- as that is where he now exists. He fears that the underworld is going down that road.
The Top World: Is the real abandoned world and is completely still. He goes there as he resents what happened to a once successful place. He is sad that the town went down a horrible route and didn't strive to be better.
Upside Down World: The world that the Ghost currently lives in. It is also a horrible, muggy, industrial with lots of other ghostly figures who are working hard.
As the ghost first enters the abandoned world the creaks of the buildings that he passes scare him.
But as the Ghost goes on deeper into the town he walks past each house illuminating them. Much like him, the times where homes were full of life but are no more and have become nothing but memories now. As he walks past, you will hear the noise of the families that once lived in each house, giving each house a different character to go with their unseen occupants.
This idea really struck me with present events. I was cycling during the second minute clap for NHS and the eerie, silent street became loud with cheering from the front door ways, the balconies, the back gardens of peoples houses, fire works and even boat horns. People were barely visible and remained hidden, yet the glows of their windows and the great noise they created was a great reminder of what the busy streets used to be like almost as if we were all working as one. This is very much the idea we are aiming to reflect in our project.
CHARACTER DESIGN:
Our character design was heavily inspired by Thom Yorke's - LAST I HEARD (...He was circling the drain) directed by Paul Thomas Anderson. All the figures in the crowd remain faceless and almost lack individuality and they all seem to all move as one. They all seem to move at a reduced speed enhancing the dream-like effect Anderson wanted to create. 
We really liked the idea of keeping the figure simple and feature-less. This would mean we would have to focus more on the body language of this character. We decided to keep it as a human-like figure. But we had the idea of slightly distorting it... maybe make its figure elongated and hunched over. This is because we want the Ghost to look as if it is drained and tired, as if it has been through and seen a lot.Thom Yorke's video was black and white which meant that there was great contrast with the light and shadows on to the figures. This meant that at some points instead of the figures being silhouettes, they were all contrasting white faceless people.
This image really stuck with us and triggered an idea of having a glowing, white ghostly figure as our main character. We hope to achieve this through animation by having the background of the animation black. Therefore, leaving the only visible thing to be the character. Once this is projected on to the dark set of the paper buildings. The character will illuminate each building as it passes each one. We would possibly have the character encounter some other things within the animation. Design No.1
For my first character design, I focused on having a plain human silhouette. We have chosen to keep the figure genderless as the gender does not mater to the story. In addition, I also kept the figure clothes-less to highlight the naturalness of life and and not define the ghost's character too much. My main aim here was to mess around with the tools on photoshop and see how I could make the figure appear ghostly.
I started by drawing out an outline of the figure. I realised I kind of started backwards as I should have made the background black first and then drew the figure in white. However, it was too late and I was too committed. Instead, I filled in the back ground black and then using an air brush I filled in the figure white. I chose the air brush tool as I didn't want it to be harshly coloured in. Furthermore, I wanted to have that glowing effect of an apparition. I also realised for the concept design, I wanted to add some form of shadow to highlight that the figure is 3D to make it more realistic. To achieve this I shaded the the back half of the figure as if the light was hitting it from the front.After figuring out the basic effects I want to use, I then needed to develop the look of the character itself.
The things we wanted to focus on are having the figure more elongated and hunched over. We want it to look tired, withered and worn away, with a sombre expression in its body.
Design No.2
However, I felt that the figure still looked too healthy and strong. I really wanted to capture a withered, alien like feeling to the ghosts figure.
Before I started the third design, I wanted to gather a bunch of different artworks to inspire me in order to do another design to fulfil these descriptions.
ALBERTO GIACOMETTI
 |
The Walking Man I/II, 1961 |
Giacometti's style of sculpting the human anatomy is very alien-like. I imagine the long slender bronze figures to be very precise in the way they move, a little slow and careful. There is a lightness in this figures walk. I would quite like to recreate this feeling within my character. So far the first two designs seem a bit too sturdy, heavy and healthy, a bit too alive. Where as Giacometti's piece seems so floaty. The man seems to be walking with purpose and is striding to get there.
ANTONY GORMLEY
Gormley's work really stood out to me as he uses human form to explore man's existence in relation to the world I particularly like his piece Field (1991). This installation piece is made up of 35 000 terracotta figures. The piece was made by men women and children.
They were asked to be hand sized, easy to hold, to have deep eyes and to have the head in proportion to the body.
 |
| Field 1991, Antony Gormley |
I really like the simple shape of these figures with only deep hollow eyes, this makes them look slightly curious or shocked which i think is quite sweet. Each created by different hands, yet as a mass, they belong together. Though they are only sculptures they seem to me to be silent and so still.
THE MACHINIST 2004 Dir. Brad Anderson
The main character in The Machinist is Trevor (played by Christian Bale) who is an insomniac and hasn't slept for months. I am really interested at looking at him as he, much like how we want our character to be, is weak, drained and is essentially a bag of bones. Due to him basically starving himself, he is long and thin, ribcage visible, hip bone visible.He looks lost and hopeless, as if he has given up on trying at all. I don't necessarily want him to look starved but I am more focused on the idea of reflecting that idea of the after life. I want his figure to reflect the abandonment of the city. Once serving a purpose.
1984 - GEORGE ORWELL (both film and novel)
Whilst thinking about how I would want to portray our character, I found my self thinking about the character of Winston from the dystopian novel and film adaption 1984. He was a hard working labourer of strict totalitarian regime, someone who was forced to submit to the world around him and was brainwashed to the destruction of it. He was described as "smallish" and "frail figured". I think our character too like Wilson was in awe at the wonders his world could create, that he became blinded by the destruction it had caused until it was too late. And now he does not want history to repeat itself.
Design No.3 - Final Design
I was quite pleased with the third design I did for the character of the ghost. I really reflected on the character of Trevor from The Machinist. The Ghost appears to be in motion, wandering. I really elongated the figure as I found this was more helpful to make it thiner and in proportion(ish). I struggled towards the end with shading both back arm and back leg as I had no reference as to where the light would be hitting. But i was not so worried by this and turns out I was quite pleased with the outcome.
Throughout this process of character designing and developing, I really learned how to use photoshop in a more thoroughly which is exciting as I previously had never done any form of illustrating digitally.
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