YEAH lingbo

I think the early stage work is almost done at this time.

This is the finished animatic for now. https://vimeo.com/417526148 password:MACA

Also I made a lot of changes of the animatic.

This is the old one.

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The new one.

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This part confused me for a long time. Because I don’t want to delete the writing music part. But it is really hard to connect with the later part. I prefer to design a transform between these two scenes instead of change to another scene directly. So I made a new animatic for this part. And I will put the writing design to the end of the story maybe. About this new animatic, I choose the strings to represent the music. I’m not saying she is playing the guitar or some specific instrument. It’s just a symbol which will appear at the later part of this story as well.

And I also updated these two style frames which I think have the biggest contract. The first one is the bullying part. I’m about to use a very rough line to create the people who want to attack her and also use a very bright colour to make this scene have more visual impact.

I try to make this frame to be gentle and peaceful. And the strings will shows at this part as the symbol of her music. The shapes will move gently with music and it was inspired by Oskar Fischinger’s work.

I developed the character design with the model sheet. Fortunately, I don’t have to change a lot of this character design.

Charles helps a lot about how to express this girl’s fear and panic when she walking on the street. I think a good animator must be a good actor. We really need to feel how the character feels and express it for the characters

We mainly discuss this part. Charles is super good at express character’s mood with body language and I was inspired a lot. When I follow his lead I really understand the feeling that the character has and really involved in it. When we discussing the part about the character was swallowed by the shadow, Charles first told me to stand up and down several times and I was a bit confused. And then I realized this is the preparation for the part when the character crouches her body. I crouch my body too and calm down. Different from the feeling that I do the stand-up and down, my body was warm at that time but now I really feel helpless and my body is not warm at all when I brought the characters’ feeling to my mind.

So I made some keyframes in the following days to not let the feelings go away.

After the tutorial, I updated some content of the animatic. This is the ver 2 animatic.https://vimeo.com/414478558

I add the scene that she is writing music. But if I draw the composition like this it’s very hard to connect with the later part so I may change the composition. And I was recommended to have a look at Oskar Fischinger’s works which is really inspired. He made the music visible through the changing of different geometric shapes. This is what I would love to do at the end of my work. The girl is listening to music, her expression will be soft and gentle, and a lot of shapes and pattern is moving with the music.

And come to the part where she is swallowed by the bad mood. I made some changes to this part. Because the old one is hard to link with the front frame.

About the colour tone. Firstly I was thinking to use the cold tone colour to express the panic of the character. like this:

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I’ve changed my mind. I’m going to make this scene lose all the colours become to the simple tone which I think maybe more effective to show her feelings.

I finished the storyboard which I think is really a big progress.

And I got more information about this character: she writes her own music. I could add more things to the apart which she said her music is a big sort of therapeutic release to her. She could relax and peaceful when she is writing music the could have the contract with the later part(the school bullying) I think this animatic is a bit empty for now. Some part is too long without moving so I should add more contents.

These three frames which I think is the most important part of the animatic so I finished them first. They link together and also a contrast between two different mood.

I was thinking about how to express the school bullying scene and also had a look at some works about school bullying. This one made me empressed.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sPZm-B0zQN8

This film is really attractive and amazing, but the bullying scene is too directly to make the audience feel a real sense of stress and painful same as the character. I want to do it differently, just to show the shape of the bad guys. I may focus on the reaction e girls to show her pressures.

I changed the start of the story. I did some research about PTSD. There are lots of “triggers” can cause people who had PTSD re-experiencing of traumatic events like nightmares, flashbacks and painful thoughts. The reason why I put the character on the street is I want to express this kind of negative feeling will happen without warning. One second before she walking on the street just like the other people but suddenly everything change and become aggressive. But she could do nothing because the feeling is so strong.

And the part that she is enjoying the music. I keep the music bar behind her. Her expression will be more and more relaxed with music. It may show how music treats her mind.

After the tutorial, I decided to develop the character based on the figure at the right corner.

I kinda mix this figure from all of my initial design. A short hair girl with the sweater, and a headphone in her ear. It’s an ordinary girl with nothing special. I don’t want to make any exaggerated features for her. I think she becomes a special one when she starts to tell her story.

I draw a little start of the story. The girl is talking about she’d argue she had PTSD. And she feels panic and stressful frequently. I don’t know what things made her had PTSD so I just describe her feelings with shadow. The shadow represents the bad mood which is spreading through her body and finally covers her. Then the scene becomes black and transfers to the back of her locker. The next part is about her experiencing school bullying so I made this part start in front of her locker which I think is a signal of school.

I draw two different style frames which reflect the different mood of her. I try to use the opposite colour tone to express deep and relax.

For me, fear and anxiety are shapeless. They like air and water can’t be controlled by my hand. This animation made fear like a little black shadow and when people feel afraid of something, the little monster will grow bigger until cover people all which I think is a really interesting idea.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1sHAGAuceE

About the music with her. I think the audio bar is like a symbol of music. And these bars could move with the background music. And the girl sitting on the guitar( it could be other instruments) enjoying the music.

I think this girl is nearly 13-16 because she mentioned about the bullying things happened when she started secondary school. So she should be a teenager figure. And maybe I will keep the headphone with her to emphasis the different between whether she is with her music or not.

And about the characteristic, I think she is a brave girl and won’t give in. She is strong and fight with the bad mood but sometimes can’t defense it. Even was dragged into the panic and stressful situation but she will stand up and keep fighting.

When I first hear the audio of this girl I really understand her feeling although I am lucky enough not experienced these pains, I do believe that music could treat people’s broken heart. It reminds me of the song which used in a game called devotion.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sLCEe8RZM0M

This game talks about a sad story that happened to a poor girl. She is ill but her parents use some superstition methods to treat her. She was locked in the bathrooms about 10 days and die in there. I was really sad when I play this game but in the end, the song started playing and I saw the ending animation. The girl walking in the bright space and I don’t know whether it is heaven or not.

This part is really touching, especially the music. After suffering the dark story that happened before, I feel that my pressure and sadness is release by this song. It inspired me of this project. Because this girl thinks music is a kind of therapy to her. I think I should describe this story from the feeling of the character’s mind and body. There has a contrast between these two, so I want to emphasis how music cures her and the importance of her music.

About the style, I think the world of character’s mind should be described in the abstract and in opposite the real world will have many differences from the mind world.