Five Cycles of Mazikki

Evaluation

Tara 6/7/2013

Brief and Research Development The idea of the specialist project was to develop specific skills that accommodate to my own choice skill set. Therefore, it was natural to me to transform the specialist brief into my own animation project- aiming to create an animated short film. I am inspired majorly by Japanese animation, specifically Studio Ghibli who create down do earth fantasy films. Ultimately I wanted to focus on developing the following skills: Narrative skills Realistic movement Pacing Increase in workflow Improve my illustration skills

The brief I created had to fill the criteria of the above for me to add onto my skillset, preparing me for employment. Furthermore, it was also an opportunity to show my work at film and comic conventions. This is also a learning curve, teaching me discipline in terms of my production schedule and animation style. My initial ideas were heavily inspired by Studio Ghiblis Spirited Away in which the animation style and narrative was smooth with major magical elements. However, the film also held a touch of reality, tackling real life issues such corruption within society. It was imperative for me to get this across within my ideas because I wanted the audience to leave with an important message. Within Japanese animated films; it is common to reveal an important message bringing the audience out of their escapism. Within Spirited Away along with the coming of age themes, it also highlighted major problems within Japanese society such as pollution. The can been seen through characters such a No Face inspired by the Japanese fables, Nuppeppo. He is a stark comparison to the less greedy and corrupted, and during the scenes within the bath house, reveals a theme that connects to purification of mind and spirit. This is a major convention within Japanese fantasy films which lead to my first initial ideas. During the first pitch, feedback allowed me to think about the opportunities and constrains which were as follows: Opportunitieso Animation development o Employment aspects o Placing a message within the film Constraints o Time scale of production o Length o Complexity

These were aspects I had to come back to during the production; however, within the first stages it was important to make sure my final brief was not overly ambitious or too long. To avoid this I began to seek out inspiration within shorter films, which lead me to research She and Her Cat by Makoto Shinkai- a short film about a young woman and her cat told from the cats perspective. My research development was imperative and successful in influencing

the final production and led me continuing in-depth research of specific aspects such as character design within other modules. Academic modules also developed research skills such as validity, which were transferrable into my production file. My final brief was majorly inspired by the melancholy look of She and Her Cat. The animation style was also limited, with most scenes as stills. Practically, developing from this idea allowed me to avoid the issue of over complicating the movements, but also allowed more time to be dedicated to isolated movements during the animation process. Visually, the use of black and white in Japanese animation represents a lower mood, or an emotional state. This linked well with the five stages of grief in which a sad tone was more effective. Five Cycles of Mazikki focused of the five stages of grief and had certain elements which connected to the thematic convention in Japanese fantasy films. The harsh element of death was softened with the use of anthropomorphic characters such as Mazikki being presented as a feline creature. Anthropomorphising elements allow the story to be told to a wider demographic along with the added fantasy elements. Production management and Process My directing skills improved slightly with the aid of other training within other classes. This transferrable element aided my communication development with Chris Peak, the voice of Mazikki. The overall management process involved casting and recording sessions in which it was important for me to communicate the way I wanted certain words stressed. Overall, working with an outside contributor went well because I evaluated his performance regularly after sessions. This allowed me to review clips and give feedback in further sessions so we could get the best from my project. As a result, the variety of audio clips allowed more choice within the editing process. The use of audio is important within animation because sound is generated separately. Conventionally, the audio track is created first and the visuals connect with them. Audio levels were hard to maintain until I had all the audio in place due to lots of overlying sounds. Therefore, I had to edit the audio in different stages: Blocking stage- basic plan of sound Spot effects Checking levels

Interestingly, some of the sounds in reality are completely different to what they are used for within the film. For example, using bottles full of water, glugging, was used to create underwater effects, which indicated and added drama to the swimming movements. This creative use of audio had been successful in building up a world around the characters but sometimes felt jarring because of extra noise within the audio clip. I used normalise and noise remover within Audacity to remove clicks. For future projects however, it would be wise to

check noise levels through-out the recording process.

Visually, I was inspired by practitioners such as Winsor McCay in terms of line work and style. The line work is slightly bolder than traditional Japanese animation however this was to allow my own style to develop. The major challenge was to keep all designs consistent in particular the character design of Mazikki. To develop this further I used character sheets as a template to avoid any major changes in different angles. The sheets show a rough guide of building blocks that make up the character with some experimentation in sizes for exploration of style. The success of this was shown through my final product, in which most drawings were consistent. However, some shots showed a fuller faced Mazikki than others. This had been a huge discipline and will allow me to make sure I study my characters further within future projects. This process has ultimately developed my drawing skills, specifically within character design, and increased my productivity when creating a series of imagery. Strengths and Weaknesses Time management of production was strong at the beginning of the project, with the preproduction planning paper work, such as script. However during the animation process, I felt that the pace of development began to slow down majorly. The common obstacle was the complexity and number of shots. Through feedback with my tutor, it was discussed the possibility of cutting areas of the script in which it was felt that the section bargaining would less likely effect the rest of the narrative. This aided in improving the pacing of my scheduling because the work load was cut down considerably. However, my time management was ultimately effected by the growing complexity of the film during the preproduction phase. This issue was relieved slightly because of the research in which I was able to reference back to my inspiration to keep me on track. Development within narrative was important to me within this project because it is my most under-developed skill. This was a strength because the project was an opportunity to develop this skill. Again, audience feedback influenced my decision within the edit. When cutting down the script it was important to me not to lose sight of the narrative I set out within the brief. For example, it was suggested that lines were cut out completely because it seemed out of place with the rest of the film. In turn this began to tighten up the pace removing repeated metaphors such as winter is creeping up on me again and kept the continuous speech going. Feedback from the audience also suggested the continuous speech was important to maintain the pace and therefore influenced by final decision to add two more lines between the longer dream sequences at the beginning. However, some

pauses felt needed to let the audience hang on to the last work spoken. This felt most effective within the ending, leaving the audience with the message, without too much explanation after. The overall product was successful because it helped me develop the following skills effectively: Drawing/visual skills Narrative skills Increase in workflow Editing skills

Aesthetically, the visuals fitted well with the audio and kept in pace with all sounds present. There was a sense of a message within the film which also was a success within keeping it close to Japanese fantasy animation. However, sometimes the imagery felt too metaphorical and while this still got the message across, one of my original goals was to have a level of continuity within each shot. There is now an opportunity to develop my continuity skills within animation, which will work well alongside my narrative development. This can be achieved my creating very short animation stories the possibly focus in one scene, with different angles and shot sizes. All in all, I managed to keep to my brief, and even when I cut areas of my script, I kept within the length I proposed. There was a discipline involved, when staying with the same project and developing the narrative, which had been the opposite within previous projects. Keeping goal orientated helped me achieve a level of development in all the skills mentioned, helping me on my endeavour to become an established animator. Furthermore, other transferrable skills from other modules aided development in other practical skills such as research and critical analysis skills. (1,619)