DDD Evaluation - 502 words

Over the course of the second term I attended lectures held by Andy. The main area’s we focused on were story boarding, characters and plots, roles with in production and realistic scheduling.

First of all we concentrated on making a good plot, this includes various factors like settings, point of views, style, tones and languages, themes and symbolisms. We mainly focused on creating well-developed characters. There are seven standard character types, the confidant, dynamic, flat, foil, round, stock and static which all bring different attributes to a story and ultimately keep it interesting and vibrant for the audience. We mainly focused on a protagonist and antagonist. The more the audience know about the character the easier it is for them to relate to the characters, anticipate their reactions, emotions and emphasize accordingly. The best way to start doing this is by making a biography for the characters. As essentially, the only way to come up with a believable developed character is principally the depth of research and background we have given them.

The next thing we concentrated on was storyboarding.  This is the first time we draw out the key scenes, this helps us create a structured narrative that makes sense, but to do this to a high standard we need to do some essential work before hand which include; initial concept – the theme of the animation/film, what is it about, some times it is easier to start with a seed and then layer up everything else. The synopsis comes next, which is a summary of your film or animation. Story development is the next stage, as you should have a clearer idea of the direction of your production, this means you have time to check and change anything that needs to be altered. Next comes, camera scripting, this is when we turn out story into a script this is mainly the directors job, as this is where you start to think about the different shots and how you want them to be framed. Blocking is when you turn your idea into a plan, plotting the key parts of the environment and also the positioning of your characters, its so important to make sure that the geography is consistent. Once all these stages are done it leads onto the story boarding.

I mentioned above about roles with in the development of a project. Executive Producers are Andy and Ron they make the ultimate decisions and are rather hand’s off. Producers are the bean counters. The make a production schedule, make everybody aware of roles and gets everything in order. The Director plays the nurturing role, they create a loyal army of followers it’s a tough role and requires a lot of work. The animators do the graft, when they feel like they contribute to a production it works better, Negotiation and compromise is key to make sure they everything runs smoothly. Other roles in the production process includes, product designer, layout artist, sound designer, editors who all individually contribute to a project.

Final Version of 30 clip.

This is my final version of the 30 second clip piece. Just to refresh everyone i thought i would re-blog the passage that we had to make sounds for so everyone can know what i've tried to.

Final 30 Sound Track

 ‘Tales from the Geronimo’ Scott Frank 

The beaten hotel had memories flickering from almost every corner. Drifting into short dreams, at times I thought I heard the putt-putting of old Model Ts pulling up to the lobby, dropping off elegantly gowned women accompanied by pillars of the community in cool, white tuxedos. Opulent repose, 1920s desert style. Back in 1919, when the Geronimo was built, edges of huge desert tracts were still nearby. Horses and Model Ts pulled up to the community growing around the new University of Arizona.

When dragging hours in the hotel corridors reached post-midnight hush, time secretly eased its pace. My eyelids would droop; then faint brown light oozing from dust-covered globes caught my lashes. Momentarily I’d catch the glimmer of sparkling chandeliers and the bright warmth of the old-time light bulbs. They had a filament in them that you could see clearly, and it wouldn’t hurt your eyes to look. Sometimes I fancied flickering on the dreamwalls, flames dancing in the lobby’s old fireplace. But when I opened my eyes, all I saw was a sealed up chimney and an old black and white TV sitting where the logs used to burn.


As i have explained in previous posts i have tried to slip the narrative into three separate parts and share a equal amount of time on each.

Evaluation:

Overal, im pleasantly surprised with the outcome of this task. At first i struggled to understand what i had to do and what i was reading as i have dyslexia, it took a lot of brain storming and pulling the words out of the text to get a idea of what the passage was  talking about. There are things i would change - for instance i think the change between inside the lobby and then the lobby after dark is to quick. If i was allowed an extra 10 seconds this wouldn't be a problem anymore. One whole paragraph talked about the outside of the hotel and i felt like i needed to make this as one of the longer parts of audio. Over all the outside of the hotel goes on for just under 12 seconds.

I feel like i have created a story with sound, and i feel like its quite easy to follow and quick logical in sound and approach. Maybe next time i could be more abstract in approach and think outside the box rather then what is immediate. Also if i had more time i would probably book a sound room and make my own foley noises. I have two different walking tracks however, i find that they are rather slow and i would have preferred something a little quicker in walk. Although, when i put it all together the pace of the foot steps isn't really noticeable.

I have learnt a lot from this project the thing i am most proud of is tackling a new Adobe programme, i feel like i know the bare basics but it was enough to get me through this task. I did get a little bit over whelmed in the sound workshops because there was so much to do, so many buttons, menus, rules, settings that i couldn't take it all in. I just made sure i took in all the essential information and it seemed to work out okay. I would probably benefit by having more classes on Adobe Audition, there were many things we did in class that i cant remember how to do now, and therefore i believe it would be beneficial. 

Link to Sound

Near finished sound

Above is the link to my version of the sound piece with the piano - but after listening to it a few times i have decided that i need to add two lots of foot steps walking into the lobby to make it seem like we are following some people inside. I will do this and upload shortly.

30 seconds with Piano

Finally after a lot of research i found a piece of music that would be appropriate for the time that the passage was written. The music i chose can be found on YouTube - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0qMU17puYnw - its called 'Night & Day' and its on a cd-rom called Pianoforte Jazz. The piece itself goes on for just over 5 minutes so i have the opening part of the piece as the door opens.

30second Piece with Piano

It actually makes it sound much better, much more up market however, i could do with some talking outside the hotel as they walk up to the butler standing outside the hotel ready to let them in. Also maybe i could have some foot steps, some high heels and flat shoes?

There seems to be some technical issues with my upload onto Vimeo - i think when i exported from after effects i forgot to click the audio settings, and therefore after effects didn't export the audio! So i have done the process again making sure it had some sound.

30 Second clip with no piano

The link i will paste below is the link to the 30 second piece with out the classical piano playing in the lobby! I thought it would be good to have two different comparisons for me and also for other people to listen to, it will be interesting to see how it changed the atmosphere - i think it will make the hotel sound much more upper class.

30s Clip - No Piano

I had to make the audio into a film in AE to be able to upload it to Vimeo. I rendered it at the rate that Joe told us to do in the sound work shop and i also exported it at H.264 as i have learnt from Jon in my Digital Skills lessons that it is the best compression format.

Finishing the 30 second sound clip

This is a image of the first version i have completed for the 30 second clip. I think it works rather well. It has all three aspect of the passage, outside the hotel, inside the lobby and then at night when everything has settles and the author comes to the realisation of where he is... I couldn't really add too much more sound effects because then it could sound over crowded and it would have been a struggle for me to make sure that everything stays under -10dB. I labelled everything to make sure i could keep tabs of where everything was - although they aren't in order, this is because i made the error when i added a new multitrack of having one of the layers high lighted, this meant that then the new multi tracks would altermatically go underneath.

However, i was watching a film last night and there was a couple in a hotel having a lovely meal and it was based in America - NewYork i think. They were sitting having dinner and it sounded much like the lobby that i have in my 30 second sound clip - but they had some classical piano playing in the background so i might add something like that into the lobby sequence as it might help bring the lobby to life a bit.

BUT...... the definition of a lobby is:

Noun A room providing a space out of which other rooms or corridors lead, typically one near the entrance of a public building.

Verb Seek to influence (a politician or public official) on an issue: "booksellers lobbied their representatives".

Synonyms hall - vestibule - foyer - hallway So they might not have the music playing, but from the information in the passage, i can gather that this is based in the evening, and i'm sure that if i owned a hotel i would have some music playing in the lobby whilst people meet up before they either leave the hotel for the evening or come to the hotel for dinner or to stay. So i think i will have some classical piano in the background.

Production of 30second Piece

I set up a new project as Joe showed us in our sound tutorials with him a few weeks ago.

I imported the files to the project manager on the side one piece at a time. I started off with the ambience of the place outside, so i imported my desert sounds which i put on a really low volume, i then started layering up the desert sounds with other noises like cars and horses in the background trotting and maybe a neigh, some birds and other noises that could be heard.

With the car coming up to the front of the hotel, i wanted to make it seem like it started far away, went past the audience and then want on part, this means that i had to manipulate the sound of the clip to suit my needs - i had to change the blending of the layer by changing the gradient of the sound lines, and i also added some 'key frames' so i could change where the sound gets louder and when i want to make is quieter. Its actually really clever, and i am so glad that i made Joe's lesson or i would have had no clue.

This image is a print screen of the two tracks that i explained about - you can see the left and right ear sounds for the ambience and then some birds chirping. On 'Track 3' you can see a line which is all over the place, that line demonstrated how loud i want the track, and it varies as you can see. These ambience tracks will mainly be on through out the whole clip - this is because they are on so low and also because when the character is quiet in his room he would still be able to hear the outside ambience - although the birds probably wouldn't be chirping.

TECHNICAL ISSUES..... Adobe Audition kept shutting down which was really frustrating - it wouldn't save my work, nor would it stay open for a long duration. So i had to do this process 4 times, however, it probably did me some good because i got to slightly amend it every time, getting me used to the process and also to opening new projects.