friday

Myself Matt and Adam met up today to go over character designs and talk more about the story.

Matt and I have differing styles of drawing and I think the next week should see us lock down a final design that will best work for the story. As we both have preferences to our own designs, I asked a few members of the class to come over and give their opinion on what they thought worked and didnt work about each of the designs. I explained each of the characters roles and their purpose in the film. It became clear that Macho Gnomes design is currently the strongest with a clear definiton of being a brute whilst Lady Gnome required some furhter development in order to make her presence more understandable to the audience. In terms of either Matts rounded eyes or my button eyes, Yaniv provided an interesting question for us that it would depend on the vairety of facial expressions needed for the piece. Whilst Matts designs would provide more sublte emotions, my simplified look would provide a stylisation of animation. It would need to serve the story justice. Whilst I agree with this, I am tending to favour the AKA-esque eyes in means of my inspiration for the piece, but we shall see how the week progresses, especially after the meeting with Mike and Dave on monday where i'd like to focus on the story development and get their opinions.

In terms of the story, the ending requires more punch. In the 2 minutes that you have to tell the story my thoughts were

• as an audience, would the story satisfy if the hero simply gets the girl?
• would if be better if he lost and the villan won?
• what if neither got the girl?
• what if the girl was the real villan?

my answers are that 2 minutes isn't really long enough to suffice a simple love story like this....ok it works but maybe its too....fluffy? there needs to be some added kick in order for it to stay in the audiences minds.

Thats when Adam had delivered an almighty discovery of what if the Lady Gnome got hit by a football just as our Hero goes in for the kiss....SMASH, she's shattered. You get to bring it home about the fragile quality of these objects and it brings a nice twist to the story. I told a few people the new ending idea and whilst trying to say "awww thats cruel" there was a clear laugh trying to be stifled. result.

This weekend, I'd like the group to create more character designs but also focus on collecting images of inspiration for style, colour for a mood board that will help keep us on track thoughout the year. This will also mean collecting any interesting textures that might be used for the film. I'd also like the group to begin some environment concepts. Although the environment isnt our main focus, its design needs to be nailed in order for proper set dressing placement for the action to occur. A proper layout will be created which depicts each point where the characters will be, move to and requires our attention. Again, character development is also important so it will continue to be set until with nailed this too.

Good meeting team :) bring on the Monday meeting!