Research Part 1

When thinking of my 3 components, a lot of different exciting stories came up but I was also wondering of the various possibilities of the components. Like my setting for instance, the plane. What kind of plane could that be?

 Plane

1) A modern aeroplane

2) A toy plane (or remote control plane?)

3) A military plane

4) A paper plane

5) An old plane in a museum?

6) Inside or outside an aeroplane?



Burglar

I've been working on different character designs for the burglar. It's been fun using my own cartoony style but I might experiment with more styles to explore my abilities in this area.

Also, don't know if this is allowed but what if the burglar was an animal like a raccoon or a rat?

 

Trampoline

Tramploline with straps.

Floating Trampoline

Regular Trampoline

Mural moments to pass time

Since I had a lot of free time for myself this week I've been  busy working on some "jungle themed" murals for my 2 year old cousin's bedroom wall. They were all done using acrylic paint. It was something I really enjoyed doing and was certainly pleased with the outcome.

Some quick character sketching..

I am not sure how to approach this project. I've been doing a few sketching and trying to map down some ideas. Are we allowed to use any style we want though? Also, does our story need to be entirely based on our 3 components? Can we add anything more to the story or make any adjustments?

Basic Shapes

Rough outlines 

Clean sketches

Comic Strips from when I was 14

This Unit will be focused on storyboarding. I've always been interested in making my own stories from a very young age. This is a small collection of scanned comic strips I made when I was about 14 using Paint. I used to spend hours on the computer drawing them and colouring them in. I am not still sure what those characters are-probably some round aliens living on Earth. I do apologise it's in greek but I thought  I should share them because they do mean a lot to me :)

UNIT 4 STORY-TELLING

On last Friday's crit we got to take a first glance to our next Unit which is Story-telling. Each of us us had to draw 3 words: A character, an object and a setting. So what kind of story can you make up from those 3 words?
Character: A burglar
Object: A trampoline
Setting: A plane

 My 3 components could link together very well. I am very pleased I got those words as I've come up with some ideas already. It will be an exciting Unit for all of us and I am quite curious to see what everyone else's work will be like. 

EVALUATION OF UNIT 3

This Unit was all about 3D, a real introduction to the production of a 3D scene. There is one thing I’ve learnt about designing a 3D set: It’s amazingly hard to build up and requires al lot of dedication. The amount of work we had to produce this time was twice as much as last time and looking back to the first project we had I am thinking: “Oh my God, that Unit was so much easier!”. I guess this is a good sign, a sign that we are becoming better and quicker in such a short amount of time. I never thought I would be able to design a 3D set especially after all this trouble with Maya <=……(>_<)… 
But I finally made it and created a fairly satisfying scene for my skills in this area. I was enjoying and was simultaneously feeling anxious about the process. I gained knowledge on texturing,, lighting and learned a lot about different effects than can bring your ideas into life. I am looking forward to the next Unit and learn a lot more. For now it’s time for a break after all this “Uncanny Overdose” which is still hovering in my mind! Yay! Reading week at last! :D

Digital Set Pipeline

Thumbnails

Concept art

Matte Painting

Untextured Model

Wireframe

Textured Model

Mental Ray

Ambient Occlusion

Z-Depth

Final 3D scene

Definitive Influence Map

UV Maps and Textured Maps

BLUE VELVET-Review

FIG.1

 Director: David Lynch
Producer: Fred Caruso
Cast: Kyle Maclachan, Isabella Rosellini, Dennis Hopper, Laura Dern, Dean Stockwell
Year: 1986

Blue Velvet is an American mystery film written and directed by David Lynch. The story takes place in a  sort of ‘Nowhere’ American-like town which in terms of its environment (architecture and vehicles) it looks  as if it’s based  in the 60’s whereas the clothing style is resembling more of a 1980’s style. This could have been done by the director intentionally to give it a more surrealistic style and show how underneath any bright, welcoming town hides a dodgy underworld, a terrifying reality, where crime is the main player and poisons people’s lives. "The message is clear – perfection often hides deeply-rooted rot. Dreams can easily turn into nightmares. Corruption is everywhere, even in places that seem immune to it. These themes, and others about the pernicious influence of evil, are explored in some depth throughout Blue Velvet." (Berardinelli:2002)

FIG.2: The film'e opening: A garden with red roses and a clear blue sky
in the background. But underneath this beauty lies an ugly truth.

Blue Velvet is Lynch’s obsession with the strangeness of suburban America and is essentially a detective story of two young students, Jeffrey and Wendy, who are trying to uncover the mystery surrounding a chopped off ear. Their investigation leads them to a torch singer, Dorothy, who is being abused by Frank, her torturer-lover who has kidnapped her son and husband and uses her for his sick sexual arouses.

The film has been pointed out for its offbeat stylistic quirkiness especially around the issue of sex which is used to reveal indeterminable character traits.  A good example is Dorothy’s and Frank’s sado-mazohistic relationship. Frank was physically and psychologically destroying Dorothy by sexually abusing her and releasing his psychopathic hunger for violence on her. Strangely enough, Dorothy had both negative and positive response to his malevolent behaviour. She seemed to enjoy it but simultaneously she was suffering  and eventually became diseased by Frank’s sadistic behaviour. The sexual roles in the film are reinvented or reversed like in Jeffrey’s case whose short affair with Dorothy was transforming him into an aggressive monster who was finding pleasure in beating his partner during sex. 

All characters are strong and have a different story to share. Of course the most mysterious ones are Dorothy and Frank. Frank was an abusive drug dealer, a violent man who only cared about his personal satisfaction in sex ignoring the fact he was destroying Dorothy's life. What could lead him though to such harsh actions? Was it the overdose of supplemental testosterone or the resulut of a chilhood riddled with parental mistreatment?
"In a film of extreme characters and daring performances, no-one is wilder than Frank, no characterisation more "out there" than that delivered by Dennis Hopper. Nearly two decades on, and with a string of self-parodic rent-a-nut job gigs from Hopper to taint the viewer's perception, Frank remains an astonishing creation. He is a terrifying individual, perverse and brutal, with the attention span and tantrum capacity of a small child."  (Fraser:1999)
As for Dorothy, her unstable nature is unexplainable. As Jeffrey was becoming more involved with her she was pleading him to extract more physical abuse on her.

FIG.3 Frank abusing Dorothy

The film also explores the transition from childhood to adolescence  through the contrast between Dorothy and Wendy, two women who come from a totally different background but share the same need: the need to be loved, cared and protected by a heart-warming man. Wendy represents the stage before entering the cruel reality of the world, the innocent, the inexperienced whereas Dorothy is the victim of the darker side of human nature.

To sum up, Blue Velvet requires strong constitution to watch. It is a journey to the underworld of bright cities, a story about adult-sexual awakening juxtaposed against violence and mental illnesses. The film offers a snock of recognision and catharsis to the audience.

Bibliography
Berardinelli, James(2002) Film Review At: http://www.reelviews.net/movies/b/blue_velvet.html ( accessed on 18/1/2011)
Fraser, Rob (1999) Film Review At: http://www.empireonline.com/reviews/reviewcomplete.asp?DVDID=5261 (accessed on 20/1/2011)

List of Illustrations

FIG.1: Film Poster At: http://goremaster.com/blog/2009/09/19/blue-velvet-released-september-19-1986/ ( accessed on 18/1/2011)

FIG.2: Film Still At: http://www.dvdbeaver.com/film/DVDCompare5/bluevelvet.htm (accessed on 18/1/2011)
FIG.3 : Film Still At: http://www.onlygoodmovies.com/blog/good-movies/david-lynch-movies/ (accessed on 20/1/2011

Final Scene Combined with Matte Painting

My scene is officially done and ready to be combined with the matte painting.

 When I put my scene and painting together I realised the colours did not match so I left the curves and levels do their magic. Is the city in the horizon still working though?