Le Patissier- Animatic Ver.1 with footage

After a lot of delay, I have been able to work on the animatic, by taking Alan's advice of using footage from other animations and films onto mine to use as a choreography for my piece, I began editing scenes that I felt that i wanted to add into the animation. So with no further ado here is the 1st version of the animatic.

I have added a few notes for more information.

 

 Meanwhile I have been working on the initial sound effects that will be added on the beginning of the animation, before the character enters the cake/ abstract world.

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Major Project: Olivier, the Patissier, Character Modelling II

Lately, my life has been very hectic, juggling university work, my money job, and a newly acquired commission, therefore my lack of posts regarding university work. Although the little activity on here, the university work, has been going ( not as fast as I have wished) but it is going.
One of the great news, is that I have been commissioned to do a design project, unfortunately details can not be shared, it has been a good experience, that is allowing me to know new software, acquiring better design skills with a high standard of quality.

With this commission, something was revealed to me, that i would need to improve the access to my website featuring my work. So i decided to buy a domain for my website, and make the url link more user friendly.

so to visit my website you will only have to type:

 www.ruben-martins.co.uk

With more university related work, I have decided while working on the commission to carry on modelling the character. 

so here is the progress: 

Legs and Feet

 Hands

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Major Project: Le Patissier, Concept Art- The Wedding Cake

Fro the previous thumbnails, I decided to choose another and take it further into a finished concept art piece. Here is the wedding cake. from a more subjective view.

Also this time, i made development sheet, showing the progress from thumbnail to final piece.

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Major Project: Le Patissier, Environment Design I

While, on one side I have been doing boards for the animatic, I have also been moving along with the other tasks in pre-production, and aiming to finish the designing stage very soon. with the character done I moved into visualizing the environment. yummy!

I have done some initial thumbnails of the 2 environments that my animation will have. the patisserie and the cake world.

 With a few favourites of mine, respectively. 3, 5 and6, i decided to take one further, and produce a concept art.

 

A few more to come!! Stay Tuned!!

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Major Project: Le Patissier, Prop Design

While I starting to draw the storyboard, I took some time to explore the important props for the animation. These being the cake, the piping bag and the spatula.

While designing the piping bag, i came across and idea which can influence the animation, while the piping bag will assume a normal role in the real world being used by the patissier. In the cake world I firstly had the idea to have it become an oversized one which the patisserie carries over his shoulder. However as i was exploring a different idea came to my mind. having the piping bag as a companion to the patissier as he bounces the piping bag accompanies him, behaving and decorating on his own. In terms of animation it would be literally like animating a prop by maybe using blend-shapes and little rig. Having these prop assuming this position towards the patissier will allow me to use it a few times throughout the animation, and use it surely in repetition.

Therefore I initially began exploring it.

 With the developing and brainstorming of the prop, I arrived to a design which is little a minimalist version of the patissier a chubby, short cute prop little helper.Therefore I decided to create a quick turnaround to help me model it. 

I have also explored the look of the spatula. 

 

Last but not least, I have explored initially the cake design. I decided to create profile and top view of the cake, explaining all the elements I want to add. Also in order to research my cake details I opted to draw and specify their look. 

Further cake design will be done already in 3D where i will mock up a cake and apply these elements and then play easily with colour. Yum! 

Finally, while designing and developing the cake, I came across another idea to influence the story. When i  talked with Phil last week, he suggested me to use the screen frame and position in my favour, for instance having a character walking from left to right on the ground floor where other would go down to the top. of the right side. This idea would work great when the character is creating the wall of icing roses on the side of the cake. As my initial idea was to have the character steps become the flowers, the idea of using the frame would emphasize the upward decoration visible on the cake design and would enforce believability.

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Major Project: Olivier, the Patissier, Head and Body Ortographs

To understand the character it is crucial to create turnaround model sheets, this allows us to to understand how the character looks from front and side views, as well as to know if the proportions are working.
Another advantage of a model sheet is that it is a crucial drawing that helps translate the 2d design onto 3D.
Therefore, here is a separate model sheet for the head and the body.

EDIT: I have experimented with the hair as suggested, and i really liked the results.

This extra detail on the hair, allows the silhouette to be more interesting,  and to follow the idea of the whipped cream shape.

I have quickly edited the ortographs also.

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Major Project: Olivier, the Patissier, Colour Experimentation

With the final design of the character done, I will be moving onto creating model sheets to help me translate the character from 2D to 3D, such as turnarounds and expressions sheets. However before that, I have decided to begin experimenting with colour, which then will help me create the final posed version of the character fully digitally painted.

With these 3 colour variations, I have like a few colours used in each of them. Firstly the uniform, I opted for a fully clean white, the trousers will be chequered and a red scarf. In terms of character complexion, I have opted for a brighter whitish one, and a slightly darker nose (which reminds of Disney). The facial hair, will be a lighter hazelnut colour like variation 1, finally for the eyes, I have chosen blueish.

 Therefore the final colour choice looks like : 

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Major Project: Olivier, the Patissier, Character Body Development

The Final Head design was done, therefore I decided to work parallel and explore the body of the character.

For the body shape of the character I have decided to stylise it a lot, just so I will be able to animate in numerous impossible ways. Although, I tried a few different body variations in terms of overall shape, I decided to opt for a smaller head, big rounded body and tiny feet.

Here is the Final Character Design:

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Major Project: Props and Cake Assets Research

Being my animation revolving around the world of cakes and sweets, I have decided to research props that i will be using the most in my world. As I chose the patissier to decorate the most fabulous wedding cake, I focused this research on understanding what is used to decorate wedding cakes.

Indeed wedding cakes are available in many shapes and forms, and have numerous assets that can be put on to add flavour or merely decorate the cake. However to be more specific, I had to decide how my cook would look like, and what additions it would have. 

By having the base of the cake already cooked, which would consist in a simple vanilla or chocolate batter, I will add the following components: 

- Icing or butter cream to coat the cake base, plain and chocolate, this will allow the cake to lavished in white and brown cream as the preparation for the decoration.

- Fruits such as cherries or strawberries.

-Adding flavour with nuts and chocolate sprinkles.

- Icing sugar decorations such as petals or doves.

- The most iconic figures on the cake, the wedding toppers, the bride and the groom.

Alongside researching the components that are in the decoration of a wedding, i have also looked at the way of decorating it, I found a few videos, which showed a step-by- step how to decorate a wedding cake. this will help me to stage the animation, as well as understanding how each step is done. Although, I wont be showing an exact replica of each step on my animation, it will help me decide on which movements my character will want to convey. 

As you may see to decorate a cake, everybody follows the same steps in the same order:

- Apply icing or butter cream onto the cake.
- Add ribbons.
- Decorate with frosting around the cake.
- Apply fruits, nuts and chocolate sprinkles.
- Add icing sugar details (doves and petals).
- End by adding the wedding toppers.

Alongside these videos, I found slightly different one, which works as a gallery to showcase different wedding cakes.

Wedding Cake Gallery

After such a delicious research, I just feel like stuff myself with a lot of sweets, ohh.... the sacrifices of research!

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Major Project- Research: Art Direction and Character Stylisation

As I want to create a feel good animation, I have chosen to use a particular look for my world. The world of the Patissier will be a soft, rounded delightful world, with vivid colours delicious assets, this hopefully will also help to evoke happiness and joy as we follow he Patissier make the cake.

Therefore I looked at a few examples:

I have looked at:

Animation:

-Bill Plympton
- Heavenly Appeals by David Lisbe.
- Love Recipe by Supinfocom School
- Al Dente by Supinfocom School
- Parigot by School George Mellies
- Cosmos by Supinfocom School
- Fantasia by Walt Disney
- One Man Band by Pixar Studios


Films:
- Wizard of Oz
- Willy Wonka Chocolate Factory
- Charlie Chocolate Factory


As you may perceive, what these films and animations share in common is the visuals, strongly vivid pastel colours. Colour will be one of the vehicles to evoke happiness and joy.


Meanwhile, I have began looking at the character and how I want to go on stylising it. Belonging to a very specific style of animation (rubber hose), this will allow me to have the freedom to stylise my character as much as I want, then I will be able to apply squash and stretch features on the rig.

For Character Stylisation, I looked at:

Animation Characters: 

- Brett Bean Characters

- The Incredibles by Pixar Studios.

- Ratatouille by Pixar Studios.

- Tangled by Disney.

- Snow White and the Seven Dwarves by Disney.

- Fantasia by Disney.

- Elmer Fudd from Looney Toons.

-Bill Plympton Characters.

-How to Train your Dragon by Dreamworks.

- Despicable Me.

- Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs.

For my animation, I want to the character to assume a really stylised form, just so I can apply squash and stretch and exaggeration without looking repulsive. Stylisation will also allow me to explore the designs and create a more appealing one. 

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Atom Pancakes Work- Arthur Winters Character Development

With the initial sketches done, I brought them to a meeting and each of our studio members decided which would work the best. Taking on their feedback I began to develop the character.

Arthur Winters- Face Development

With the final head shape done, I began to develop the facial features on the character. Though first, I want to check our art direction and how much of stylisation I could give to the character.

Arthur Winters- Different Character Stylisation

At the same time I have began working on the body of the character. Using the same technique I used on the face I began by creating a few silhouettes of body shapes and then play around with them.

Initial Body Silhouettes

Final Body Silhouette

On the head with the right stylisation decided, i began to explore possibilities of the character. By creating a few assets I created variation of the head by mixing them up. 

Character Face Variations

After another studio meeting, it was finally decided how ultimately the character would look like.

Arthur Winters - Character Face 

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