Week 18 Life Drawing

This week life drawing was again focused towards the drawing of movement in models. The emphasis was to create a sense of exaggeration or amplification on the models body structure.

I did a lot of pages during the movement exercise- the model moved fast and therefore pages were filled pretty easily.

It's a shame Scribd doesn't have the option to add manual captions to different pages afterwards, least as far as I've seen.

Unit 4 - Treatment, Outline, Premise, Logline, Biographies

Essay Introduction

Research - Lion Tamer: Sergio Alexander Ravozket

Final Biography:

" Sergio Alexander Ravozket, a legendary giant from the wintery depths of Eastern Russia known nation-wide for his lion taming abilities (Wild lions aren’t exactly native to Russia, so it’s not really a big deal). Although now living alone, he was born from a large family of animal trainers, particularly bear-trainers; Sergio has an evidently enormous muscular appearance, but bigger heart due to his love for his teddy bear named ‘Lucky’. However he has a lowly attitude of real animals (taking a likeness to calling them weak, puny or small), he speaks broken English and has dreams of going to Northern America to live “The American Dream”. "

I wanted something more then just a strong willed and courageous Lion-Tamer. As I progressed into watching more and more cinema I have been noticing that typically Russian actors or Russian characters to be more precise, struggle to overcome the shadow of the Great Soviet Mother Russia heavyweight stereotypes. At one point I moved further into more muscular and ferocious characters such as 'Tank' from Valve's 'Left 4 Dead' series due to his destructive vibe. However my character is a lion tamer, so he must need to be somewhat "tame" himself if he is to tame animals.

Unit 4 Maya Scenes

Unit 3 Maya Scenes - part one

Initial Development Idea Brainstorm

Whilst waiting to talk to Phil, I created a quick brain storm of ideas that I need to think about in the coming weeks in order to progress my project. These are still among the initial development of ideas. When I have a basic idea of what path to take overall I will push into the individual areas of work. Then aim to come together at the end.

Life Drawing

Life drawing this week was interesting because it was focused on drawing movement. In terms of relation to the project one of the requirements is the storyboarding, which involves the direction of characters, scenes, angles, etc. The life drawing was a good warm-up into getting involved within that specialisation of drawing.

I've only had experience in static drawing of figures. So to draw a moving man was an interesting experience, despite being disappointed with some of the outcomes. Click for full view.

Starting drawings, Overlaying of multiple poses- finding ways into drawing movement	Dissapointed in this one, pushing into more detailed development of moving figures	Break: Static Drawing	Final four drawings, figure was waving a stick around. Upper body movement was fluid (although fast) while lower body was slightly moving

Initial Film Set Research - Who Framed Roger Rabbit

When I first thought about what I can relate to or draw inspiration from in terms of a film set, the first thing popped into my head was the starting scene of 'Who Framed Roger Rabbit'.

During the "live" filming of a Roger Rabbit "cartoon". Roger messes up his lines causing the director to yell cut at the end of the cartoon ( 4 Minutes )





A film set is an excellent scene to stretch one's creative flair. It also allows an interesting place to experiment with lighting and backdrop changes on the fly. As well as numerous props to create and add to the scene.

Initial Character Research - Lion Tamer

As a starting point for my 'character' portion I checked out some relevant material involving lion-tamer characters.

One notable example is Hanna Barbara's Lion Tamer Huck (7 minutes)



Lion Tamer Tools of the Trade:

• A whip
• A pistol
• A chair
• A fool-hardy fearless individual
• a ferocious lion

Another notable example is 'Amos and Andy in The Lion Tamer' (9 minutes)



Lion tamers are drawn from circus themed characters and generally can incorporate a lot of comedy as well as excitement through their performance. It's perceived as generally a dangerous occupation due to the fact the performer "plays" around with a powerful animal who could rip them to shreds.

Storytelling - Useful Links

Initial Influence Map

One can tell by now that there is strong uses of cartoon influence here. Mainly because they're so dynamic and fun to work with, as well as go beyond the boundaries of "realism".

I have to admit the first scene from 'Who Framed Roger Rabbit' drew me to this idea. The freedom of character design choices to compliment freedom of pushing boundaries in the scenes creation, as well as add in the odd object element the filing cabinet, is going to be engaging and hopefully create an entertaining one minute scene.

Unit 4: Story-Telling - START

In response to the three story components given to you at the time of briefing, you are asked to pre-produce an original one minute animation

The pre-production is submitted in 2 parts, 'Pre-Viz' and 'Art Of'

Pre-Viz includes
a 2D Animation with soundtrack and transitions (example)
and a Maya Pre-viz with soundtrack and transitions (example)

The Art Of section includes
concept art: Environment Design, Character Design and Prop Design
Final Environment Desings
Final Prop Designs
Final Character Designs (Example)
Final Presentation Storyboards
and Final Script (Example)

I've been given the following:

Character: Lion Tamer	Setting: Film Set	Object: Filing Cabinet