Animation T-Dome: Wertle's WIP

**Wertle** · April 28th, 2006, 07:11 AM

OY! I am so terrified to do this! But facing fear is what the Thunderdome is all about, yes?

My side-kick concept is going to focus on the role of the stage manager, because never does a director wander far without a stage manager close behind, clipboard in tow. (Personal Narrative? What?)

As far as a story, I am unsure of whether to focus on a particular instance, or whether to create a sort of montage of clips from a play production process. Either way, I'm hoping to exaggerate the stage manager role in a super-hero-like fashion.

Character designs will be a difficult step for me - I'd like to make designs from the get-go that are easier to animate, and that sort of stylization is something I've always had trouble with. The main characters will be the director and the stage manager, with possibly a couple of actors that will need fleshed out designs as well.

For my weapons of choice, I'll be using Flash and.....probably just Flash.

Okay! Sketches to be posted soon. I'm so terrified! *dives in*

**sciboy** · April 28th, 2006, 08:25 AM

Welcome to the arena, yeah character design is always a pain for me, but i've always found that if you throw out a few pages of different designs, pick the best and do some animation tests, the design evolves to suite your needs. But main thing is that you pick the right character to convey their personality and actions, which there is no better way to find the requirements than to do a rough storyboard.

**FlipMcgee** · April 29th, 2006, 11:03 PM

I am so terrified to do this!

Don't worry Wertle....It will be painless

**Wertle** · April 30th, 2006, 06:55 PM

Okay, a few sketchies to share. I did several pages of sketches for the stage manager, then picked out several that I was more pleased with than the others. Then I realized that the ones I picked out were all in the same pose, doh!!!

Next, I have sloppy thumbnails of a potential story idea, nothing to the caliber of storyboards, though. I don't know if this idea will stand on its own, but it might with some fleshing.

Here's a description of what's happening.

1) Starting off with some generic stuff, the director is directing the male actor, the stage manager popping out from behind the director on occasion to scribble notes on her clipboard. If I decide this idea works, I can flesh this out to more introductory stuff (to show the setting, to set up that it is a rehearsal, etc). This is also where I could establish the sidekick role that the stage manager has to the director.

2) The door to the (wherever they are, rehearsal hall? Actual theater?) opens.

3) To reveal the actress, who is sick! (gasp!)

4) General panic, for everyone in theater knows that the only thing sick actors do is spread whatever they have to other perfectly-well actors. EDIT: This is a point where no one in the audience will understand what I'm talking about. I need something to indicate this thought, be it someone saying "oh no, now everyone's going to get sick...", to an old school 1920s-esque caption box that says that. Some way to explain why people are reacting with panic.

5-7) Impossibly slow-motion sneeze from the actress approaches the other actor, surely he is doomed!

8) Stage Manager appears toting pneumatic nail gun.

9-11) A shot is fired, the nail zooms through the sneeze, the camera will whip around to follow the nail as it is lodged into the wall. A close up reveals that the evil germ has been slain.

12) Relief.

If I decide on this idea, I'll probably want to do more things to define the director's role as the hero-in-charge. Possibly during the impossibly slow sneeze scene, I can cut to him dramatically issuing a command to his stage manager, who flips offscreen or something. On the other hand, this whole idea might be too weird to work as a narrative, but it's a start in the brainstorming process at least.

EDIT: it has been brought to my attention that my fatal flaw with this idea is that my sidekick has out-roled the leader. Drat. I may have to rethink my entire thing to figure out a better hero-sidekick relationship.

**Wertle** · April 30th, 2006, 08:58 PM

Okay, after a story brainstorming session with a friend, here is a revised idea.

Story as such:

Intro with establishing stuff, director is directing male actor, stage manager assists.

Sick actress enters. We zoom into to see that she is infected with the evil king germ of all germs (villain), who will plot to infect the entire cast!

General panic.

Actress sneezes.

The director (hero), attempts to rescue to rescue the actor by running and leaping in a very dramatic, super-hero way, landing and posing to shield the actor from the evil germ.

Of course the germ wooshes past and now the director is sick.

Actor is doomed, evil germ laughes with glee.

Stage manager appears with pneumatic nail gun, pierces evil germ against a wall, slaying him.

Hooray for death of evil germ.

Oh no, the director is sick, the play is ruined!

Fortunately, the stage manager made soup. All is well again.

Still just a start.

**Steph Laberis** · April 30th, 2006, 09:34 PM

You can totally do it Lisa ^_^ I'll be on stand-by if you need help breaking up or simplifying your characters, I seem to have a knack for that kinda thing.

**FlipMcgee** · May 1st, 2006, 01:49 AM

I like the gestures in the first pic. Nice flow in them.

Charming thumbnail sketches. Definitely interested in seeing how this will progress.

**Wertle** · May 11th, 2006, 01:58 PM

Dum dee dum. Okay, working out characters. This is my first attempt at trying desparately to simplify them (and a few setting thumbnails)

Steph helped me out and gave me some advise for further simplification. I'm trying to break them down to where they are simple but still interesting, and then I can build them back up.

My goal is to get them into basic, recognizable shapes that are individual but still distinct, and then I can work them back up a little bit. I need them to be easy for me to draw quickly for more actiony shots, but to still be able to break them apart into symbols for less actiony cut-out, limited animation parts. This is haaaaard.

I have some other layout sketches I will post later.

**sciboy** · May 11th, 2006, 11:48 PM

Good work, keep it up.

**Wertle** · May 17th, 2006, 11:13 PM

More progress. I was instructed to break the bodies down into shape parts. But then I backtracked and got too complicated again.

Attempting to simplify

One more try

It's going somewhere! I am getting redlines as we speak....type...read....something.

**Wertle** · May 22nd, 2006, 06:59 AM

After working closely with some of my animation friends and having my brains beaten in over method of simplification, I've gotten down this far. I think this is my last stage before "Oh crap I only have 2 months to do this this is good enough," and hopefully things will get fleshed out in the storyboard process.