My Animation Story Board

My story is of earth sending out radio waves from satellites  which travel through space to far off galaxies trying to find life. The radio waves read a UFO in one galaxy and is read and converted into number codes. The UFO travels to earth to find life o a new planet after thinking it too was alone. After visiting Earth he flies back to his galaxy to tell of his adventure but when he returns the radio waves had disappeared and he couldnt find his way back. the earth Satellites try to send them the radio waves back but it just travels through empty space again. 

The animation will last 30 seconds long at 12 frames per second. I will use stop motion techniques to produce it. The media it will be made from will be wither coloured card or Rayograms.

scene 1 is of a Satellite sending out radio waves lasting 1 second long. 

Scenes 2+3 last for 4 seconds with the radio waves in space pulsing and waving lasting for 4 Seconds.

Scenes 4+5 are of the UFO in a far off galaxy receiving the radio waves and reading them in numbers raining and flying around through the galaxy scenes last for 5 Seconds.

Scenes 6+7+8 is of the UFO's journey through space to earth lasting 7 Seconds.

Scenes 9+10 is of UFO flying in and out of the earth up and round as well lasting for 5 seconds.

Scene 11 UFO travles back through space to galaxy to tell of his adventure scene is 3 seconds long. 

Scene 12 UFO gets back to its galaxy to tell of his journey but there or no long radio waves there any more. scene lasts 2 seconds

Scene 13 Earths satellite sending signals again into space lasting 2 seconds.

Scene 14 Earths radio waves in space not being received by any one again lasting 1 seconds and is the final frame in the 30 second animation.

Rayograms

Rayograms is the term used for a photographic image created without using a camera. This works by placing objects onto photographic paper and exposing them to light. Depending on how how opaque the object is depends on how many shade you get on the photo. The areas that are white receive no light the areas black got full light and then tone grey areas get tone depending on how much time in the light they receive.

Here is a stop motion video using Rayograms by american artist called Man Ray. He is best known for his unique photograms which he made after himself as he became a pioneer in this line of work. 

The video is called "Le Retour a La Raison" and was produced in 1923

Here are my own attempt at making Rayograms in the dark photography room my self. I used mostly images printed on acetate so i could use images that tired into my sci-fi concept for my own animation.

Here this Rayogram a layer of numbers and the covered with a acetate sheet with a pokey dot pattern on it which i the exposed at intervals of 2 seconds and kept on moving the pokey dot sheet to different heights and positions. 

Here again I used a sheet of numbers which I then covered with an image of a galaxy swirl around it to give an idea radio waves reaching other galaxies.

Here I used a sheet of numbers in a complex formation looking like its raining down this was inspired after seeing the image of the WOW Signals.

Here I have used an image of a satellite dish as it thought it tied into my them of being lost and trying to make contact with what's out there.

Here I used the same image but again used the pokey dot sheet to cover it and held it about the image at a certain height. I feel this gives a wavy effect on the image maybe looking like radio waves.

Here is an image of a UFO possibly on its journey from the galaxy it has just left.

Here was an experiment with a 5 Not I think it looks really good how you can see the hologram  in the middle and the queens head on the next side.

I have really enjoyed the workshop on stop motion and really like some of the images I was able to make. And would consider using some of these techniques to make my final animation.

Michel Gondry

Michel Gondry Is a French born director who started by directing music videos for Bjork, Daft Punk, Chemical Brothers, Beck, Radiohead, and also The White Stripes. He has so made feature films such as "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind", and also produced commercial work for such companies as;Adidas, Air France, BMW, Coca-Cola, Fiat, levi's , nike and Polaroid Cameras. Gondry was also the pioneer of the "bullet time" technique which always thing that would normally be unrecordable slow motion and there for recordable such as a gun shot fire..He produced two Music videos for The White Stripes both times using Stop Motion techniques. here are 2 short videos on how he created the videos for; 


"Fell in Love WIth a Girl" &
"Hardest Button to Button"

In the "Fell In love With a girl" video i thought i was very clever how he used actually Stop Motion lego bricks and digital animation by changing films in to digital lego pixels. 

Also In the "Hardest Button to Button" video I though how he explained how he times his Stop Motion to the music where he added and removed items was very clever.

Stop Motion

Here are 3 exams of Stop Motion animation. Both of Them are by two of my favorite musicians . The First Video Is called Able/Ready by Grizzly Bear and is directed by Allison Schulnik who is an american born animator. This video is made by using plasticine models in a several different colors being moved in to new positions.  

The example of stop motion is a music video by Fleet Foxes called Mykonos and has always been my favorite Fleet Foxes' song listening to it on my ipod to sleep. I think the video for this makes your eyes just fix to the screen as its just mesmerizing. and fits with the song very well as It think it has a Native American Sound and Visual to it. Made from pieces of card in stop motion. Out of all the Stop motion videos I've watched this has been by for the most inspirational for my piece to me.

The final video i found accidentally whilst search through songs of one of my favorite Musicians Kid Cudi. This is an unofficial fan Stop Motion video but was spotted by Kid Cudi on Youtube and posted on his official website.

Animation

So what is an animation?

An Animation is where a series of images are is displayed at a fast rate, this gives the illusion of movement and motion from an object or drawing. There are 3 different frame frequencies used for TV and Film, 24FPS (frame per second) 25FPS and 30FPS. 25FPS is the mostly commonly used frame frequency for TV and Film but high quality films tend to use 30FPS. The least amount of frames per second you can get away with without each image being seen separately is 12 FPS, but this still gives the animation a jerky feel to it. 

Animation techniques that can be used are;

• Flip Book animation, an image drawn repeatedly but slightly moved each time when flicked through quickly gives the illusion of movement.
• Stop Motion is where there are a series of photos stills with an images slightly moving through out each one flicked through again gives an illusion of movement. 
• 2D animation can be hand drawn or drawn on computer using vectors.
• 3D animation.

Space Themed Mood Boards

After noting town word that came to mind after listening to Music is Maths, I took some of the words from the list to create a mood board to see what images could be used for a space theme. This also helped me look at what colours i could possibly use as well. 

From the images i can see that black, dark blue, purple and brought white can represent space. Green worked effectively representing radio waves from satellites and the green type helps it to looks more futuristic. I also used mathematic equations white could be used to read satellite waves, In this i also included the WOW signal which is the only radio wave picked up form out of space from a none human source. 

Here I made the images into grey scale to see what the photos could look like as black and white negatives/ Rayograms. I still feel these work effectively but you don't get the colours alluding to space.

Initial Ideas

These are the first words that came into my head after listening to Music is Maths a couple of times. I felt it started with a futuristic spacey feel like radio signals trying to make contact like something is lost and lonely. And then after a while when the song kicks in it feels like contact is made and a journey starts. Towards the end it feels like the person is lost again and is lonely as contact is broken. 

Print to Pixel

Print to Pixel is a new module focusing on animation. We have been asked to create a short 20-30 second video using animation to a piece of given music. My song is called;

Music Is Maths - By Boards of Canada

After listening to this song a few times, I am going to note down all the words that come to mind when listening to the song, I also going to jot down how the song makes you feel as you are listening to it. I will then create a mind map of ideas and a mood board.