Animation

This is terrific! The audio really sells it. Reminds me of Michael Granberry’s From Beyond. Really scary!

If you’re looking for critique, I would say be careful with camera angles and movements. Any time you cut, it should be motivated by the story. There are times, especially in the last section, where there’s not a good reason for a new angle.

Also, even if the character animation is done on twos or threes, camera moves look a lot smoother when done on ones.

As for character movement, I don’t mind it somewhat choppy. But something to work on for the future is convincing walk movements. You might not be doing “tie-downs” yet, so that’s worth investigating.

Keep up the good work!

sounds interesting. I just signed up for an appointment.

I want to echo the sense of appreciation both for this class and for all of you sharing your creativity and your wonderful stories. Sometimes it's hard work creating something beautiful, but being in a structured setting together helped me alot in writing "Arctic" in record time, at least for me. I'm sure I would have poked and prodded at it for months or maybe a year before I had a completed draft. So thank you all for your brilliance, creativity and persistence in creating new worlds and stories. I wish everyone the best of luck in bringing your work to the world. - John Tupper

From Scriptnotes some concepts I like are :

From Finding Nemo start with an an unsettled arguments/ testable statement "If you love someone set them free, then turn it into something like "No matter how much you want want to hold onto the person you love, sometimes you have to set them free, and then pair that with a scenario like "If you try hard enough you can do anything, even find a single fish in the ocean. Then you get the concept of a character who absolutes loves someone but is forced by the story to learn how to set them free while searching for a fish. what if both characters ARE fish?

Also from finding Nemo: at the beginning of the film your main character is in a state of acceptable imperfection. e.g. "Marlin can live with a resentful son, so long as he knows his son is safe. "I get it. Nemo resents me. He's angry at me. He feel's stifled by me. That's okay. He's alive. I can keep going this way. "This is Marlin's acceptable normal. This is what his character wants to get back to because it feels safe and acceptable to Marlin despite its imperfections and trade offs. Better than the pain of losing his wife and all his other children. The film then teaches him that can't work. If he actually loves his son, and wants his son to truly live, he has to allow his son to experience life including its risks. Even if his son is disabled and faces higher risks than other fish.

That concept of a character starting with a state of "Acceptable Imperfection" hit for me as to why many character's journeys work. The audience buys into the hero's journey more easily because we see the flaws in the character's original state of normal, the price of maintaining their trade-offs and imperfections. We want the hero to have a better reality than just acceptable imperfection.

The second piece that stood out to me was the description of four c's in the script. Are the events being driven by Causation (character decisions and actions (so causality + consequence)), Correlation (situations not directly due to characters but that provided reasonable opportunity and motivation for characters to act), Coincidence (The Spider biting Peter Parker out of everyone in that room and beginning his journey as Spider-Man), or Convenience (the writer needed something to happen so miraculously it happens, like the side kick has a swiss army of skills that all fit perfectly to the situation no matter how long the odds or a dues ex machina saving everyone at the last minute.). Audiences give writers a couple of coincidences and then start to really question the script. Most events should by driven by Causation, then Correlation, then coincidence and anything driven by convenience must be removed,.

Before our last class (did anyone get a link to sign up for a time? I tried the precious calendar link from our 1:1 class and it didn't work), I wanted to say how much I appreciated this class and reignited my drive to work on my project. I loved all the discussions and analyzing what makes an animated film's story/characters stand out. You've all been wonderful to chat with and learn from.

HI ALL !! I am sending sign ups links want to say that giving notes for the second of half of the scripts have been a challenge to find things that need work on. ! THAT IS A GOOD THING. I love this thread and this class and what you have all developed. Each of you should be so proud of yourselves.

Very true. In some ways the animation of that era out does what exists today.

It really does Kevin Jackson, it’s rather unfair to compare current animation to it. Hopefully there will be a kind of animation renaissance one day, when today’s highly talented animators get even more powerful and keep the wave going.

Banafsheh Esmailzadeh I always enjoy seeing your post here in the lounge. My original thought before watching the vide was "maybe we are simply experiencing nostalgia and reminiscing of the old days and how things you to be," but after watching the video... I do think there was something special about this time period and I'd say passion and care. I feel like we moved away from caring about the craft and story and we're focused on hitting metrics and numbers. Sure Disney has big goals and dreams BUT I think the passion came before the metrics. His passion started as a child, nowadays it feels like we are doing our best to hit numbers.

On that note, I do think there will be a renaissance however it won't be how it was back in the day. I think it will be more indie creators building their own communities or at least one can hope.

The nine old men are legends. They make their animation very pure and very genuine. Frank and Ollie were part of the wonderful gang. I watched the documentary about those two and they give us nice behind the scenes work on every classic animation.

Abidoye Ezekiel - I agree with Simon Breuer . A strong storyline can grab attention and keep it there. A clean animation might look cool but can become uninteresting, fast.

Not sure what you mean by clean animation, but storytelling comes first. I’ve been moved by rough animatics before.

Bad animation will never tell (I say never, but...) a good story. If the audience notices that the animator either skips a frame or the arm movement is wonky, it will stand out and the story will be lost. That said, no amount of clean animation can keep an audiences' attention when the story is bad.

I sat through a movie about a superhero dog. The animation was excellent, but the story was hit or miss. It is the best feeling in the world when the audience is drawn into the story and the feeling of comradery within the audience as they experience the story. So both are difficult, but necessary.

This is a good question. With awesome animation, if the story is bad, the animation is wasted. So for me, the storytelling has to come first. If the story is good and the animation is great, that completes everything.

You would have to do both in order to pair well. Don't divide into either clean animation or great storytelling. You need to make sure to pull off a little bit of risk on going both. There's no guarantee that if the bad storytelling comes with clean animation or vice versa. You have to compromise to add both in order for those criteria to stand out.

Id say it's pretty good.

Hi, I really like the idea behind your illustration. I’d love to help make it even more polished and visually appealing, and I can also help create a complete book cover design for both the front and back if you ever need one.

Thank you! My current interest is in pitching an animated series. I'm looking to refine the material and find an agent who believes in the series' potential. I'm also seeking creative partnerships.

If i may ask, what is it that you're aiming for on your project

Like what kind of edition do you need

This is cute. I love this. The world and characters really speak for themselves.

That's right Cyrus Sales, I posted in more than one forum to get a lot more feedback, because at this stage feedback is essential. Actually, right now I'm testing the impact of the series with the general public. I already have some things documented and I'm still in the documentation phase, as I plan to present a pitch. I'm preparing an 11-second animatic, but I believe I'll opt for a storyboard with voices for the practicality of testing what works and what doesn't.

Lucas Evangelista That honestly makes a lot of sense, especially at this stage. Gathering feedback early can really help shape what resonates most with the audience before moving deeper into production. I’d definitely love to keep following the progress of the project and see how things evolve as you continue developing it.

The drawings are sort of like a cross between Adventure Time and One Piece, nice work

Muito obrigado!

I really like the visual direction here. The mix of playful energy and expressive character design gives it a very memorable style. It already feels like a world people could easily connect with. Looking forward to seeing how the project grows.

Hello Joshua, your project sounds really heartfelt and inspiring. I love the idea of an animated adventure set in 1980s Honduras, and it already feels very cinematic from your description. I’d truly love to connect and possibly contribute creatively, especially with illustrations and book cover design if needed. Wishing you the very best with Gringo’s Journey to Freedom.

I would love to voice a charecter in this, I love movies like this, especially the ones you named. I'm fifteen years old, do you think there's a charecter I could voice? You can send me the screenplay at kbstudios.josiah@gmail.com

Thank you so much for your interest in the project. I actually focus more on book illustrations and visual design rather than script writing or movie production. I help with children’s book illustrations, book covers, and creative visuals. if you need proofs let me know so that i can forward them to you

I can also help create a cinematic movie trailer or visual teaser for projects like this. If you’d like, I can send you a sample through email so you can see my style and the kind of work I do.

Roger Clavier - Thanks for sharing! I see in the caption it mentions Paul as the voice talent. Did you work on the animation?

Yes indeed animated and edited in-house