I like the idea of your animation being positioned in Doctor's surgeries and in waiting rooms. In this way, things absolutely need to be stripped down to simple and engaging designs and your visual story-telling needs too be pinprick sharp. It's quite likely, given the context for your animation, that it would have to communicate just as well without a soundtrack, as in waiting rooms etc. they wouldn't subject patients to the same bit of music or dialogue playing over and over again. In this way, you may need to think much more about the way in which text elements appear in your world; people might be 'reading' your animation more than 'listening to it'. Using subtitles and labelling etc dynamically is a real challenge, because it would be a shame if you produced a lovely looking animation that then had lots of text stuck onto the bottom of the screen. Integrating text is a design mission all by itself - but a wonderful opportunity too in terms of animation in its own right. Here are just a few examples of text elements being integrated imaginatively into the 'world' of the films:
In terms of your designs so far, I think we've established that the bacteria thumbs 1 & 2 are working nicely and are worth developing further, but I do think your antibiotic designs are fast becoming too complex. Personally, the first 'capsule with arms' is already strong, because it will make sense as an antibiotic to your generalised audience. I'd get rid of the cape too. Take a look at year 3 Danny Rolling's character design work for some pointers on keeping things strong, but simple (and using the idea too of disembodied hands etc.).
http://dannyrollings.blogspot.co.uk
I think you need to avoid too much visual complexity and go for bold, strong and effortlessly readable designs. Your backgrounds/environments should resist complexity too. Take a look at the background art for Samurai Jack for a great example of simplified, graphical yet effective approaches:
In terms of using text elements dynamically, you might want to do some additional research into infographics/motion graphics - I think you're going to need to think in this way a bit more if your film is going to be designed for the environment you suggest: obviously we can enjoy it with music, but I'd strongly suggest that it would have to work without it too.
OGR 03/03/2016
ReplyDeleteHey Mish,
I like the idea of your animation being positioned in Doctor's surgeries and in waiting rooms. In this way, things absolutely need to be stripped down to simple and engaging designs and your visual story-telling needs too be pinprick sharp. It's quite likely, given the context for your animation, that it would have to communicate just as well without a soundtrack, as in waiting rooms etc. they wouldn't subject patients to the same bit of music or dialogue playing over and over again. In this way, you may need to think much more about the way in which text elements appear in your world; people might be 'reading' your animation more than 'listening to it'. Using subtitles and labelling etc dynamically is a real challenge, because it would be a shame if you produced a lovely looking animation that then had lots of text stuck onto the bottom of the screen. Integrating text is a design mission all by itself - but a wonderful opportunity too in terms of animation in its own right. Here are just a few examples of text elements being integrated imaginatively into the 'world' of the films:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sqIclb4qsJI
http://ucarochester-cgartsandanimation.blogspot.co.uk/2011/02/cgaa-one-day-macro-kingdom-123.html
In terms of your designs so far, I think we've established that the bacteria thumbs 1 & 2 are working nicely and are worth developing further, but I do think your antibiotic designs are fast becoming too complex. Personally, the first 'capsule with arms' is already strong, because it will make sense as an antibiotic to your generalised audience. I'd get rid of the cape too. Take a look at year 3 Danny Rolling's character design work for some pointers on keeping things strong, but simple (and using the idea too of disembodied hands etc.).
http://dannyrollings.blogspot.co.uk
I think you need to avoid too much visual complexity and go for bold, strong and effortlessly readable designs. Your backgrounds/environments should resist complexity too. Take a look at the background art for Samurai Jack for a great example of simplified, graphical yet effective approaches:
http://images5.fanpop.com/image/photos/24700000/Samurai-Jack-samurai-jack-24714237-800-608.jpg
http://41.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_m9r7r8ezNz1rz6ivmo4_1280.jpg
In terms of using text elements dynamically, you might want to do some additional research into infographics/motion graphics - I think you're going to need to think in this way a bit more if your film is going to be designed for the environment you suggest: obviously we can enjoy it with music, but I'd strongly suggest that it would have to work without it too.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IxumhXTD9o4