Case Study
Assignment Details
For my film and special effects final we were to make a short film within one of the listed genres. There were many options and we could combined them. I chose to do sort of a coming of age animation. If we were to make an animation, it had to be a minimum of two minutes long. Stuck is a minute and fifty-three seconds long. While we worked on our short films we had to submit film dailies to show our progress. Our films also couldn't be experiemental since we are learning the principles of film. Along those same lines, the narrative style should be obvious and there needed to be a plot and show the exposition, climax, and resolution. Creating a beat sheet really helped with this. We needed to have at least 3 characters and their roles in the narrative needed to be shown. Each step of this final project taught me so much and helped me find new skills and techniques such as those beat sheets and brainstorming processes. Stuck is a little rough but it will always mean so much to me.
Brainstorming
These are my many pages of brainstorming during the pre-production process of Stuck. We had to think of topics, themes, beat sheet, and even the world building. The biggest lesson I've learned from this was to just write everything that comes to your mind down. I didn't have anything to do in my drawing class at the time so I just sat down and wrote all the different sub plot/routes I could go with this story. This felt like a breakthrought since I've always loved coming up with stories but they would never go anywhere. I am just as proud of the brainstorming process as I am with the final short film.
Digital Storyboards
Here is one of the rouch sketches I've done for Stuck. You can see how I copied some frames to speed up the process. I also studied common animation principles since it had been a while since I'd taken an animation course. For quick movements all I did was draw an organic shape to add the illusion of speed. Looking back this process was fun and I'm proud of how I went about it.
Stuck
Stuck was my first attempt at old-school frame-by-frame animation. It’s rough, but I’m proud of how it turned out—especially since it's based on my personal experience working at Baskin Robbins. This short film was my final project for a film and special effects class. Before this, I had been doodling silly cat characters, and when I learned about the project, I knew I wanted to animate them. The concept was developed with help from class brainstorming sessions. I started with paper storyboards, then moved to digital ones in Clip Studio Paint, keeping the animation simple to save time. I reused frames, designed background graphics, and recorded voiceovers with friends using my phone in a practice room. Everything came together in Premiere Pro. This project taught me a lot and helped me turn a difficult time in my life into something creative and meaningful.