Freedom & Liberty: Title Card

Title card design development

Authors own

I focused on the idea of being trapped and controlled, in my title card design. I wanted to include the protagonist and the antagonist in a situation that represented the concept of my piece. I think each idea that I produced captured that in one way or another, but I found some of them to work more successfully than others when considering visual communication and aesthetics. I was also playing around with the symbolism of the black power salute (a raised fist) in reverse (a fist punting downwards) to symbolise the oppressive nature of the narrative. I also worked slightly with tone, using a darker tone to surround the character, reflecting their mental state. I found this ideas to be very visually effective and emotive. However, when regarding the pose of the character, some of the positions were quite weak. For example, the very last coloured image that you see in the photo above gives the expression that the character has laid flat by choice, voluntarily being controlled. In order for me to create a successful image for the title card I will ask others what each image is saying to them and from that choose the one that evokes the most accurate interpretations. Once I have decided this, I can finally move onto the production stage.  

Freedom & Liberty: Final Storyboard

Reworked storyboard

Authors own

I reworked my initial storyboard so the idea's explored are much clearer and flow better. In this new narrative the character is walking to the park and is constantly bothered by the giant hand, getting poked around, tripped and dragged across the floor. They are then picked up and placed at the gates of the park. Relieved that they have been left alone and are at their intended destination, they enter the park. Suddenly, the hand reappears and crushes them into the floor, they are left a squashed and dizzy mess. This story works better because the character is put through a more brutal sequence of events and we are taken on an emotional roller coaster of tension, empathy, hope, relief and shock. 

Freedom & Liberty: Initial Storyboard

Initial storyboard

Photos are authors own

This is my initial storyboard for the freedom and liberty project. I found the process to be very time consuming as it is the most in-depth, elaborate story I have worked on so far. However, due to my inclusion of more boxes I was able to get a clearer picture of my final piece. The most successful component of this storyboard is the concept and its potential. Although, the sequence of events sort of splits into two separate stories. In order to work past this issue I will pick one half of the story that I can work best with. I need to identify one goal for the character, which is making it to the park. I also need to create a more sever antagonist and identify the significance of that antagonist (the hand). At the moment it is coming across as a parental hand, but I wasn't leaning towards that idea. I wish to make it the hand of unnecessary brutality and control.

Freedom & Liberty: Storyboard Ideas

Storyboarding 2 ideas

Authors own

The process of storyboarding my ideas was quite challenging, as I had a lot of places I wanted to take them.  I feel I produced some successful ideas due to the responses I received when pitching to a group of my peers.  However, I went with my first storyboard idea, as it had the most potential.  What I think works well about the idea is its potential to engage with the viewer causing them to empathise with the character and its struggle to control its own freedoms.

The narrative follows the journey of a non-gender, non-racial character as they attempt to make their way from A to B.  However, throughout this journey they are burdened by the presence of a gigantic, controlling hand.  This hand pokes and pulls at them to the extent of them snapping and fighting back.  When reviewing the story I can see that the extremity of the hands behaviour needs to be intensified in order for the audience to have an emotional response and for the characters resulting reactions towards the hand to be justified.   

Freedom & Liberty: Research and Concept

Research into Freedom & Liberty, including definitions (authors own)

Screen shot of freedom (google search)

Olympics: Black Power Salute (right to left: John Carlos, Tommie Smith and Peter Norman)

Source: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/mar/30/black-power-salute-1968-olympics

For this project I aim to make a short animated piece that communicates something about Freedom and Liberty, and what it means to me. I started my research, looking into dictionary definitions of the terms and then diversified my sources onto the world wide web and that of other peoples opinions on the matter. I then watched documentaries and films such as, The Naked Rambler, that explores others opinions on what freedom is, in this case to be publicly nude without being antagonised. I also watched the films, The Truman Show and Bruce Almighty (both staring Jim Carey). I found something very interesting being said in Bruce Almighty, which was about the idea of playing God and the limits to that power. We as humans all have free will, we make our own decisions and choose our own paths. This can be manipulated by those around us, but ultimately it is our choice (unless you believe in destiny). However, in animation an animator has the job of playing God and the poor character has absolutely no free will. In continuing this project I will work with the concept of free will.

I then looked into historical revolutions, such as the black power movement and freedom fighters. I found it to be rich in potential visual metaphors. The black panther could be a great visual metaphor for me to play with, as well as the salute (seen above) . Oppressed, black people were almost completely without freedom, but the Black Panther movement was them using their free will to make a difference. Just like them, I want my character to fight back.

Manifesto Project

This is a double page spread in my sketch book that contains things to do with my past/roots and a spider diagram of my hopes and aspirations, what I stand for. It was a helpful start to the making of my manifesto as it clarified to me what I could include within it.

I then looked at my blog on tumblr for some more inspiration and research into myself e.g. the things I like, my interests, views. I realised it was almost like an already made manifesto of images instead of text.

This was part of my idea generation that I started after looking at some manifestos and decided on concentrating on the concept of equality and acceptance. I found the idea generation process quite challenging because I initially went with an idea that I didn't feel as passionate about and therefore the ideas were lacking. However, was I reevaluated my direction I was able to come up with a few good ideas:

These were my four favourite ideas, which I looked into and analysed. In the end I decided that the 3rd idea was my favourite as it worked well with the 'Open your mind' slogan I had become attached to. The idea that the characters eyes are covered is symbolic of disallowing yourself to judge with your eyes and the literal translation of her open mind within the illustration works effectively I feel.

I decided to develop my final idea using illustrator in order to develop my computer skills. It was my first time using illustrator and I found it to be really easy to grasp and effective in making vivid images that aid the aesthetics of a design.

 Using illustrator, I decided to try out lots of different backgrounds to find one that worked well with my character. Some of them clashed, some took away the attention of the character and some weakened the colours that spouted out of her head. I found the space background to work the best as it related to an earlier idea I had about people being cosmic, such as the universe. Although, I did worry that the space background wasn't very innovative/over used, but it worked that best for me.
 

FINAL MANIFESTO

I feel this is an effective manifesto both in a metaphorical way and visual. However, I feel my type sizing does look a bit messy. If I were to rework anything in my manifesto it would be type size and placing. Apart from that though, it clearly depicts the ideas that are important to me and the mentality and strive to have/keep. When getting feed back most people enjoyed the manifesto, but some found the word strange staggered the flow a bit. I made the decision to keep the word strange in because it was important to me that attention was brought in some way to the idea that people/things can be strange, but they still deserve equality, acceptance and love from us all. Overall, I am happy with the resulting image and what I gain personally from this project, which was a clearly view of what I stand for, improved illustration skills and a sharper knowledge of what works/doesn't work when dealing with typography.