A production of any magnitude is more than just its final part or product. Its more than just the final piece you see. When creating a production with depth and meaning you must go beyond the surface level and breathe life and weave intricacies into a piece. The pre-production stages of a work and the creative journey a creative undertakes can be just as important as the final product. The detailed documentation of such a process can explore what thought and meaning has been put into a work. Delve into the inner thought processes of the designer, unveiling the subtleties of a work. Reveal not just the denotations and obvious observations a casual viewer would see, but exploring the connotations of actions and design choices, as well as the allegory within the piece. This site documents the process I went though in developing "The Light of Liberty", from scripting and concepts, to roughs and the finalised refined pieces, as well as allowing for reflection upon the process undertaken during the creation of this work.
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The Poem
The first step in any project is the initial inspiration. For this task i was asked to look at Edward Lear’s "Nonsense Omnibus" and select a poem that I liked and that inspired me. Within his Omnibus was a book called "The Jumblies, and Other Nonsense Verses" which held some of his longer works. Although pieces like "The Jumblies" and "The Dong with a Luminous Nose" stood out to me and I was intrigued by the crossover between the pair, there was just something about "The Owl and the Pussy-Cat". The sweet little tale about a pair that fall in love and spend so long waiting to be together. Even though the idea of combining the two other poems into a piece sounded very intriguing, I couldn't stop thinking about the Owl and the Pussy-Cat. So in the end I went with my gut and opted to invest in that poem.
The Owl and the Pussy-Cat
The Owl and the Pussy-Cat went to sea In a beautiful pea-green boat, They took some honey, and plenty of money, Wrapped up in a five-pound note. The Owl looked up to the stars above, And sang to a small guitar, “O lovely Pussy! O Pussy, my love, What a beautiful Pussy you are, You are, You are! What a beautiful Pussy you are!”
Pussy said to the Owl, “You elegant fowl! How charmingly sweet you sing! O let us be married! too long we have tarried: But what shall we do for a ring?” They sailed away for a year and a day, To the land where the Bong-tree grows, And there in a wood a Piggy-wig stood, With a ring at the end of his nose. His nose, His nose, With a ring at the end of his nose.
“Dear Pig, are you willing to sell for one shilling Your ring?” Said the Piggy, “I will.” So they took it away, and were married next day By the Turkey who lives on the hill. They dined on mince, and slices of quince, Which they ate with a runcible spoon; And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand, They danced by the light of the moon, The moon, The moon, They danced by the light of the moon.
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The Initial Script
After choosing a poem, I was then asked to translate it into a script. To remove all of the fluff and poetic language and refine it down to literal language. Although i had some idea in my head of what to do, I didn't quite think they meant proper script format so my initial attempt, although script like, wasn't a proper script.
A Script-Ish?
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After I realised my initial "script-like" text was not what I was supposed to have done, I took another shot at making a proper script, with the appropriate format. As a person I'm usually a very descriptive and flowery writer, and thus thought the task of creating a purely literal script would be difficult, however, it instead was quite easy. Identifying from the poem what was and wasn't necessary for my initial attempt at a script proved quite simple and, although not the correct format, had removed almost all of the flowery poetic language. Thus for my second attempt, all I really needed to do was take the first attempt and correctly format it.
The Script
Adaptation
After the initial script had been developed, I moved away from the poem to work on refining and adapting the concept into a new and interesting idea. To achieve this I started thinking of how I could alter the settings and adapt the characters to tell the same story in different ways. I looked at many different themes and concepts. What if it was a romance? A comedy? A cop drama? Could it be a horror? A mystery? A western? Out of this world? I sketched out in small concept sketches many ways i could frame the story. Seeing if any of them sparked any inspiration for my animation. All of these ideas rushed through my mind but none of them seemed right. However, there was one question that stayed with me, that kept coming back to me, one question that the script and poem didn't answer.
Why did they leave?
The story has the couple pack up a small odd collection of items and set sail. But why were they leaving? Why did it take the pair a year and a day to reach their destination? Surely there were other places that would have sold them a ring. Why did it take them so long to buy one? Thinking on this lead me to parallels between the story and today's political climate. Where people are prosecuted, discriminated against, and denied services due to who they are. Where in America, "the land of the free", people are free to be who they are... as long as it subscribes to these conservative political views. Thus, America became the setting and a political commentary became the theme.
The Premise & Allegory
With this established I was able to refine and adapt the premise of the initial script. In its essence the old premise and the new were the same. They both focused on the couple leaving somewhere to get married. However, the new expanded premise better showcased the core underlying idea of the adapted script. And so the premise went form this:
"An owl and cat sail away from where they are, to get married."
to this:
"A hijabi woman (owl) and her girlfriend (cat) flee America due to the ever-increasing hateful, conservative political climate to get married."
After I had established a premise for the production I moved to develop an allegory. However, due to the nature of my theme, an Allegory was already embedded in the premise. The story as a political commentary focused on conveying a deeper meaning and stimulating a discussion on the way people are being treated. So my allegory became just that:
"A reflection on the increasing political climate and issues of equality in the US and the world."
The Synopsis
After penning out a premise and allegory, I started working on adapting the actual story and script. Looking over the initial script for the poem and the story I wanted to tell, I started thinking about what I could use to show and imply bigotry. Researching and reading about real issues faced by minority groups in America, like discrimination in the workplace and business winning cases to not serve gay couples, gave me real life situations to incorporate into my work. Simple instances like these that mimic the real life current political environment make the animation firmly based in reality. It would allow the work to address, and make the viewers confront, the real discrimination these people experience. I also looked to discuss and portray the LGBT struggle for marriage equality, something that has only just begun to be accepted through law, which many countries still outlaw, and which many people actively refuse to support.
With these issues in mind I worked on adapting the story to reflect this intense discrimination that people all across the world face. Thus my story focus on telling the story in which two women struggle against the public, which would see their rights stripped away from them, two women just trying to live their lives. However as much as there are an overwhelming number of people who would discriminate against those different from themselves there are still groups of people that work to create areas of acceptance. Thus the story also looks at the idea of finding acceptance and a home in those that would accept you. Doing so cements the idea that acceptance is achievable and challenges viewers to address their own ideals and asks them what they are doing to provide a safe place for everyone.
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"An Owl gets ready in the morning for a date. She looks at the news and checks for job listings crossing out a few new items. She then goes outside picks a rose from her garden and takes a walk, getting side-eyed and avoided. She finally meets the person she was going to see, gives them the flower and starts walking together holding hands. People look away annoyed and disgusted. Others laugh, whistle, or mutter to one another. The two women continue to walk by. Down by the beach at sunset the Owl proposes to the Cat. From off-screen a piece of rubbish is thrown at the pair followed by yelled insults. They try to buy a ring but everyone they visit refuses and sends them away. Late that night the couple quickly pack all they can into a small boat and set sail to get away from all the hatred. They travel to many different locations looking to buy a ring and find acceptance but instead they have doors shut in their faces. Finally, after a year when they are running low on resources and money they land on a beach. After a small walk they find a Pig and ask if he would sell them his ring. A shilling is all they can afford to pay for the ring, but the Pig still accepts and points them inland, towards a house on the hill. They go to the house and meet a Turkey who offers to officiate their wedding in his chapel. With another rose, the Owl and Cat finally get married and celebrate down on the beach with a small dinner. Under the starlight the couple dance into the night."
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The Adapted Script
After cementing a synopsis I worked on turning it into a formal script. Taking the ideas discussed and formalising them for ease of understanding. Adapting this into a formal script was more challenging, as with deeper understanding of how I wanted my animation to look and what the characters and scenes would be like, I wanted to show these in the script. However that is not the purpose of a script and I found myself constantly going back and removing extra fluff and information that i was putting in that wasn't required. I also included small character descriptions, I'm not sure are entirely necessary for a script, but I believe help with understanding the characters involved.
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MoodBoards
When developing a concept its always good to find your foundations in real life. References and Inspirational imagery can help propel your work into the realistic. Searching up concepts and time periods you want to set your work in will help it seem far more believable in the eyes of the public. Thus I have developed these mood-boards to help convey and consolidate just what my animation looks to discuss.
The Premise
In this first mood-board, I look at the current political climate in America. What America is more and more commonly being known for. Supremacy and bigotry are become increasingly common, finding root in its culture. One that now has a leader that cannot even condemn Nazis and White Supremacists and continues to promote backwards and bigoted ideologies. This is the world in which our story takes place and thus, appropriate reference material was collected.
As my story is not only about the current bigotry that plagues our society, but also love, acceptance and fighting for equality, a second mood-board was created for the premise. This one in contrast to the one above showcases people standing united together to fight for whats right. Shows acts of selflessness and good. Acts of pride in who they are and defiance against persecution. Scenes of families reunited. Scenes of Love.
To help connect the concepts above to the story, and to understand how to create the same atmosphere in my animation, I further analysed the two sets of images. In doing so many differences can be drawn between the sets of images above.
In those of bigotry and hate darker colour schemes are implemented. There is a strong prevalence of black and red and strong sharp visuals. They stand tall and proud in stances of anger and dominance trying to assert themselves above the rest. They also tend to conceal their identities or hide behind guards or weapons like the fire they carry. In the images of acceptance however there is a lot more colour and life. They are smiling and laughing, not intimidating. They stand tall, not with arrogance and superiority, but with pride in who they are. There stances and much more relaxed and softer as well. They hug and they hold hands with one another. Although both depict some images of protest the ones in the former board clearly show anger and hatred whereas those from the latter depict love and defiance.
It's interesting to note that it did not take me long to find the images of hatred. That one or two simple searches provided plenty of images for those of bigotry and white supremacy. However, I had to stop and search for those of acceptance. That I had to dig through search after search for the content I needed for this simple collection of images.
The Location
To better understand and explore the location that the animation would be set in I went searching for landmarks in America. Considering the premise of the story, I wanted to incorporate the Statue of Liberty. As a representation of what America "Should" be and the passage displayed on the base of the statue, it seemed the most appropriate location to set the scene. Thus, I have looked up several reference images for New York, Central Park, and The Statue of Liberty herself as well as her sonnet New Colossus as written below.
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame, with conquering limbs astride from land to land; Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand a mighty woman with a torch, whose flame Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command the air-bridged harbour that twin cities frame.
“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she with silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
The Characters
As I was planning to use animals for my characters, rather than humans, I decided that I would find reference material on the two main characters to help with overall design of the animals.
The owl in the story is a female hijabi woman and thus the owl would need to share parallels in her design. A lot of Islamophobia stems from the unfair and bigoted idea that Muslims and middle eastern people are terrorists and are therefore dangerous and shouldn't be trusted. Thus for the owl I needed images that didn't look like the scary, angry, predator that it is known for being. Instead they needed to contrast this ideal and show a gentle, sweet and innocent bird. The story was also supposed to be about a lesbian couple and thus I needed images that gave of a more feminine look and feel. Smooth soft shapes and more gentle features inspired my direction and lead me to this set of images.
The pussy cat, gentle yet fiercely protective, plays the girlfriend of the owl. The cat is also seen as quite aggressive and dangerous even though used as a pet by most people. So much so that owners will often declaw cats, ripping away part of them and leaving them in pain, just so they can keep them as pets. This echos the rhetoric of lots of homophobia. Saying that they either need to "be fixed" or have a part of them "removed" to be accepted. Saying that they should not be so public with that part of them and that they are not going to be accepted if they don't act the way others want. Thus in finding images of cats with their claws, that still look gentle and sweet, the character shows you don't need to change to be accepted. Finding more feminine images of cats also allows for the couple to be identifiable as a lesbian couple.
Additional Content
Although not main characters and elements in the story, these elements are still important things to have reference material for. Thus, when tasked with creating my other on screen characters and a prop for the story I found a few images to help guide me in the right direction. These photos serve as materials for reference to make the designs realistic more than anything else. They help provide perspective on things not seen in my everyday life and thus just provide what I need to help create the limited characters and props after them.
Character Design
Lets Get Gestural
Once the script and concept were finalised I started on character design and development. To do so I went down to South Bank and started looking at gesture in characters. Without looking at the page I drew many of the students in my class to get gestural images of their faces and character. Although these images often looked quite bad and rushed they captured a subconscious look at characters that my mind was seeing. They created interesting images of characters you wouldn't normally think to design in your work which leads to interesting animations.
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Additionally I went and watched people as they walked about South Bank and looked at capturing their basic form and gesture. How they walked. How they sat. How they composed their bodies. Not spending more than 60 seconds on any one drawing I quickly found myself covering pages in character forms of all different types of people. Understanding how different people composed themselves meant that I could better understand how the body worked. This would enhance my character designs, making them look more human and realistic in design and meant that not every character would compose themselves the same way.
Initial Character Development
As a political commentary, the themes and concepts discussed within are far more effective if discussed indirectly. This makes the viewers really think about the film they are watching and the messages behind the film. Thus, the characters in the film, which in themselves discuss the bigotry in the world as a lesbian couple and a hijab wearing woman, needed to be designed in a way that they looked just like normal characters. To do this, instead of having the characters be human, I left them as the animals as described in the poem.
With this in mind, I started playing around with the animal forms I would need to develop with limited success. Even with the small scale draft attempts I was making, proportions seemed off, with the fur/ feathers looking off-putting. The pointed ellipse eye designs of animals also seemed to give off a far more sinister style than what I needed for the animation. These eyes looked far too small and gave off the 'evil monster' vibe rather than a natural sweeter 'cat eye' one. However, though this practice I was starting to understand what worked and what didn't. I started to get a grip on the eye shapes and started to settle into an art style that better captured the mood I was looking to achieve.
With a more advanced understanding of the character shapes and a more evolved design style I attempted a full page draft of the characters. Keeping my pencil light and quick I drew rough outlines of the characters I wanted to see. While drawing I made an effort not to erase lines and instead let the darker outlines of the characters emerge as I decided on what lines I liked and what ones I didn't. I looked at drafting and capturing the overall mood I wanted in the characters and recorded why I had included what I did in notes on the page.
Character Roughs, Refinement & Designs
Although wildly unrefined and far less than perfect, these rough images formed a basis for identifying what was successful in the design and what wasn't. I also felt I was straying from the roots of my reference images and gestural drawing, leading to less interesting and less dynamic character designs. Thus, I took a step back, reviewed my source images and gestural drawing and analysed what went wrong in my initial draft.
The Owl - Roughs
The Owl was good but she resembled the commonly recognised "great horned owl" which looks more aggressive and powerful. Although this owl look is easily recognisable it was not the look that best suited my characters needs. Thus, I substituted features of the "barn owl", a much more sweet looking owl, into the drawing. This meant removing the tufts of feathers on the face and refining the beaks shape. Additionally the hijab in the original design looked like it was just wrapped around the face and was far two rounded at the bottom. I thus adjusted this to create a more natural fabric look for the character. Unlike the original, I also added the body of the owl into this design and designed her feather dress in the same style as the modest dress Muslim women wear. These feathers looked a little static, however the overall design fitted in with the intended theme of the animation.
With this full body design in mind I drafted up some variations on the face to get a rough idea of what it would look like in different situations. By doing these I not only got a better idea of what the character would look like talking and with different facial expressions and profiles, but noticed that my hijab style needed improvement and that I should make the fabric detail more authentic.
Finally I created a character turnaround for the Owl. The character design shown here makes use of far more dynamic feather arrangements and better identifies which feathers are the wings and which are the body by darkening the wings. This is not just a way of differentiating the wings but further inclusion of realistic design choices, as barn owls wings are a darker brown than the rest of the body. I also further evolved the hijab, adapting it to be further dynamic and realistic. The asymmetry this provides also makes the images more visually appealing to the viewers.
The Owl - Refinement
Once the rough character ideas had been finalised I moved to refining them and preparing them for their use and animation. Taking the character and evolving her into a more formal design. Looking at my sketches I noticed that the front and back character views were different in size, something that wouldn't happen if you looked at a real character. I reviewed my reference images for the barn owl and the turnarounds I had completed and opted to use the back's sizing. Where the design gets thinner towards the bottom of the character, noticing that this was a more accurate depiction of an owl or bird and that it gave the character more shape and figure, instead of depicting them as a solid block of feathers.
When I looked at the back of the owl's sketch more closely I noticed that the feet weren't centered to the character. In sketch form this didn't seem like an issue but when moving to vector line art this became more and more apparent and off-putting. With the feet so far off-center like this, the character's center of gravity was incredibly skewed, making it quite alarming to audiences, thus as seen above needed to be altered. Evening and pushing out the base of the owl to make her look more symmetrical in her form helped fix these issues.
Once my initial line art was set I looked at some of my reference images for colour inspiration and swatches. Drawing colours from nature and the actual birds I was modelling my character after, I started creating a colour palette I could use for my character. The base feather colours and hijab worked well together. The Purple and Yellow-Oranges used, formed a complementary colour scheme for the majority of the bird, making her quite visually appealing. The pale whites and greys also allowed for both realism, and aided in distinguishing the body from the wings and creating a some visual relief in the image as a more stable colour.
Using the dark blues and blacks for the eyes created some clashes however. The initial, more oval shaped, almond eye style used in the initial line art had good flow, but when used with the dark, void like colours of the owl, instead of looking sweet, looked evil. The style and mood the eyes created, and the connotation they projected was that of demon like black eyes, where you can't see what the people are thinking. This was far more sinister than the character should have been and produced the wrong connotation. Looking back over the reference images I had, I noticed that the barn owl had a rounder eye. I drew up a less human, more rounded, owl eye and even when using the same colours noticed the character became far less sinister and evil, and instead gave a more sweet and innocent wide eyed look for the character. This was for more in style with what the character was supposed to represent and look like, so the altered eye was used instead.
Another key moment during character design was finding the right back colour for the owl's white feathers. At first when the character had used a pure white backing colour, it had washed out the colours of the bird far too much and not allowed for a lot of depth for the feathers. it had come across afar too cold and unfeeling. With this I realised I needed to create a slight tint to the face. Many iterations of the face colour were looked at, ranging from oranges like the rest of the feathers of the bird, to blues and greys for a more neutral subtler shade. The colours often looked far too prominent in the images and gave the feathers unrealistic or unappealing colour grades. The greys didn't have enough colour and often left the images looking dull. After limited success with standard colours for the owl, I moved on to more alternative colours that you would be less likely to find on birds. This led me to a brown-grey green colour which when placed behind a white layer with a lowered opacity, created a pale green grey. This non-pure grey worked perfectly as a colour, not strong enough to make the feathers look distinctly fake like the other colours, but appearing not as dull and plain as the previous pure greys had been. This then became the colour used for the owls, white feathers.
Once I had chosen a base colour scheme for the owl and finalised the look of the face and feather line art, I moved on to colouring the bird. This was a long drawn out process as I hand drew the design for each individual orange feather on the bird. This was motivated by me not wanting the feathers to just look like cloned copies of one another or like just a huge block of plain colour. Each orange feather featured the same base creamy-orange colour with a similar colour running down each feathers spine. They then each had cream coloured elements on low opacities lighten the feather at the top, and orange coloured elements on low opacities darkening the tip. Noting the barn owl appearance in my reference images and wanting my wings to stand out from the base body, I used the orange feathers to depict the wings and styled the inner feathers similar to the way I had styled the face. Upon completion of this styling however, I noticed that the white feathers where quite clumped and looked like one large element. This was what I was trying to avoid in its design and so re-visited my reference images for inspiration. Noticing how the whiter owls often had very small dots of brown on their feathers, I added orange tips to some but not all of the feathers. This broke up the block of white and allowed for feathers to be individually distinguished, but didn't take away from the overall look of the design, so was kept.
With the main design of the owl now finalised I moved on to creating the rest of my turnaround and character sheet. When creating my owl character sheets the one key element designers would need to know is how the owl lifts her wings and what she would look like with them up. Initially I just grouped together a collection of feathers and shifted it around to get a feel for the wings design. However I could never seem to get the wing to look just right. The wing always seemed to sit a little funny on the page. Looking back over my images of barn owls, I noticed that the inner wing was the same colour as the inner feathers and that the wings tended to flow upwards rather than down. Looking back over my image, I decided that although i was just playing with size and position, the wing would always look off if it wasn't in the right colours or if it turned the wrong way. I quickly changed over the colour the wing was, to one that closer matched the white and sightly altered the angle it was at, and saw the image drastically improve. In not too much time after the birds position was finalised and read for colour.
With a much better look and feel for the wing, it was coloured to match the design of the other white feathers, however proportion still felt slightly odd. Remembering that the wings of a bird don't just come off the side of the bird but attach to the back and wrap around to the front, I added in some shadows to the inner wing. This created a much better sense of depth, separated the wing once again from the torso, and greatly increased the visual appeal of the bird. With the wing's front design completed I also created a back design of the wing.
Looking far better than the original design of the wingspan, the owl had come a long way, however there was still room for improvement. The white wing lacked interest and colour and the back wing seemed to lack depth to it. Deciding that the feathers from the back of the wing would be larger and bushier than the inner ones, I added a small ring of these along the outside of the white wing. This gave the impression the feathers were sticking out over the white ones, creating a more visually appealing and interesting design and creating more of a texture for the wings. I also attempted to add a small shadow on the back of the wing from where the feathers would be bunching.
This shadow on the back of the wing however made the feathers look like they were coming from the front of the bird and so took away from the image even more. However something was needed to be done to fix the original issue. A shadow was needed, however the placement and darkness of the shadow was throwing the image, so I moved it to cover both the wing and part of the back, and made it less prominent. This fixed the issues with the wing and with some other small little tweaks finalised the Owl's design.
The Owl - Final Design Assets
The final refined assets for the Owl including: The Colour Palette used; Character Turnaround, with and without the lines; Character Wingspan from the Front and Back; and a Character Sheet of various Emotions.
Overall the design process for the Owl has been a rocky one. As the element that went through the most change and iteration over the course of the entire design process it has been the most challenging to complete. She was in a constant battle between accurate portrayal of the animal, it's animated visual style and the overall connotations of the character. However, as our central character, she has been the centre of the evolving vision of the animation. Initially I was lost with how to go about designing this character, but with research and a strengthening connection to the premise of the story, she slowly took form. Heavily tweaked from her initial styles and designs, this final character design achieves all its requirements effectively. She closely represents all that her character was initially designed to do and creates both visual interest through her design and a sympathetic character for the audiences to root for. With all this I am more than happy with her final outcome.
The Pussy-Cat - Roughs
In the original design of the pussycat the overly rounded face made the design look far too fake and cartoon-y. It also made the image quite symmetrical in design and far less dynamic. Thus, a less rounded style was used, adding interest to the image but also making it more realistic. The body was also quite plainly designed. She lost her neck and although her body had a nice smooth rhythm to it, it lacked identifying features. So a neck and necklace, styled after cat collars, was added. Additionally a dress was detailed, allowing the character more human like characteristics and adding detail and interest to her torso.
Once again, with her full body design in mind I drafted up some variations of her face to get a rough idea of what it would look like in different situations. By doing these I got a better idea of what the character would look like talking and with different facial expressions and profiles. It also allowed me to experiment with the canines of the cat and how prominent I wanted to make them when she spoke.
Finally I created a character turnaround for the Cat. Although I struggled to get her faces side profile to look realistic and visually appealing, this turnaround helped in visualising the character as a whole. Playing around with making the cat anthropomorphic was also a challenge. Creating the right balance between human and cat like features for the character lead to much deliberation over the curves and body shape of the cat. However, I think that in the end I have found a nice balance. Her head still needs tweaking but the body provides a clear imagining of a human styled cat.
The Pussy-Cat - Refinement
Once the rough character ideas had been finalised I moved to refining them and preparing them for their use and animation, taking the character and evolving her into a more formal design. Looking back at the turnaround, I noticed some small discrepancies. Although not by much, the back of the character was slimmer than the front, its neck also a completely different style. The side profile of the cat also didn't seem to correctly line up in several locations with the front or back.
Working alongside the initial drawn sketches I drafted up some altered line art for the cat. Starting with simply porting the lines to digital I used a tablet to bring across the same natural flow of the hand. Once all the basic lines were in, I turned off the layer holding the original designs. As I worked I tweaked the lines I had, thus tweaking the styles the sketches provided. I worked to increase the natural flow the lines of the character provided and the natural curves my hand drawing had allowed for. While completing this process of alteration, I also made sure to better match the lines up with each other, adjusting the positions of the lines to better reflect the different sides of the character. Once happy with the lines of the cat, although clearly still the same design and style, I noticed very little had been kept of the original line art. Instead it had inspired a far more dynamic and overall beautifully flowing character design.
Once my initial line art was set I looked at some of my reference images for colour inspiration and swatches. Drawing colours from nature and the actual cats I was modelling my character after, I started creating a colour palette I could use for my character. As cats don't have a distinct fur colour, instead with countless diverse colour patterns, I started to think about the character I was designing. What did I want her to represent, what other characters is she going to spend time with on screen, and what settings or environments is she going to be shown on. With a blue-grey colour scope for the city and sky, dark blues for the scenes at night and a heavily orange love interest, I went for a sandstone-esque colour palette. This creates a complementary colour scheme contrasting the character with the sky and city, making her pop more off the screen. It also allows for a connection to be drawn between her and her love interest the Owl, who is also designed in a orange-y colour palette.
When looking at Ginger Tabby Cats (the cat my design takes after the most) the fur is generally not a solid colour. It is patchy with areas of paler creams and more colourful oranges and pale browns across the fur. Fur is also rarely sharp distinct colours, with it often blending together and making funny unique shapes. Thus, when drawing my cat, I looked to include similar patches to create visual interest and unique personality for my character. Without these patches, the character looked quite flat and undesirable, thus making them even more of a necessity.
With the Owl, matching up the colours when colouring the turnaround had been quite simple, all the feathers had similar enough designs that the would look all but the same from the front side and back. However, with the Pussy-Cat, her fur markings needed to be somewhat matched up on the turnaround. If there was a patch of white fur under her chin on the front, then it still needed to be there when looked at from the side. But how would the different angle distort how the shapes looked? What on the front should be visible on the sides? Does anything make it all the way around to the back? Where do elements from the front and back meet up on the side? These and much more are all things I needed to consider. And with the unique and almost random line textures I was using for each element, how could I reproduce the exact shapes from different angles. Although not completely perfect, I, to the best of my ability, tracked how I thought the colours would wrap around the model. Doing my best to match and mimic the sizes and shapes of the object and how they would actually look from different angles.
Once the Colour and Line Art had been finalised, I moved to working on the cat's expressions. Without the hijab or feathers of the Owl, there was much more to work with expression wise. Working closely with reference material I looked at what cat like expressions I could bring over into my character design. From head tilts, to the use of her tail and jaw movements allowing for the teeth to be shown. As I was creating these profiles and especially the body movements, I made sure I matched up the elements I was using to what was actually possible with the character I had designed, I compared proportions with my works. This mean that I could make sure the arms and body looked the same from all sorts of angles. It also allowed me to work out where and how the colour patches on the fur would change with character movement. Additionally, as the head is much longer and overhangs the body, I looked at how the shadow it was casting would change from different angles. Thinking of the lights that would be present on the character if in at least a moderately lit room. This helped create dimension in the character stills and allowed for me to really get a grip of how the character was behaving.
The Pussy-Cat - Final Design Assets
The final refined assets for the Pussy-Cat including: The Colour Palette used; Character Turnaround, with and without the lines; and a Character Sheet of various Emotions.
It didn't take long with the cat to settle into a good design. Her overall design process was aided by the fact that while working on her elements I had already grasped an idea of what I needed to do and what she was to look like from my struggles with the owl. After all the work with the owl, an art style was already beginning to form and all I needed to do was place the cat in it as well. On top of that, her character design, even from the start, was a far less complicated look, focusing instead on her simplicity and elegance. These together allowed far quicker for a more formal style and design concept to take form. Although she does go through many refinement iterations where her character design is adjusted slightly to improve flow or the overall quality of the lines used, she is mostly the same character from the start and has simply improved over the course of the project. Due to this, I am very happy and proud of how she has evolved throughout the project and what she has become.
The Line-Up
To aid with the design of these two characters and to get a sense of what they look like next to each other a lineup was created. This provides a height comparison between the two and allows for their respective heights to be shown. Comparatively to each other, I wanted to demonstrate the height difference birds and cats do have with each other. How cats are a much larger animal than the owls/birds and how the Pussy-Cat could be seen by the owl as intimidating. However, the unlikely pair look past each others differences, not seeing each other as threats but as other beings and are thus quite happily in love.
When deciding on the heights of these characters compared to others, although the animals they are based on are far shorter than depicted here, I thought of the other characters on screen, The Pig and The Turkey included, and opted to make them taller. I didn't want the animals to be towered over by the other character however still wanted them to be overall shorter than the other animals on screen. In doing so I once again demonstrate how the bigotry of the other taller characters is irrational as they themselves are taller and more physically imposing than the characters they are afraid of and demonising.
The Other Animals
The script and synopsis also feature two other minor characters "The Pig" and "The Turkey". Although these characters only appear for small portions of the animation, they do appear on screen and thus I drafted the basic rough character designs in the style of the other characters. Once again, these characters both take after animals that look less friendly and have more aggressive connotations associated with them. However through the use of softer rounded lines and careful design choices, these characters look far more friendly and accepting, and thus fit in with their characters in the story.
Environment Design
The Roughs
When designing my sets I thought about what meaning and allegory could be conveyed through them. How I could further explore the concept of ignorance vs acceptance through the background visuals in the film. Remembering the passage written on the bottom of the Statue of Liberty, and how it is supposed to prove and advocate for the US being accepting of others, I first looked at the symbol of the torch and light. Thus, I designed the scenes where the characters are happy and are accepted to be better lit, and the ones where they aren't, are darker with more dramatic shadows.
I also looked at designing the scene where the couple run away from America and the one where they finally get married in contrast with one another. In the former, its a darkly lit night with a mostly new moon, the only light in which would be coming from the boat they are in. In which the statues torch has fallen out of her hand, symbolising how liberty and freedom are dying within the Americas with the rise of bigotry and hatred. This is contrasted by the latter, another night time scene but this time with a full moon and a starry night sky. In this scene, a lit torch sits on the bay lighting the scene up. This contrasts the former, symbolising that liberty and freedom are still obtainable with those that accept you and advocate equality for all.
As these scenes were so important to the overall message, I drafted and developed them, to further explore and plan out the details. In the initial drafts I looked at how I could layout the sets. To enhance the dreary nature of the former, I looked at including a mist. This would help increase the feeling that the pair were all alone and thus increase the emotional power of the scene. I also drafted it without the torch, however I felt this would lose some of its impact. In the latter scene I looked at including the boat they had been sailing in upon the shore of the beach and the couple in clearer focus this time holding hands and dancing.
These scenes gave me a good idea of what I needed to design, however they both needed touching up. In the final version of the midnight getaway I edited the cityscape to include more variation in building sizes to make it look more dynamic. I also made sure to include the distinct buildings to make the scene more accurate. I also increased the amount of mist so that the moon too was partially obscured in the scene.
The beach set underwent more noticeable changes. The rougher sees was replaced with a more calmer horizon line. This enhances the peaceful nature of the scene instead of creating conflicting vibes. The illusion of water was instead created by showing a reflection of the moon on the waterfront. The beachfront was also edited and the boat removed as the flow of the scene was disrupted in the original design. This alteration also enhances the peaceful atmosphere by creating a smooth and soft curved line that guides viewers attention across the scene rather than a broken and bent one that stops and starts.
Additionally, through the design of other sets involved in the scene, it is inferred that acceptance and equality are natural and that hatred and bigotry is built and unnatural. This is through the subtle influence of the natural and man-made environments on the scenes within the script. In those where the couple is happy and accepted, there is an abundance of the natural world. This is evidenced through the final honeymoon scene (above) which is set on the beachfront, the date scene, set in central park, and in the design of the owl's home, where a large tree is outside her home. In contrast the scene where they flee america (above) features the man-made statue of liberty and the cityscape, and the shops which refuse to sell them a ring feature the cold display cabinets with no greenery. These subtle concepts help further the allegory of the animation, deepening the intended emotional outcome of the film.
The Refinement
Use of colour, lighting and the contrast between the man made and the natural were all a large part of the connotation and allegory being represented by the story. Thus, these were all incredibly important elements to consider when digitising and colouring my sketches.
Liberty
I wanted to make the scene where they escape America very dark and gloomy and thus chose very dark gloomy aquas and turquoises for my design. This in itself was easy, finding the right colours for the background and statue herself wasn't a hard task and they all worked together quite well. However, the mist and colour grading of the lighter elements in the scene needed to be more carefully chosen. How does one create a mist like substance in vector and how do you find the right shades of dull yellows to match the rest of the scene.
Using opacity and various brushes, I managed to make some whip-like elements that could easily represent mist and fog. Using these I carefully crafted where the various elements would go creating a nice fog around the image. To get the right shade for the yellow elements, I lowered the opacity of all elements involved and created a solid backing colour the same as the base blue used in the image. This meant that all the yellows used would automatically adjust to what was needed for the overall colour grade of the image. This still required some work to find the correct opacity to use. Originally the buildings were far too bright and the opacity needed to be dropped significantly to set them into the background.
This needed to happen as I wanted the main two focal points in this scene to be that of the Statue of Liberty in the foreground and their boat on the water. With these as the focal point, the audience is drawn to the contrast between the two. The yellows of the torch are distinctly dimmer than those of their boat. It makes the audience feel that the liberty and freedom are no longer welcome in America and instead, they too, are fleeing with the couple in the boat. The light on the boat reflecting on the water is also an important detail. With the passage on Liberty referring to her lighting the way for all those that need it, this shows just how far from her words America has strayed. "I lift my lamp beside the golden door!" is what she calls, however here she cannot lift her's anymore, the only lamp being the one leaving this place, showing America is no longer a place of freedom and is no longer worthy of this title or her triumph.
The Beach
When developing the beach the colour and nature used were very important to the overall design and so needed to be completed well. The moon's reflection on the water at first was quite hard to get right and in an art style that accurately reflected the rest of the imagery. Originally it used a far more line driven style however this was not what the rest of the film was designed like and so was altered to fit a far more sooth vector like style. In addition, the sand had to be altered, as the light from the torch did not seem to accurately project onto the sand and the waterline seemed to just start rather than fade into the water. The key blues that were used in this scene were deliberately made lighter than the blues from the previous scene. Showing that even though both take place late at night, those where there is acceptance and happiness for all are innately brighter and better places.
The trees, as such an important aspect of the scene, showing how acceptance is natural, needed to be well designed as well. However, I could not seem to create a tree element that was both bold and visually appealing. Initially I used far too many individual colours for the tree which broke it away from the main style of the image. I tries to limit the colours used but the leaves still looked fake and bubbly rather than a bushy tree. I finally decided to create a few odd shaped tree elements and collage them together to allow for the branches of the tree to peep through. This new design style drastically improved the overall quality of the image. Changing the bush below to better match the new style of the tree, I also added in some small roses. This not only parallels the bush outside of the Owl's house, but brings back in the rose prop used elsewhere in the animation.
Contrasting the previous scene, this scene is from the end of the film where the characters are seen dancing on the river. The inclusion of the fire lit torch in this scene works to once again show, the "golden door" is no longer in the America's, a place more and more commonly being associated and filled with bigots. Instead, the "huddled masses yearning to breathe free" find her light elsewhere, in a place not consumed by hatred and bigotry but by love and understanding.
The Home
With the tree being such an important element of the scene, The first thing I worked on in the scene was designing that. Using bright warm browns and greens I created a wrapping effect around the tree. After already having struggled with the tree from my last design, I had a far better idea in mind for what this tree would look like. However I still didn't know how many lower opacity levels of the leaves would work properly. Thus, in my initial stages I left the leaves alone and instead worked on creating the warm brick background.
This was a relatively simple task and just left me finding the warm colours needed for the bricks and house. The warm reds here stand out from all other buildings drawn, as the two lots of city's are quite grey and washed out. Even the shop is very cold in it's colour palette, leaving the home as one of the only warm places shown. This in itself shows how the Owl is only comfortable and safe in her own home as the public who unfairly discriminate against her make the rest of the world colder. When the background was finished I was able to test how the tree would look in the image and judge how many leaves were required to finish the tree off.
The Park
This image proved difficult to realise as it was quite hard to balance the amount of greens needed for all the grass and trees. Thus I worked through it in stages, colour blocking trees and slowly finding what colours were needed where. By the time I had drawn all the trees I noticed something was off. The image was nice but it was missing something. I started to add in shadows for all the trees and bushes and the image started to improve. Finally I decided to include all the water reflections and shadows needed and when I looked at it again, it seemed far better. The incredibly natural bright green environment here for when the girls go on their date is the epitome of the allegory. It is the brightest and lightest scene in the film as they are with each other and happy even if the people around them don't think they should be together. As this scene doesn't make their dislike the centre of it and instead focuses on the girls, the abundance of nature shows how their happiness and love is a natural thing not something forced like the hatred the others show.
The Shop
This scene was the easiest and most simplistic to make. The choice of the colours was the most important part of this shot. The colder washed out colours used for the entirety of the image reveal it as the icy, bitter, and unwelcoming environment it is. Even the browns and the golds are quite washed out and void of colour in the shot, accentuating this feeling. To top it all off, the big dark shadows cast in the final add to the gloomy, inhospitable and impersonal environment being created. As one of the most telling scenes for the bigotry the story uses as its antagonist, this scene well represents how evil and uncaring it is.
The Environment - Final Design Assets
The final refined assets for the Environment including: The Statue Of Liberty Scene -When the characters run away from America; The Beach Side where they finally get to relax when married; The Home the owl lives in; The Park, they go on their date in before the owl proposes; and The Shop that refuses to sell them the Ring.
The evolving vision is most present with that of the set designs, especially in reference to those set at the beach and by the Statue of Liberty. These two scenes and their respective allegory are what inspired this whole project. Seeing these settings take form has been interesting and although I think some minor aspects could still be improved, I am happy with the images produced. As I thought more and more about the environments I was creating I saw more and more room for allegory and symbolism to be embedded in the visuals I was creating. This lead to strong symbolism being formed in the colours, plant-life, and overall lighting of the scenes. These made development of the images quite easy when I got to the refinement part of the project. Already happy with the way the concepts, through the realisation of these scenes colourful digital scenes, I find the additional meaning I've embedded in the images to be even more reason to like how the images turned out.
Prop Design
The Roughs
Using the concept that acceptance and equality is the natural way, the rose prop given to the cat on their date delves further into this allegory. At the start of the film it is fresh and new, untampered with by society. However, as the film continues and the characters get bombarded with more bigotry by the people around them and by the shop keepers who refuse to sell them the ring, the flower slowly dies. This shows the deadly effects that a backwards and bigoted society can have on those within it The rose has done nothing wrong, and it cannot effect its surroundings to stop this abuse. Yet bigots still try to suppress its natural beauty, forcing it into the dirt. Although the bigoted society has killed the beauty that was the rose, when the couple are finally married within Turkey's church, a new fresh rose makes an appearance. This presses the idea that love and acceptance promote beauty and growth of a society, and that diversity is not something to be killed, but instead nurtured.
My first attempt at designing this flower was less than successful. The side on design, showing all of the flowers layers did not look as visually pleasing as intended for the plant. With a more sketchy design style the roses detail became cluttered and messy. it also became quite difficult to differentiate the individual petals in this design.
I thus switched to a more side on view of the rose. This was not only more like what would actually appear in the animation but also was more visually appealing. This was in part due to the increased simplicity of the flower, which leaves more breathing room for the viewers. The side on approach also increased the amount of rounded soft lines, increasing the flow of the design. Once the 'alive' flower was designed, further versions of the decayed flower were developed. As the flower died, the lines became sharper and straighter, creating a less natural look for the plant. These types of lines also give off the impression of the flower drying out, showing it dying. They also incorporate more and more of the stem of the plant and less of the petals. This design allows the users to determine the petals are falling off, which is yet another sign of decay in plants.
The Refinement
One of the harder parts of the props refinement was creating the natural colours and lines required for the decaying flower. This was quite difficult as these colours and lines can be quite authentic and unique, making them hard to reproduce online using digital means. Following along the lines of the rough sketches I had completed, I used a tablet to better track the natural flow of my hand to aid in the creation of these more natural lines. Specifically for the wilting flower, I created two drafts of what the lines could look like, so I could better figure out what I wanted for the look of the rose. This proved useful as the second set of line art I did for the rose looked far more visually appealing than the first and featured a far more realistic and flowing appearance.
When dealing with the colours of the respective flowers I ran across various issues. With the first, the colours seemed far too plain with no highlights but I could not seem to add a great deal of detail into it without drastically changing the the design style. However, as I remembered how small a rose would be comparatively to all the other elements on screen I found that simplifying the colours for just the alive one would work perfectly, as you don't want to over-complicate or over-detail a small element on screen. For both of the decaying flowers, I found it quite hard to balance the purples, reds, and browns that were needed to create the decaying colour I wanted to achieve. While creating the wilting variant of the flower, I thought to trial adding the greens used on the stalk of the plant into the purples of the rose. This helped bolster the decaying look that I was looking to achieve, creating a sickly look to the flower petals. I then used a similar style for the dead rose and as I got stuck on the rose bud, moved back into the stalk to find colours I could use for the petals. I also found that adding the backdrop colour of the dirt helped push the unnatural dead blacks and purples that the rose used, making them stand out and pop more.
The Prop - Final Design Assets
The final refined assets for the Prop including: The rose bright and alive, decaying, and dead on the ground.
The development of the rose prop is an interesting one. The sketchy nature depicted in the sketches is actually far more accurate when depicting its decay. But those fine lines are quite hard to recreate in the digital. The overall natural look and feel in those is something that really adds to the overall design of the flower. However when the characters and settings were crafted and moved away from the more sketchy design, so to did the roses to keep up with the overall design style. The colours used, especially for the wilting rose do much for the prop, and do make it visually appealing however it is just not as impactful as the bare bones sketch was. These flowers do look good and work well within the style of the rest of the film, it is just a shame that they had to loose the sketchy handcrafted nature that the sketches had.
Overall Reflection
This project has had its ups and downs. From the struggles of the owl and its visual style and complexity, to finding ways to best represent the subject matter and required symbolism in the settings and props, the project has had its challenges. As a whole however, it has come together quite nicely. As the project moved between sections, it's own unique style was developed to best showcase the characters and story it wanted to tell. The rough sketched products provided a jumping off point for the refined works, allowing them to grow. The art style seen in the finalised images is subtlety different from that shown in the sketches but that's just a part of the evolution of the project. And for most of the graphical elements it improves how the are shown. The slim, vector-style watercolour used, works in great favour for the characters and various sets like the Home, Park, and Shop, as well as the Statue of Liberty within her scene. It doesn't work as effectively for some of the elements, with the sketchier design working better like with the rose. However, these elements still create interesting visuals for the audience and provided great amounts of character to the design style. Overall I believe this project has been a success and am happy with my outcome. The way the various elements have been designed work well to communicate the intended meaning of the story and work well in conjunction with one another.
Ready for Production
With carefully constructed and designed environments, characters and props, the story of the Owl and The Pussy-Cat is ready for production. With these finalised products the design teams within the animation will know exactly how to go about animation of the characters, settings and props. They will also be able to produce the required animation with cohesion between production teams.