Wednesday, January 16, 2013

New Collab film

Just finished a few pieces from the new film I am working on in class. I still have some other concepts I'm finishing up tonight/tomorrow but here's one character sheet and a speed painting of the street performing location the help capture the mood. The entire class will be posting to vitamagusfilm.blogspot.com so check it out.


The above character is a woman in her 60's that has been performing as a magician for over 40 years. I wanted an older woman that wasn't what you normally see in animated films; hunched, wrinkled, and eccentric. She should have a sophistication and refinement about her gained through performing her act for decades. A past that was filled with stardom and beauty in which she continues to confidently project.

My key influence was the beautiful 63 year old Jessica Lange. Another is a Canadian street performer by the name of Billy Kidd who along with Janelle Monae inspired the androgynous outfit. This adds an interesting character trait to her unseen history of struggling with not only trying to introduce magic to the world but also to stand out and become accepted. Billy Kidd stated in an interview "It's a boys' club,"... "I have to work harder and do different things." which is one reason for Kidd's androgynous persona.

Lastly the color pallet chosen is an example of how the world could look towards the final few scenes of the film. Bright colors that play with a high contrast complimentary pallet. This method is more about experimenting with hue contrast than value contrast.



After finishing the last environment frame I decided to do a quick concept of the little girl in the street to refine that sloppy painting. This idea of having a child being able to also see the magic everyone else overlooks was brought up in class and I though it was interesting and worth exploring. I wanted her forms to reflect the magician she is impersonating so I tapered her arms and legs to mimic the magician silhouette.

4 comments:

Coeptus said...

Looks really cool man, I am excited to see this pan out. Are you still working on " The Keepers of the Trees" because that one really peaked my interest.

jeff macdonald said...

@Coeptus Thanks bro. Well actually "Keepers of the Trees" was a stand in name for the blog. The pitch I had written that took 2nd I called "Gaia's Clearing". The good news is that the 4 other classmates that voted for it said "We must make this outside of class!" So it may happen maybe next quarter. In the mean time I will be working on my indie film http://jelliefilm.blogspot.com and effects animation and Props for Vita Magus.

Unknown said...

want moooooore! this is cool, i like ur concepts especially the b&w concept with rain etc nice comp!
keep it up

jeff macdonald said...

@christelleThanks! Unfortunately I am no longer on environments. But stay tuned because I will begin on environments for my own film Jellie!