Sequence and Time

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The project ‘sequences and time’ encouraged us to explore time based outcomes that inspire people to change their thoughts about specific environmental issues. It invites us to consider sequence and time when making our pieces.

I was also a little worried when I received this brief. So many illustrators and artists have created work about the environmental crisis and there are so many animations and videos out there already to help educate. I was worried about not being able to create something unique while also staying true to myself.

To overcome this I decided that I should try and find a niche topic as a starting point and focus on the part of the brief that states ‘change the mind of one person to affect the

After doing a small brainstorm I decided that I wanted to look into single use plastics as the basis of my project. Specifically one you get with food products bought at the supermarket. I actually used to work asa checkout girl at a supermarket and I was always so disappointed in. how much useless packaging our food comes in.

• 1. layering receipts and and illustration done in Posca

• 2. Looking at useful vs. needless single use plastics

• 3. Collage inspired by excessive food packaging

To generate some ideas I did some little illustrations of products you might find in the super market. I briefly explored the idea of useful vs. needless single use plastics but decided to focus on food packaging. The collage I did with the two fish made me think of packing I saw whilst I was travelling in Japan. The packaging they have there is usually so cute and pretty but there is so much of it. It is common to find wrapping inside of wrapping inside of wrapping and you are almost always given a plastic bag even if. you just buy one small item.

Research : Japanese Convenience Stores

These are some pictures taken at a Japanese convenience store. All the packaging is neat and beautifully designed but in some cases there is much more than needed.

I love the contrast between the cuteness of the packaging and  the ugly reality of the horrible impact plastic can have on the environment if not disposed of properly

Research : Project Target

Developing from this I decided that my ‘target’ for this project would be my boyfriend. He is Japanese so he regularly buys these products. A different problem, however, is that unlike my friends who come from Japan he does not see a problem with the amount of plastic waste and doesn’t even actively try to reduce his waste consumption or recycle. For this project I want to work towards an educational video that tries to convince him to take this issue more seriously.

Research : Target’s Interests

To help come up with ideas about how I should go about my outcome I decided to look into the things my ‘target’ is interested in. The TV shows he likes and characters he grew up with. If my work takes inspiration from these sources or at least resembles them, he will probably be more interested and be more likely to listen.

I really like the colours used in both images and i especially like the colours and illustrative style of the screencap from Kobo-chan (right). 

Research : Editing Style

Since this will be a time based piece I also looked into some of his favourite youtube  channels as inspiration for how i should edit and add sound. I noticed a lot of his favourite content creators used similar sound effects – short, comedic sounds that emphasise movements and reactions. Sound can really make or break a time based piece, so i should think about what will and won’t work and what has been proven effective already.

Research : Stylistic Inspiration

I looked into a big selection of Japanese advertisements. I wanted to study how things are promoted in Japan to see if there were many major differences I could miss. 

I mainly noticed that there is a lot more celebrity endorsement in Japanese advertisement, we do have it here but almost every advert I watched for research had a celebrity  of some kind promoting the product or service. 

However as it would obviously be very hard to include a celebrity in my piece I decided to look more into the adverts that left an impression, rather than all the ons that were similar.

This is an advert for the convenience store ‘Lawson’, even though it is very short and simple, this Studio Ghibli directed ad stayed in my mind thanks to the beautiful animation style featured and the effortless way it shows why people keep coming back to their shops. I think it would be interesting to combine this beautiful, simple way of advertising with the other high energy ads that  I watched.

Research : Japanese Mascots

I also decided to look into Japanese company mascots. Cute little mascots like these are a common sight in Japan! Even each different region has their own mascot.

As character design is something I really love I thought it would be fun to design a character that could be a mascot of this project.

Development : Character Design

Development : Initial Animation ideas

Mini mindmap of animation ideas

After designing the little fish characters I decided to create some simple animations of them. These consisted of just some basic motions such as bouncing, spinning, kicking and waving. 

I took these two GIFs to the first crit of this project and the feedback I received really shocked me! Going into the crit I thought these little videos were quite funny but I was told that they were actually disturbing! That it was like they were traumatised because of the repetitive nature of their movements. This was a big surprise to me but taught me really showed me how I need to think really carefully about how other interpret my work…

Development : Green Screen Tests

After the critique I decided that I would not go further with the little fish characters and instead focus on a way of combining animation with a green screen effect. This was a suggestion I got after showing my work that I thought was interesting, as  I have never really tried anything like it before.

In many of the Japanese ads I watched for research there was usage of a green screen, so I thought that this project would be a great time to try something new!

While I was shoot with the green screen I decided to film  short movements that I could use to enhance any animation or drawing I create instead of being the main feature.

Development : After Effects

This is a short test clip I made using after effects – I wanted to test the animating features the software has. Even though this is a very short and simple animation it still took me a really long time to figure out… So I decided that it would be best for me to do the animated parts of this project on procreate then import it afterwards.

Development : Animation Storyboarding

This is how I planned out my animation, what I wanted to say and how was going to say it visually. Having this guide really helped me to stay on track.

Development : Written Stills

Development : Stills from Animated Segments

Development : First Test

This is my first attempt at putting all of the material I made together into a video. It’s ok, I realised when I started editing that the  clips I filmed were too short to be paired with the text, as if i change to the next scene after the movement is finished the viewer won’t have enough time to read. This meant I have to freeze some of the little clips on the last frame to allow for the required reading time – this doesn’t look great, it looks like the video is frozen or buffering. 

It’s a little disappointing but this means for my final I think  I need to leave out the green screen part of my video and just have it as plain text on the screen. Having it like this will also let me reach the 2 minute requirement, as right now the edit is only 1:30, as I couldn’t have the text on the screen for as long as I wanted to.

Outcome

Evaluation

I like my outcome for the ‘Sequences and Time’ project, however, I am slightly disappointed in myself for not achieving everything I wanted to with this project. Even though the final video is cute and delivers my message well I was unable to include the use of the green screen and I was not able to edit the sound well enough to be used. Whatever I tried it just seemed tacky or out of place.  I don’t know if this was down to me being too ambitious, my time management skills, or maybe both but I know I could have done better. 

What I am proud of in this project was being able to create something that is (almost) entirely in a  language I am still learning! I am really proud of myself for pushing through and not giving up on doing the final piece in Japanese, as I feel it is something that really adds to it and  makes it special. Something else I am proud of is how I overcame one of the worries I had going into this project – that I wouldn’t be able to create something unique… Personally, I feel I have achieved that with this project. I created an educational video aimed at one person in particular that I truly believe will be able to reach other as well.

Even though I wasn’t able to achieve everything I wanted with the outcome I still feel that this project overall was a success, I have learned so many new skills by pushing myself to try something new. I now feel even more motivated to make sure I experiment as much as I can for future briefs.