We had our second interim and presented out new concepts. I revamped the pitch presentation so it would look a lot nicer and more professional that our first interim. We presented our finished animatic, character sheets, my comp test, an animation timing test, and our production plan/schedule.
We got some mixed feedback.
From a student we were told that the audio Tomas added really helped bring the concept alive and just reminded us to make sure the audio loops as well as the images.
Chris gave us feedback that was a bit divisive in our group. He liked the abstract visual approach and the audio, but told us he found it hard to connect with the themes as it wasn’t grounded enough. The creature and the void of space made it hard to connect as the audience when our intentions are to make this a piece about creative burnout. He suggested that the moment where the horn grows with a tree branch sort of tecture was the only grounding moment and we could elaborate on that. While I could understand where he was coming from, I think we failed to explain how we were planning to incorporate more natural, earthly imagery in the backgrounds when the scene sort of explodes out.
During the pitch Su-Lynn gave us some tips and we spoke to her the next week as well. The first change we made based on her advice was to emphasize the gravity of the Other creature by making sure we animate particles being pulled towards it, as well as the first Creature being pulled in during the wide shot of both.
She also wanted us to emphasize the human connectiong by grounding it through an extended metaphor, maybe using the horn/branch, like Chris suggested. In the wide shot we will show how the branch that was initially torn off begins to grow back on both creatures to show firstly, the cyclical nature and regeneration, but also emphasizing how if you put too much of yourself into some thing, it will begin to take away parts of you.
Hannah focused on the narrative structure, telling us that she couldn’t really see a journey/progression. We weren’t really sure how to incorporate this advice as we intend the film to be on the abstarct side and we are really focusing on the cyclical nature of our themes. We decided that in editing the film according to Su-Lynn’s advice, this narrative would become more clear. She agreed with Chris’ comments that we needed to ground the visuals with the audience more.
Overall, we are now quite clear on our direction, and will be spending the winter break working on animation.