Buster Keaton, along with Charlie Chaplin, is one of the most well-known pioneers of silent comedy from the early 20th Century. I've been recently looking at the work of these actors for influence and inspiration in my own animated short's character. Buster Keaton's silent movements and exaggerated action-comedy is perfect to study  in preparation for animating my suitcase.



Specifically, I watched Buster Keaton's film 'The General'. Released in 1926 it tells the story of a stolen locomotive train in the mid-west, where Keaton's character chases it alone, through the country desert across enemy lines. This film was very helpful in resolving my story, as it includes a lot of gags and uses for wild-west environments, a couple of which I am adapting into my own short. A lot of the film takes place on a steam train also, which gives great references.



One such scene which I am taking inspiration for is this one pictured below. Keaton's character catches up with the stolen train by riding on a handcar (or a pump trolley) Something which I am determined to make my character do in a more heroic moment. I still have a few more shorts of his to watch along with some other comedy, but I think I am closer to a resolved story.

After a discussion tutorial with Phil yesterday, I was advised to find and watch some early silent comedy films to find inspiration for my story. In my head (and storyboarded) I currently have an idea for the opening of the animation, and after going over it, I think it works quite well. The real challenge is in the next two acts, where the story and character movements become more exaggerated and ridiculous as he tries to board the train.


Harold Lloyd was a suggested name, I found a nice selection of his short films which were re-released on DVD by New Line Cinema in 2005 ( from countless other releases before). I recognised Lloyd's name but assumed I hadn't seen any of his films, yet I still recognised many famous scenes as he is such a iconic comedian. I've spent the entire morning watching his comedy, which is leaving a huge impression on my story and character design.


Harold Lloyd became a household name from 1915 after starring as the glasses-wearing 'buffoon' usually named 'The Boy' in many silent short-length comedy films. Lloyd formed a partnership with Hal Roach who directed the majority of films that he starred in. In each film he has a love interest who he stars opposite, in the films I've watched so far, it has been a mix of Bebe Daniels and Mildred Davis (In his later shorts) Even though the earliest of his films are almost a hundred years old, they still are incredibly funny and I would say that they are arguably as funny as anything created since. After watching Billy Blazes Esq (1937) and An Eastern Westerner (1920), which are both set in a western frontier town I saw  a lot of opportunities for gags and actions in my own animation. Also after watching some of his others, such as Bumping into Broadway (1919) and Ask Father (1919) I realised how important comic timing and exaggeration of movement is when your film has no dialogue.

I'm going to watch many more of these to try and find more gags and I'm considering using certain scenes to animate my suitcase from, I'd love to attempt to give him Harold Lloyd character's personality, as a 'brave' fool. This afternoon I'm going to watch some of Buster Keaton's work, which I think will be just as beneficial.

Despite having the piece of music for quite some time, since getting assigned it for my summer project, I haven't researched much into it. I'm now at the stage where I need to analyse the music thoroughly, which also means researching into its author and original use.

The classical track I'm transcribing is 'Hoe-Down', a action-oriented piece from Aaron Copland - a film and ballet composer. The piece is a compilation of several different folk-tunes from Ireland with a mid-western twist, to feature in a ballet named 'Rodeo' - a love story between a cowgirl and a rancher. The song is essentially formed of entirely Irish tunes and influence, but it has been adapted to the 'Wild-West' environment, and I think that in this case, it's where it belongs. I'm going to split the music up into sections, which will correlate to different scenes in my animation. The song accommodates the following tunes:

William H. Steppe's 'Bonaparte's Retreat'
Originally an Irish marching tune - "The Eagle's Charge" played on the fiddle.

McLeod's Reel 
A traditional Irish Jig, used for river dance.

As I've decided to produce an animated short (From my storyboards as of now, I think it will be roughly a minute and a half long) I need to completely understand what makes a character-driven short successful. I've been reading through the following book, that was listed on the brief:



My aim for this transcription project is character animation, even though there will need to be a lot of effort put into the environments, the real focus will be on bringing an inanimate object to life in a believable way. I have been applying the advice and tips from this book to my piece. Below are some of the notes and connections I've made.

Character

The book states "A good character is one that is both believable and memorable."


"..A believable character is an ordinary character (in relation to the world that he lives in) who finds himself in extraordinary circumstances and reacts to those circumstances truthfully." 

This sentence is more-or-less my ambition for the next 10 weeks - to make the ordinary, inanimate suitcase character believably move and react to the environment and circumstance (The train moving away, leaving him deserted) The second-half of the point, is also crucial:


"A memorable character is visually appealing and has the ability to move an audience emotionally
through the events of the story."

Going back to character design, I need to really convey the object as being alive and give him a personality, which is a real challenge. The emotional side is an even bigger step, if I successful, the audience will be relating to the suitcase's struggle and will be able to tell what he is thinking.

As well as the protagonist, there is also the love-interest / companion suitcase, which although will not be focused on as much, will still need  believable movement and personality.


Environment


" A landscape is never just a landscape... The location, and the objects in it, is specific to the character and the story. They give the audience many visual cues that provide instantaneous information about the character, the back story, and the situation."


As this passage from the book shows, the environment is also going to take a lot of thought. My current idea is to make the waiting room as worn-down, rusty and undesirable as possible, giving the cue that the suitcase really doesn't want to be left there. When the story moves onto the platform, I want to give the station a very deserted feel, putting across it's isolation and the fact that it is in the middle of the desert. The environment is going to be a huge factor in portraying the situation.

Below is a plot-character sheet from the book. I have tried to apply the formula of a short to my own story, which I think so far is successful.




Next Steps
My first storyboard draft is about half-way complete. Once this is finished I will go over it, working out timings and placement and improve it until I'm happy. I'll then begin working on an animatic, seeing if the timing works with the music (Which is the main story focus) The whole storyboard is working around the pace of the music.

I'm also planning on creating some environment layouts, which have been recommended by the book, an example is here:

It is going to be a busy week of pre-production and time is of the essence. I'm hoping to have my story polished as soon as possible, so I can start some art direction.

The transcription project is very close to starting, so like many others, I'm formulating some sort of plan. As advised by Phil, I've decided to pick up my Summer project from last year and bring it to fruition. There were a number of struggles with the project which I encountered, which after the lessons of Narrative, and Alan's tutorials, I think I can solve. The pre-production stage has already been worked on quite a bit, but it still needs a lot of attention over the next couple of weeks. I have a draft storyboard and a couple of pieces of concept which need improving (Below) I've also got a few pieces of production which I think I can carry on through. Below is my 'Keep' and 'Cut' list.

Keep from Summer Project:






Production (Most will be redone, but in a similar fashion, but more stylised)



So now its time for a lot of re-working of my storyboards and concepts along with thinking of a nice style (Perhaps similar to the props above)

Here is my current progress on the tutorials.

These are the character updates so far from the Narrative Project. All the characters are finally ready for animation, which has also began. I spent a day re-creating the Jock's upper body (Although this lost me a day near the end of the project, I thought it was necessary as the Jock's arms previously were botched) Re-modelling, Rigging and Skinning in a day was a bit of a misery, but Im feeling much better about the character now. Here he is now, and below him, as he was before.




We have two large piece of character animation - The Cheerleaders walking in sync down a corridor and a Jock playing basketball. I've been working on the cheerleader walk cycle this evening, I think it is almost complete, just a couple of things to fix, but it is mainly out of the way. Here it is, complete with a bit of breast jiggle (My highlight of the project so far was adding this..)



Lastly, I had rigged and skinned the Nerd Girl. She is below. she'll only be used in a few scenes, so shes only rigged from the waist up (He legs were never going to move) I still need to texture the face (unfortunately for her this means Freckles/ Pimples )




Tommorow I'll be having a crack at animating the Jock playing basketball as well as the tentacle underneath the cheerleader's skirt.