Progress report: 22/02/2012

Unfortunately Jae wasn't able to join us today but we still managed to make some great progress, so well done everyone!

Just to recap:

22/02/2012

•  Jazzy made fantastic progress with the animatic! It's probably around halfway complete at this point, which gives us plenty of extra time to refine and really nail the timings. Jae, this means for you that it's going to be really important to start gathering some sound effects to put to the animatic. I'll email you the storyboard animatic tonight, so if you could spend some time putting some sounds to that for Monday that would be great!
• Puppet design responsibilities discussed. Sam and Jae (under direction of Jazzy) to focus on animating and building the scarecrow puppets, Alex to focus on the crow. The scarecrow is a far more complex character with more screen time and a greater range of motion than the crow, we decided it would be best for two or three people to work with him. The crow, in comparison, is much more simple and could comfortably be animated by just one person. Alex needs to contribute to the animation as well, so that works out quite nicely. Once Jazzy has completed her work with the backgrounds, she will be free to focus her attention on either of the two characters as needed. This allows us flexibility in giving extra attention where needed — difficult scenes that may be falling behind schedule etc.
• Sam and Alex worked together to start refining the design for the scarecrow and the crow, discussing proportions in greater detail and how to help keep things consistent between all animators. Began building initial model sheets to aid with animation — to be further discussed with Jae.
• Timescale discussed. We agreed that it would be best to build as many puppets and backgrounds as possible before the Easter break, whilst still allowing a week to begin animating to ensure that everybody is comfortable using After Effects and tackle any potential problems before they arise.

Homework

Sam & Alex — more colour schemes for Friday, using the model sheets drawn today. Familiarise yourself further with drawing the characters, try sketching some of the poses and scenes shown in the storyboard/animatic.
Jae — for Monday: start gathering sound effects from the internet and put them onto the animatic that Alex will email to you. It's really important that we have the first draft of the sound ready by next week, so please let us know if you have any problems. Try and have some colours for the scarecrow ready for Friday as well!
Alex — Amend production schedule to reflect new roles. Complete the timetable, showing targets for each task to be completed, and start looking at how best to divide up the scenes for production. Complete crow model sheet with potential colour schemes for Friday.

Next meeting on Friday 24th after Digital Skills. Don't worry, it'll be a brief one — please bring character colour schemes!