Week 10: Continuing Creating 2D Animation

I have been continuing with the completion of my 2D animation. Through this lesson I have added the audio of a music soundtrack and narration. I did initially record the narration, although it did not fit in with what was being shown visually within the animation. Therefore I re-recorded the animation for it to play with the visuals of the animation. Another problem which I encountered was the speed of my introduction title; this needed to be faster than the frame rate which it initially was. To overcome this problem I originally planned on creating a new scene using action script. Although, this was not working correctly, therefore I decided to create the introduction title again using less keyframes. This therefore made the speed of the animation faster because I had created this title by adding keyframes.
I created this animation by creating the text, adding an initial keyframe, breaking the text apart. I then worked backwards and used the eraser tool to erase each letter and add various numbers of keyframes to create the animation. I then reversed the keyframes to make the title animation appear in order of ‘The History of 2D Animation’.

I have now synced by voice over into my animation. I did initially have problems with my voice over being not being synced with my visual animation. I have stated this in my previous post as it was an issue which I approached and I have dealt with. I also stated in my previous post of the changes which I have made to my animation. I have made some significant changes to my animation since I created my detailed storyboard. I will justify reasons for these changes within my evaluation as I have made various changes to make the animation the best it could be. I can start to plan my final evaluation for this project, starting with the skills and knowledge which I have gained throughout this assignment. I will also be updating my skills audit for the skills I have developed in the past month whilst creating my animation.  

Week 10: Progress of 2D Animation

I have been continuing with my 2D Animation in Flash. I am aiming to finish the animation by the end of this week, this then allows me to have 2 weeks to gain feedback and write my evaluation for this assignment. Through this week I have made some changes to my animation which will make it more appealing to the target audience. Some of these changes include:

• Animating Continuous Film Strips: I have decided to animate and create a continuous movement of the film strips at the side of the screen moving upwards. This gives the effect of a film playing throughout the animation. As I have now included this animation I have had to change the original timeline effect which I was using. I was using the timeline effect of Wipe transition to show the animation continuously moving from one part of information to another. I have taken out this transition as the continuous movement of the film strips gives the sense of the animation progressing.
• Animation of the Title: I have animated the initial title which appears within the first few seconds of my animation. I have animated this to give the effect that it is being hand written. I understand that I need to change the frame rate on this as it is quite slow, I am aware of this and will change it within my final animation. I animated the title by writing the text and breaking it apart and erasing part of each letter and adding a key frame whilst repeating this process. I understand that there is an easier and less time consuming way of creating this effect, which is by creating a shape tween.
• I have added the animated devices to my animation, this has been stated in my storyboard. I decided to include these to keep the audience interested within the animation. I have created the Thaumatrope and the Zoetrope which shows the audience how the devices work, whilst the narration is playing.

I have stated the changes I have made to my animation and justified the reasons for this. I can include these within my evaluation to show how my idea had developed within the production stage of this assignment. I therefore believe that the changes I have made will appeal to the audience and they will be interested in watching the animation because of the changes I have made.
I will continue to complete my animation and I will reflect in my blog the techniques which I have learnt through this project in terms of Adobe Flash. I can then gain feedback from the target audience and start my evaluation.

Week 9: Progress of Animation in Adobe Flash

I have continued creating my animation within Adobe Flash. Within this animation I am showing the history of animation, by showing three devices which helped develop 2D animation. These devices are, the Thaumatrope, The Zoetrope and The Kinetoscope. I have been away for the last two weeks, but I have still been able to continue creating my animation. I have made some changes to my animation which I will be discussing within the post. Below shows the process which I am currently at creating my animation.

• Adding the soundtrack to the animation: I have added the soundtrack to my animation, I decided to create a narrative soundtrack. The reason for this is because the theme of my animation is 'music chart show' inspired countdown for animation history. Therefore I am using a narrator who will narrate the countdown as it would be heard on a radio show countdown.
• Starting to create the animation as a final animation: I have continued creating my animation by using my detailed storyboard as a tight guideline. As this has all of the narration, effects, duration and timeline effects which I will be using within my animation. Therefore this storyboard has helped me in understanding clearly what I have planned to create and I can bring the idea from the storyboard to life in Adobe Flash.

Changes made to my animation
I have made some changes to my animation from my initial idea. I have come over some issues, one being that the effect which I wanted to create, being a number countdown cannot be created in Adobe Flash. Therefore I changed this within my animation and I have now made the animation strip move along continuously as though it is playing a film.
Another change which I have made to my animation to make it clearly appeal to the target audience. This change is to add more colour to my animation to appeal to the target audience. This colour will be added towards the end of the animation, as this shows the time passing within the history of animation and colour becoming noticeable throughout time.
I have also decided to animate some sketches which I will create within Adobe Flash. These drawings will be of the animation devices which I am discussing within the animation. I decided to add these animated images into my animation because I did not believe my initial animation with still images would appeal and catch the audiences attention. The video below shows my animation of the Thaumatrope animation which I have added to my 2D Animation.This shows how the Thaumatrope works as the two images merge when the device strings are twisted, created one continuous movement.

I will continue to create the rest of my animation in Adobe Flash by completing the last 2 device history within my animation.

Wek 9: Detailed Pre-Production Work Completed

I have completed all of my detailed pre-production work, this included the planning for my final 2D Animation. This included documents such as the detailed storyboard and additional elements added to my justification of my final idea. In my previous post I mentioned the changes which I have added to my storyboard for my planning documents to meet the criteria. This information has been added to my storyboard. I have also added some other components to my planning which need to be included to meet the criteria, these include:

• Appeal to the audience- audience needs (14-16 year olds): throughout my detailed storyboard and additional information to my justification I have related all of my decisions for my final idea to my target audience. I have justified why all the decisions which I have made will appeal to the target audience. This is shown within my planning documents, by stating this within my documents I am showing that I have considered my target audience clearly.
• Format of animation: I have also discussed the format which my animation is taking. I have decided to incorporate the film strip format as the format for my animation. This format has been shown within my planning, in my sketches and storyboard. The film strip relates to the subject which I am discussing, the history of animation. Within the animation the film strip will be moving with the appropriate information on the history of animation within the each section of strip as the film strip is moved along within the animation.
• Generation of ideas: I have also documented my generation of ideas. This included the process in which my I have made the decisions. This included aspects such as layout and audio. Through documenting my decisions made through my planning documentation such as my justification and detailed storyboard I have clearly shown my process of creating the idea for my animation.

Through completing my planning documentation I can continue with creating my animation in Adobe Flash. I have started to create my animation in Flash as I had an initial deatiled storyboard, therefore I could start to create my animation. I believe that now I have completed the detailed storyboard I have a completely clear idea of how my animation will be created and how it will look.

Week 7: Animation Progress in Adobe Flash

I have started to create my 2D animation within Adobe Flash. From creating my detailed storyboard I have been able to start to create my final animation based on this. I firstly recorded my narration which will be played over my animation. By recording this first I will be able to create the visual animation in time with the narration which I have recorded.
I have started creating my first few frames within Flash. As I create some of the main frames in Photoshop to create the effects I wanted on the main frame border. I have started to create the introduction image with the typography and movement explained within my previous post. Another change I have made to my animation is that I am using motion tweening to animate images of the various devices. I created an animation of the Thaumatrope, which I will add into the information screen. I will add animated images of the other devices to the animation with the relevant history.
I am away for two weeks from 7th November, but I scheduled this into my production schedule. I will continue to create my animation in Adobe Flash as I will have access to this programme. Therefore I believe I will be able to complete the production stage of the animation and be on schedule according to my production schedule.

Week 7: Responding to Feedback: Detailed Storyboard for Animation

I have gained feedback in relation to my skills audit and detailed storyboard. I will respond to this feedback and add these elements to my storyboard. I will also write a a justification of how and why I am using these elements within my animation. The different elements which I will be adding to my detailed storyboard include:

• Typography: the typography used within my animation will reflect the time period of the history of animation (1800's). I have researched into existing and similar typography to the one I will use within my animation. The typeface which I am using will be easy to read, the reason for this is because some old fashioned typefaces can be hard to read.
• The Soundtrack/ Narration: this determines the pace of the animation. As I will create the narration before I create the animation, as I can create the animation to the pace of the narration. The narration effects the pace and the contents within the animation. The narration which I am including within my animation is the radio broadcast style. I will create the narration from a script and then add the animation to the narration pace in Adobe Flash.
• Engaging the target audience: the audience of 14-16 year olds needs to be engaged by the content within the animation. This relates to the content such as colours, characters, pace and soundtrack/ narration. I will consider these elements for my animation and add them into my storyboard.
• Colours: the target audience are interested in bright and bold colours. These are colours which will catch their attention and engage them within the animation. These are colours such as blue, yellow and orange. My original animation idea did not include bright colours as such, as I was keeping to the vintage, old fashioned colour scheme. These colours were black, white and brown. I now understand that the brighter colours appeal to the target audience, therefore I will add coloured elements into my final animation. I can bring a modern animation feel to my animation with the bright colours, but still keep to the vintage animation style.
• Pace: the pace of my animation is very important. It determines how the audience will respond to my animation. The average frames per second for an animation to appeal to the target audience of 14-16 year olds is 8-10 fps. My current fps in my animation is 12fps, therefore I will alter this to 10-12 fps. The faster the pace of the animation, the more interested the target audience will be within my animation. It needs to be to a pace which the audience will be focused in watching to understand the history of animation. This is another aspect which I will change to make it appeal to the target audience. I will also use real time within my animation. This will be used within my opening sequence as this allows the audience to understand what the animation they are viewing is about. The pace will then increase from this point, into a pace which will keep the target audience interested.
• The concept of my animation is the main aspect which I believe appeals to the target audience of 14-16 year olds. The concept I have created is taking the music chart shown countdown as music is one of the main interests of the target audience. The audience will therefore be familiar with the concept and format of my animation.
• Effects: I will be using frame by frame motion to create the 'jumpy' screen effect used throughout the animation. This will create the vintage, old cinema screen effect. I will also be using motion tweening to animate the drawings of the devices which I have created in Flash. I have included these within my previous storyboard and will add them to my detailed storyboard.
• Transitions: I have added the slide transition effect to the animation. This transition will be from the countdown screen (shown below) to the screen containing the animation history. This effect is continued throughout the animation

I will add these different elements into my detailed storyboard, as these are the elements which I have decided on for my animation.
I have created the pages in different content within Photoshop. By creating these in Photoshop I have been able to take an existing image and edit it and add the vintage effect. This added the colour effect and 'scratch' effect which is continued throughout the animation.
Below shows an image from my animation, which I have started to create in Adobe Flash. This shows the layout of the main information, this shows the Thaumatrope. I have added frame by frame animation to create the jumpy, old cinema film effect. I have also re-drawn the Thaumatrope image in Flash and animated this image.

Thaumatrope Information in Animation

The image below shows my countdown image within the animation. The jumpy screen effect is continued and the slide transition is used.

Countdown Screen in my Animation

I will make adjustments to these images from my animation. This relates to the aspects which I explained above, such as the pace and colour. This will then appeal to the target audience clearly. I will add these to my storyboard and write the justification document explaining my decisions