Hi Ren - okay, so all your reasoning makes sense, but I'm looking at those very early thumnbnails and I'm instantly obliged to remind you of your 'early-career' status in terms of 3D modelling and animating in 3D - that fish character drawing implies a level of detail and complexity that might back-fire in terms of your abilities to translate it effectively into CGI. The nice thing bout marine animals is that they can be simplified and reduced, so just keep your eye on your own production schedule and the 'do-ability' of your ideas at this earliest stage.
Educationally, you'll need to make sure that you're also teaching something, as opposed to just telling these students about 'plastic pollution' - that's the sweet spot, so in addition to thinking about character design etc, imagine someone revising from your film and what they will need to know, hear or be shown.
I like your visual puns - 'sword fish', 'moon fish' etc... though you need to bear in mind that young people can 'remember the wrong things', so you'll need to be careful in terms of suggesting that this is what these fish actually look like. The other question I have is what purpose does it serve to design your fish in this way - or rather, how does designing your fish in this way help your concept about the dangers of plastic? I'd also guard against committing yourself to a huge range of other characters - remember, you have to produce everything your story needs, so make sure your story truly needs it.
The key to nailing this is about characterisation: I can see that you're presenting your plastic bottles as 'monsters' - though you could argue that 'we're the monsters' for throwing everything away! Your character design of the fish looks like a consumer - trainers, headphones, phone (all containing plastic) - is it your idea that this fish is about to learn that he/it/she is knackering it's own environment because of its reliance on plastic?
So - things to think about - style as it relates to 3D production and number of characters as it relates to 3D production. Don't design a world you cannot achieve realistically in the timescale of the project (particularly if you're considering lip-synching etc). The scenario/characterisation: who is your fish character? Are they the source of the throwaway plastic themselves and need to be 'taught' about plastic by something else? Maybe it's the the 'plastic' that is doing the teaching, as in 'Wait, don't just chuck me away, I'm made from all this stuff that doesn't biodegrade...' Educational content: how are you going to ensure that a GCSE student will find this useful - and perhaps as importantly, that their teacher will want to use it too?
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OGR 14/03/2019
ReplyDeleteHi Ren - okay, so all your reasoning makes sense, but I'm looking at those very early thumnbnails and I'm instantly obliged to remind you of your 'early-career' status in terms of 3D modelling and animating in 3D - that fish character drawing implies a level of detail and complexity that might back-fire in terms of your abilities to translate it effectively into CGI. The nice thing bout marine animals is that they can be simplified and reduced, so just keep your eye on your own production schedule and the 'do-ability' of your ideas at this earliest stage.
Educationally, you'll need to make sure that you're also teaching something, as opposed to just telling these students about 'plastic pollution' - that's the sweet spot, so in addition to thinking about character design etc, imagine someone revising from your film and what they will need to know, hear or be shown.
I like your visual puns - 'sword fish', 'moon fish' etc... though you need to bear in mind that young people can 'remember the wrong things', so you'll need to be careful in terms of suggesting that this is what these fish actually look like. The other question I have is what purpose does it serve to design your fish in this way - or rather, how does designing your fish in this way help your concept about the dangers of plastic? I'd also guard against committing yourself to a huge range of other characters - remember, you have to produce everything your story needs, so make sure your story truly needs it.
The key to nailing this is about characterisation: I can see that you're presenting your plastic bottles as 'monsters' - though you could argue that 'we're the monsters' for throwing everything away! Your character design of the fish looks like a consumer - trainers, headphones, phone (all containing plastic) - is it your idea that this fish is about to learn that he/it/she is knackering it's own environment because of its reliance on plastic?
So - things to think about - style as it relates to 3D production and number of characters as it relates to 3D production. Don't design a world you cannot achieve realistically in the timescale of the project (particularly if you're considering lip-synching etc). The scenario/characterisation: who is your fish character? Are they the source of the throwaway plastic themselves and need to be 'taught' about plastic by something else? Maybe it's the the 'plastic' that is doing the teaching, as in 'Wait, don't just chuck me away, I'm made from all this stuff that doesn't biodegrade...' Educational content: how are you going to ensure that a GCSE student will find this useful - and perhaps as importantly, that their teacher will want to use it too?