Ben Harrison Animation Blog: June 2014

Monday, 9 June 2014

Rotoscoping test

Here is a little bit of rotoscoping test footage I made in Photoshop; I shot a short video of Reece kicking around a football, I then imported the film into photoshop as frames, then traced over each frame. This created a cool little bit of animation.

Sunday, 8 June 2014

Voice Talent / Dream Casting

Dante:

Personality - Friendly yet aggressive, intimidating, deep.

Vocal Performance: low tone, a slight rumble light the voice of Optimus Prime, energetic and fun.

Dream Casting: Bryan Cranston

Most famous for playing Walter White in 'Breaking Bad', Bryan Cranston's voice has subtle overtones and low end rumbles in his voice that would really bring out the character of Dante

Cheaper Alternative: Jason Biggs

Famous for his role in American Pie, Biggs also has the ability to create a deep voice with a friendly touch

Master Hakiru

Personality - Rather plain in character, but deep, wise, and full of humour.

Vocal Performance - Old man Chinese accent.

Dream Casting - Ken Jeong

Most famous for his role as Mr Chow in 'The Hangover' movies, Ken Jeong's voice would give personality and character to Master Hakiru. With his Chinese accent and funny voice, his voice would be perfect for the part.

Cheaper Alternative: Yung-Fat Chow

Famous for his role in 'Bulletproof Monk', Chows voice would also provide the accent, and some humour.

Final Character Design / Process

Dante

This is my final design for Dante, the main character of my TV series 'Ninja High'. I chose to make his shape rectangular to show his confidence, strength and his leadership. I gave him golden hair to make him look young. Dante has a beard to show off his manliness but also to assert his wisdom.

The main objective when designing this character was to make him look as strong as I could, while still keeping him cartoony. He has broad shoulders and chest, a slim waist and a broad head to show this.

When designing Dante's clothing, I wanted to make him look like part of the team, but also have his own qualities to it as well; Dante has a red stripe along his vest and belt to make him look intimidating, and he wears a golden ear ring.

In this profile, I wanted Dante to look cool, and badass. I make the tails of his headband fly, as if they were in the wind. He needs to look cool, as he is the driving force and main character of the show.

Target Audience and Design

Target Audience

Age : 7+
Gender: Male
Media Consumption: Teenaged Mutant Ninja Turtles, Legend of the Dragon etc.

Typical viewer:

Name: Connor

Age: 8

Basic description: Connor lives at home with his mum, dad, and younger brother. goes to a primary school. He likes to play games with his friends where they pretend to be ninjas. He enjoys playing video games, and card games also. Connor is a very fun, bouncy 8-year-old.
Connor wakes up at around 8 o'clock most days, and goes to bed at around 7 30.

Typical media consumption: Connor watches Cartoon Network every day after school with his little brother for about an hour and a half; this includes shows such as Ben 10: Omniverse and The Amazing World of Gumball. Connor also likes playing the Cartoon Network games online.

Why will the animation Appeal?

The animation will appeal to Connor as it fits his preference; he enjoys action packed cartoons with fighting ninjas, so it should be right up his street.

BBFC

The BBFC or British Board of Film Classification is a British non governmental organisation, funded by the film industry. They have the role of categorising films with each licence they fall under. BBFC classify films in terms of violence & gore, sexual content, drug use and profanity.

There are several different certificates which the BBFC categorise films under: