Saturday, April 9, 2011

The Case For "Paper"

Taking the time to ponder other contributing aspects of this new short film version of Really Bad Movie while awaiting opportunities to record with all my actors; I decided the updated version of this project needed an equally updated version of opening credits. So when our gifted new composer Ryan Brawders signed on to help transform the musical side of this short film, I took many angles into thought. Since this short is a celebration of the classic 50's b-movie, I wanted to incorporate as many b-movie monster scenarios as I could. Alien abduction, flying saucers, giant sea creatures, zombies, giant robots, slime creatures are what I set on and in passing this information onto Ryan I was totally blown away by what he returned with. Instantly I set to storyboarding and what I ended up with is far better than what I had envisioned. Still 2 weeks after completing the animatic I watch over and over in total amazement.

That being said, I must now set out to establish the visual aspects of my new credits. Currently I take inspiration from the classic early 60's paper animation credits from directors Bill Justice and X. Atencio. Their work can be seen in the opening credits of such Disney films as "The Mis-Adventures of Merlin Jones" and "The Parent Trap". Their style has come to find new found popularity with kitch artists of today.


Now there is no way I will have the time to do old school stop motion animation because, well if I'm gonna make 2012 film festival deadlines I've gotta have this thing in the can by December at the latest. What I am considering is using bitmap fills with my already constructed Flash animation character components. I played around with this idea all morning today and this is what I came up with:

Not finalized yet, but most assuredly in the running. Flash hates working with bitmap fills, and animating with them would prove to be a program crashing nightmare. The image you see above as a matter of fact is a second attempt as Flash crashed on my first attempt. Small update, but an update none the less. In a few short weeks I should have all my actors recorded, and a locked animatic in place. At that point it will be onto animation. A process that will consume at least the summer.