Connor Craig FeedBack

                                                                 Feedback.



1, I liked the cartoon appearance of Life of a Biscuit and thought that it was well put together and flowed really well, but i am of the age group that do not understand the meaning of it. The colors and detail were very well thought out.The scenery in which it was filmed could have been a little more evenly put together and a little more variation of color and texture.

I think this feedback is good enough to allow me to take on-board what has been said and i could use this feedback on any animation i could do in the future such as changing the background so nothing that shouldn't be showing is not showing and to make the background more colorful and better looking finally maybe this animation was not for the age of the viewer because they may have been over the age of the target audience.

2, I am not of the age group who would appreciate this but i like the style, using the clay on the biscuit was a good idea but it could have been a little more detailed, also the flashbacks were a little to long and finally the backdrop was a little poorly put together but even if it was showing in the original pictures they could have at least been edited so they didn't show the cardboard structure behind.

I think that this comment allows me to see that the narrative was not so clear and could have been shown a little better towards the people outside of the age group, also the set was poorly put together so in future projects i will have to spend more time on creating the set or editing the video after, also i should make the faces and the characters with more care and set out more time for creating them as well.

3, In my opinion this animation was good, i say good because it was not for my age group and i didn't understand what was happening but the creation of the characters was well done but the backdrop could have better with a little more work.

I think that the narrative should have been shown more clearly, maybe subtitles for the change to flashbacks while falling and as the rest of the comments more time could have been spent on the on the backdrop.

4, It was a pretty decent animation, It could have been smoother and the flashback could have been shortened, but it was still overall pretty decent.

I couldn't get much from this feedback but i was able to get that the flashback was to long and could have been shorter and the frame rate could have been higher but that would mean taking more photos which would have taken a lot more time to do and also we had the problems with the frame time in the editing phase.

5, Was........... pretty good.
the flash backs took a bit long to change to and from each one. but overall was a good animation.

The only constructive thing i can find from this as the flashbacks need to be shorter so they change from one to the other faster.

6, I Think backgrounds could have been covered up a little more as you can see the cardboard it is stuck onto. but the lighting is is consistent so I'm guessing you've used extra lighting equipment rather than standard room lights.overall, was a great animation

From this feedback i think that the background could have been covered up and more time could have been spent on it, i also think that the lighting was well done because it is consistent so in the future if i do another animation i will make sure to use a light like the one i used for this one.

7, The audio tracks were used at the right moments. but the same ding ding ding backing track could get quiet annoying after a while. so i would have found a backing track that would have changed a bit throughout the animation.

I think that the audio was done well but i could have found a sound track that could have been less repetitive and could have changes throughout the animation.

8, Great narrative conveying the life of a biscuit from sale date to the moment before "death", totally understandable plot through the use of a white haze to show flashbacks, sound effects add to the immersion of the video, however it felt as if a large part of your animation is still frames, perhaps maybe next time you should think about adding more animated scenes and not just still frames, overall a great video with really high production quality, a decent amount.

This comment was the first to say the narrative was well delivered which makes me think that the person who wrote the comment was within the age group that the animation was aimed for but they are also old enough to know that the white haze resembles a flashback. the comment shows that the person think the music fits the animation, but they also feel that the flashbacks are to long and they could have been animated in some way. 

9, I feel like this animation was aimed at my age group from 7 - 14 because i found this animation  amusing because it is something that i would find devastating if it happened in real life but this animation makes the situation comical, the only problems with this is the still frames were to long and the audio could get repetitive but over all a solid 7/10.

From this comment i think that the target audience i set for this animation was well set because this person knew the age group because he/she found the animation amusing but like most of the other comments they have found the still frames to long and they also found the sound track annoying this could be changed in the future were i can find a sound track not so repetitive.

10, Good, not the best but good, audio doesn't suit the video and the backgrounds were poorly made so you could work on them if you do another animation.

There is not much i can take from this feedback because there is not much but i can take that the backdrop is poorly made and i can make sure that this does not happen in an animation in the future.

11, I'm not sure, in my opinion it's good ! But I thought there would have been more animation than just shots of a packet of biscuit !

All i can take from this comment is that the still frames are to long and could have done with being shortened and i will take this and apply it to anything i do in the future.

Unit 33 - Assignment 3/Task 4 - Exhibit and Respond to Feedback on Your Animation - Sam Greig

See my original video here:

Identify Criteria for Feedback 

Genre: The audience should be able to identify the genre as a kids animation. However this may not be the case, as the animation may not correctly display the genre I am trying to get across. Such as the minor threat level in the video when the biscuit smashes on the ground with sinister music in the background, so the audience may find it more suitable to older audiences from ages 7+ possibly, rather that the original target audience of ages 3+.

Content: The content of the video should appeal to the audience as it reflects the title in its content. It reflects the title as the content of the video shows the "Life of a Biscuit", which is also the title. I believe that the content of the video accurately reflects the title and so the audience should be able to know what they are watching before they open the video.

Style: The style of the video again should be evident to the audience, being a pseudo-realistic animation that presents a biscuit as having life. This should be evident to the audience because they know that the biscuit isn't actually capable of independent movement, but yet it appears as being able to move. This emphasises the pseudo-realistic style of the animation.

Narrative: The narrative of the video should be relatively easy to understand, as it is generalized in the title. The narrative of the video is that a biscuit has 'flashbacks' to early 'life' just before 'death', and so it shows different scenes such as a shop shelf, and the open boot of a car. The audience should be able to identify that the biscuit is having 'flashbacks' by the use of effects I have added in the editing stage, such as fading in and out to white, which is a common convention for flashbacks used in films and TV programmes.

Character: The characters used in the video are quite plain in nature, but they portray the emotions for what we needed them for. The characters included are the biscuit, and the person about to eat the biscuit. The biscuit portrays the main character, being the focal point in the animation.

Techniques: The techniques I used in the video are stop-motion animation frames taken at 8 frames per second, which looks very 'stop-and-start' due to the low frame rate. If we were to have to film it again and be given more time, then I would film at 24 frames per second, the only disadvantage to this would be that it would be extremely time consuming to complete for at least one minute of footage.

Technical Qualities: I believe that the technical qualities are obviously amateur, because of the low frame rate and a change of lighting in some scenes due to an accident with a lighting rig. A few frames were also lost in the editing stage, as importing an image sequence misplaced frames, which has impacted the animation heavily at the start, as it is a very fast movement when the hand takes the biscuit. Although I also think that given it is the first full animation me and Connor have made, it has decent technical qualities and stands as a strong start to future animation work.

Aesthetic Qualities: I believe that the character creation and the clay modelling we have done is a good effort to modelling life-like characters such as the human head and arm. The head was made with a simple ball shape with googly eyes with the clay stretched over to imitate eyelids, and finally we used a hook from a broken coat-hanger and sank it into the top of the head to hold for animation. The arm was again made from clay, but it was too heavy to keep itself upright, so we used broken plastic cutlery and submerged it inside the arm until it interlocked to stop the arm from breaking.

Creative Qualities: In my opinion, the idea of the "Life of a Biscuit" was quite original and creative. I thought the idea would be interesting and new, and we could also use biscuits from our own homes or buy them at a shop, and then add clay appendages to them such as eyes and mouths. I think the idea of the biscuit having 'flashbacks' before 'death', as it allowed us to implement different scenes into one short animation with a variety of locations.

   Collect Audience Responses

1.)

I think that this response is fair as the sound does appear slightly unbalanced due to the nature of the track I downloaded for the flashbacks scene from incompetech.com. Also I agree with the sound effects being a little too loud in comparison with the background track, such as the phone ringing and the smashing of the biscuit. In response to this, if I were to be given time to go back and edit the animation, I would start by lowering the volume of the sound effects to bring out the background track a little more so that the sound effects aren't the centre of the viewers' attention.

2.)

I think that due to this response the narrative of the video could be a little more clear, as the reviewer clearly has doubts about the structure of the narrative. To help solve this, I could have added a scene or two more to the animation as suggested to lengthen the animation and to add further depth to the biscuits' 'life' as it were. Although this could be quite tasking to come up with added scenes to show the 'life' of a biscuit, as a biscuit doesn't travel very far other than store to household, so adding scenes could prove difficult to generate ideas for. Other than that, a fair comment and fair review.


3.)

I do not believe that this comment is fair. The idea of the animation is to show flashbacks to a biscuits early life, where there is not much motion, as a biscuit cannot move independently; therefore the comment of 'lets it down a lot' doesn't really apply. Regardless, I do believe that the animation could have done with more motion, but not in the flashback scenes, but in another scene such as an extended falling scene or a scene before the biscuit is taken.


4.)

It's clear to see with this comment that the animation needed a little more work in terms of getting across the narrative to the audience in a clearer fashion. As the reviewer has commented, some annotations could be used to explain the storyline in more depth, or maybe a way to implement more speech into the animation to carry the story further. Overall I think this comment is fair and is helpful to further the quality of our animation.


5.)

From this comment I can see for definite that the animation could have been improved with a higher frame rate to increase the fluidity of motion. However, unlike previous comments, this reviewer seems to understand the story more than the others, which leads me to believe that the animation does accurately portray the narrative we were trying to get across but to some more than others. If I were to have to complete the assignment again, I would shoot the video in a higher frame rate, such as 16fps as this is an acceptable frame rate that is still time-consuming but not as much as 24fps.

6.)

This comment again shows that the animation needs more work on the storytelling aspect. Although the reviewer also mentioned that the end scene needs more work, this could mean that the ending needs an extra scene to further the narrative or that more can be done to emphasise the biscuit as having 'flashbacks'. Again to improve the animation I would work on the storytelling aspect by adding either extra scenes or annotations, or possibly a short introduction.


7.)

I believe that this comment is both fair and slightly unfair. Firstly, I disagree that the animation could be easily done on PowerPoint, as there is a fair amount of photo editing and sound editing to achieve the flashbacks effect. But I agree the stop motion animation aspect needs a little more work such as increasing the frame rate of the animation to increase fluidity of the animation.


8.)

I cannot really get anything from this comment that I have already have from the others, such as the sound seems unbalanced and more scenes are needed. To improve on this I again could add more scenes with more of an introduction just after the title scene.

9.)

From this comment I can see that the reviewer thought that the biscuit could have more of an involvement in the film. I have to say that I am not sure what the reviewer meant by this, as the biscuit is the main feature of the entire animation. However, I do understand that the hand could have been a bit smaller in comparison to the biscuit and also the head, as it looks out of proportion and the biscuit can barely be seen. To improve on this I would reduce the size of the clay hand and arm so that the biscuit and its' 'emotions' can be seen.


10.)

This comment shows that the work on the title screen has definitely paid off tied in with the opening shot. It also shows that the animation was a little hard to follow along with in terms of narrative, as the reviewer said that they had watched it several times, implying that the story was hard to follow at first, which they believe is because the length of the animation is short. The reviewer also thought that the use of backdrops was well used in the animation, such as the supermarket, which I edited in Adobe Photoshop CS6. To improve the animation I could increase the length of the animation so that it can be understood easier and clarify the story.


11.)

From this comment I get the impression that the reviewer enjoys the fact that we have covered the important events in the 'life' of a biscuit, and that we have given life to an inanimate object through the use of stop-motion. I cannot identify and areas for improvement in this comment so I cannot comment on how I would improve the animation.

My Overall Reception of Feedback

Overall the feedback on our animation has been quite helpful in the fact that the reviewers have given strong points of the animation as well as ways to improve. From what I can glean from the comments in general is that the animation definitely needs more work on the storytelling aspect in a way that it can be understood easier, possibly by adding annotations or by including an introduction to explain the premise of the animation so that the story is clearer and easier to understand. I also get the impression that to improve the quality of the animation a higher frame rate is needed to increase the fluidity of the animation, as in its current state the animation seems 'choppy' and this effects the quality of the film. I have also learned that the sound could be altered so that the sound effects could be made more subtle so they blend in with the background track, which I agree with. The final improvement that could be made as suggested by reviewers is that work could be done to reduce the size of the arm in the frames so that the biscuit can be seen in the clay hand of the human character so that it is clearer as to what is happening in the scene. So finally overall I think that the comments for the most part have been fair and strong and weak points in the animation have been highlighted in the reviewers' feedback, allowing me to find out where we have gone wrong in the perspective of our peers and older audiences; which in turn if it ever came to us having to recreate the animation, the feedback allows us to create a new and improved version of our animation with better quality and professionalism. 

Assignment 2 - U33 Stop Motion Animation Production - Task 2

U33 - Task 2

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Key:

Connor's Work: Red Text

Sam's Work: White Text

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Components of Production

Format: The format which we have used to create our animation is stop motion animation, using 8fps and using HD capable camera to get used to using professional standard equipment in the media industry.

Narrative: Myself and Connor Craig brainstormed multiple ideas for our animations which you can see in our coverage of Task 1 (link: http://samgmag.blogspot.co.uk/), in which we both presented individual ideas and then decided to collaborate on a single idea, which was the "Life of a Biscuit" idea. The narrative behind the animation is that it shows the life cycle of a biscuit through a series of 'memories', as it were; going from being displayed on a shop shelf, to eventually being left on the kitchen table.

Music: A varied amount of music and sound effects was needed for this animation, as we needed to convey different emotions, which is relatively hard to do with a biscuit. This is why the audio was important, we had to have a bubbly, happy start to the animation to show the biscuit as 'happy', and then sad music for its 'memories' and its eventual 'death' on the kitchen floor.

Special Effects: There wasn't too many special effects utilised in our animation, as it wasn't needed too much. There is a fade to black transition on the title image, and then a fade to white transition to represent memories. We used a scrolling effect on the last image to create credits, as to my knowledge there is no tool to easily create credits in Adobe PremierePro CS6.

Timing: Unfortunately, due to unforeseen circumstances, we did not have as much time as needed in the production of our animation, which in my opinion effected our animation's quality due to high stress and pressure to have it completed and edited for deadline.

Frame Numbers: Myself and Connor created the animation with the idea of 8fps being used in production. However, when it came to editing the animation we discovered that Adobe PremierePro CS6 does not include the option to have a custom frame rate, so we had to reduce the speed of the animation to 25% to compensate for this. This meant we had to edit in 24fps to reduce the speed of the animation to give the effect of it being produced in 8fps, which was difficult to understand at first.

Construction Elements

Character:  The main character was a biscuit that is about to get eaten, and the second character is a man who is about to eat the biscuit, the biscuit is an actual biscuit it is not made of clay but it has accessories made of clay and the man is 100% clay.

Lighting: For the lighting we used the lights found in the room B105 this made it easier to see the models so we would get a better picture.

Blue/Green Screen: We did not use a blue/green screen.

Movement

Walking: There was no characters that walked in our animation.

Lip Synching: Although the human character had lips, they never actually move in the animation as he never speaks, and only sighs when he drops the biscuit, so lip synching was never much of an issue.

Expression: As the biscuit is dropped in the animation, its face changed from a happy expression to screaming with its 'tongue' out. This was to convey that the biscuit is 'worried' as it were.

Securing Characters to Set: To secure the biscuit character to the set we used the packet the biscuit came in to lightly rest the 'character' onto. This proved quite effective as the biscuit remained relatively secure to the set and we had no incidents with the biscuit, only the human characters' arm knocking it over with its' weight.

Flying a Character: Although we had no actual full character to speak of, we used a head and an arm model. This was because we knew that the rest of the characters' body wouldn't be visible, and by building the entire body we would reduce valuable production time. So when the arm was shown in scene, I held the arm in place, which in some images and scenes it slightly impacts the professional quality of the animation.

Camera

Framing: For the framing we made sure that the main item in the scene was in the middle of the frame and that no things that should not be in the frame is not in it and that every thing that needs t bee seen can be seen.

Access to set: We made sure that the camera was not in the way so that there could be easy access to the set so the models can be moved were they need to be moved.

Angle: The angle was looking down on the object in a 3rd person perspective .

Movement: The only movement of the camera was when we were filming the biscuit falling we moved it from it looking at the set to i top down view on the table as the biscuit is moved along the table but this did not cause any problems as we only moved it when we had finished with the filming on the set.

Lighting: The lighting did not effect the camera because the light that we used was facing the set from behind the camera allowing the set to be well lit and so it did not make a glare on the picture.

Post-Production Editing

Visual Effects: We used a fading in and fading out effects to represent 'memories' of the biscuit. We also used a scrolling effect to represent credits, as this was not evident in the software as a tool.

Compositing Different Elements into one shot: We didn't use many elements into one shot, as the requirements of the storyboard we put together. Because of this we only used a wide shot in the majority of the animation.

Removing Rigs: To remove the rigs, such as lighting and camera tripods, we had to remove the tape from the floor to better secure the rigs so that the floor isn't left in a mess. We did this because we had an incident with the lighting nearly falling over, for health and safety purposes.

Post-Production Audio: 

In the video i think we have done the audio perfectly because we have a appropriate sound in the background, we have the sound effects in the correct areas and the are synced to the video well and we use the different audio levels so we can play the sound effects without the sound track stopping an starting.

U33 Assignment 2 - "Life of a Biscuit"

WIP Task 1 - Sam Greig and Connor Craig

Sam: White Text
Connor: Red Text

Use of Possible Formats

Stop-frame techniques: Stop frame techniques are useful because they allow me to use a clay model, or a found object to create my animation, although it may be difficult to get around continuity errors. And any disruptions such as the model falling over or the scene collapsing, can seriously effect quality.

Time-lapse Photography: Time-lapse photography can be useful for capturing scenes such as decaying fruit or the growth of a plant, so it is very useful for capturing various spaces of time, such as the sun rising and falling to signify the days going by. This can be used to represent an event spanning overnight etc.

Plasticine Animation: Plasticine animation is an effective way of producing animation because you can use wires in-between the plasticine to create a skeleton for a model, in which you can create an animation which allows for a range of motion in the animation, using a wire skeleton.

Claymotion Animation: Claymation is the process of taking multiple photos and placing them in a sequence to imitate motion. This can be used with either clay or found objects, such as LEGO pieces or a toy car. Using found objects generally makes the characters look better, as if you are not skilled enough with modelling clay then it can provide a better looking character or object in your animation. For example, for Connor and my self's animation,  we will be using a biscuit as part of the animation (the ideas generation for which can be found in both our individual mind maps. 

Modelling and Puppetry: Modelling and Puppetry is important to animation because it allows a creator to create a unrealistic character or object through the use of clay, plasticine, puppets or found objects. This can be used to create things such as aliens and creatures from fairy tales to create an animation that doesn't have to adhere to reality, such as an everyday experience.

Combined Formats: Combined formats can be useful when creating an animation as you can use two or more different formats in the production of your animation, such as using using plasticine animation with time-lapse photography. For example, in Connor and my self's animation, we will most likely be using a combined mixture of Claymotion and Stop-frame techniques. Although it is found that most animations use combined formats, such as stop frame techniques being used to animate anything the creator desires.

Generation of Concepts

The animations subject as about the life of a biscuit, it starts off be the biscuit being raised to someone's mouth but it is dropped at the last second, during its fall it has flash backs to some parts of its life and after the flashbacks have ended it hits the floor and then role the credits.

The characters:

The eater, The person raising the biscuit to there mouth.

The biscuit, Cookie.

Random people in the background.

Technical limitations some of the technical limitations that we my have whilst working on this project will be to do with filming equipment because of we need to something out side of college we would need to book out the cameras but if all of the cameras are al out be would need to use a different camera which could have different quality image meaning there would be some continuity errors in the video, also we would need to use the premier pro in college but we are not able to use it at home so we would need to plan some time for editing and that would need to be a fairly large amount of time because we have only just started to use this software.

Generation of Production Ideas

Storylines: Although we have compiled various possibilities for a storyline, myself and Connor have decided on using 'The Life of a Biscuit', as we can play around with time lapse photography, and build a variety of sets to create a sequence of different environments that a biscuit passes through in its 'life' as it were. This way we can use time lapse photography to create the effect of the biscuit being left idle for a long amount of time. 

Set/Background: To create the set of the animation we will have to adhere to the storyboard closely, as we will need to build more than one set for the requirements of the animation. For example, we will need to replicate a shelf inside a shop, aswell as create a cupboard and kitchen surface/table. To do this we will need to use cardboard or plastic sheets with the appropriate colour and surface details drawn or modelled on. For the background we will again have to use appropriate coloured card, probably white, to provide a suitable backdrop.

Scenarios: In order to get across a message in the animation, in particular scenes we may have to add particular sounds, and change the pitch and/or volume of the scene. Such as, for example: when the biscuit is about to hit the ground, a threatening tone can be added by placing a harsh sound to emphasise danger. Although in more pleasant scenes, we can add soft sounds and a slight haze round the border of the animation to get across memories and such.

Audio: In order to entice the audience, we will have to add an appropriate soundtrack. As we are not skilled enough to create the soundtrack ourselves, we will have to find an appropriate soundtrack for our animation from a royalty free, copyright free mp3 site in which we can download for use. In the credits of the animation we will add the URL to the website as a gesture of thanks. As there is no legal impediment to not including the source of where the sound was sourced, as it is royalty/copyright free.

Audience

The audience will be for the ages from 8 - 20, I have chosen this age range because the animation will be comical in a childish way but it can not be shown to people under that age as its shows signs of threat  and it needs to be for a older range because it needs to be shown to the people in our class and it allows us to have a wider audience. This animation will not be targeted at a specific gender as it won't contain and gender specific content and it will not have and sexist comments towards a gender.

Planning

Drawings: Here are the drawings that I have created for the ideas generation of the animation in collaboration with Connor Craig:

Storyboarding: Here is the storyboard that I have generated for my animation in collaboration with Connor Craig:

Consideration of Movement: There shouldn't be and camera movement apart from the panning of the camera downwards when the biscuit is falling towards the ground, also we would have to move the biscuit ad the camera at the same speed so there is no or as little as possible motion blur.

Continuity: There should not be any continuity errors in the animation as we should be filming with the same background and the same models/items used and the lighting will not be a problem as we have equipment that means we should have a consistent amount of light even if the filming is on different days.

Frames Per Second: We should try and go for 24 frames per second but it will probably going to more around the 12 frames per second mark but the more frames that we have the smoother the animation will look and the better the animation is the better the grade achieved should be.

Soundtrack Design: We are going to use a series of sound effects to emphasize the point we are trying to make with a particular scene in the animation.Throughout the animation there will be a ambient sound effect that is appropriate to the scene: for example, in a car scene there will be a sound effect of other cars passing by and other traffic related sounds. We will be sourcing these sounds from www.soundbible.com, a royalty/copyright free site that allows for generic mp3 sounds to be downloaded.

Perspective and Point of View: The animation will be in the 3rd person because it would be to hard to get the camera in the view of the person with the biscuit and also you cant have a 1st person view from a biscuit.

Set/Background: To create the set, we will be using cardboard to hide the surrounding production area from view from the camera. We will then add detail to the set by adding different coloured objects to create a contrast. We will then have to add a simple background piece when an elaborate set is not needed for a particular scene of the animation.

Lighting and Colour: Lighting is very important to the animation, as it can become difficult for the viewer to watch, as the creator cannot get their point across easily without full vision of the scene. For example, if there is insufficient lighting, then an animator may not be able to convey the detail of expression on the model, such as expressing anger or happiness. Colour is also very important, as without colour diversity, a viewer may become bored due to the animation being dull or too bright. For example, an animation using just dull colours is often boring, although it can sometimes be used as a good thing to emphasize boredom or a depressed mood.

Test Shots and 'Behind the Scenes' Shots - Sam Greig

These are photos we have taken of the setup of the production area and the character pieces we have made to start our animation:

The biscuits we are using to create our biscuit character variations.

This is the character production area, as you can see various pieces of modelling clay was used to create the models.

Here I am holding the screaming biscuit!

Here is the head of a character used in the animation.

Here is the biscuit character variations that are going to be used in our animation.