Animation process: island scene

The second part I worked on is the island scene. This is the part where the lamb stop and look upon to Hong Kong which is over the sea. To let the audience knows that the Island is Hong Kong, I decided to use a night view of Hong Kong as a reference and interpreted it using my style. The reason why I use the night view is due to the good reputation of the view and the fame of it. However, I do not think this is the main problem as the audiences do not have to fully understand the meaning behind before watching the animation. They could still enjoy it as a brand new experience.

 I am quite impressed with the rocky base because it does make it ''island'' looking. I have try use a blue tone of colour to paint the rock but it did not turn out as natural as using grey therefore I think the gloomy atmosphere could be brought out using the lighting in After effect afterwards.

 The wave is learnt from the after effects induction where we were given some wave layers to create the sea. I am so fascinated by that idea and I want to try give the wave more paper texture in order to introduce a cut-out style animation.

I searched for parchment paper texture because I like the colour and the texture of it and combined it with the wave I created in photoshop.

However it does not look right. The waves are too spiky and not natural enough, so I designed another simple looking wave.

This one is the final outcome. With the colour gradient, the wave is more texturised and has depth. I am happy with this design and use Hue to create two more darker coloured waves so as to make three layers of waves in front of the island.

I really like the gloomy colours and the texture of the sky and the wave. This is very close to my idea which is so delightful. To improve the visual impact, I might use the camera tool in after effect to zoom out from the island to add more drama to the scene and lighting to drag the focus onto the island.

The design of the cage is a difficult part. My initial thought was to use bird cage to trap the island but I thought bird cage would be too grand for the animation and it does not fit the rest of the component. Therefore I searched different types of cage and found this rather simple looking style.

I want to use this cage because it is more like a human cage, it makes me think of suffer and pain which is totally different from the bird cage which is trap for entertainment. In order to give it some rusty texture, I found pictures on the internet of rust on metal and applied it to the cage. I created two layers, the front and the back so that the island can be placed between the two layers.

The one below is the final cage that has thicker top with five stars (representing a country...not sure it is appropriate to talk about) that the citizen is fighting against. The reason why I include a lock is a give the island a hope, a hope that someone will rescue them with the key to release them from the pain and the horrible experience. I found simple shaped object could tell the story very straight forward and ease the understanding but it might not be the best looking cage. Hopefully the impact would come when the sound effects are added at the end.

In after effects, I used blue coloured lighting to improve the atmosphere and smoke made by lowering the opacity in photoshop to create a mysterious environment in this scene. This is the scene I like the most because it looks really professional with the layered waves and texturised background.