Sting Production - Sound Development

After creating the short animations, I sent them to my team mate who has begun placing the files together in the final After Effects file. Our next stage was to then concentrate on the sound for the animation and to fit it appropriately to the visual frames.

I had to use the original animatic in order to test out some sound as my team mate is still working into the sting and by importing the animatic into After Effects I was able to mute the audio used in it originally and overlay it with new sounds. This is how it turned out:

The speed of the animatic towards the end is a bit fast and we agreed at the beginning of the project that it should be slowed down slightly in the final outcome so that it reads better for the audience.

I collected the various sound bites in this video from some original Tex Avery and Warner Brothers cartoons and on the Internet in various sound librarys. I'm hoping some of the sound files will be used in the final animation.

Sting Production - Final Animations

I have been working into the animations I have created in order to clean them up and make sure they're ready for importation into the final After Effects file.

I was asked by my team member to create a short animation of some leaves which are thrown out of the tree as the ducks fly out, I created a number of versions of this animation before I was happy with it and my team mate liked the final outcome.

I tried creating realistic leaves which shoot out of the tree and then fall due to gravity but my team mate wanted a more comical effect on the leaves.

I then changed the animation by giving them more of an arc and by importing them into Flipbook with the ducks animation on another layer I was able to adjust the timing appropriately.

The final animation coloured and layered.

The other animations were then cleaned up to finalise them. I was going to change the blue birds and small birds wings to give them a more realistic 'U' shape but as they only appear quickly at the beginning of the animation I was hoping to get away with that small inaccuracy.

Small birds animation.

Bluebirds animation.

The final squirrel animation which I'm very happy with.

I have sent the final files to my team mate and the next stage will be sorting the sound out on After Effects which I have been collecting and checking over the animations when they have been imported to check for errors and inaccuracies.

Sting Production - Colouring & Cleaning Up

After working into the rough animations I then coloured each frame in Photoshop in preparation for the frames to be imported into After Effects which will be used for the final sting.

By importing each individual frame into Photoshop I was able to go over the line-work and ensure the drawing style was consistent. I coloured the creatures as based on the Tex Avery source material.

Examples of the coloured birds which fly at the beginning of the animation.

Inspiration

Examples of the blue birds which fly in the opposite direction at the start of the sting.

Inspiration

Examples of the squirrel's coloured frames as he runs down the tree at the start of the animation.

Inspiration

 

 I imported the coloured frames of the squirrel into Flipbook and this shows the final outcome which I'm really happy with. The birds sadly came out in grayscale as they did not support the alpha channel setting.


I decided to change the ducks animation as the right duck flying was proving difficult to animate. I have made both ducks fly in synchronisation with the further duck been smaller in proportion so they are not completely identical.

To contrast nicely against the vibrant background I made the ducks a plain white colour.

My team mate seemed happy with the progress and asked me to save each frame as a Photoshop file with a transparent background so that when they are imported into After Effects it is just the creature that is visible.

 Once all the backgrounds were made transparent I sent them to my team mate who began to import them into the final After Effects file.