Labels

Information Design / Final Project

23/01/2023 - 05/03/2023 / (Week 3 - Week 8)
Derin / 0354969 / Design in Creative Media
GCD 60504 / INFORMATION DESIGN
Final Project

INSTRUCTIONS


FINAL PROJECT

We are group 3!

  • Adifa Putri Harisyam / 0358362
  • Arata Mabuchi / 0351579
  • Chai HongHong / 0354211
  • Derin / 0354969
  • Han Le / 0355089
  • Justin Averill Prasetya / 0355048
  • Muhammad Afif Safwan HJ Akzam Shukri / 0354429
  • Song Yang / 0355576



Idea Exploration

Adifa, Afif, Arata, and I met in person for the idea exploration process. Initially, we decided to have 3 protagonists in the animatic. The first character is Aaron, a grumpy, stressed, and overworked salaryman. The second character is Sharon, an insecure perfectionist who constantly needs validation from others. Lastly, introduce Cameron; he is a depressed, neglected kid who needs parental love (aww). We got inspired by these characters from the shows (respectively) Schnitzel from Chowder, Blue Diamond from Steven Universe, and Shaggy from Scooby Doo.

Fig 1.1 First draft for character design


After submitting our animatic to Mr Martin for feedback in week 5, he suggested only one character for clarity. We merged the three personalities to one character and moved Cameron's facial expression to Aaron, leading to our story's main character today.

Fig 1.2 Final draft for character design


Videos we used for references on animation style.
https://youtu.be/ThiCMd5kGbE
https://youtu.be/pCMxuCqRWO4

Our group also decided on a main color scheme.
Colors: white, black, #eb4c34 (red)



Animatic

Adifa, Arata, and I started working on the animatic together. Arata did the first part of the animatic, where the concept of burnout is introduced. His sketch is digitized by Adifa, who also worked on the scenes for perfectionism in part 2. I worked on the remaining scenes.

Fig 2.1 Arata's storyboard (1)

Fig 2.2 Arata's storyboard (2)


I compiled our sketches together in After Effects.

Fig 2.3 Making of Animatic


Here is the first draft for our burnout animatic.


Fig 2.4 First draft of burnout animatic


Final Outcome

Mr. Martin gave a lot of feedbacks for our animatic (refer to the feedback section). I made the changes according to the feedback. The following is the final draft for our burnout animatic.


Fig 2.5 Final draft of burnout animatic



Work division

The following is the work division we collectively decided on in a group meeting:

Vector Art

  • Derin
  • Afif
  • Han Le
  • Adifa

Animation

  • Arata
  • Justin
  • Chai Hong
  • Song Yang

I listed down the items that needs to be digitalized by the vector art team as well as the timestamps for each items.

Items - Adifa & Afif
  • Alarm (00:08)
  • bedside table (00:08)
  • bedframe (00:08)
  • computer (00:15), (00:38)
  • keyboard (00:15), (00:38)
  • blanket (00:20)
  • "?" speech bubble (00:28)
  • soccer ball (00:29)
  • phone (00:31)
  • battery bar (00:32)
  • trash can (00:34)
  • crumpled paper (00:34)
  • office chair (00:38)
  • office desk (00:38)
  • stack of paperwork (00:58)
  • heart shape (01:10), (02:48)
  • dumbell shape (01:16)
  • Zz shape (01:16)
  • weight (01:35)
  • ouroboros (01:45)
  • hands (01:51), (02:36), (02:48)
  • thinking bubble (02:09)
  • rock and nail (02:12)
  • hammer (02:12)
  • beret & mustache (02:12)
  • stop sign (02:36)
  • bench (03:01)
  • butterfly (03:02)
  • reason of being diagram (03:12)

Background - Han Le
  • office cubicle
  • city
  • earth (space)
  • mountain (01:18)
  • bench at sunset (01:26)
  • park (03:00)

People - Derin
  • Aaron standing (looking at side, front, back)
  • Aaron covering ears with a pillow (00:07)
  • Aaron brushing teeth (00:09)
  • Aaron sitting while working on desk (00:13)
  • Aaron typing (00:38)
  • Aaron pushing ball (01:20)
  • Aaron talking (01:27)
  • Aaron shocked (01:32)
  • Aaron holding signs (01:53)
  • Aaron gets covered in darkness (01:59)
  • Aaron falling (02:07)
  • Aaron thinking (02:11)
  • Aaron sitting derpily (02:11)
  • Aaron shrug (02:16)
  • Aaron hands on hips (02:54)
  • Aaron sitting on bench (03:00)
  • Aaron walking (03:06)

  • person figure (00:59)
  • person talking (01:28)
  • person holding a trophy (02:45)



Vector Art

I started working on a reference sheet vector art for Aaron in Adobe Illustrator according to our agreed-upon work division. I divided his body parts into separate layers and made several facial expressions to make the work easier for the animation team.

Fig 3.1 Aaron reference sheet


After making the reference sheet, I created vector art for the actions. The vector art team compiled our works into a google drive folder for the animation team.

Fig 3.2 Character actions 1

Fig 3.3 Character actions 2

Fig 3.4 Character actions 3

Fig 3.5 Extras



Animation

Since we have 4 people in the animation team, the script is split into 4 parts:

  1. Intro 1 - Cynicism
  2. Intro 2 - Perfectionism
  3. Loneliness - Purposelessness
  4. Intro 3 - Align your life to your purpose
Fig 4.1 Animation work division


The following is the first draft for our animation. The animations are compiled together here


Fig 4.2 First draft of the final project animation

I wasn't delighted with the outcome, and some animations didn't fill in the time slot, so there were times when the frame stayed black. There wasn't enough time left to make the changes, so I requested a time extension of 3 days. With the request approved, I gave everyone feedback on their animations for them to make the changes.


SongYang had to return to her hometown due to family issues, so we divided her workload among three people, SongYang, Justin, and myself. I wasn't part of the animation team, but I wanted us to finish this project quickly with a good outcome.

I spent 1/3 of the three days smoothening out everyone's animations. We accomplished this by having the animation team send me their After Effects project file and the files used in the animation. It was time-consuming since I had to allocate the missing files to the correct ones.

Fig 4.3 Example of a missing file in After Effects


I had to return to my hometown on day 2, so I couldn't work on the project for the whole day. I did make up the lost time on day three and finished my animation. YouTube tutorials guided many of my animations since I wasn't familiar with using After Effects. Here are some links to said videos :)

I couldn't find any video guides on creating a loop animation for the snake eating its tail, but I didn't want to waste Adifa's efforts for making the yin and yang ourosboros serpent vector art. So I had to make some changes to the animatic. Here is the final result :) I'm quite proud of what I accomplished in a span of few hours.


Fig 4.4 My animation for part 3.2


Around this time, most of my groupmates sent their changed part of the animation. I noticed that another groupmate, ChaiHong, didn't use vector art made for their part. However, she couldn't make final changes then, so I took the matter into my own hands. Here are some cool videos I found that helped me at this part :D

I changed some scenes from ChaiHong's animation to make it look more like the animatic. It looks different if you compare it now, but the reason for that is that I added the missing vector art into the animation. I kept some of her animations since it looks good to put in the final product. I like the 3 derpy clones of Aaron xD.


Fig 4.5 Changed version of part 1


Final Outcome

After receiving everyone's work, we are almost done with the project! I made final changes and tried to fill in the blank slots. The following is our outcome for our final project!


Fig 4.6  Final Outcome for Burnout Animated Infographic


FEEDBACK

Week 5:
Mr. Martin commented the 1st part of the animatic needs fixing as the character seems to be walking here and there. He also pointed out some visuals that needed more relevancy to the script. Some visuals also need to be changed since they remained static for the entirety of the scene. Besides that, he suggested having one main character instead of three.

Week 7:
Mr. Martin suggested changing the file type from PNG to an AI animation file. Otherwise, the animation is good.

REFLECTION

This final project was a fun experience for me as an artist and animator, and a stressful experience as a group leader. Considering our collective work pace, I didn't think we could manage through, but hey, we did! Some challenges, such as unresponsiveness and late submissions, made me feel that it would be better to do everything myself. I repeatedly remind myself to have faith and trust in my groupmates, but to put trust means to be confident that they will follow through on their responsibilities and reach expectations. Although it may be my fault for having expectations in the first place, since I don't know most of them personally. I ended up doing most of the work so that the quality would reach my standards. I am grateful for my supportive friends and groupmates who are cooperative, responsive, and helpful through out this project. Without them I think I'll go insane and start my villain origin story.

Things could be different, I still lack managing my group's work flow. In the beginning, we could have devised on a progress timeline and have goals to accomplish each week. I still have a lot to learn to be a good leader. o7

Other than that, I'm actually glad to do the animation work for my team. I got to learn a lot of animation effects and techniques that I wouldn't know if it wasn't for this project. It was a fun learning experience! <3


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