Project Duncan Snyder: Week 5

For this week I have cleaned up my thumbnails into figures that I will use for my animatic in Storyboard Pro, all I need is some shading and the backgrounds.

I also experimented a bit more with more interesting color techniques. Much less drastic than last week's.  I really like how the crocodile came out, Aves not so much (and yes, she is supposed to be dark-skinned).

I've also decided that the classes will be outdoors.

And I've finally come up with names for the professors.

Bearcat- Robert Musial

Owl- Alfred Steinbeck

Crocodile- James Irwin 

Next week I plan to have the storyboards completely shaded with backgrounds and ready to go into Storyboard Pro.  I will also continue to experiment with colors on the characters and possibly get a classroom finalized.

For the final week, I will have my animatic done and a nice lineup of characters, fully colored.

And for fun, here's a few quick pen sketches I did~

Project Duncan Snyder: Week 4

This week I was planning on getting the basic thumbnails down for the opening title sequence, ideas for classrooms and continue with characters.

I am possibly going to do a yearbook style post of my main characters, including a picture and some information on them. Here are some examples, unfortunately in my year of Photoshop I have never experimented with making textures so I decided to give it a go on Prof. Bearcat and Binton (first time without the hat). They didn't turn out the best but certainly more interesting than flat color. I will continue to experiment with this technique.

And here are some sketches of how the Bearcat's and Crocodile's classrooms might look. The bearcat has a stage in his room and different height levels of seats for students and nets to climb to them. The Crocodile has a shallow pool around his workspace as well as a small waterfall behind him to keep him tranquil.  Halfway through designing these I realized I don't even know if they are indoors or out.

Crocodile's room is outside, shown from 2 separate angles.

And here are some messy pen sketches of what I'm aiming for for my final animatic.

First, we see Aves jumping from tree to tree in a hurry (panel 5 is crossed out).

The branch she's standing on snaps and she falls into a net set up by Bin who greets her.

They are hurrying still, when Aves hears something and it sneaks up behind them SO SHE KICKS IT.

It turns out to be just another classmate (Dillion) and just as she is about to yell at him, a bell rings and they all rush off to class.

Obviously these will look MUCH better when completed and will have more interesting angles and all that, I was mainly just trying to think of ways to get their personalities to shine through somewhat without any words spoken.

And lastly, here are a few more classroom and character pen sketches. Just for fun.

Things I could use suggestions on:
-Names for Professors
-Location of school: Indoors or out?
-Ideas in general on classrooms, character design, etc...
Thanks!

Project Duncan Snyder: Week 3

So for today's update, I planned on finalizing unfinished character designs and adding any more I want to focus on.  I think with the time allowed, 3 teachers and 3 students to represent them will be my main focus and I will add backup characters as necessary.

So here are Aves (Owl) and Binton (Bearcat)

A finalized version of Mr. Bearcat (professors' names still to come, I can't decide if I want them to be humorous and punny ((ha)) like the kids' names or just average names).

And here is my final student, Dilian (Crocodile).

As for the story, I have already explained some details, about how the children dress up to represent their class and each class is chosen depending on the childs' attributes at a young age.
The bearcat students are generally laid back, clever and kind. (Teaches drama, gathering and basic survival techniques)
The crocodile students are usually brave, spontaneous and persistent. (Teaches swimming, advanced survival and self defense)
And the owl students are hard working, athletic and adaptable. (Teaches english, spotting and botany)

Instead of going to this school to get an education toward getting a job in a company, they go in order to get an education on the planet. About the planet, how to survive in the wild and most importantly, how to save the Earth. All the while participating in the same types of physical activities and daily school challenges that we had to put up with.

I might also mention that there are schools like this around the world and in different parts of the Earth, different teachers attend.  For example, in the arctic there are Polar bear and seal teachers, but our kids are in a basic forest environment.  However, they will have a few foreign-exchanged students, because I'll be darned if I don't get to make an armadillo character.

Project Duncan Snyder: Week 2

So here is my basic schedule for these last few weeks:
Week 1: Basic idea/Character concepts
Week 2: More elaborate character concepts
Week 3: More story details/Still more characters
Week 4: Scenery/Background Design/Thumbnails for intro
Week 5: Elaborate on everything (characters/background etc.)/ Basic storyboards for intro
Week 6: Storyboards
Final Week: Animatic for intro

And here are some more character concepts that still need some details hammered out.  I'm basically just trying to give last week's characters some more personality but I promise there will be a larger cast eventually!

Birds. I need to be better at them.