Project Summary

When I attended Bristol Community College the decision to put on a Little Mermaid play. So, they decided to ask the Animation and Motion Graphics class I was in to make an animation for it. The teacher then split the class into two teams and I was the lead animator for the group I was assigned to.

Step 1- Independent Research

Before doing any group work each person went off to come up with some ideas on their own so the group had a selection of ideas to start with.

My reference and sketch materials.

Step 2- Divide and Conquer

After doing some work on our own we took a look at each other’s pieces and then went to work with everyone tackled a different task in the pre-animation stage to come up with a direction we wanted to go in.

Brett’s Background Sketches

Aron’s Fish Study

Alyssa’s Color Study

The two teams were working on polar opposite styles, we wanted a warm and inviting animation. So we used coral reefs for our color pallets.

Brook’s Light Study

Step 3 – Set and Moving props

In the next step, each person would then tackle a different piece of the animation. One person would work on the set making sure there were background and foreground pieces. Another person would work on the seaweed movements, and another on the lighting and make it look like it was underwater. I personally animated the fish.

Step 4- Pulling Everything Together

With the final step, it was just putting all the bits and pieces together and revising until you got the product you were looking for.

In conclusion, I learned a lot from this project, from managing people’s work to putting everything together, to the fine polishing the product. It helped me to understand that being a head animator involves a lot of management and assisting people with their parts of the product.