Sketchbook Thread of default-rol

#141

Mike - Rebecca bugged me to come check out your boards. :smiley:

I have to say I’m pretty impressed. The important part of storyboarding is being able to convey the story to the viewer with pictures (primarily … text is secondary). I think you did a good job with this. The first pages are very clear and the transitions tell me that we’re looking into a room inside the building. So, nothing to change there.

The last page has me a bit confused though. You had a camera movement that zoomed into the TV on the table and then suddenly in the last page you jump back to see the table again. I’m a little lost as to why you did this.

A little more background into the story might help explain it, but as a series of just pictures, the story really gets lost there on the last page. What are we looking at on the TV or is it just blank (or off?). If the holding up of the picture is important to the next scene, why can’t you just show the picture and hand come into frame when the camera is set on the TV?

Also, for continuity’s sake, why can’t we see the person in the earlier frames when you have a wide shot of the room? The room appears empty in the earlier shot, then suddenly a hand is in front of the camera … where did the person come from?

If the last 8 frames are POV then you need something to indicate that in the transition shot from outside to inside. Maybe showing the person opening a door to enter the room, carrying something in camera frame or placing a hand on the table to sit down?

#142

Kirt, 

  Thanks for the excellent crit! The check's in the mail! :D :) Mike should be thrilled to bits. :)
  [b]
  Mike, [/b]
  
  You should also check out the following threads we have here:
  
  [[b]Storyboard Artists - Post Your Storyboards with Humans / Animals - T/D[/b]](http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?t=257583)
  [http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?t=257583](http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?t=257583)

Kirt’s got some really nice work in there, as well. :slight_smile:
Simple theories and excercises to improve your drawings - by our own intrepid Kirt :slight_smile:
http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?t=302282

  [[b]TUTORIAL - SEQUENTIAL ART by eliseu gouveia[/b]](http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?p=2958712#post2958712)
     http://forums.cgsociety.org/showthread.php?p=2958712#post2958712
  
  Cheers, :)
  
  ~Rebeccak
#143

@Kirt

Thank you very much for the input so far!! :thumbsup: I was considering introducing the narrator/voyeur character earlier in one of the shots to “introduce him to the viewer,” and your comments on that line has convinced me to go with that. The storyboards will be finished tonight/ tomorrow daytime, so I will post up the full sequence then, including changes and a premise so you get what is going on.

@Becks

Thanks for the links, I will be checking them out as I scan more boards in!! :scream:

I will be posting updates later on tonight.

Thanks again you two. :thumbsup: :bounce: :bounce:

MIKE

#144

Heya Mike,

No problem! I’ve pimped the Kirt. Now I can die in peace. :wise: :scream:

Cheers, :slight_smile:

~Rk

#145

Here is a model sheet for the environment and a layout sheet. Storyboards will be appearing later. I will be adding text to these too in a little while…

MIKE

#146

Nice work, Mike! Let me see if the Kirt is available…:smiley:

Cheers, :slight_smile:

~Rebeccak

#147

I figured it’s time to post up the lyrics for this piece: :wink:

  [b]Tom Waits[/b]

  [b]Mule Variations (1999)[/b]

  [b]What's He Building in there?[/b]

  

  What's he building in there?

   What the hell is he building

   In there?

   He has subscriptions to those

   Magazines... He never

   Waves when he goes by

   He's hiding something from

   The rest of us... He's all

   To himself... I think I know

   Why... He took down the

   Tire swing from the Peppertree

   He has no children of his

   Own you see... He has no dog

   And he has no friends and

   His lawn is dying... and

   What about all those packages

   He sends. What's he building in there?

   With that hook light

   On the stairs. What's he building

   In there... I'll tell you one thing

   He's not building a playhouse for

   The children what's he building

   In there?

  

   Now what's that sound from under the door?

   He's pounding nails into a

   Hardwood floor... and I

   Swear to god I heard someone

   Moaning low... and I keep

   Seeing the blue light of a

   T.V. show...

   He has a router

   And a table saw... and you

   Won't believe what Mr. Sticha saw

   There's poison underneath the sink

   Of course... But there's also

   Enough formaldehyde to choke

   A horse... What's he building

   In there. What the hell is he

   Building in there? I heard he

   Has an ex-wife in some place

   Called Mayors Income, Tennessee

   And he used to have a

   consulting business in Indonesia...

   but what is he building in there?

   What the hell is building in there?

  

   He has no friends

   But he gets a lot of mail

   I'll bet he spent a little

   Time in jail...

   I heard he was up on the

   Roof last night

   Signaling with a flashlight

   And what's that tune he's

   Always whistling...

   What's he building in there?

   What's he building in there?

  

   We have a right to know...

More of the storyboard coming soon....

MIKE
#148

Wow, those are some haunting lyrics, Mickety Mike. :eek: Very interesting…can you explain how this relates to your story?

Cheers, :slight_smile:

~Rebeccak intrigued yet also in need of unloading groceries :smiley:

#149

Nice lyrics, but I get the impression that the setting is suburban middle class. I’m not sure that the tall apartment building is the right setting for the tune. I mean, there’s no lawn for him to mow (or not) … no pepper tree for a tire swing. :surprised

Nice layouts and storyboards. However, I see a creepy quiet house in the neighborhood. The one house that the kids in the neighborhood avoid and make rumors about. Know what I mean?

#150

Kirt,

That’s a good point. :slight_smile: I sort of picture a down and out suburbanite myself ~ someone with a backwards baseball cap, a grizzled beard, and a broken down truck in the front yard. Someone that has marijuana smoker written all over him. I guess it depends on the song’s relationship to the piece. :slight_smile:

Cheers,

~Rebeccak

#151

@Becks, Kirt

Alright, you asked for it!! :stuck_out_tongue: :wink:

 [b]Premise update 05/12/05:[/b]

   “What’s he building in there?” is a short, monochromatic animation based upon a Tom Waits track of the same name.  Based in Ashland, Illinois, it follows a local investigative journalist as he searches to uncover the mystery surrounding a reclusive stranger who lives on the outskirts of town.  Is this stranger really a man to be feared or is the film noir obsessed journalist playing out his own fantasies?

I need to re-work the above premise in the next 24-48 hours.

Without sending reams and reams to this thread about my outline:

The journalist is staking out the recluse, by renting an unused apartment across the way from the strangers home. He has him under surveillance and is monitoring his actions night and day…

Over the course of the animatic, the percieved actions of the recluse convince the journalist to take matters into his own hands and break into the strangers home to find out once and for all what he is building in there.

The animatic concludes with a close up of the eye of the beast (see previous work for the project on this thread,) and then fades out. The reason for this is that the recluse is actually a former big-game hunter (during his time of running a consulting business in Indonesia.) He found a new species in the remote areas around his village and managed to smuggle a baby beast to the USA. He plans on growing it to maturity and then releasing images of it to the press, making himself famous and rich in the process. What the journalist is actually witnessing, is the recluse building a stronger cage for the growing animal.

Contrary to popular belief, his ex-wife doesn’t live in Mayors Income, Tennessee. She was actually an early meal for his new pet. Also, the recluse has managed to persuade the local grave digger in his favour, and for the past 6 months the town’s dead have not been buried, but instead have been meals…

Hope that helps! :wink: I’m writing it up for real in the next few days.

MIKE

#152

Originally posted by Mike Noir: Contrary to popular belief, his ex-wife doesn’t live in Mayors Income, Tennessee. She was actually an early meal for his new pet. Also, the recluse has managed to persuade the local grave digger in his favour, and for the past 6 months the town’s dead have not been buried, but instead have been meals…

I knew there was a reason I liked you! :scream: That rocks…I love this sort of creepy yet oddly plausible~seeming premise…I guess you never really do know about your neighbors, do you? :surprised :curious: :scream:

Thanks for posting that…this really sounds interesting! Best of luck in bringing this project to a successful conclusion! :thumbsup:

Cheers, :slight_smile:

~Rk

#153

The journalist is staking out the recluse, by renting an unused apartment across the way from the strangers home. He has him under surveillance and is monitoring his actions night and day…

that is a fantastic setting and puts a nice emphasis on the fact that the ones who suspect the man of doing something (his social environment) could be regarded as the weirdos in this text.

It is a great piece of poetry (to my mind) as it is open to interpretation and lends itself to many directions.

While the story you made up makes perfect sense and will be very entertaining I don’t feel that the text needs a fully solved explanation, actually, but that is just my interpretation. (The text never really offers a solution or explanation which partly is why it leaves you so uncomfortable with the situation)

But, all in all, I say: great! Get to work. Let’s see something… … Wanna know what it’ll all look like…

after all… “We have a right to know”

#154

@Becks,

You really need to actually hear the track to fully comprehend the flavour of the lyrics. It is truely excellent!!

@Mr.Mu

I think you are totally correct on the piece remaining unresolved. I love the ambiguity of the ending as much as you do. Unfortunately for the both of us, resolution is what is going to get me more marks… and I am a sell-out!! :scream:

MIKE NOIR Purist at heart

#155

Originally posted by Mr. Mu: While the story you made up makes perfect sense and will be very entertaining I don’t feel that the text needs a fully solved explanation, actually, but that is just my interpretation. (The text never really offers a solution or explanation which partly is why it leaves you so uncomfortable with the situation)

I quite agree, I always find it disappointing when there is an easy sci~fi explanation for something mysterious…I always like the mystery of never quite knowing what the hell is going on…a la X~Files suspense fame. :smiley: God! Do I miss the X~Files! </rant> :smiley:

I think the bit about the wife being eaten is more interesting than the fact that there is a beast itself ~ it really tells you something about human nature, which is what to me always makes stories interesting. I think I’ve mentioned before that one of my favorite authors is Ian McEwan, one crazy sardonic Brit, but one hell of a writer ~ he wrote horror when he was younger, and all of his work has a dark slant to it. There’s one where they chop up a man and put him in various manageable packages for convenient disposal…now that’s what I’m talking about! :thumbsup:

Originally posted by Mike Noir Lite: :scream: I think you are totally correct on the piece remaining unresolved. I love the ambiguity of the ending as much as you do. Unfortunately for the both of us, resolution is what is going to get me more marks… and I am a sell-out!! :scream:

Don’t do it! Don’t make me call you MNL! :scream: shakes head

Cheers, :slight_smile:

~Rebeccak

#156

Yeah, this is totally the best part of the story I wrote. But I will only get to expand upon it after I get the $90,000,000 funding for the full feature :cry: :wink: .

MIKE

#157

Originally posted by young Master Shymalamadingdang: Yeah, this is totally the best part of the story I wrote. But I will only get to expand upon it after I get the $90,000,000 funding for the full feature :cry: :wink: .

Well, I think it’s a great story…can really see this being fleshed out pardon the pun :smiley: and expanded upon…wow, think of all the CGWorkshops you can take with $90,000,000! :bounce: :scream:

Cheers, :slight_smile:

~Rk

#158

Ah! It makes more sense now. Aside from the aforementioned critiques about the storyboard, ignore everything I said. :smiley:

#159

whoa! awesome story! deliciously evil and creepy… gives us a glimpse into what goes on in that mind of yours!! :smiley: i also like those environment sheets, will we get the chance to see the final result?

:surprised

backs away sloooowly

#160

@Kirt - Will do… :wink: The complete storyboard should be on here by tomorrow night, I promise… you can cut it to shreads then. I’m still struggling with simple concepts like “not breaking the centre line” and the like… :surprised so I will post them up in case you spot any glaring mistakes I need to remedy at light speed.

@Lyneran - I might be able to post up the complete animatic if I can get it down to a respecable size. I’m loving your Loomis work btw…

MIKE