Finished Product

Here is my completed piece of animation:

Critical Analysis

How / what is the meaning of your work?

My work is an advertisement for a car. This medium requires eye-catching colours, premise and ideas.  The idea behind it was also to let the advertisement potentially become a viral campaign, and in order to create a successful viral advertisement, it is important to allow the main product to seem secondary while actually being of primary importance to the piece, which I did by not showing until the end that the oak tree is growing from the car itself.

How / what is it supposed to communicate to an audience?

The target audience for the piece is young people in their twenties buying their first car. In this day and age, environmental concerns are very important, and this particular car – the Seat Mii – is an environmentally friendly car, so I showed this in a visually striking way by associating it closely with nature and showing a tree growing from its exhaust pipe.

I asked several people about this idea before exploring it, and I have seen first-hand the impact a car with flora growing from it has on a community, as I have been to Kensington market on multiple occasions, where there is a car decorated by residents that has many plants growing from it.

Why are particular techniques employed and how do they impact on the piece?

I used digital cut-out animation in the piece. I believe this helps with the idea of partnering mechanics and nature, which is what I was doing with the car and the tree.

Your chosen style, form and content

I used bright colours to make the image more striking, and to associate the product with positive feelings. I also gave the tree natural textures to support the idea that the car is at peace with nature.

Your shot construction

I used a close up of the acorn at first so that the first thing we see is an element of nature, then the camera follows the squirrel up the tree, and only pans out at the end to reveal that the tree and car are one. I did not want to reveal the tree growing from the exhaust until the end of the advertisement, and until that point I wanted the focus to be on the squirrel.

Your chosen format

The piece is thirty second long, as I wanted to keep it short and to the point, since this is how advertisements should be. A long advertisement will likely bore the target audience and not sell the product.

In what way has critical work assisted your practice?

What research methods have you adopted and how have they informed your work?

I researched by finding successful viral advertisements and asking other people to recall advertisements that had gone viral in the past which stuck in their minds. I reviewed these advertisements and came to the conclusion that the product needed to appear secondary to the piece at first, which I did not do in my original project work when I opened the advertisement with an image of the car. I believe this advertisement works much better as a potential viral video than the other has.

What experimentation have you conducted and why?

I went through ideas of how the car and the tree could be shown together, whether it should be on top of it or growing from within the car, or growing out of the exhaust as it is in the final piece.

I also initially considered just showing the camera following the path of a tree and ending up at the car, but I decided it would be better to give the audience a character of sorts to watch instead, to keep their attention, and then reveal at the end that he was not the main focus of the advertisement as a whole.

From what traditions of film-making /fine art / popular culture has your work emerged?

I researched into other advertisements to see what approaches were successful. I have also looked at music videos aimed at the same age group as my target audience, and my style of animation was based partly on this research.

Does your film challenge any easily held notions that are in existence?

It combines nature and a car, which is not an idea that is explored too often.

Does your pre-production successfully communicate your idea?

I believe my pre-production communicated my idea well. I was blogging regularly throughout the process, and I think the development of my idea is rather clear.

Who is the audience for your work?

The audience for the piece is drivers in the twenties.

What issues does this raise?

Due to concerns about global warming and our carbon footprints, advertising a car to educated young people can be difficult, but since the Mii is environmentally friendly, it is important to stress this fact so that the audience can see the benefit to buying this car over any other.

It is also important to keep the message of the piece short, clear, and striking, so as to capture and keep their attention long enough to let them see what is important.

How has your process been influenced by your awareness of your audience?

I think my audience are quite aware of the environment and the damages of carbon emission, and so would be looking for cars that leave a smaller carbon footprint. As such, it was important for me to realise that this is the most important feature of the Mii, and focus on this trait within the advertisement.

What social, political issues may have informed your work?

The work is mainly informed by the issue of global warming and how much humans have contributed to this problem.

How successfully has your work achieved its meaning?

How might your work be mis-read?

I believe that the concept is simple enough that it should not be misread. The car is displayed in a very bright and positive manner, and it is clear that the tree is flourishing as opposed to being destroyed be the car’s emissions.

What issues regarding distribution and exhibition may effect your work?

I do not own the rights to the music I have used in my piece, however if they need to be obtained I could do so with relative ease as I have talked to the people who wrote and performed the song before and we are certainly on positive terms with each other.

How has your practice moved on?

In comparison to my original attempt at the Media 2 project, I believe my practice has moved on a considerable amount. I researched into viral advertising in a much more effective way and came to concrete conclusions about the medium before I began to develop my idea. I think I learned more from advertising this time around and incorporated it into my piece in a much better manner.

Animation tests

I have essentially completed the animation for this project, and while doing so, I uploaded several tests to YouTube.

At the moment, as they have only been uploaded within the past 24 hours, Blogger will not allow me to embed the videos, and as such I must hyperlink instead.

1 - Test render of animation with no camera movement

2 - Test render with camera movement

3 - Second test render with camera movement


There are still some kinks to iron out within this animation, but overall I am much happier with this piece of work than I was with my original submission for the project. I feel I completed much better research into viral marketing this time round and it informed the style and colour palette of my advertisement.

Further Notes Regarding Absence

As I predicted earlier, I have not had internet access since my last posts. I actually have not had much access to a computer at all, but have been working away at the project whenever I have had access.

I am currently in the process of animating, as I will be moving location next Monday and I'm not entirely sure whether or not I will be able to continue on with the project from that location.

As I began this blog on the 25th of June, I will have been working on the project for eight weeks as of Monday, so I will have completed the minimum amount of time required by the brief. If I am still able to work on the project after that, I will continue to tweak it and fix any errors there may be, but my aim is to have a complete piece of work by this coming Monday that I will be happy to submit if needs be.

Cut-Out Squirrel

I've made a cut-out squirrel to use. He probably needs some tweaking before being made into the final product, but I made a couple of test stills with him for the moment and will work on getting test animation to see how he looks when he's moving.

Absence

I'm not sure I'll have internet access for the next week or so, and as such, after today I might not get to blog again until some time next week. I hope this does not pose as a problem in terms of the proposed minimum of two blog posts per week, and I shall continue on with my project in the meantime.

Youtube Channel

I have set up a Youtube channel on which to place animation tests and other relevant videos, since the Blogger video player does not seem ideal. The channel can be found at: http://www.youtube.com/LisaDoyleMedia2

At the moment, I have uploaded a selection of my squirrel reference videos, as well as my animatic.

Animatic

Here is an animatic of the piece of animation I have decided to do:

Animation Style

I've been thinking about the style of animation I want to use for this project. I think I'd like to animate it similarly to this music video:

Since it's an advertisement, I will keep the colours much brighter than those used in the video. However, I like the digital cut-out look the animation of the wolf has, and I would like my squirrel animation to be
somewhat like that.

I'll base my squirrel cut out on the bone-structure of the squirrel, and then from that I can change the additional flexible skin/muscle from his hind legs depending on the position of the legs.

Some design work

These are just a couple of drawings I've done to get a feel for the aesthetic I'm aiming for. They're just in pencil for the moment, but I may redraw them in pen, and will likely colour them in photoshop.

Squirrels

I took some time out of my schedule today to visit the park to observe some squirrels. I'm strongly leaning towards the squirrel ad idea, and if I pursue that idea, it's important to me that the character moves like a real squirrel.

I got a lot of reference photos and videos, and did some life drawing while I was there. I will put some of my reference here in this post.

My Ideas

I used my research with viral marketing to determine the best approach with the advertising campaign. As with the most successful viral advertisements, these ads all open on something seemingly unrelated to the car, which is then shown to portray a message and advertise the product. In all three storyboards, the Seat Mii features quite dominantly, and the message is carried across that it is an environmentally friendly car. There are no voice overs or overly obvious attempts to push the product on people, just a simple message and reveal of the project.

Of the three storyboards, I am most happy with the third. I feel the first two may be too simple, and thus may come across as quite boring. The use of the squirrel gives the viewers a character to watch and be drawn in by, while still being quite simplistic and not adding too much fluff to the message.

Storyboard Idea 3

This is my third storyboard idea.

This version of the advertisement opens with a shot of an acorn on the roof of the Mii. A squirrel enters from the left of the screen and proceeds to sit by the acorn and pick it up. The camera cuts to a closer shot of the squirrel holding the acorn, and the squirrels eyes dart towards the camera. The music begins at this point. The camera cuts back to its original position as the squirrel turns to flee. The camera follows the squirrel as he runs to the back of the car and leaps. As the camera pans across, we see a tree trunk that the squirrel lands clutching. The camera follows the squirrel as he scampers back up the tree and out onto a branch. Once settled on the branch, the squirrel starts to nibble at his acorn as the camera pans in towards him. The camera then cuts to a more zoomed out shot of his section of the tree, then a shot of a larger portion of the tree, then a shot of the tree in its entirety, which as before is growing out of the exhaust pipe of the Mii. Finally, the camera cuts to a shot of the Mii itself before fading to black.

Storyboard Idea 2

This is my second board idea.

This scene opens on a branch of the tree, where one of the leaves is blowing back and forth in the wind. The leaf breaks free of the branch and begins to drift away in the breeze. The camera cuts to a closer shot of the leaf and follows it out past the trunk of the tree. As the leaf reaches the peak of its arch, the camera cuts to a more zoomed out shot of the leaf and follows it back to the trunk, where the leaf circles the trunk, getting lower as it does so. The leaf makes one more wide arch upwards before gently swaying down to rest on a bright surface. The camera zooms out to show that the leaf has landed on the Mii, and continues to pan outwards to show that the tree it fell from is growing from the car itself.

Storyboard Idea 1

This is my first storyboard idea.

In this first draft, the camera starts above the tree, and pans downwards through the tree to the trunk as music plays. The camera continues to pan down the trunk of the tree, and makes a round turn at the bend in the trunk. It is revealed that the tree is growing from the exhaust pipe of the Mii, and the camera stops panning when the exhaust pipe is almost in the centre of the screen. The camera then zooms out from the exhaust pipe to reveal the whole of the car and the tree. The scene fades to black, then a Seat logo fades in before it finally fades to black again.

Concept Art

I've decided to stick with the idea of showing the environmental message by using the image of a tree growing out of the car. As such, I have drawn a few images to see which idea works best visually.

Personally, I like the idea of the tree growing from the exhaust pipe, as it makes a very distinct connection between the emissions from the car and growth within the environment.

Concept for project

At the moment, the idea I have is to have the ad start on a shot of leaves, and for the camera to follow the trail of the leaves to the exhaust of the Mii, where it will then cut to show the car with a tree or other fauna growing from the exhaust pipe, to show that it is helping the environment instead of harming it a lot.


This piece of music is inspiring me right now, so I'm thinking of using a section of it in the ad, but this could change depending on whether or not it suits the actual animation.

Inspiring Imagery

I have been looking for imagery that inspires me and relates to what I am interested in exploring. This car represents the kind of idea I would like to go for, as it marries off the car with nature in a really visual way.

The Environment

After some research, I've decided I'm quite interested in the environmentally friendly side of Seat's new car, the Mii. It is very important to minimise our carbon footprints, and I think a lot of younger people are realising this now, which means that focusing on the environmental aspects of the Mii might be a good way to capture the attention of the target audience.

Successful Viral Marketing

This post is largely just for advertisements that I think have been quite successful in terms of viral marketing. These are the kinds of advertisements that will inspire my process, as I don't want to go over the top and make a video that does not work well at all.

Each of these ads features their product, but only briefly. They are made to capture the audience's attention and appeal to their sense of humour, and make them interested in what the advertisement is for.

Viral Marketing

It is difficult to put a finger on what exactly makes a successful viral marketing campaign. Usually advertising campaigns that set out with the intention of going viral are over the top and do not achieve success at anything but irritating people, although they do still stick in people's minds. Advertisements that successfully go viral don't seem to have been made with such force, they just have an interesting or unusual content, which often does not seem to relate heavily to the product being advertised. I think the key to a good campaign is to have an advertisement that will keep an audience captivated, without giving away too much until the product is shown at the end. As such, my initial idea may have been to obvious in having the car visible from the beginning.

Cadbury's seem to be one of  the most successful companies in terms of viral marketing. They have released multiple advertisements that have gone viral, and people still remember what the ads were for. They begin their advertisements with a card reading "A glass and a half full production", so if you have already seen one, you will know the advertisement is for Cadbury's. The advertisements themselves seem disconnected from the product, but the main colour associated with Cadbury's, purple, always dominates the scene, and then the chocolate bar is shown at the end. They seem to have a handle on what captures people's attentions, and balance it well with linking the ad to their own brand.

Introduction

This blog is here to serve as a medium to show my developmental process of my Media 2 project. I have decided to start my project from scratch and approach the brief with an open mind, rather than attempting to salvage the work I had done previously.