Animatic V1:

Based on Justin's advice and by looking into traditional Thai costumes I made a few thumbnails to help us visualise our character . The special ornaments she'll be wearing will be used to emphasize her Thai and bird like qualities like the tall headpiece,  the wing-like ear cuffs, the long fingernails and the chain hanging from her arms creating the illusion of a wing.

I had a chance to ask for some help from Justin Wyatt today on our characters and got some great tips to improve our design.

I used Lai Thi art as reference for the detail in the tail and wings. These are very early sketches but I can already see what changes I need to make. The human torso looks like it's a completely different part of the bird body. The Lai Thi influences need to be added on the top half  to make it look more consistent.

Some more tests. Discovering new methods in Maya:

Here is a couple of initial foliage designs with new colour palette. Interesting to note in the attached references is the gold colours. On an international level, gold combined with lighter shades symbolises wealth and prosperity. Another way to look at its meaning – albeit subjective - is it’s usage to represent armour on top of flesh belonging to an imperial lineage of people. But in the references there a few individuals wearing no gold. If we assume the notion of social stratification, the people excluded from the golden patterns probably belong to a common ancestry and so there is illustrative divide. Our lead character is something of a special deity so the idea of bloodline and imperial belonging is a feature we're thinking about for the character design/ dictating the amount of gold in her costume.

There is a lack of gold in the surrounding nature in the murals (works conversely in the case of our designs). Gold is central to life, very bold; the first thing we see. Experimented use of gold in nature is something to consider, then whether there’s a weighted use of it. These are things to continue thinking about...

We’re going to continue experimenting by limiting the colours to core Thai cuisine: Golden patterns, green and jade etc. 

Andriana discussed colour theory from Thai culture on an older entry; click here to read her analysis post.

Here are a selection of designs we both worked on.
Andriana established some shapes by looking at traditional Thai
art & Lai/ Kranok patterns. We scanned in the pictures
and I experimented with colour.
These are mainly pieces of foliage:

I was having a little play-around in photoshop with some mirrored 'scribbles' and came up with some very interesting shapes/ silhouettes. I worked nearly the same way as Alchemy but for some reason it worked a lot better for me this way. Ideally, they were going to look like feathers but some ended up looking like tentacles. It is a start anyway..

For the purpose of exploring new turf, I have recycled the 3D model from my transcription piece: Mèng Pó. A concept that is very different from re-use. We have progressed to the unsatisfied, however, the 2D and 3D projections in Maya itself have revealed some decent potential. The early idea of progress implies, as these images show, the cutout styles. We have also starting looking into Lai Thai Patterns: Ancient Art Works, relevant to the study of core Thai themes. Updates will be posted soon as we continue to inject and experiment with this concept and later introduce negative space and the inner-confines of patterns. 

Yesterday's tutorial was a reality check for the art direction we are aiming for in our animation. Dayle's thumbnail drawings are heading towards the right direction but need to become even bolder with more emphasized  Thai elements on them.

The trick to make this work is to strip whatever is unnecessary and  rely on a limited amount of colours and patterns. Our world has to become minimalistic with the use of patterns and negative space to give the illusion of an open space. We are specifically looking into three animated films which we find inspiring:  Thomas Beale Cipher, The Silence beneath the Bark and The Secret of Kells. 

Notes after Feedback

• Decorative – None of that
• Character Design Silhouettes
• Not to use alchemy when producing silhouettes.
• Kinnaree should not be imperial; ambiguous; intimidating
• Kinnaree should be brattish, charming, look at padmay from Star Wars – Natalie Portman
• Cultururally the piece should not derive from a type of witchiness
• It is more allufe, fey, anti-witchy quality
• Archetypes of imperial women
• Girl playing queen
• Irrelevant comparisons based on vague perceptions
• Music: Zakk, YouTube composer signature theme ost of a certain character; two bits of music co-habit/ Harmony
• Instructions on themes; based on characteristics
• Kinnaree – Pecky
• Hemaraj – Percussion
• Musical information/ way to commission/ if music is unusable, critically construct why it doesn’t/ creative wriggle room/ Bird-like ethnicity/ identity with a track on YouTube
• Look at Peter & the Wolf
• Thumbnails/ Art Direction
• Emulate Thai/ Logic: shapes derived from Thai ethnicity/ absolute Thailand
• Secret of Kells: Celtic Carvings.
• Kinnaree: Thailand fabrics/ murals/ silks
• Bolder representation of Thai
• Tracing back to Thai ethnicity
• Relationship colour with distilled, evocative of Thai culture/ Limitation of look at Kuler
• 5 words of boundaries = more coherent world
• Task: Thai ceremonial fabrics/ silks/ patterns to be extracted
• Colour limitation/ gradients/ enamel/ gold pastiche
• Look at Thomas Beale Cipher
• Back to drawing board with specific look at influence maps
• Limiting colours: Jade green, gold…
• Negative space patterns
• White signifies death in Thai culture
• Kinnaree oriental white shadows/ gold shadows
• Getting the right recipe in the concepts
• A lighting rig set-up in service to the style we will establish/ with 2D elements
• Limited/ linear/ striped away
• Indie scenes
• Honing understanding/ re-configure the world pieces. At present, the environmental thumbnails look reminiscent of rain forests – generic space - thus have no belonging to a Thai world. It does not invoke core visual Thai themes. Generic fantasy
• Visuals need to SCREAM Thailand! They will not work otherwise
• Lightblubs from Kells references need turning off
• Sown/ embroidered Thai designs
• Harry Potter animation: Tale of the Three Brothers
• Inverted shadows
• Audaciousness/ sustained colour palette – aforementioned Harry Potter: Tale of the Three Brothers
• Turn off seventy-five percent of current light bulbs
• Limitation; work with unique budget
• Five colours; seven surface patterns
• Sky colour
• Shadow colour
• Floral colour
• Rock colour
• What is our Thailand?
• 16:9
• Preceding character models to be used in testing to look at how 2D and 3D can be combined
• Coherence!
• Say no to generic content
• Thailand-ish ingredients needed for a highly spiced dish of visual ecstasy
• The Silence Beneath the Bark – by Joanna Lurie
• Character Design in service of the world/ essentialised it is
• Cultural precision
• Thomas – Avant-Garde
• Definitive Map/ Essential Oil/ Potency
• Hillscape
• Style wins


Analysing works

Thomas Beale Cipher – Stability of the projected patterns. Patterns do not move. Collaged-based; pattern shadows, negative space

The Silence beneath the Bark by Joanna Lurie – Composited After-effects sandwich/ Negative space; patterned shadows against the inverted whiteness of the forest floor

Secret of Kells – Patterns are strongly influenced by originating text/ cultural references/ everything is patterned, no negative space

Lai Thai Art