audio production process for final animation

Ambience

For our ambience, we used public domain sounds from websites like 'Sound Bible', and 'Free Sound'.

http://soundbible.com/

https://www.freesound.org/

- We ended up layering cave ambience, especially at the beginning at night to give a eerie feel. This goes with the scary, unknown feel at the start which the characters feel.

- We also used lots of multiple animal noises, like wolves, birds, growling and bush ruffling to give the feeling they're truly in the middle of the wilderness and alone. It also gave an idea of danger and fear, something out characters are clearly experiencing at the start.

- Finally, when the scene turns to day, and we re-join our characters, we changed the ambience to a more friendly, new and fresh one, changing the crow sounds to morning bird songs.  This changes the atmosphere and mood, giving a more friendly atmosphere.

dialog

For dialog, we wrote out lines and scripts, practised the ascents and voices, and finally booked a studio and recorded.  We applied and synchronised the dialog throughout our animation. 

sound effects

We used the majority of our sound affects for added comical effect, as well as to just add believability.

- We used footsteps on different terrain like gravel and grass, and different volumes for different characters. For example, Kovsky who marches in a militaristic fashion makes a large amount of noise when he walks; whilst Paul walks very lightly and delicately.

- We added lots of sound effects for comical value, for example; we used a high pitch and over-exaggerated glass squeaking sound for Paul rubbing his head in confusion  and a leather stretch sound for Kovsky's stretching arm.

- We also used a fire sound effect which was overly loud to control the mood of the situation, and how how important it is.

music

finally, we used one piece of music for the end credits which was appropriate with the crazy happenings on screen.
 The age of the song allows it to suparse copy write issues, making it fine to use.

The song was Tchaikovsky - Overture, made in 1812.

screen grabs and evaluation.

with these screen grabs we have the final edit and the changes and added edit decisions from the feedback from the rough cut, we kept with the style and look of the animation and kept pushing forward with artistic looks from before.

we also added the audio and dialogue from before feedback, we had voice acted dialogue for the characters through out the sequence we also included sound effects of foot steps, eating food and blinking.

we also included ambient sounds that was recommended to add more effect and humour in key scenes.

in terms of the visual effect change we updated some scenes to be colour corrected in the later of the sequence, we also had some scenes re-illustrated due to the difference in artists style of animating, and having more flowing with one style and more visually appealing   

project 2 - animation final pitch document

Animation pitch from Chris Yarwood

health and risk assessments.

time scale and production 

rough cut and feedback.

feedback

barney: some shots are breaking the 180 degree rule, and break the flow of the animation.
however he found the look and art style very very good and gave it a unique twist.

sam: needs sounds with dialogue and sound effects, also the ending needs to be re-looked at and finished to get a resolved ending.

matt: the begining clearly drops in quality between transitions and in later parts of the sequence, also colour of characters change in certain clips from black to brown and back to black again.
a positive was that it was rather comical even without sound. 

animation - shady bunch - treatment - project 3

Animation Process Flow Chart and animation process

- The pre-production stage consists of making a few rough structure of the idea you have which may Budgets, scripts, a brief and the concept are all discussed and considered in this stage. If all this is given the go ahead. the other stages get involved and crew get hired for their specific  jobs.

-  the concept is expanded out a lot more. The narrative and visual style of the animation will be looked a pon on so their is a strong feeling of what is wanted and what has to be achieved. This stage often consists of a lot of experimenting and trying/tweaking things.

- Next, the director and storyboard artist come together to create the narrative in a visual form. Storyboarding is a way of planning the types of shots wanted, the camera movements and a rough guide line for animators to stick to within loose constraints, still giving room for creativity.

- Then the art director will develop a style and create the characters and environments. Most of these pictures showing what everything will look like would be drawn, but it really depends on who is designing, and if it is a group of people or just one person.

- The director and producer will then cast the voices for each character until getting what is needed. The chosen voice actors will then go over the script, trying to get what they want. sometimes it is all recored in a day, sometimes it can go for days, once again it is up to the vision of the director and producer. The editor will then create a sound track example to show a representation of each character.

- From the original drawings and designs, modellers will begin to make CG examples and skeletons of the characters so the animator can move each joints creating realistic movement.

- Working on things like layout and timings are next. although the first real show of timing is form the storyboards whilst keeping in mind camera movements, shot types, moods and other visual information. Ones completed, the layouts will be shot and made into a 'layout reel' or edited into the perviously made storyboard. In the making of larger, more structured and expensive products there will be often two phases, rough and final.

- The animation can now begin as all the assets needed to go with it are done with exception to the backgrounds. Scenes will be assigned to specific animators by the director. As each scene is completed the director will approve it and will then be added to the real to be viewed in context. each scene will built up to create an almost completed running animation. Effect animations will be added after all is complete.

Final Animation