Foundation Art & Design

              The restrictions brought into place by the Corona Virus lockdown significantly impacted the development of my Final Major in many different ways. From being unable to attend college because of school closures to being limited on art materials due to non essential shops shutting, all these factors affected the overall result of my project.  The availability to work whenever I could soon became extremely useful as the days I could and couldn’t work changed rapidly. When Lockdown was first introduced, they announced that all non essential workers were to stay home and only key workers were allowed to continue working. I currently work in the bakery at ASDA  and before lock down would only work Sundays or the occasional Saturday due to my contract being seasonal, meaning my hours are very flexible to my normal college routine. ASDA being a supermarket meant I was classed as a key worker and could continue working but once...

Section One:  Influences, Research, Sources and Ideas The starting point for this project that inspired me to pursue animation for my final  major was the song “Come Along” by Cosmo Sheldrake as the song has quite a whimsical  yet eerie tone to it, helping to create vivid imagery. The overall vibe of the song reminded  me of the film “Coraline” directed by Henry Selick, about a girl who discovered a secret door  to an idealistic world far more exciting than her own. While being creepier in style than I  intend my final major to be, “Coraline” uses traditional stop motion animation to bring to  life the characters, the same type of animation I want to use for my story. The behind the  scenes of “Coraline” were a helpful insight into how creating a stop motion is done on a  larger production scale, giving helpful tips of how to construct both sets and character. Section Two:  Major Project After planning all the storyboarding...

"Come along, catch a Heffalump Sit with me on a muddy clump We'll sing a song of days gone by Run along now, don't be glum Get you gone, now, have some fun Don't be long, for the end is nigh Don't let moments pass along And waste before your eyes March with me and the borogroves Come with me and the slithy toves And never ask us why Come, come, come, come, come along now Run away from the hum-drum We'll go to a place that is safe from Greed, anger and boredom We'll dance and sing 'til sundown And feast with abandon We'll sleep when the morning comes And we'll rise by the sound of the birdsongs We'll be here when the world slows down And the sunbeams fade away Keeping time by a pendulum As the fabric starts to fray There's no such thing as time to kill Nor time to throw away So, once for the bright sky, twice for the pig sty Thrice for...

At first I decided on six main characters that were all part of the circus. Each one is a different animal but all of them apart from the raven would use the same type of armature as the main character that would be the mouse. The lion is the ring master and is uncharge of the circus while all the other animals just perform as part of the group. The mouse is the main character within my narrative. He sees the circus and befriends all the other animals and is then convinced he wants to run away with them. This is the design of the armature I used to create his body with, after looking at many other armature designs on Pinterest, I eventually planned to use wire inside allowing maximum flexibility but also durability. This was the first attempt at the mouse armature. The clay worked really well at keeping the wire together and created a solid base that would have been great for painting on top of or covering in fabric. The real issue was with the arm and leg j...