Contents PRE-PRODUCTION PRODUCTION Early Concepts ....................................................................... Colour Keys ........................................................................... Character Design ................................................................... Storyboards ............................................................................ Animatic ................................................................................. PRODUCTION Environments ....................................................................... Colour Script ........................................................................ Animation Frames .......................................................... Render Process ............................................................... “A journey of a lost soul, searching “A journey of a lost soul, searching for peace after death.” for peace after death.” Amongst the rages of battle the Sworn Protector of the King falls to the enemy. Unaware of his fate Ace wakens to find h imself in a desolate and frozen forest, alone. With nothing but the faded memories of his King he embarks on his journey in search of the love he left behind, and discovering the truth of what became of himself. AMATA, meaning ‘ my beloved ’ in Latin, is a 2D hand animated short showing a tale of grief, separation, loneliness, and love. Early Concepts Early concepts for AMATA explored the concept of the ‘Beyond’, a place after death. It began with an inital greyscale sketch of a ghostly stag and blackbird companion. From this I took the concept and continued to explore visual styles, colour schemes, and overall themes for a story. Concepts for two human characters were also tested out alongside the animals. Development of these characters continued and the foundations of a narrative were formed. Alongside my rough ideas I created several colour key art pieces to use as the starting building blocks for the short that would soon follow. 8 9 10 11 12 13 To the right is a portrait piece completed in October 2021 of a character who belongs to a personal project which has been in development for several years. With the concepts and narrative themes I had created surrounding the stag and the raven, I felt it was thematically appropriate to include them into the short film, and build a narrative around them exclusively for this project. The imagery in the illustration such as the white roses and a shattered crown would lend themselves to the foundation themes for the short. 14 15 Ace Kambara A warrior King, Kambara stands steadfast, strong, and just. He is fiercely devoted to his place as monarch and ruling dutifully over those beneath his reign. He rules with a fair hand and will go to any lengths to defend those closest to him in his court. With Ace by his side as Hand of the King and Crown Protector he willingly entrusts the Knight with his life. Kambara and Ace hold close ties, both with each other in duty and personally behind closed doors. On the dawn of battle Kambara led his men into the frey with his Hand by his side. When Ace fell in battle his world was shattered and he lost all that was important to him. Whether divine intervention or just cruel fate the King would not survive the battle, and he may yet have a chance to see his love once more. A loyal subject and skilled swordsman, Ace stands as the right Hand and Sworn Protector of the King. His purpose in life is to follow and protect his King, no matter the cost. If need be they would willingly lay down their life to ensure the safety of his King, and his lover. Through his duties and time spent in Kambara’s company Ace found himself falling for his King beyond oaths and duties and the two of them formed a passionate relationship. When war came to their shores Ace stoutly remained by his side to defend their Kingdom and the Crown, only to fall in battle against the enemy. Unaware of his fate Ace began his journey as an estranged soul searching for his love he left behind. 17 16 To keep in style with the animal characters I created figures that were top heavy. For Kambara there were two variations of a top heavy form, however I chose to go with Concept A as it kept more in line with the overall style, and worked more cohesively with Ace’s shape than Concept B. This allowed two accurate turnarounds to be created along with other character development. To keep in theme with the styliation of the stag and the raven I diverted from my usual style of illustration and attempted to push the designs of Kambara and Ace to emphasise shape and form more than I normally would. From this I was able to create two forms that I was satisfied with and that were animation compatible. 18 19 20 21 22 23 Finalising the character designs would allow me to move out of pre-production and start animation in production come the start of November 2022. While I had some brief experience prior in 2D hand drawn animation I had never taken on a project of this scale and the learning curve would be steep to begin with. However with a solid understanding of the animation fundamentals (mostly from a 3D work- flow) I found myself being able to aptly apply those to my 2D animation tests conducted throughout the mid pre-production phase. Creating accurate and scaled character turnarounds would act as a cheatsheet and aid in the consistency and accuracy of my 2D animation throughout the duration of the runtime. 24 25 Storyboards AMATA follows the tale of an estranged soul on a journey to find the one he left behind and discovering what became of himself. While I had the basis of a concept narrative it had little cohesiveness or structure. This is when I attempted to take a personal favourite song and build a narrative around the pacing and tones of the music. ‘Frozen Pines’ by Lord Huron, while having a lightly upbeat tune it’s undertones are melencholic and the lyrics tell the tale of the division between life and death, and growing to accept an outcome that you cannot control. With this it was a strong match for the narrative themes and I was able to plot out a sequence of events to the lines of the music. A song about losing a loved one and choosing to live your life anyways, knowing you’ll see them again on the other side to accompany the tale of a Knight searching for his lost love. 26 27 Anmatic The animatic was the starting point of bringing the narrative and storyboards to life. The animatic began production in late August 2022 and was completed in just over a month. I explored key imagery that I wanted to feature in ‘Project Pines’ as well as properly align the storyboards to the music. In this phase several individual shots were rearranged and organised to help the narrative flow more cohesively. The animatic went through several draft iterations before it was wrapped up and set aside for animation down the pipeline. By fleshing out the keyframes used in the animatic. Imagery of the stag remains a strong focal point throghout the animatic and short, as a metaphorical symbol. As stags are often connoted to royalty it highlights Ace’s want and desire, persuing the animal in a desparate hope of finding his love. 28 29 Environments Painting the environments for AMATA helped bring the world and narrative to life. Using the environment thumbnails as well as my colour script backgrounds for all 49 shots of the film were matte painted. Several of the environments were panoramic to support parallax animation. The environments are muted in hue all while adding to the atmosphere and tone of the Beyond, a frozen secluded limbo that exists between Life and Death. To keep the environment consistent several tree assets were created that I could build the backgrounds with. 32 33 36 37 38 39 40 41