Embroidery Test

I’m about to embark on another short animated embroidery piece, though this time using mixed media rather than being fully embroidered. The reason: the last one I did was ‘just’ a 12 frame walk cycle which I felt I could embroider in full, in a (reasonably) timely fashion. However, this latest piece is 22 frames and is slightly more detailed. I didn’t want to give up on this piece before starting by being put off with the amount of frames and the detail involved, but I knew that embroidering it in full would just be too much. After all, this is meant to be a fun little side project and something which I don’t want to dedicate 100% of my time to at this point. So I was thinking of a few workarounds.

As well as the reasons listed above, I also thought there was little point in using full embroidery again as I had already done that now. I know what it looks like and I know that it works- so why create something similar? What would I learn or gain from that? Very little… And then the idea of mixed media popped into my head- I can’t remember how or why (perhaps from the embroidery sub-Reddit maybe? I love having a nosey on there to get fresh inspiration and to see all the cool projects emerging from this community). Regardless of how the idea got there, I have now decided how I’m going to produce this next piece.

It’s the first time I’m working in mixed media for embroidery (I think, or at least in recent times), so I wanted to test out a few techniques first to see what works (or doesn’t) and how I might go about it. Paint was my initial idea, but then I thought what about pens of some kind? They’re less messy, don’t need much drying time and I already have them readily available- my stationary collection is prettttyyyy big!

So I tested out several different types of pens to see which would look best on the fabric and if any would bleed, dry weirdly or anything else that crops up! In the end, it actually turned out that good old gel pens worked the best. I only tried them on a whim towards the end of my experiments. They drew on the fabric well, they don’t run/ bleed and the fabric retained the colours nicely (looked nice and vibrant).

For this project, I bought a cotton bedsheet to use as my fabric as I need a fair amount. I thought bedding would be a perfect solution to getting a good amount of fabric at a reasonable price. Better so if I had an old one which I could up-cycle, therefore being more environmentally friendly, but unfortunately I didn’t have anything which fitted the bill this time around. The bedding is a lot thinner/ delicate feeling than the fabric I usually use, which is much more robust. The fabric also has a tighter weave, so I wanted to test out how that felt, before I dive straight in. I also wanted to get a feel for stitching next to the inked sections, as I have never tried it before. Another reason for using the bedding was that I actually wanted something with a tighter weave as it’s less ‘gap-py’ and would make for a smoother final result.

I tested out the main three stitches I use: satin stitch (both single and double stranded), back stitch and long/ short stitch. It definitely felt different embroidering on this fabric, though I’m sure I’ll soon get used to it. The main thing I found was that because the bedding material is much more lightweight, using single stranded thread worked a lot better for all the stitches, rather than the double strand which I usually use on my regular fabric. The double strand just felt too ‘heavy’. The single strand took a little longer to sew as it filled up the spaces slower due to less thread, but I felt the overall result was preferable, so that is how I’m going to progress with this… See you in about 8 months for an update!!

Below is the test piece- just a load of circles in different pens and stitches!

Animation Project Update

The short story: I have decided to put my feature film on pause for the time being and make a short film instead.

The long story: I completed my last short film, ‘Bear’ at the end of September 2022, so coming up to two years ago now. I have not created much animated work in the interim either- well a few small test clips here and there, but nothing major and to be honest, it’s really rather agonising. When I have a project on the go I am at my happiest, so inevitably I’m bursting to make something of my own again.

I started developing up some ideas for my feature and wrote a few outlines etc, but most of the ideas I was coming up with lent themselves towards the short film format instead. Maybe this is because I’ve concentrated on that medium for so long and wasn’t allowing myself to think bigger or longer. Or maybe it’s some other reason and/ or a mixture of things (most likely). But regardless, I am shelving it for the time being. I am desperate to satisfy my creative urge to make another film and I feel a feature won’t do that justice at this point in my life, because the time it will take to create. I can likely have the short made in around about a year, whereas the feature will take several. Meaning I won’t have created something complete for, say 3-5 years since finishing up on ‘Bear’. And that doesn’t sit well with me! So that’s where my head is at now with what I’m doing.

I have an idea for my short which I’m super excited about. I won’t be giving a synopsis away just yet, but the film is quite personal (like most of my projects- animation is my way of expressing myself and I find it hard to work on projects which don’t do that). Though the working title is ‘I Wish I was There’.

So far, I have scripted the film- though unconventionally and also started the storyboarding process. To be honest I was having a hard time writing it in the usual script format- you know where you write INT/ EXT WHATEVER LOCATION and it needs to be in a certain font and in a certain layout. I found this extremely restricting. The story was hard to make flow because of the constraints in how it “needed" to be written. And every time I sat down to write it, I felt really put off and unenthused. So I scrapped my Fade In script doc and started writing it afresh in Google Docs. And it came to me so much easier. I didn’t feel trapped and I could write what I wanted without feeling the need to satisfy some arbitrary age-old format. It was much easier to visualise the story this way. I had never questioned it before, but realising I don’t have to follow these rules especially on a personal project, I doubt I’ll go back to writing scripts in the conventional format. Everyones brain works differently, so why should we all have to squeeze ourselves into boxes that don’t fit.

To help me develop my story further, I used the storyboarding process in tandem with my written document. I thumb-nailed each shot and section, coming up with new ideas as I went, which worked better than the ones I had written. It allowed me to see my script as a film in the visual manner that it is intended and easily weed out what was/ wasn’t working so well. I have a complete draft now- which of course needs refining and iterating, but I have something to work with. I’m sure if I continued in the traditional script writing format, I’d still be struggling for ideas and probably wouldn’t have got so far with my story.

I’m excited to start drawing the storyboard up from thumbnails into clean panels and turning it into an animatic- something I have never done with my own projects. For the last almost two years, I have worked assembling animatics for a TV series and I can really see how valuable they are to the filmmaking process. It’s essentially another rewrite of the script and it allows you to see what scenes work (or don’t), if the story holds up, what can be added or taken away and so on. I always thought because I work in rotoscope, a storyboard would just be sufficient, because it was akin to creating a live action film (or at least in the first instance). But as I found out on ‘Bear’, not everything in the storyboard translated to my live action edit of the film, meaning lots was cut and I had essentially wasted precious shoot time which I could have used better in other ways. I also think that using the live action footage as the animatic edit made it difficult for the people I asked for feedback off to visualise what was going on, because the backgrounds were all pretty much just the same.

So, I’m thinking an animatic might be a really useful way of seeing my film before actually seeing my film, if that makes sense! I think as well, it’s much more important in this one, because I don’t have a traditional script as explained above, so it is also acting as part of the writing process. Every film I make is different and therefore requires a different approach in creating it. Though so far I am really liking this way of making my film. It feels like I’m getting stuck in right from the start and it’s suiting my preferred way of working. I’m definitely more of a visual person, so being able to script out my film in the means of images is a work style I feel I might continue using in the future. Maybe if a future film I make requires a traditional script for the purposes of funding or something, I could do all this and then write the script from the animatic, because I’ll just be copying what I see off screen rather than creating my story from the start in that rigid way. PSA for anyone who needs it: there’s more than one way of writing your film: if the ‘normal’ way isn’t working, then try something that does! Though obviously don’t listen to that if you have to do it for an assignment or something, but maybe for your personal projects…

Right, as usual I have rambled on and outstayed my welcome on my own blog. So I’m out of here for now, but I am mega excited about this project and can’t wait to share more about the process on here. To follow my progress for this short, check the ‘Animated Short 2’ tag on the sidebar where everything to do with this short will be posted. Regular readers will know that it is not the second short film I have made, but it’s the second I will have written about in detail on here!

Also, sorry for the lack of pictures in this blog- quite ironic for a visual person, I know! So have an unrelated pic of a recent bowling alley I went to and me skateboarding:

See you in the next one xo

Road to Wembley- COMPLETE!!

WE DID IT!! After a couple of failed attempts since the 19/20 season (which are also documented on this blog), myself and my parter Ben finally completed our ‘Road to Wembley’ quest: attending a match from each round of the Women’s FA Cup! And what an incredible journey- taking in games from grass roots in the early rounds right through to fully professional set ups in the later stages and everything in between. The FA Cup provided us with a real cross section of the football this country has to offer, which is the beauty of the competition and why it’s the best competition in football (I say that as fact)! Each match day experience was enriching in it’s own right, whether that was in front of 273 spectators as Kiveton Park Ladies took on SJR Worksop Women in the Second Round Qualifying or in front of 18,000+ fans at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium at Semi Final stage.

2534 was our total miles travelled (house to stadium by car), the longest round trip being 418 miles (Crawley Town FC for Brighton vs Man Utd) and the nearest at just 20 miles was Kiveton. We saw 45 goals scored and number of photos taken was far too many to count!

The final at Wembley was incredible- the crowd of 76,082 was the highest attended game I have ever watched and the atmosphere was great! It rounded off our FA Cup journey extremely well. A strong Manchester United side won 4-0 against (touted underdogs and first time finalists) Tottenham Hotspur, with their efforts rewarding them the clubs’ first piece of major silverware.

The FA Cup will start again in a few months, so if you’re willing to take on the challenge, then get ready! If you’re so inclined, you can see all the games we attended by clicking the #RoadToWembley filter. See you at a game then, yes?!

Recent Embroidery

Hello hello! Pretty much the title of this post: I have some more embroidery to share! This first one I completed back in February, but as it was made as a gift I only wanted to upload to here once the recipient had received it:

It's the main character from the most recent TV show I worked on: The Rubbish World of Dave Spud (currently streaming on ITVX- go check it out, it's the best)!

And then the piece I finished this morning was just for fun- maybe I'll stick it on Etsy and see if anyone buys it, but not sure yet... It's the Dreadful Flying Glove character from the 1968 Beatles film: Yellow Submarine. At the start of the year I completed a jigsaw puzzle based on the film and really liked the eye catching design of the glove and thought it would look cool as an embroidery. I have seen the film but years ago, though the animation has long stayed in my memory. I reckon it's due a rewatch...

Pretty much all the embroidery I do seems to be either animation inspired or part of animations I make. I think I quite like animation!

Polaroid (Instax Mini) Fun

Around 8 or 9 years ago, I purchased an Instax Mini instant film camera. At the time (and for several years after) I thoroughly enjoyed using it and it was a lot of fun. I then took a break from it for a few years- the film felt expensive to me at the time (I was broke) and I remember not really liking the results of some of the photos. So with those two aspects combined, I shelved it for a while and concentrated more on the digital side of my photography.

I had been thinking about getting a battery and some film for it again for several months now and it was a few weeks ago I just thought: 'yep, you know what, I'm just going to do this!', which is just what I did! And to my surprise it still worked! Having had a break from using it, I've come back to it with a different mindset and I'm really enjoying the results. Yes, not all of them come out well, but that is the nature of analogue photography. And the more you use it, the more you learn about how to use it and the types of subjects/ lighting it works best with...

Few of my favourite recent ones below: