Road to Wembley #5

This FA Cup Third Round Qualifying tie between Sporting Khalsa Women and Lincoln City Women will be the first game of the competition this season my partner Ben has attended with me. Besides enjoying a day out with him, he also drives meaning for this game I didn't have to get public transport. Unfortunately you won't be reading about any convoluted train journeys this time. Apologies.

So, how should I fill the first section of this post up? I could describe our shopping trip to Morrisons pre-game or perhaps even recount our pre-match walk or what sweets we decided to buy. I'm just taking a guess though, that you might not want to hear about those, so I'm going to risk it and use this opportunity to air my thoughts on a recent graphic that has been doing the rounds on social media comparing the prize money in each round of the men's and women's FA Cup. If you do want to know what sweets we bought and aren't fussed about what I think about the prize money, then they were 'clear fruits' and you should probably skip the next three paragraphs.

I am not at all shocked by how low the women's prize money is in comparison to their male counterparts, but instead, disappointed. A lot of the comments on various threads are from people saying either the attendances aren't there and therefore not generating the revenue to justify higher prize money or saying the standard of women's football isn't 'good enough' to justify higher prize money.

Without breaking into too much detail and turning this blog post into something it's not, I will keep my thoughts brief. Basically, I see it that if there is very little money injected into to the women's game, especially levels lower than the Barclay's FAWSL (the only women's fully professional league in England), then how will the game ever develop/ progress at a reasonable pace and improve standard and therefore attendances? Surely this makes a case for increasing the money? I'm not even talking about equal prize money here. If the clubs had more money, this would inevitably improve facilities and coaching, resulting in a 'better' standard of play, equaling higher attendances and money justifiable. I feel we're at a perfect time now to introduce more money into the game, because there's definitely an increased interest after the success of the WWC during the summer. This is proven through recent record attendances at various levels across the women's game and of course selling out Wembley Stadium for the Lionesses friendly against Germany in November. Now is exactly the time there should be investment, or the momentum it has been building might fall, especially if the game doesn't progress any further or not at a fast enough pace.

As for attendances, in my experience they tend to vary depending on how well the clubs do with promotion on social media and in the local area. For example, in the first game of this competition I attended this season there were over 170 in attendance which was a lot for that level (tier six), though in this round there were approximately 25. A lot of clubs lower down the pyramid do not charge entry either, though some put a small price for spectators.

Sporting Khalsa is a club which isn't named after the place it is situated. It is on the outskirts of a small market town called Willenhall, located somewhere between the M6 and Wolverhampton. It is mainly known for it's lock and key industry. The town centre has a lot of paraphernalia related to this, including a workers' memorial and a giant mural of a lock.

The lock mural in the town centre

Without having done any 'proper' research before heading down the M6 to The Aspray Arena, we did not realise that it was an artificial pitch before paying our £3 admission and entering into the ground. This was a slight disappointment, because it's usually best to leave these kind of grounds for a bad weather day when everything else is waterlogged and postponed! Nevertheless, at least this game was definitely 'on' and in contrast to a lot of other 3G grounds, it had plenty of character. This is mainly due to to a refurbishment which happened during the 2017-18 season, which upgraded the then-current facilities without removing all the older characteristics of the ground. The main stand on the turnstile side was the original stand from when the ground used to belong to Willenhall Town, which Sporting Khalsa bought from them nine years ago when they went into financial difficulty. I spent some time chatting to Gary of 353 Photography who told us all sorts of useful history about the place. He was also the programme editor for the club, though unfortunately there was no programme for this game, but we did manage to obtain a team sheet.

The dugouts are unusual in the respect that they make up the front row of the main stand, cordoned off by a barrier separating the players from spectators. This is as far as I can remember, the only ground I've been to where the dugouts are part of the stand.

The main stand interior

The main stand exterior

As you can see from the pictures, the seats and ground are decorated with the clubs yellow and blue colours. The ground looks really bright and aesthetically pleasing. Besides the two main stands, there is no other terracing or covered areas. This isn't to say that you can't freely roam about: there is uncovered hard standing right the way around. Behind the goal opposite the clubhouse and changing rooms is a raised section. This allows for an elevated view and makes for a nice change of viewpoint throughout the game.

The other seated stand

This was always going to be a close match with both teams playing in the FA Women's National League Division 1 Midlands: Lincoln City fifth, just three places above Sporting Khalsa. The goalless first half displayed some very good football, especially from Khalsa who seemed to have the upper hand for the majority of the 45 minutes. They had the real first chance of the half, with the ball just shy of the net and bouncing off the post. Lincoln retaliated, though some good defending and goalkeeping from the home side halted Lincoln from scoring.

With October drawing to a close and the daylight diminishing thanks to the end of daylight saving going into this game, this was one of the first matches this season I had started to feel properly cold. This meant our usual half time routine of coffee was in order and off we went to the warm clubhouse to purchase our coffees for £1. To get to the clubhouse, you were to walk out of the ground and round, as the snack bar wasn't open for this game. On the way back around, I managed to spill some of my coffee as apparently walking 300 yards with a hot drink is difficult! In efforts to protect my camera from damage, the main victim of the spillage were my hands. Luckily I didn't get burnt and it actually did a nice job in warming my hands up! Still, I do not recommend...

Continued pressure by Sporting Khalsa continued into the second half, but Lincoln made a breakthrough around 15 minutes in. Around ten minutes after, Khalsa equalised, putting the two teams under pressure to score the winning goal. The hosts soon had another chance, but it strayed just wide of the post. Lincoln were the ones to break the deadlock and score another, putting themselves in the lead with a fantastic finish from a shot outside the box. Despite Khalsa's efforts, they didn't get another past the keeper and with a few minutes to go, Lincoln scored their third, sealing them a place in the next round of the cup.

Winners

Lincoln City demonstrated their lead over Sporting Khalsa in the league in this game with some excellent finishes and one can only admire them for that. As usual, best of luck to them in the next round and hopefully Sporting Khalsa will go into their next league game knowing they played some excellent football in this cup tie.

Sporting Khalsa seemed like a great community club, with a wealth of teams across all age groups for both females and males. It's facilities were excellent, housing various artificial pitches on the complex, with further developments on the cards.

Full photo set here.

Follow Sporting Khalsa Women on Twitter here and Lincoln City Women here.

Road to Wembley #4

You would think that leaving an Airbnb just outside Bristol at 9am would get me to Petersfield Park to witness the Second Round Qualifying clash between Cheltenham Town Ladies and Brislington LFC easily before the 2pm kick off? Well, in fact I was lucky to make the game at all, with a series of train cancellations doing anything to scupper my meticulously timed plan and stop me from attending. After a panic, some more walking, a bus ride and an almost two hour station wait, I finally boarded the 12:22 from Bristol Parkway to Cheltenham Spa. From there, the easiest option was to walk the 1.6 mile journey to the ground, arriving me at my destination just fifteen minutes before kick off for this somewhat local tie. They kicked off five minutes late, allowing me to take more photos beforehand and get a feel of the place.

One of the stands

The ground is the home ground of both Cheltenham Saracens FC and Cheltenham Town Ladies. It is situated approximately 30 minutes walk from the town centre. As I was pushed for time both there and back because of trains, I didn't take any photographs of the town, which I usually like to do when I visit a place. If my original train wasn't cancelled I would have got in around 11:15 which would have allowed me to look around Cheltenham first. Of course this wasn't the case, so I went straight from the station to ground which wasn't an especially scenic route, unless you like looking at massive Tesco supermarkets or reasonably average A roads. I can't say I do... 

The ground has two small seated stands and one covered standing section on one of the long sides. It has a compact clubhouse, which was filled with all the usual memorabilia and trophies, along with a snack bar and hot drink facilities. Coffee cost £1. The changing rooms were positioned just outside the ground near one corner in a separate building. The entry was £2, which included a programme. I was pleased about this, not because I'm an avid programme collector (I often don't bother with the things), but women's games especially lower down the leagues don't often issue a team sheet, let alone a programme so I must admit it was nice to receive one. The majority of the 80 spectators were already there when I arrived and the club had a friendly feel about it.

Despite picking this fixture over it's sheer convenience due to me being in the Bristol area at the weekend for the Western Hop the ground was a pleasant surprise. It was conveniently situated, just off the train route on the way back to Preston and for a ground I can't say has been on my radar or 'hit list', it by no means was a wasted or disappointing journey. There were more stands than I was expecting and the ground had a fair amount of character than the satellite version of Google Maps suggested. For bonus points, you can even see the Cotswolds if you are looking towards one of the goals, plus a train line running alongside the ground: a clear 'must visit' for all those who enjoy both trains and football! Unfortunately I didn't manage to get a photo with a train running past as they were few and far between.

Scenic

Character

With Cheltenham in third place of the FA Women's National League Division 1 South West and Brislington at the bottom of the table having lost all their matches so far, this tie was almost destined to go the host's way. Despite a few early chances holding Cheltenham in good stead for game, the visitors didn't make it easy and they too had their fair share of chances with a few shots going above the bar. Good defending too meant Cheltenham scored their first goal towards the end of the half at 39 minutes, with a brilliant free kick from Charlottle Criddle.

All change!

Brislington had the first real chance of the second half, which kicked off at ten past three. After a slow start, Cheltenham soon picked up the pace and kept the majority of possession. This half definitely showed the split between the two sides with Cheltenham looking extremely confident, bagging them their first goal of the half just 12 minutes in from a fierce strike by Georgia Brown. They scored again just two minutes after and then notched up a further two later in the half, resulting in a 5-0 victory at the whistle.

The win has Cheltenham going into the Third Round Qualifying, where they will take on Exeter in three weeks time on Sunday 27th October. This won't be the last time these two sides meet throughout the season, as they meet again in February next year.

The draw has been made and I'm already looking into a couple of options. Fingers crossed the travel will be easier..!

You can view the full photo set here.

You can follow Cheltenham Town Ladies on Twitter here and Brislington LFC here.

I Have NO Idea What this is Called

I've not written a post about animation on here for a while, so without further ado:

I went to the zoo recently with the intentions of filming more animal footage to animate over. As it was raining *all day*, I didn't get as much footage as I'd have hoped or liked, though I feel I still got some pretty useful stuff. Mostly of capybaras, mind... I think it should keep me occupied for a while, anyway.

I must admit, I have no idea what this animal is called. I just know it's super cute and felt like a good starting point. To the untrained eye, it's probably not that far removed from my usual work, though I will point out a vast difference: the addition or presence of markings/ colourings on the animal. My usual work often lacks any kind of shadow or shading and is often block colour. This is more a practical choice rather than a stylistic one, because it is usually down to lack of time. I like to try and complete one segment or clip of animation each week, because of a) discipline and b) an animation Instagram page won't look that great without much animation on it!

I do like what I have added here, as it definitely gives it more depth and characteristics than something without extra colour. Knowing that it has potential and clearly 'works' I would like to transfer this technique into more of projects, especially with the animated people, as sometimes they do look quite flat. It's not especially effected me thus far, though knowing adding what I have here makes me think I can create much more interesting imagery with a little extra work.

Elsewhere in my animated world, I animated my friend and collaborator Alan Livesey:

...And I also, after visiting a couple of portrait galleries of late, decided to do a few animated self portraits:

I think you are now update with pretty much most of my recent animation ventures, though don't forget to follow me on Instagram and Twitter if you like my work to stay super current and 'on trend'.

Road to Wembley #3

Despite deciding not to follow Farsley Celtic in this round due to them being drawn at home consecutively, I once again headed into Yorkshire to witness Yorkshire Amateurs AFC take on Hartlepool United Women in this first qualifying round. This meant all three rounds so far of the Women's FA Cup I've ventured into Yorkshire. I'm not quite sure what the attraction is: it could be because it's the county I was born in and there's something inside pulling me back, or maybe it's because the grounds have been both appealing and easy to get to via public transport. I'll let you decide...

From my base in Preston it's an easy route: a straight through train to Leeds, followed by a bus. Bus being optional and on a nicer day I would have walked the 2.5 mile trip to The Southerns Stadium, but having already got drenched on my walk from my house to the Preston train station, I decided not to risk it for a second time in one day! This also gave me a bit more time in Leeds to allow me to 'tick off' my 109th bowling alley (Roxy Lanes). Plus, it was forecast 'thundery showers' for the whole day, with a high per cent chance of rain. Luckily, once having reached the ground it stayed mostly dry, though unfortunately very grey and dark. Not all that good for photos.

I arrived at the ground in good time. This allowed me to take my usual pictures of the stands before the spectators arrive and get a feel for the place. My favourite stand was the seated one- well to look at- I didn't actually sit it in. I think my pictures will describe it more eloquently than I can, so without further ado:

I saw an image of the ground online last season and thought it looked attractive, but in real life it's even better. Well, depending on your taste, of course.

To the left of the seated stand were the two dugouts and players tunnel, with the changing rooms in a building behind. You could also stand between the two dugouts and be covered as well. Next to this was another stand. It was more of a covered hard standing section, though there were some benches dotted along. Directly behind this was the clubhouse.

Around the rest of the ground was uncovered hard standing. It was quite different than most of the grounds I've been to recently, because the rail was set quite far back from the pitch. This was especially apparent at one of the ends behind the goal and coupled with the large net to stop the ball going over, it made for quite distracting viewing. Of course you don't have to stand there, in which I only did to take a few photographs before moving on. As I made my way around the pitch, I noticed facing that goal you could see some of the tall buildings in Leeds city centre. On a nicer day the view would have been more clear, but it still was a pleasant surprise as I continued with my lap.

The entry was free- always slightly disappointing as I would happily pay entry to any game I go to. I don't think charging even one or two pounds would have turned away any of the 52 person crowd attending, but I suppose free entry means all welcome, whatever income you are on. There was a very friendly atmosphere about the place and I would really recommend a trip here if you haven't previously been.

The visitors, who play in the North East Women's Regional League, took a lead nine minutes in over Yorkshire Amateurs who play a step below in the West Riding Women's League. Hartlepool scored another thirteen minutes after. The hosts defended well for the rest of the half and didn't concede any more before the half time whistle.

Mirroring the first half, Hartlepool scored early (nine minutes), though nothing again for a while letting Yorkshire have a couple of chances, but not managing to hit the net. With Yorkshire failing to put on enough pressure, they conceded a further two in quick succession (thirty nine and forty mins), with the guests confidently securing their place in the next round. It's always sad to see the host team you're visiting lose especially when the club were so friendly, though from a perspective of a neutral Hartlepool were overall the better team.

I wish both clubs the best for the rest of the season. You can follow Yorkshire Amateurs on Twitter here and Hartlepool United WFC here.

Full photo set here.

Elephant #2

If you keep up with this blog or my creative ventures in general on my social media channels, then I assume you will know I've already created a clip with an elephant. Well, as I enjoyed that one so much, I decided to make another, from another piece of footage.

I wanted to make this one different to the last and also different to my other work, though I wanted to use to same sort of concept/ style as the previous elephant, using a silhouette and detail lines within said silhouette.

This time, I decided to fill the silhouette with big, bold, colourful dots, which move every frame. Why? I wanted to attempt filling a shape with something that isn't a block colour, plus it's aside from my usual often quite 'neat' and realistic style. The colours aren't ones you'd find on an elephant, either, unless of course it has been thoroughly mistreated and painted. Which is not the look I was trying to portray in this animation and I hope it doesn't come across that way. I wanted to expand and push ways to create pattern and texture in moving image on screen, along with wanting to push all the reality out of my work!

I overlaid the dots with texture, made up of frames I hand painted and scanned in:

...Which made the dots textured:

I really liked the amount of texture I used on the last elephant clip, so decided to take it a lot further in this one and use a textured background as well:

I thought the two lots of textures might clash or look too 'busy' on the final clip, but once I darkened the background, the two styles complemented each other well. It gave the look I wanted, which was basically a wall of texture and colour and definitely something I've not used before.

I really like what I've done here with the colourful dots. It's something I probably wouldn't have thought to do a year or two ago, which shows that I'm trying really hard to step away from my realistic style of work, to create something more surreal, perhaps. I think there's still so much further I can go with the rotoscope technique and it's really exciting for me to be able to experiment with so many different styles at this moment in time.

My next piece is slightly more realistic, though that's because it's for a short film a friend and I are developing and the style of the film doesn't need to have any crazy colourful dots- or at least not for now anyway..! Without further ado, here's the colourful elephant animation: 

Road to Wembley #2

September first was here, which not only signified the meteorological start of autumn, but also the Preliminary Round of the Women's FA Cup. My tie of choice for this round was a local derby between Farsley Celtic Ladies and Thackley Ladies, situated just under five miles from each other. Despite seeing Farsley's 3-0 win over Wakefield Trinity in the previous round, I wasn't intending on following the winner from each round I attend, because that poses potential problems, such as transport issues and revisiting grounds. A big part of what I enjoy about my football travels is going to new places, therefore not so keen on the idea of revisiting a ground in such a close timeframe, should consecutive home ties be drawn.

Exterior

I decided on this game, because I had intended to visit twice before, though unfortunately on both occasions, the games had been called off: once in March due to bad weather and more recently in August for a pre-season friendly when the opposing team couldn't field a side. I had also heard good things about the place and when a few fellow groundhoppers put pictures of the stand on social media following the men's game they attended on Bank Holiday Monday, I made up my mind to come here. Third time lucky, then?

I got on the 11:43 train from Preston, which goes straight through to New Pudsey (there isn't a 'Farsley' station), which would have me arrive at 13:21, giving me ample time to walk the eighteen minute journey to the ground. Unfortunately there was an issue with the train and it was held for what seemed like an infinite amount of time at Blackburn while they sorted out whatever fault the train had developed en route. Eventually the train got going again and luckily arrived just twelve minutes late, leaving me ten minutes to spare when I arrived at The Citadel. It gave me just enough time to get settled and take a few photographs of the exterior and clubhouse area before kick off.

I started watching the game near the entrance in front of the bar and clubhouse, just to the left of the main stand (more on that later). I then slowly made my way around the ground in an anti-clockwise direction, stopping at various intervals to take photos and watch the match from different angles. On the other side of the stand was some beautiful old terracing. After admiring that for a while and taking a couple of photographs, I continued on my lap and spied further terracing on the other side. This ran the whole length of the opposite long side and although not as old as the other, it still looked rather pleasing and when stood on, it gave a nice elevated change of view. The trees behind this also provided generous and well needed shelter for when the rain came at half time.

The older terracing

The other terracing

This is when the rain set in- or so it seemed: despite complete cloud cover and a heavy downpour, the rain eased off around fifteen minutes into the second half. Thankfully I had got the majority of the photos I wanted by then. By this point I had taken shelter under the long covered terrace behind the goal as the rain got too heavy for my makeshift tree shelter! Here was where I got chatting to a spectator who also turned out to be a hopper. He was based just outside of Leeds and had good knowledge about various clubs in the local area- both men's and women's. He explained to me that both the ground and club had had some work done over the summer, including a new look green and white kit, along with new badge. This was in replacement of the previous blue kit, the colours in which the ground is still painted in. He also told me that the youth teams use the back pitch, while the women and men's first teams, along with Albion Sports all use the main pitch. Kudos to the groundsperson(s).

Following a further shower or two after the main bulk of rain subsided, I left the stand and moved a little further around the ground to get a few more pictures of the main stand from a different angle, thus completing my lap. If you follow me on social media, then you might already know that I like a stand with wooden seats and The John Palmer Stand had exactly that. 400 of them, in fact. I lingered around after the final whistle had blown enabling me to take a few closer photographs of the stand and seats without any spectators in shot. I had almost one hour before my train, so this provided a productive way of spending a portion of that time.

Farsley scored in the fifth minute of the first half and didn't give the visitors much of a chance, with possession staying predominately with them. Despite this, they failed to hit the net for the rest of the half and it was only until the second half where they scored a further two- one being an absolutely fantastic kick by Shirley Murphey from a short corner assist! It could have perhaps been a couple more, because they missed a few what looked like clear cut chances, though a 3-0 win takes them safely into the next round. Despite Thackley not having as much possession, they didn't make it easy for the hosts and too had their fair share of chances- the closest hitting the crossbar.

There were about 50 in attendance, though I didn't actually do a count as I'm too embarrassed to use my clicker on my own! So there could have been more. The admittance was free, though I would happily have paid to watch this game. Congratulations to Farsley as they progress into the First Round Qualifying and commiserations to Thackley who will have to wait another year to try their hand at this prestigious tournament.

I'm now looking forward to the next draw to see where to visit next...

Full set of photographs here. 

I Don't Like Cricket

...I love it. A post about cricket, what else is there to call it, right?! Yes, my sense of humour really is that bad. Shall we get on with the blog post now?

I said in a previous post I'm making a series of small animations at the moment and I have now finished my next one and this time it's all about cricket.

I started on another animal animation, but it just wasn't going to plan and I didn't have the will to finish it. This is because I didn't want to potentially waste time to finish a clip which might not look very good when done, especially with how long animation takes. I was looking on my computer for any other video clips I had hanging around and came across some cricket footage I shot around 2009, for a project I made in college. And no, I will not be sharing that here, as it will most probably embarrass my brother who is in it! Oh and the fact that I shot it on a compact digital camera against a terribly lit green screen.

As it's quite a summer of cricket (Men's World Cup, Women's Ashes, Men's Ashes and all the usual county stuff) it felt right to rehash the footage and make something new out of it. It was around 2012 where I already had my first attempt at animating said footage, though as it doesn't reflect my current skill level, I wanted to see what I could do with it now.

A still from the previous cricket video I made in 2012

When I went into this project, I had no idea what it was going to turn out like, but I knew I wanted to make it fast paced, eye catching and like something I've never made before. When I say I had no idea what it was going to turn out like, I mean I didn't have a storyboard or anything and had little idea of the styles I would use throughout the animation. These came as I was animating it and the raw animations were really only the basis of the full animation, as it all came together in the edit.

The final piece used a number of different rotoscope styles, along with various other effects and techniques which I combined in Premiere Pro. As there are so many styles, I will go through them piece by piece and say what worked/ what didn't work etc. and so on:

Before the animation starts, there is a split second of a 'movie countdown', which I made a number of years ago for another project. I thought when I put this animation together, it was still looking too 'clean' and wasn't especially jelling, so I decided to intersperse this countdown throughout. It was a bit of a risky move for me, because I was worried it might look a bit cheesy/ tacky. Even after deciding to keep it in and after uploading it to various destinations on the internet, I still had my doubts, despite all good feedback. Now I quite like it and think the video would look somewhat empty without it.

After the countdown cuts out, we are left with this film strip style clip. I wasn't sure what to do with this section, as the animation style (silhouette and white detail line) was fairly basic. It wasn't looking good filling the full screen, so decided to make three of them and stack them up like so. This was also to relate to a clip later on in the video. I really like how I found an effective solution here and it's definitely something I've never used before in any of my own projects. It's also in keeping with the old film style, which is a constant throughout the video, as you will soon see. 

The next section I decided to give a '3D' look by adding a coloured 'shadow' on either side of the figure. I left the background just white here, but perhaps I could have added some TV style 'scan' lines or a slight fuzz, to make it look a little less plain. I do quite like the white though, as the rest of the video is quite busy and mainly uses black backgrounds, so it provides a nice contrast.

If you can see past the number and film grain here, I did this section in a sort of comic book style, by shading the shadow, with a silhouette behind. I then inverted the colours. I like how this turned out and I think it was the right choice to use this effect on this shot. This is because it's a fairly tight shot in terms of framing, so I wanted something a little more than a silhouette to display some detail. I think this was achieved here.

I thought of this section before the beginning section where there are three clips stacked vertically, though this time they are horizontal. I decided to have them going side by side, because the motion of the bowler is going across the screen. The earlier shot where they're on top of each other, is because the movement of the shot is panning upwards. I added a blurred out version of the bowler clip behind as well here, because the background was definitely much too plain for my liking. This really emphasised the clip, as the three squares are quite small on screen, too.

Before I made the outline offset, this clip was looking rather plain and a little flat. I was looking on Premiere Pro for any suitable effects and came across this and decided to settle on it. I can't remember what it's called now! Maybe it's a warp effect.

I was trying to find more variants to create the figure without getting too repetitive. I thought I could do some kind of cross over between the comic book inking style earlier on and the standard silhouette I've used quite a lot throughout. Leg pads are very iconic to cricket, so decided to highlight these in this way and nothing else. This is definitely one of my favourite clips in terms of aesthetics.

I repeated the batsman play his shot to emphasise it. I thought it would make the video appear even faster and more eye catching, than if I just had him play his shot once and that was that. I feel that doing this was a good choice, as it created the effect I wanted to achieve. For this section of the repeat, I used three outlines all in bright colours, with some extra streaks to highlight the movement at various points. These are the yellow and red marks you can see top right in the above image. As you will see when watching the video, these streaks are constants throughout. They not only give the video some extra pace and dimension, but also because the video is made up of so many different styles, they essentially tie the video together.

Here I used a silhouette, with a different outline. Instead of using the regular ink brush I often use in TVPaint, I used the oil brush. This brush provides a vast difference in line thickness, ranging from extremely thin and barely noticeable to very thick, almost like a highlighter pen. I don't often use this brush because I'm unsure whether I like it, but it really works in this shot, so it's definitely a brush I will remember to use in the future.

The penultimate shot was a simple silhouette flash, where I inverted the image negative across three frames. It definitely comes in the right place in the video and is a contrast to the shots either side.

I felt this last shot against a plain black background wasn't really doing much and really thought it could do with a little extra 'something'. I had also used it previously, so didn't want the final piece to end up looking too repetitive. I was just messing around on Premiere to see what effects I could use and came across this broken up image effect. This was after me messing around with the parameters, of course! I like how it's not just a plain silhouette behind it, or a plain red background, but it is actually the outline of the figure, which moves as the figure moves. It does look perhaps a little dated, but I also think it did what I was needing it to do to round off the video nicely.

•

I found this exercise to be really useful in a number of ways. Mainly, it was fun to experiment so much, push my comfort zones and force me out of the usual styles I like to work in and find 'safe'. It goes to show that when you do change what you're used to, it doesn't always work out in a negative way, but often very positive and even if the end result isn't what you wanted, then at least you gave it a go. I always think that if you don't try anything new, then you're never going to progress and develop- this can be in anything, not just creative work. I'm often bad for doing this, because I don't like things going wrong, though recently I have been making myself try new things (in life) and new ways of creating things (in work) and feel I'm often better for having done those.

Overall, I'm pleased with the outcome, because of a) how it looks and b) my attitude towards creating the piece, as described in the previous paragraph. It achieved what I wanted it to- eye catching and different to my usual style, but still in keeping with the techniques I like to use (rotoscope and analogue film). I also like how I used a quite experimental approach to the edit, by using numerous effects in Premiere Pro, to give it more dimensions. I'm often cautious to do this sort of thing, but I feel it paid off. This is something I will take forward into future projects.

Obviously the piece isn't perfect, because nothing ever is and there are still some things I'm unsure about, such as whether I should have done more with the backgrounds. I also cut out a shot, as it just wasn't working. It wasn't in keeping with the rest of the styles in the video and whatever I did to it, it just looked out of place, so I cut it. Anyway, I feel this piece is somewhat a new start or the start of something new and I hope I can progress my work further and more confidently.

Here is the full clip: