Short Film: Receiving Feedback

As mentioned in my previous post on the topic of my next short film, I said I’d write a little about the feedback process. I asked several trusted friends/ colleagues whom I value the opinion of to provide me with some feedback mainly regarding story. It’s quite easy to get lost in what you’re making and what might be obvious to you, potentially won’t translate to others who have not seen the project before or know what it’s about. I sent them what was then my “completed” animatic, alongside a Google form with a few specific questions I had (as aforementioned: mostly related to story, though there was also space for them to write any other notes/ comments/ suggestions). I did not give the synopsis to the people I was asking for feedback from, neither did I tell them anything about the story or themes or anything for that matter! This was so I could get the most true opinions.

The process was extremely useful, though always scary/ nerve-racking when sending something out like this, especially when it’s a fairly personal piece of work and also very rough- I didn’t spend a whole lot of time on the audio and as for the visuals, lots of it was quite Frankensteined together! Despite a few comments on people unsure of the geographical locations (due to the way I had cobbled the animatic together), the general themes seemed to have come across, as did the gist of the story. Though feedback is always difficult, as film is very subjective and you bring your own meaning to the films you watch because of your own lived experiences. So something that reads in one way to one, might read another way to others.

Saying this, there were some sections/ ideas that did need clearing up and clarifying further as they didn’t quite come across in the way I had intended. The animatic has been re-edited pretty dramatically since receiving the feedback. I feel this current cut tells the story I want to tell and in a much clearer way. Most of the scenes are there, though the order has changed and some bits have been added (and some redacted). It was a little difficult at first to change aspects of it and/ or cut scenes which I liked, but you just need to do what is best for the film and trust that it will be a stronger piece because of it. And I’m sure once I have shot the footage, it will likely change again and then again after I have started animating it. Films often shape as they grow, because some scenes or shots might not work as well in actuality even if they worked well on (metaphorical) paper.

I’ve now started shooting some of the reference material, so once I’ve made more headway with that, I’ll put another update on here… Another storyboard panel below as I appreciate this post is pretty wordy!

I Painted a Skateboard Deck!

As the title suggests: I painted my next skateboard deck! Here’s a few pics:

And a few of the (lengthly) process below:

It started with a mockup (above), just to see if my idea would work. It's extremely rough and looks nothing like the finished piece, but the concept is the same. It was taking forever to plot out the pins how I wanted them (which was a lot closer together than on this- this is so sparse).

I made a template of a bowling pin from card and drew around it creating an ‘all over’ style pattern on the deck. I then used acrylic paint for the base layer. I was lazy and didn’t sand the deck down first (naughty, I know), but the paint held quite well regardless. Though I’m sure the coat of paint would have been a lot smoother if I had sanded the deck first. So in future, I will definitely get the good old sandpaper out! Also, just for info, the deck I used was an ‘Enuff’ blank deck (8”). I usually wouldn’t go for this brand, but I’m sure it won’t be the worst thing ever to skate. Or at least I hope not!

Second coat (left) vs first coat (right)

After the base layer had fully dried, I used Posca paint markers to do coat two of the white, followed by the red stripes at the top of the pins (once coat 2 had fully dried). The second coat of white made it look a lot cleaner and more vibrant, as you can see in the image above). The first coat really wasn’t that opaque, despite me using a fairly decent brand of paint (Liquitex). I did the red stripes freehand, so they aren’t completely uniform, but for this project I felt that wasn’t especially important: the overall impression is there and they aren’t even wonky! It felt odd for me to do something which challenges my perfectionism, but I didn’t think measuring out the lines and drawing them on with pencil first would have made much difference to the overall design of the deck and would have just wasted time. Perhaps for another project, yes, but definitely not for this one. It’s going to get scratched off after a few skate sessions anyway!

It took a while to create, especially the first coat of paint, but no good things come easy (or so we’re told). I’m super proud of it and can not wait to skate it! I always feel I skate better when I’m using a deck with a design I’m fully into and this deck, I am 100% fully in! It’s essentially my dream deck. Bowling and skateboarding all in one- doesn’t get much better than that! I think I’ll get some white griptape as I always like to match the grip with the board graphic... See you at the skatepark xo

Embroidery: 'Covid Abstraction #1'

If you are a regular here, then you will know that my embroidery (and the majority of my other work) is extremely calculated and planned out. I like order, what can I say! And it’s also to do with the whole perfectionism thing I’ve got going on and probably a wealth of other things. But, last week I managed to contract Covid. Slap bang in the middle of summer and during my birthday week. Yes there are worse problems to have, but it was still very un-fun.

To get rid of the illness quickly, rest is best, but lying in bed all day for two days straight had me yearning to do something creative. There’s only so many trashy films and Sudoku puzzles I can take! I decided I wanted to do some embroidery. It’s a low effort(ish), high reward activity, not messy, and fairly easy to get set up (my box of threads, scissors, fabric, needle). Though I really didn’t have the energy (physically or mentally) to create a pattern or even trace a pre-existing design onto the fabric. So I thought: well why don’t I just sew? And that’s exactly what I did. No pre-planning, no sketch, no pencil guides. Nothing.

As you can see from the above image of what I created, I decided to just do squares/ rectangles as they’re the easiest- I mean who wants to mess about with circles or wavy lines when unwell? Not me, no thank you! And to keep it even more simple, I used just one type of stitch (Satin Stitch), which also happens to be my favourite! I used no outlines and just switched colours when I felt like the one I was using had even coverage. It sort of evolved as it went on and I thought of new ideas as it developed- i.e. filling the gaps with white squares at the end- this was because I thought if I do full coverage in all different colours, it might end up looking a bit messy/ murky. Though maybe I will make another one exploring that idea…

I actually liked this different way of working, or at least I did for this project. It was quite freeing just deciding what to do on the spot and working to no specific pattern or design. It was more like a ‘doodle’ in fabric or a stream of consciousness. And it also backs up the notion that just creating up something (anything) leads to further ideas/ inspiration. Before this I wasn’t that inspired with the embroidery as I had just finished a rather large project and was unsure what to produce next. Now I have ideas flooding to me! Picking up the needle/ pen/ pencil/ insert chosen medium here, really does lead to ideas, especially if you’re feeling stuck or lacking in motivation.

I’ll definitely be working this way again, but that’s not to say I’ll not be returning back to my more organised creative endeavours! It was a really fun ‘no strings attached’ way to create something, which I don’t often entertain. Watch this space for more…

Animatic Completion Post (round 1)!

As the title would suggest, I have now completed a full run through of my animatic*! After many iterations, I may add. The film currently runs almost eight minutes in length, so although once I have filmed all the footage it’s likely to vary, it still gives me a good idea early on of how much animation and backgrounds I’ll be looking to produce and therefore the length of time it might take. Which is always nice to know!

*if you’re reading this and are unsure what an animatic is, it is essentially a moving storyboard. So in the most basic form, you would draw all your storyboard panels as usual, then put them in the timeline in an editing software and adjust the duration of each panel to mirror how long that frame might take to play out if it was actually a moving film. Then add any scratch dialogue/ SFX/ temp music to give more of a sense of the final animation and then you’re good to go! If you want to find out more info or delve deeper into this, then there’s a ton of resources online such as this video (this whole series is excellent by the way)!

The animatic took a lot longer than I thought it might- though doesn’t everything animation related?! And it wasn’t quite as smooth a process as I’d have hoped, but I feel it’s been such a wonderful tool in shaping the story for my film, I don’t regret doing it. Or at least not for this short (a feature I expect will be a different kettle of fish). It has given me a much more accurate idea of how the story works visually, rather than any storyboard or script I have ever written. It’s probably because I can see (in the crudest way possible) the film play out like I’m actually watching it and because of that, it makes it clearer to see which sections are working, which sections aren’t and what needs more work. It also allows others who I’m asking for feedback to see it visually too, meaning the feedback received is likely to be more accurate/ relevant.

When I made my previous short film, I went the more traditional way in terms of numerous script drafts, followed by a storyboard and then into filming it. Once I pieced it together in the edit as per my storyboard/ script, I realised that the story didn’t quite translate as I had intended on the page. This resulted in me spending a significant amount of time in the edit essentially crafting a new story from the footage I had. Well, not completely ‘new’ as the core elements were there, but it wasn’t the film I had scripted either. This meant loads of footage went unused, so that time spent filming those scenes could have shifted to spending more time on the scenes I did use and not having to rush towards the end of shoot day 2 when the light was fading. But you live and you learn and nothing good ever comes easy.

Whereas for this one, I used the animatic as part of the script writing process. I’m a much more visual person, so I felt this way of shaping my story suited me better. And I feel a lot more confident going into the shoot of this one, that I already know it will work as a story and I’ll be shooting only the scenes I’ll be using. Of course a few things will change- it’s rare for things not to at each stage of the filmmaking process, but I feel relatively confident that it will work well once shot.

I’m now in the scary ‘waiting for feedback’ stage of the process. I have sent my animatic to a few people whom I trust and value the opinions of to see if the story makes sense to anyone who isn’t me and see if anyone has any notes/ thoughts I have not considered. Once I have all the feedback, I will decide what/ if to make changes, especially if a certain note keeps cropping up in numerous responses. I might do another post on the feedback aspect of creating the short, as I feel it’s an important part of the filmmaking process. So stay tuned for that!

I am still not going to be revealing the synopsis just yet (sorry!), but I will give you the title: ‘I Wish I Was There’. So you can use your imagination of what it could be about… I’ll stick a few panels below as well.

Embroidered Animation (another)!!

Remember in my last post I said I had been working on a super secret embroidery/ animation project? OK, well, I have finally finished it! Ta-da!

A 21 frame embroidery/ animation/ skateboarding mashup. So basically all of my favourite things combined into one 2 second clip. Was it worth it? Well kind of…

I must admit, I felt the result was a little anticlimactic or at least on having immediately finished it. I think because I had spent so long creating the piece, I thought I’d be super ‘wowed’ by it on completion, but for some reason it fell a little flat. Though that is often a quite common feeling after any big project (or at least in my experience): like when it’s done, a random all-singing all-dancing fanfare isn’t going to suddenly appear and you’re not going to get your favourite producer calling you up out the blue asking if you want funding for a feature film (though one can dream). In reality, you’ve just finished a piece of work and then the day just carries on!

Perhaps it’s a sense of a loss/ emptiness (of finishing the project) juxtaposed with expectation vs result, which is why I felt a little underwhelmed. But also, because it’s not my first embroidered animation, I have something to compare it to and on the whole, I feel the first one I did was much more impactful. Maybe because the previous one was fully hand stitched, whilst this one was only partly hand stitched, part mixed media, so not quite as impressive?

I’m not saying I dislike it, not at all and I am extremely proud of the accomplishment- to hand stitch 21 frames of animation is quite a feat and if it was easy, everyone would be doing it. I think because the sewing is neat, it perhaps looks too ‘clean’ and not ‘hand made’ enough for my liking. Especially when viewed on a phone screen- I feel the detail disappears. You can’t really tell it is sewn unless you play it frame by frame (or watch it on desktop), so it feels like all the hours I spent hand stitching each frame have kind of got lost. And as an animated clip itself (say if it wasn’t sewn), it’s a little straightforward.

I also think the choice of using plain white fabric wasn’t the best for the background- because once scanned in, the texture of the fabric is so blown out. This of course I wasn’t to know going into the project, but perhaps I could have thought ahead and done a scan test of the fabric to see how it might look. Anyway, what good is an experiment such as this if you don’t learn anything from it? I didn’t want to recreate what I did previously because I had already done that, so here I was trying something different, which is (often) always the point of these small clips I make. Perhaps the next one I try will just be stitched outlines- though that might be a short while off, as I’m pretty deep into creating my next narrative short…

Below are a few of the frames before I edited them in post: outlines, hair and shoes were all hand stitched; for the jeans I scanned in some denim and added it in post, the t-shirt and wheels I coloured with gel pens on the fabric and everything else coloured in post and used a ‘multiply’ blend mode, so the texture of the fabric showed through.

Several of the frames

Close up

Final comp image

Update 1/7/24 (incredibly boring post title)

Goooood morning! Looks like I skipped the whole of June on here- too busy to blog- I guess that’s a good thing though, right?! So what have I been busy with? Another assistant editor contract, skateboarding, attending Sheffield DocFest, watching films, a few little trips away, watching even more films, watching cricket, continuing my super secret embroidery project as alluded to in this post aaaaand storyboarding my next short film. I’m sure I missed out a few things there, too!

When I don’t have anything specific to blog about- I.e. if I haven’t finished any of the projects I’m working on yet, I don’t tend to do ‘update’ blog posts until after a while (like this), because I find that I don’t have much of value to say if I keep up my blog each week purely for the sake of it. Plus it takes valuable time away from the project(s) in hand. Alongside not wanting to give away too many ‘spoilers’, so when I reveal the project once complete, it will feel fresher. Of course this depends what kind of project it is- I don’t mind giving work in progress updates of my longer form projects such as the short films I make etc.

One of the reasons that I blog (other than to create a record of my creative endeavours) is often in retrospective so I can analyse (I’m a sucker for a good bit of analysis) and reflect on what I have created, in order to develop my creative practice (and my personal growth). If a project is not yet finished, then I don’t like to go into depth on it, because you can’t tell whether you have met your aims or ambitions with said project if it’s not yet complete. I’m sure any creatives reading this will know not to cast judgment on your own work whilst it’s still a work in progress because 99% of the time you will probably hate it! When it’s finished, this percentage will dramatically drop and given even more time/ distance away from the project, it will drop further and you will be able to make more measured and constructive comments about your work. And if you still hate it at this stage, then you can hopefully at the very least have learnt something from it, whether that be about your creative practice or yourself as a person.

But as it’s been a while, I did want to put something on here to say I’m still chipping away at my work- the storyboard is almost finished- well the majority of the panels have been drawn. Then I ‘just’ need to turn it into an animatic. After that stage, I’ll give more of a ‘proper’ blog post/ update about it- whereas this is more of a ‘check in’/ hello-please-dont-forget-that-I-exist post! So maybe expect something else towards the end of this month? I think my embroidery project should be done around that time too, so expect something on that as well. Plus, I have a painting thing in the works too. And maybe will try and squeeze in some more football photography if I find the time, so will post the results on here if I manage to get out with my camera at all. Just a few bits lined up for July then!! I also realised that I haven’t done a deep dive post on here about skateboarding before, so perhaps expect that at some point as well? I feel that would be appropriate being as it occupies 99.9% of my headspace at any one time! So, yeah, lots going on. What are you working on? Anything exciting? Hope so!

Here’s a pic of my hand drawing my storyboard with myself as reference:

See you in the next one, be good xo

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!