New Character Designs

After presenting my characters and receiving feedback, I went back and began tweaking their designs, placing more emphasis on shapes. For instance, Duncan's design is based more on a square/rectangle, Ryan's design is based on a triangle, and Zack's design is built around circles and round shapes.

April 23, 2018: World

With the characters established, we now move into developing the world they inhabit. Here we must decide how it characters interact with it and how it shapes them and their experience in the story.

The overall setting for my short film is a fictional small town in the California desert called Haven Falls. The town takes inspiration from several real-life towns based around the Salton Sea in California, such as Salton City and Bombay Beach. Like these towns, Haven Falls was once a thriving vacation spot in the 1950s and early 1960s due to its beaches on the local bay. At its peak,  various unexplained phenomena began occurring in Haven Falls, including reported abductions and large, dark masses spotted in the sky projecting beams down onto the Earth. City officials tried to play up the notion of aliens and make it a tourist attraction like Roswell, New Mexico. However, it was revealed the water in the bay was becoming increasingly contaminated, with some believing there was a connection between this and the strange events. As a result, most people fled the area, leaving only a few hundred residents.

Today, the town is largely abandoned, littered with rusted, crumbling remains of cars, buildings, and boats from the time. Throughout the town, many either live in small houses, trailers, and occasionally RVs while the buildings such as gas stations, motels and restaurants retain the Googie architecture that was popular when the town was at its peak. Meanwhile, because of the rapid decline of the town, many houses under construction were left unfinished. The overall population is generally lower middle class, and there are only a few businesses still running in the area. Children in the area went to schools in neighboring towns and there is only a small community college in the county. Meanwhile, the only sort of tourism that comes in are paranormal enthusiasts who want to investigate the rumors of aliens in the area.

Once a promising hotspot for beachgoers, it is now largely a ghost town riddled with relics from its peak. This is where our protagonists have been born and raised. As there is so little to do, the three and others had to find their own entertainment, which is what led Duncan to become so interested in doing experiments. However, the three perceive the area in different ways. For Ryan and Zack, this is their world. They have grown up here with no chance of getting out and have accepted this, and have tried to simply find their place in this small community. However, Haven Falls is a prison to Duncan, who wants to go onto bigger and better things. By feeling trapped in this dead end town, Duncan is driven to find a way out and he feels actually finding evidence of the reported UFOs in the area. Ultimately, this small community is partially responsible for the unity between the protagonists. Because the population is so small and secluded, they only have each other to rely on. If they don't have each other, they don't have anybody.

In the short itself, we find the main characters searching for UFOs, they are on the outskirts of town, based out of an old abandoned gas station, again in the Googie style. At this station, all that remains are a couple of old gas pumps and a rusted car out front. A welcome sign with a design from the 1950s is nearby, but is rusting and the paint is faded and chipping. In the distance, we see some of the actual town itself. There are a few old buildings such as a restaurant and a fire station, but mostly we see residential buildings. The nearest building is Mr. Winters' particularly dilapidated trailer, with his lawn chair where he usually sits out front.

In Ideas for Animated Short, the authors explain how elements like texture and color can help inform the mood and atmosphere of the scene. In the case of Haven Falls, the overall color scheme is comprised of warm colors like oranges, yellows and browns combined with the blue of the sky during the day and the purple at night. Meanwhile, the texture of the overall area's texture is a mix of graininess and corrosion. I want to present a world that comes across as hostile to outsiders but is more welcome to the protagonists and is home to them. A number of buildings and signs feature styles popular in the 1950s when the town was at its peak, representing optimism and potential. Meanwhile, it is juxtaposed with the decay and the inhospitable environment that surrounds the town. This juxtaposition is symbolic of the relationship between the three, with the relics from Haven Falls' peak representing Duncan and his ambition and optimism and the abundance or rust and corrosion represents Ryan and Zack, who are more cynical than their friend. Together, the elements fit together to create the community of Haven Falls today, which still survives in its own unique way.

April 16, 2018: Character

Now that the story has been established, we must explore the characters in this story. While the story post gave a brief preview of the characters and their personalities, we have now look at each character in depth and what goes on in their head.

In my short, I have three core characters: Duncan, Ryan and Zack. These three are longtime friends that have known each other since childhood, forming a dysfunctional, but close knit group. While they frequently spend their time bickering or fighting with one another, they will stand by each other in times of crisis.

In order to better understand the character, the book Ideas for the Animated Short, points out three elements to a scene in acting: objective/goal, intentions, and tactics. Each character has these and I need to break these down to understand what they are doing in the scene.

Duncan

Duncan is the intellectual of the three and is the de facto leader of the group. Typically he devises ideas in pursuit of his interests and is able to goad his friends into accompanying him. While intelligent, Duncan has a habit of letting his interests turn into obsessions and frequently, these obsessions are related to scientific and paranormal phenomena. However, his longest running pursuit is finding the existence for extraterrestrial. Overall, Duncan can be awkward but is generally friendly. However, when he gets locked on one of his obsessions, he becomes much more distant and unsociable. While he cares about his friends, he sometimes has an issue of prioritizing his obsessions over them, which frequently causes friction between the three. This is the main conflict between the main characters in the short film and he must decide what is more important to him.

Duncan and his younger brother were raised by his parents in their small hometown of Haven Falls. His father works at a nearby power plant and his mother works as a receptionist at a local motel. Scientifically inclined, Duncan hopes to someday leave home and pursue higher level education, with the goal of becoming an aeronautical engineer. Another goal he has is to be a published science fiction author. Deep down, Duncan views himself as a big fish in a small pond in his hometown and fears he is wasting his potential if he is not studying or reading. While it is still home to him, he wants to move past Haven Falls and his biggest fear is failing to live up to his potential and being stuck in Haven Falls for the rest of his life. As a result, he also pursues his obsessions as a way to keep himself occupied in his small town. Duncan is twenty one years old and met his friends early on in elementary school. While he excelled in high school, most colleges were too expensive and he spent two years in community college. After graduating with his associate's degree, got a job at a local repair shop. There, he frequently works on cars and other equipment people will bring in, giving him experience with various technologies. When not at work or with his friends, Duncan tends to stow himself away in his room, reading or studying conspiracy theories. Overall, when Duncan finds something he is interested in, it develops into an obsession and it consumes him. In turn, he frequently drags his friends along in his schemes.

Duncan's objective in the beginning is to find proof that extraterrestrials exist. His intention is to seek out an area/region that is notorious for suspected UFO sightings. When he notices Zack and Ryan getting pulled up by the dark mass in the sky, his tactic is to take a picture of the shape. However, he now also has objective of saving his friends, by pulling them back down, and he must choose which goal he wants to accomplish.

Ryan

Independent, snarky and sarcastic, Ryan is Duncan and Zack's best friend and reluctant participant in their activities. Typically serving as a foil to Duncan, Ryan is also very intelligent, but lacks his friend's optimism or ambitions. As a result, he tends to oppose whatever idea Duncan has cooked up, viewing them as pointless. As time has gone on, Duncan's various obsessions have gotten on Ryan's nerves, and he has become much more impatient with him. Meanwhile, he tends to boss Zack around, but gets easily frustrated with him and his more childlike demeanor. In terms of personality, Ryan comes across as serious and occasionally grouchy, with a hair trigger temper. He tends to be the most cynical of the three and will not hesitate to protest something he disagrees with. He also does not like things that disrupt the status quo, and views Duncan's activities as threats to that stability. As a result, he often has to serve as a reluctant voice of reason for his friends and causes arguments between them. This tension leads to him finally becoming fed up with Duncan. However, despite frequently butting heads with his friends, Ryan deeply cares about his friends and wants to keep them safe.

Ryan is twenty-one and met his friends in elementary school. Growing up in a small trailer with his father, Ryan was a delinquent who frequently got into trouble in his teens. Since then, he has matured and moved out of his rebellious phase, but still maintains an aggressive, independent demeanor. Since graduating, he took a job at a local grocery store, but deep down, music is his passion and he dreams to be a musician. However, unlike Duncan, he has accepted his life in this small town and has no real ambitions to leave, simply finding enjoyment through practicing or playing to small crowds in town. In his spare time, he usually practices guitar, performs, goes to a local, dingy bar for drinks or spends time with his friends in the desert. As music is one of only a handful of things Ryan loves, one of his biggest fears is losing the ability to play it, whether it is from breaking his hand to losing his equipment. Another fear is possibly going deaf. Ultimately, Ryan is a grumpy, independent jerk with a heart of gold and is concerned about his friends' well-being, even if he does not say it.

In the short, Ryan's main objective is to get his friends to quit searching for UFOs for the night and go back into town. To do so, his intention is to talk to Duncan, who is spearheading this operation, and convince him. However, when Duncan brushes him aside, Ryan's new tactic is to simply get Zack and convince him to leave with him. When the abductions begin, his new objective is to save Zack. This results in his intention of pulling Zack back down to the ground. When this fails, his new tactic is to get Duncan to help.

Zack

Zack is the most passive member of the trio and typically has to serve as the middleman between the two. Compared to his friends, Zack is not as bright, tends to be quieter and sometimes has trouble articulating what he has to say. He is also not as stubborn as Ryan or Duncan and is easily impressed. As a result, both have easy sway over him and his opinions. Duncan can easily convince him to join him in his experiments while Ryan can easily lead him and boss him around. However, he is not oblivious to his friends' influence. For instance, if he feels Duncan's experiments are too much or he is sick of Ryan's attitude, he will get angry, which is what happens in the short film. Many of his favorite activities involve staying home and playing video games or watching television, and he rarely goes out to do things if his friends are not there to accompany him. However, after graduating high school, Zack began working as a cook in the local diner his parents run. There, he discovered a passion for cooking and he now dreams of taking over the diner someday or starting his own. Family is also very important to him and hopes his own children will follow in his footsteps the way he is following in his parents'.

Zack is generally shy around people, but has a strong devotion to those he cares about. Because his friends and family are so important to him, his biggest fear is being forgotten by those he cares about and being abandoned. This fear gives him a neurotic drive to go out of his way to make sure everyone is happy. At the same time, he gets very upset when there is conflict. As he is the most amiable of the three, he usually serves as a messenger between his two thickheaded friends when they get into arguments. He lacks Duncan's ambitions of leaving home and Ryan's cynicism and is simply content living in the world he occupies. He does not really think of what goes on around him. Instead, he just goes wherever life takes him.

While Zack shares the same initial objectives, intentions and tactics as Ryan, he has a new objective when he sees abductions occurring in the distance: get away from the abductions in the distance. His intention is to talk to his friends and his tactics involve approaching each character when the other won't listen and trying to explain what is in the distance. However, each character is too wrapped in their own objectives to listen.

Mr. Winters

Mr. Winters is a local who has lived in Haven Falls since its heyday in the 1950s. However, he refused to leave as the local lake became polluted and when most other people left. As time went on, his consumption of toxic lake water and exposure to the elements and other substances has left him a rambling mess, constantly screaming about aliens he has supposedly seen or government conspiracies. While most residents ignore him, Duncan looks to him as a source of information to feed his fascination with the paranormal. Generally, he spends his day by himself, sitting in a lawn chair in front of his trailer. Otherwise he occasionally goes to the local bar and pesters the customers there. When he is able to be deciphered, his dream is to expose vast government conspirators who he feels destroyed the local lake on purpose to spite him. Meanwhile, his greatest fear is the notion that aliens and the government are linked and are plotting against him. Overall, Mr. Winters is seen as unpredictable, but will gladly speak to anyone who wants to know what he thinks about his conspiracy theories.

Together, the trio make up a continually dysfunctional group with two leaders with distinctly different personalities and pursuits vying for control with one follower in the middle who simply wants to make everyone happy. Nevertheless, despite their conflicts, the three are lifelong companions who have an unbreakable bond shaped by their experiences and upbringing.

The book, Ideas for the Animated Short explains that animators, like actors, must understand their character inside and out. They must understand what they are feeling in order to correctly articulate and depict their characters without making them look cliche or empty. Even if they may not experience what occurs in the story, the animator or actor can still break down what the character is going through and can relate it to similar feelings. For example, suppose I were to animate Ryan, bored, tired and frustrated with Duncan constantly working away. In order to get an accurate depiction of his emotions, I can look back to a time in my childhood where I felt the same way. When I was hanging out with a friend, he was playing a single player game by himself and would not stop. I was annoyed and I got sick of waiting for him to stop playing. I can take the emotions I felt in that scenario and apply it to how Ryan acts.

April 9, 2018: Story

Now that the theme and logline have been established, our next task in our concept development is to flesh out the story and give it story beats.

Story Beats:

• Three young men: Duncan, Ryan and Zack are watching the skies for UFOs in the desert. 
• Duncan is devoted to finding evidence for UFOs while Ryan and Zack have grown tired of it and are losing patience. (Conflict)
• Zack and Ryan make it clear they want to leave, they doubt they will find anything.
• Duncan says a local saw something just the other day.
• The look at the local he is talking about.
• The local is a deranged old man babbling to himself.
• Duncan promises to give up for the night in the next half hour.
• After more than half an hour, they reassert they want to go, 
• Duncan ignores them, too consumed in his search.
• They get ready to leave on their own without Duncan.
• Ryan has a cigarette, is in a bad mood.
• Zack sees strange beams in the distance.
• One of the beams pulls up the old man
• Zack notices a giant object in the sky sending down these beams. 
• He tries to warn his friends. 
• Ryan is skeptical and in such a bad mood he refuses to listen. 
• Duncan is consumed with his search he continues to ignore him.
• Zack gives up and is going to run away on his own.
• He is caught in the beam coming down from the sky.
• He begins to rise.
• Ryan comes to help save Zack by grabbing onto his leg.
• Ryan begins to lift up with Zack.
• Ryan throws a rock at Duncan to get his attention.
• Duncan sees the beam and runs up to it.
• He pulls out his phone to take a picture.
• Ryan yells at him.
• Duncan grabs onto his Ryan's foot with one hand, while holding his phone in the other.
• Duncan tries to help also but wants to take a picture and must decide what is more important. 
• Ryan tries kicking the phone out of his hand.
• Ryan accidentally kicks Duncan in the face.
• Duncan puts his phone away. 
• Duncan tries to help his friends.
• Duncan's hand slips and his friends get pulled up.
• Duncan is left alone, stunned. (Climax)
• He is still there the following morning.
• His friends are dropped back down on Earth, but their heads are swapped.
• They all scream in terror.
• Duncan tries to take a picture.
• The two are pulled back up quickly.
• They are dropped again with their heads on their respective bodies.
• Duncan is excited his friends are back.
• He shows them the pictures he took, which turn out to be useless. 
• The three leave to go back to into town the way they wanted to in the beginning. (Resolution)
• Mr. Winters gets dropped off in the desert as well, still muttering to himself.

Treatment:

Three young men named Duncan, Ryan and Zack are on the outskirts of their small desert town searching for UFOs, with Duncan leading the charge. They have a computer, a telescope, and a ham radio. While Duncan constantly bounces back and forth between these different pieces of equipment, Zack and Ryan have grown visibly tired of this and want to do something else. Ryan, the more impatient of the two, speaks up.

Ryan: Duncan, it's been eight hours. Can we call it quits?
Duncan: No way! There's gotta be something out there! Mr. Winters said said he saw something the other day!

They look over to see the clearly deranged old Mr. Winters sitting in a porch outside of his trailer, rambling to himself. Ryan and Zack are unimpressed.

Duncan: Look, just give me another half hour, okay? Then we can go.

We fade to see it is much later than Duncan promised, now fully dark.

Ryan (Annoyed): Alright, we've waited long enough! Let's get out of here!

Duncan doesn't acknowledge them and brushes them off. Insulted, frustrated and tired, Ryan and Zack get their stuff and get ready to leave. Just before they head out, Ryan goes to have a cigarette. While waiting for Ryan, Zack begins to notice a number of bright flashes in the distance. However, he does not understand what is going on until he sees the old man being lifted into the air within a beam of light. He then looks up to see a huge, featureless mass in the sky looming towards them. He runs to tell Ryan but is too petrified to make comprehensible words. Unfortunately, Ryan is in such a bad mood he refuses to try and understand him.

Zack: (Stammering)
Ryan: Look, Zack, I'm not in the mood for your jokes, okay. I'll be ready to go in a second.

Next, he runs to Duncan, but again, is stammering. Meanwhile, Duncan is too invested in his search to listen. He gets fed up with both and starts to walk away. However, before he can go anywhere, a beam shines down on him and begins to pull him up. Zack shouts for help, which finally gets Ryan's attention. Shocked, Ryan leaps to grab onto Zack's leg. However, Ryan starts getting lifted up as well. Before he gets off the ground, he grabs a rock and throws it at Duncan to get his attention. Finally, Duncan responds and is immediately stunned. He runs up to the beam of light. In a panic, he pulls out his phone and tries to take a picture until Ryan yells at him. Duncan then grabs onto Ryan's leg with one hand while still trying to take a picture.

Ryan: Dude! Stop messing around and help us!

Ryan snaps at his friend and starts trying to kick the phone out of his hand. Instead, he begins kicking him in the head. Duncan tosses his phone and begins actively pulling. His hands slip, however, and his friends fly up into the darkness and disappear.

We fade to see Duncan still out in the desert alone, numb to what has happened. He gets up and knocks over his equipment in anger and sits back down. As he sulks, Ryan and Zack are dropped back down on Earth, landing on Duncan, but their heads are switched. All three notice this and start screaming in terror. Duncan tries to take a picture. The two are quickly pulled back up, and come back down with heads on the right heads. This time, they fall and land on Duncan. When they get up, Duncan is ecstatic while they are disoriented from the experience.

Duncan: Guys! You're alive!
Ryan: Yea. I guess so.
Zack: Were you able to get any good shots?

Duncan looks at his phone and all the images are worthless. They are either blurry, pictures of Ryan's shoe when he was kicking him or pictures of Duncan taken with the front facing camera.

Duncan: (beat) Let's just go home.

The three then decide they have had enough for the day and walk their way back into town.

Ryan: Do you think any bars are still open right now? I really need a drink.

As they walk away, Mr. Winters is dropped back down as well, still rambling to himself.



Reading through the book Ideas for the Animated Short, the book provided some advice for coming up with a story for a short film. One recommendation the book made was to make a work based on our own experiences, likes and dislikes. When I came up with this story, I knew I wanted to make a story about a dysfunctional, yet loyal group of friends, which came from my own experiences with my childhood friends. At the same time, I have had an idea about teenagers hunting aliens in the desert for years. However, another thing the book pointed out was cliches, which included aliens as characters. As a result, I want to keep the overall presence of any aliens to a minimum and keep the focus on the humans and their interactions. Meanwhile, the aliens would only serve as a catalyst that provokes their interactions. Another thing the book explains is to show, don't tell, so I had to figure out how to keep exposition to a minimum. In turn, this allows for more slapstick. Instead of having characters explain something going on, they can get each other's attention physically, like when Duncan gets hit in the head with a rock. Overall, I want this story to be along the lines of a comedy drama, where the characters constant butting heads will provide some humor while also driving the emotional story.

The story's main conflict is character vs. character, while character vs. nature is a secondary conflict. Even when there is an alien abduction, I want the true conflict to lie in the characters' relationships. Even in the climax, when two of the characters are being pulled up into the mysterious entity in the sky, the emphasis is on Duncan deciding to save his friends over his obsession with proving aliens' existence and the resolution comes from him coming to cope with losing his friends and their return. As the book says, the character's emotions and how they react to situations drives the story and the action, and I want this to affect the viewer and bring them in emotionally. While the friction between the three will lead to some comedy, it will also kickstart the overarching conflict in the story and the characters will have to deal with the aftermath. However, hopefully it leads to a more heartwarming payoff in the end when they are reunited.

April 2, 2018: Pre-Quarter Assignment

In preparation for our Concept Development class, we were given a pre-quarter assignment in which we were to find a short film under three minutes that we thought would help represent our vision for our senior projects. With that in mind, we had to explain why we chose it and what elements influence us. The short I chose was "The Incredible Shrinking Day," which aired on Cartoon Network in the early 2000s.

This was a bumper segment that was aired by Cartoon Network back in the early 2000s, featuring stylized interpretations of characters from the show, Ed, Edd n Eddy. I remember enjoying the short when it aired for the music, the visual style, and the overall outlandish nature of the characters being shrunken down to toy size. As I see this again, I really this latter feature, especially the parts when the three are stuck in their respective rooms in the dollhouse and when they escape in the toy car, and are being chased down by Sarah.

I also really enjoyed the brief montage at the beginning as the three wake up and put on their clothes. In just a handful of scenes, it shows these characters and links them together. I also really enjoyed the visuals of this short. One reason may be because it was a total revamping of the characters and shift from the original style of the show. Regardless, I really enjoyed the character design as well as the combination of the 2D characters and the 3D environment.

When I watch films or television, one of my favorite elements I like to focus on is the dynamic between a group of friends, which is common in Ed Edd n Eddy. The three must put up with each other and their differences and work together to achieve a goal, which, in the case of this short, is to run away from Sarah. The group dynamic is a major influence on my work in general, and I want to incorporate this into my own concept. The absurdity of the plot is another thing that I want to see reflected in my concept. While it will not be the same idea as shrinking someone and playing with them like a doll, I might want to take it in a similar goofy direction. Overall, this work can point the way I want my concept to go because it relies on a group of friends who must work together while in a ridiculous situation.

April 1, 2018: Theme and Logline

For my first assignment in Concept Development, I was required to come up with a logline and a theme for my short film concept.

Theme: While my short film will deal with some elements of science fiction, the theme I want to explore in this work is friendship. To me, true friends will stick together in times of trouble, no matter what. In my story, the main characters get into a dispute, but when there's an issue, the friendship between them is so strong that they will immediately jump to help out the others once they are in danger despite the tension. This relates to one of the major conflicts I want to portray in the story, which the book, Ideas for the Animated Short, lists as "Ship of Fools". In this scenario, distinct individuals must put up with each other and their differences to achieve a goal. The general conflict is character vs. character, with character vs. environment helping complement the overall them of friendship, because the paranormal UFO serves as a catalyst to bring them back together.

This them is of particular interest to me because it resembles what I experienced with my friends. Growing up, I was part of a small, close-knit but somewhat dysfunctional group of kids who all grew up in the same neighborhood. Throughout our childhood, we had constant conflicts and frequently butted heads. However, we always stuck together and some of those people are still among my closest friends even after fifteen years of this type of interaction. This type of relationship gave me a sense of belonging, which is something I have come to cherish. Even today, I witness something similar with my fellow animation students. Even if we clash on how a scene should be interpreted or how a character moves, my friends and I will constantly help each other out because we are a team and we must work together to get work done.

As the book explains, themes in works are often based on needs such as mental and physical needs as well as more specific needs such as food, shelter and love. Because the concept of belonging is so important to me, the need for acceptance is an area I love exploring with characters. I want the audience to see understand my message about true friends through these characters actions and feel that sense of belonging we feel with our closest friends.

Logline: Two young men become fed up with their UFO-obsessed friend and almost ditch him until they encounter the mysterious visitors their friend was hoping to find.