Some sorta accolade I guess

I pretty much known noone's looking at this, but for completionist's sake, Tales of Beardyman placed third in the Student Competition at this year's Flip Festival in Wolverhampton. I got a shirt out of it. Woop.

NEW SHOWREEL

Dunno who's still reading this, but here's a new showreel I made for my grad show.




The animations in order of appearance are:
PokerTime
Mischievious Monkey Magic
Citv - Keep your Computer Happy
Fredbot's Birthday Animation
I love the Internet
Robotnik Destroys the Moon
Flying Squirrels
Children's Animation at BCU
Tales of Beardyman
Energy Stoat (yet to be released)
German Xmas Market
Black Hole Sheep
Robotnik's Beautiful Head
The Big Guy
Date for One
Zombie Supermarket (unreleased)
Dracula
Hot Dog Eating Contest
Cut the Madness
Sonic Shorts
LL-PeachLock vs SBC
LL-Rewrite
Cat Face 20
ZekeySpaceyLizard drinks Tea in Outer Space
The Kevin Bishop Show
Robotnik Fukkireta
Anything
Arrgh Idol
Curly Sam the Arsonist
Guide to Celebrity
Guide to Advertising
Camp Madness
Narwhals
Pico's Bouncy Funtime
What happens to the hedgehog?
Melons
8 Bit Pwny Club
Movin'
Nene's Sorrow
8 Bit Pwny Club 2

Tales of Beardyman COMPLETED

Once again, my last minute magic has kicked in and I have managed to finish my animation on time (though I won't be going to sleep tonight as I have to get my blog up to date). There's still a good half hour before this baby uploads to Youtube, so let's get this blog rolling.

There were a few last minute changes to do time allowances, this namely being the absence of the 'wife discovering the internet' parts (also because I didn't want to let those sexy map scenes go to waste). This actually works in the animation's favour, as it makes it look less like some cheesy advert and more like a general animation, taking away some of the guilt. So yeah, basically, it's not so much an ad anymore rather than your standard animation with a few flagrant uses of brand names.

My penguin guy, Martin Tierney, delivered on his 3D cyber penguins, delivering his animation on a shiny disk. However, one slight issue I had to work around was the fact the animations used their own backgrounds, which clashed with the snowy background I had gotten from Kieran. To compensate for this, I used some colour keying on one of the opening clips so that I could show the background behind it, and adjusted the colour on the others so that they managed the colour scheme. Once that hurdle was crossed, I managed to take advantage of the scenes to get creative with the story. I also got him to send me some alpha stills of the penguins that I could use for comic flinging. I also threw in some laser sights, which I made by making a long glowy solid and then moving it around in 3D space, which looks pretty badass.

The ninja octopus scene came out lovely, thanks to a combination of rainy stuff, and rocky waves drawn by Kieran. There was quite a bit of After Effects use in this, mainly for moments when I needed some epic effects or such. For simple animations mind, I just stuck to animating it in Flash.

One lil aspect I threw in was a reference to the Avatar DVD Beardyman was questing for. In leu of wasting time doing some gay drawing, I instead took a quick webcam video of me being a twat (I do not know any 'university' alternatives to the word 'twat' so forgive me), and altered it to give me Avatar blue skin. If I had remembered to take my shirt off I bet you wouldn't be able to tell the difference from the real thing!

Post production was gonna be a tricky matter given how painstakingly last minute it was, but it came out really well. Editing the video came out nicely with some little fades in and out of the map scenes that were pulled off nicely IMO. As for sound, Deven had given me a health supply of 'Aarrrghs' to accompany Beardyman's battles. Hunting for sound effects was a little trickier, but a quick hunt through FindSounds and SoundDogs turned up some decent clips. Since I clearly had no time to make a worthwhile soundtrack in Fruityloops, I turned to that ever so loveable source of royalty free music, Newgrounds. After going through all the relevant keywords 'epic, quest, journey, etc.) and hit and missing through the iffy techno tracks, I eventually found 'Our Epic Journey' by Zero123Music, which not only sounded great, but synced PERFECTLY with the video!

The end result looks absolutely magical. A combination of smooth animation, high res visuals, top notch voice acting and well layered sound effects. It gives off a level of sheen that's expected of most professional animations (well, in the advertising field at least). For me personally, it's given me that chance to actually take my tutor's advice and animate something that isn't just the same bog standard flash stuff I do all the time.

Without further ado, here is Tales of Beardyman!

More Updates, now with actual evidence I've been doing something

Okay, so in the final week now, so things need to speed up. The hot weather and ever increasing amount of bugs is not helping. First off, here's a couple more of the models I've done.


I've decided to do a lil self insert and cast myself as the HMV clerk. I took a quick webcam picture to use as a reference and used some of the official assets from the defunct contest brief for the badge. The only real thing I'm lacking is a reference for the HMV checkout itself, as google seems to be lacking (and if google's lacking, it probably means it won't be easy to take some pics meself.)

And then you have a generic boat, but the sail does animate.

As for what the Level 5 students have (or at least are supposed to be) doing, some dude named Keiran is working up some backgrounds. They just need a few tweakings colourwise but should be alright.




Another dude named Martin is making something supremely awesome if it turns out well. 3D Cyber Penguins, which should hopefully be turned into a massive army. Here's a mockup model he's made using parts from an Iron Man figure. I've reccomended the final one be more blue tinted to fit in with the winter battlefield.



I've also got some other dude working on the HMV dog, to compensate for my general suckiness at drawing animals. I'm just worried about whether I can get all this stuff in time to do something about it. Not to mention I still have to worry about soundtracks for both this and the monkey short which quite frankly I haven't given a rat's arse about once it was finished.


As for what I've been doing, I've finally started animating and have finished animating one scene, the encounter with the fire sumo. As the process goes, I used the models I created and animated them in flash using good ol' tweenage. (These could technically be tweened in After Effects, but I'm a lot more familiar with this method). Then I imported the animations in their SWF formats into After Effects. After looking up a couple of tutorials online, I made a nifty little fire using CC Particle Systems II and CC Vector Blur, which gives it an awesome 'this is seriously gonna melt stuff' look.

I've uploaded a look at the video here (though I'm not particularly convinced of its ability to show up properly): http://www.twitvid.com/7QVE6

Another animated bit I've got sorted are your classic map travelling intermissions. Since the animation for this was a lot simpler, I could just animate everything in flash and export it straight from there. The lil 2D icon was also drawn in Photoshop since I wanted to practice my Photoshop sketching.

http://spamtheweb.com/ul/s244201088_mapscenes.html (takes a short while to load)

Usually I have to worry about stuff like file size when it comes to sticking loads of graphics and stuff in flash, but since I'm compiling it elsewhere, I don't have to worry bout that.

Wifey

Just need to make a few more expressions and stuff for her. Decided to go with curly bangs, cos...like...I've never done those before.

And I came face to face with a...

FIRE SUMO!!!

In other news, I've got the voices in from Deven Mack (Arrgh Idol) and Alison Stark (voices ladies in the Edd Egg series), and they are mighty fine. Just gotta get a few more models done (working on the wife atm) and see what the L5s are up to and I'm ready to animate this thing.

Ninja Octopus Rawr

Rawr baby.

Viking and Tentacles

So I've just finished up the Photoshopped model for Beardyman. Will probably need to go back and make some alternate versions, (such as a wartorn Beardyman) but I'm impressed with what I've made. I've done several handshapes and a few eye symbols to show his expression. I've also equipped him with a sword and a shield featuring the design of Wonchomp, a character created by ages ago by an online friend based on a mispelling of my name, turning out to be a cross between Wonchop and a Chain Chomp from the Mario series.

Considering the scenarios he's going to placed in, I've also thought about how to change the colour scheme to apply for various scenarios, such as the nighttime octopus battle or the fire sumo showdown. Here, I've done a little tinkering with saturation and colour filtering to accomodate to certain backdrops. I apply it to each part by using Photoshop's Actions feature to record an action and then replay it for each layer. Also, if you're wondering why there's only half a guy in each of those, it's because for certain bits, such as the limbs of the eyes, I only make one thing for the side, which I can then duplicate and mirror once I get it into Flash.

Next, I'm having a crack at getting the Ninja Octopus down. Regardless of whether I go with the style above for the Viking, I certainly wanna try representing the Ninja Octopus in as epic a manner as possible. Using a technique I learned during my brief stay in Gamer Camp, I used Photoshop's animation feature to draw out a four-frame animation for the tentacle, which is probably more industry like and whatnot. Nonetheless, it looks swell.

As for the unpaid hired help, I've contacted Devin Mack (Arrgh Idol) about doing some voices and he appears interested so I've sent him the script. I'm just waiting to hear from my missus. Speaking of which, I'll doodle up some more designs for her tommorow.

Experimentation (Photoshop characters)

Okay, so concentrating on my Beardyman animation for now, and getting to a point where I should get to animating it. Should be asking round for voices at this point, I'll probably ask Devin Mack, who voiced the pirate in one of my previous animations, Arrgh Idol, to do the voice of my beardy man. I'm also considering asking one of my internet friend's fiancee to do the voice of the wife (who I still need to do a proper design for).

So trying to decide on an animation style for this, I am once again reminded of my general train of thought concerning the past two years at uni.

"ALL MY ANIMATIONS ARE NOTHING BUT F***ING FLASH!!!"

It's a bit late in the day to think of learning new programs for the sake of completing a one minute short withing two weeks. So, I'm trying to think of a method of making this look like I actually tried. I have thought about sticking flash animation in After Effects for some of the scenes, but then it'd still be obviously flash animation.

It is then I am reminded of a FLIP festival lecture from a couple of years back, held by Boulder Media, the animation studio who was working on various animated series such as Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends and El Tigre. I remember them showing off some FLA files of the various shorts they worked on, and constantly reiterating the same thing:

"When we make stuff digitally, we want it to look as less digital as possible"

Or something along those lines. Basically, this boils down to taking standard vector stuff and adding a lil photoshop magic to give it a less digital look. In one of the FLAs they showed of their short film, Carte de Visite, they showed how they had animated the thing in Flash, but made it so it was composed of several little photoshopped bits to make it more realistic, such as the shading style you simply can't make in vector without chucking in a crapton of blur filters.

Going on this train of though, I decided to have a little crack at making a model of my Beardyman in Photoshop that I can export into Flash.



This is my progress so far. I have made each part on a seperate layer, so that they can be individually animated in Flash. With good ol' tweens of course. They were drawn at a resolution of almost 4x times the resolution of my animation (standard PAL Widescreen, since I realise now that animating something in flash on a 1080p canvas is stupid)so that I can get some good close up shots without causing any unsightly pixellation. The plan is to draw several different layers to make up the different hand shapes, eye expressions, etc.

With the model I have made so far, I have done a test animation in Flash. There is also the option of animating it in After Effects, but Flash seems to be the more comfortable option.

http://spamtheweb.com/ul/upload/100510/47_pscharactertest.php

One of the more notable changes of the general design I have made is the replacement of the mouth with a giant moustache. This way, I can simply squash and stretch the moustache to make mouth movements instead of wasting too much time on lipsync.

I'll be working more on this model, designs for other characters and heck, maybe I'll actually get off my arse and animate it. Still waiting to hear from the Level 5 lackeys.

Animation (sorta) Completed

It took a few nights of consecutive all nighters, but I managed to get something handed in in time for the competition deadline.

Click here to watch

It was a madcap dash to the finish. I didn't even have a final storyline until right near the end. A large amount of support in this regard came from my dad, Steve Smallman, a children's author and illustrator famous for books such as The Lamb who Came for Dinner (which appeared on the show Bookaboo), Smelly Peter the Pea Eater, and the illustrations for the Raggy Doll TV series.

I plan to make some presentational improvements to this before handing it in to uni or releasing it on Youtube or stuff like that.

Attention now returns to the HMV dooflip. We are getting assistance from the Level 5 students in this matter, which should come in handy. I wasn't particular sure what I was supposed to do during that session, but I got approached by a couple of dudes who might do some backgrounds, and another dude offering to make CG models of the cyber penguins, which should make constructing an army of them much easier.

Maracas Monkey

Okay, crunchtime is coming. I've got until Midnight PST tommorow (or today, considering the only people reading this will most likely have normal sleeping hours) to complete this idea and it was only yesterday that I actually figured out a script to tie all this M business together.

The story goes that the monkey finds a magical wand that comes out of nowhere, and finds shaking it magics M things. As you do, he goes mad with power and ends up magicing more than he bargained for.

I am getting there with the animation, about 33% of actual animation, and I'll be allnighting this one to get it in time for the Aniboom deadline.

Btw I started added some stuff to my Aniboom page, which you can find here.

Here's a sample animation of the monkey dancing with maracas. I looked around at a couple of animations, such as one with Sonic characters, but in the end I ended up basing the routine on a fad from a Japanese website called Nico Nico Douga. I ended up setting a seperate minivid set to said fad cos I dunno.

M is for...

MONSTER!

http://www.newgrounds.com/dump/item/98d6e02285e62762ab412eeacb4f0c42

Based on an old flash test I did a while back.
http://wonchop.deviantart.com/art/Monstah-Does-A-Wave-72295561

Developing the Monkey

So as I thought of my 'M for Monkey' thing, (I have to try and think of an alternate title so it doesn't clash with Dexter's Lab's segment, 'Dial M for Monkey'), I did what noone in uni thought I'd do...actually develop several designs. =O



I went and tried various styles, some involving cubish looking characters, some with rather cutesy figures, and others slightly influences by the fact I was watching South Park at the time. However, the one that stood out the most in the end was this one.


The insanely happy motorbiking monkey! His style was something that was striking and original, yet still had a hint of 'me' in there (it's gotta have at least some of that. Asking me otherwise is like getting David Firth to draw anime.) So as I opted to go with this character, I continued to sketch him, thinking of various ways to adjust him, such as trying him out with different M activities (magic, maracas, etc.), showing different expressions to trying not to give him a face that would scare small children.




After about a billion of these sketches, I drafted up a CG look, this one being done in Photoshop.


I had contemplated using Illustrator to make some assests, drawn with a pencily/brushed outline like you see on shows such as Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends. However, I can't figure out the best methods of drawing (it is not freehand friendly) and I neither have the time nor the patience to learn. So it's good ol flash for me.



Here is the model I eventually came up with, currently avaiable in cowlick and biker helmet flavours. There's quite a few layers going on here, and various symbols, such as the eyes, mouth and chin, have multiple keyframes that I can change on the fly.

There are particularly specific specifications for the competition, wanting it to be in NTSC 1080i (1920 x 1080 pixels) resolution at 29.97fps (since the ultimate goal is to get this broadcast on TV), meaning everything will have to be drawn quite big, and at least have an outline that'll stand out once shrunk to a smaller Youtube friendly definition. Face details were drawn at 200% zoom with a size 3 brush, before going over the outlines at size 4 to give them some girth. The other aspects were drawn at size 3 at 100%, so I can easily add stuff on the fly.

Not quite sure of the best way to animate, but here's an early test. The starry eyed expression was also kinda influenced from Samba de Amigo (or more specifically, it's characters victory pose from Sonic & Sega All-Stars Racing).

http://www.newgrounds.com/dump/item/34a40475101b1424dd7ead39a7e3a25a

Now to work work work.

Monkeeeeeys

So for this Sesame Street competition for which I'm basing one half of my project on, I've decided to go with a compromise for not doing anything with the Wonchop idea; monkeys.


Let's face it. Who doesn't love monkeys? Y'know, besides people who are over protective of their banana collection. Stupid people, that's what. Monkeys are awesome creatures and more or less essential viewing on any visit to the zoo. The way they move about is just awesome, with each motion seemlessly moving on to the next. They've been a big part of my childhood and are mainly what brought me to my simian online alias.


And that's not to mention how they've appeared in animation. Several cartoons spring to mind, such as Coconuts from Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog, Monkey from Dexter's Lab, Abu from Aladdin and Mojo Jojo from Powerpuff Girls, as well as recent examples like the Jamie Hewlett's Olympic monkey.

And of course, monkeys have made their mark in the videogame industry. One of the main monkey-oritented games I played during my Playstation Fanboy days was Ape Escape, a game that involved catching variously humourous monkeys in a bid to stop them messing with time. Other noteable monkeys in gaming history include Diddy Kong from Donkey Kong Country (Donkey Kong technically doesn't count since he's a gorilla), Amigo from Samba de Amigo, AiAi from Super Monkey Ball, and the various monkeys that featured in Timesplitters 2.

So what do monkeys have to do with Sesame Street you ask? Well, the criteria has various categories including numbers, letters, etc. I decided to go with letters, specifically the most delicious letter there is. M. And what's the first thing you think of when you think of M? Monkeys! Pure science at work! Here's an example of one of Sesame Street's letter-based animations.

About that delay

Much apologies for the long delay in updating this stuff. Long story short, the fan on my laptop broke, meaning it could only be on for a hour or two at a time before it overheats. I decided to take this opportunity to purchase a new PC. However, when it arrived I had trouble getting on the internet, which was neccessary for some of the programs I intended to use. It took about a week or so to figure out the problem.

So yeah, I'll try and update this now.

Ben, you're an idiot.

It has not been a good week for me. After a load of social obligations putting off my work was bad enough, but it was swiftly followed by a job for Weebl. A job which took way longer than it should have done, due to a lot of clashing between ideals.
I finally get off it and get round to finishing my animatic for the animation, which can be viewed here:
http://spamtheweb.com/ul/upload/090310/83091_hmvanimatic.php

For the heck of it, I decide to have another read through of the YCN brief to check on the submission deadline. The main kicker is when I actually have a read through of the HMV brief:

Challenge

Our challenge is a digital one. While keeping within our brand and adhering to the highest standards of usability, design ways for customers to quickly and easily find and buy what they want from hmv.com.

We’d like you to focus on improving user experience within some specific parts of hmv.com - product detail pages for CDs, DVDs and games, search results, and our homepage.

Ah. Reading through this in detail, it seems that what the brief is actually asking for is not a means of promoting attention to the hmv.com, but for designs that improve upon the website. Basically, it's web design and not commercialism. Thanks to my inability to check things thoroughly (I was always the guy who ticks the box without reading the terms and conditions), I have spent the good half of the last 2 months planning an animation for something that doesn't even require an animation.



Well....bumcakes.

Right now my brain is overflowing with problems, alternatives, counterarguments and fear or tutor ownage. Considering how much I've already done (at least in terms of thought and design processes), I don't really want to abandon this project, but it no longer fits the YCN brief. On the other hand, since the YCN brief isn't particularly relevant to the uni curriculum, I could very well just continue development of it outside the brief, kicking the nagging two week deadline away from it. But then there's issues of what to do to extend the module filling, whether I should move away from the HMV branding and try something else, maybe even a fictional brand, and how much all this is going to effect my overall marking.

One thing's for certain, my tutors are gonna be maaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaad. X(

In term's of what else I could be doing, one thing that's caught my as of late is a competition currently running on Aniboom in which animators must create an animation suitable for young children, the grand prize winner of which will have his entry shown on the long running children's TV show, Sesame Street. The submission date for this is April 26th. So what I may do instead, tutor depending, is whilst I work on the Beardyman animation for the university deadline, I can also produce a short animation for this contest. One idea I have so far is a monkey who encounters various things beginning with the letter M, such as Mangos, Marracas, etc.

Again, it's something I'll have to talk to the tutor about. That is, if I can actually get round to confessing my screwup first. X(

Rewriting the script, what to do afterwards

Okay so the first script I drafted up went with the basic idea of a beardy guy telling his epic tales and being told the painful truth by some smarmy git sitting near him. The script went as follows.

INTRO SEGMENT
EXT. Rusty Sea Shanty
It is a stormy night filled with thundering clouds and fierce waves. We zoom up on an old fashioned rusty sea shanty.
INT. Sea Shanty
Warrior is sitting over a lantern lit wooden table, surrounded by a few nervous sailor types. With a beer clenched in his fist, he regails his tales, unnerving those that hear it.
WARRIOR: Oh aye, I’ve been through various treacherous trials on a quest frought with danger.

SEGMENT ONE: Penguins
EXT. Ice filled mountains
WARRIOR (v/o): I fought an army of Cyber Penguins!
The Warrior can be seen standing at a top of a snow filled landscape, looking down upon waves of penguins equipped with cybernetic armour and laser guided machine guns. Brandishing his sword, he screams and charges into the crowd, lasers shooting out everywhere and several penguins being flown across the air as he makes his way through.

SEGMENT TWO: Manegg
INT. Laboratory of Blatant Evil Doings
WARRIOR (v/o): ... battled wits with the insane Professor Manegg!
We see the Warrior approaching Manegg, who turns around to see the Warrior in an ‘I’ve been expecting you look’. We zoom out to see a giant Egg Mech preparing a Gatling Gun to fire at the enemy. The Warrior brings out a convenient ‘Box of Hedgehogs’. Whilst Manegg laughs maniacally, Warrior throws one of the hedgehogs at the mech, causing it to explode a second later, engulfing Manegg in the blast.

SEGMENT THREE: Octopus
EXT. Ocean
WARRIOR (v/o): ... tangled with a Radioactive Ninja Octopus!
Warrior stands on a rock in the middle of the ocean, rain pouring on his face. As thunder roars, tentacles rise up and a shadow looms over the Warrior. We zoom out to see the Radioactive Ninja Octopus, glowing with a green aura and brandishing a kunai in one tentacle and a shuriken in the other. Warrior leaps towards the octopus with a scream, ending in a flash of light.

SEGMENT FOUR: Fire Sumo
EXT. Unknown
WARRIOR (v/o): ...and found myself face to face with a Fire Sumo!
Warrior stands in the middle of an inferno, the centre of which a giant sumo wrestler ablaze with fire. As Warrior shields himself from the heat, the Sumo takes a big breath and blows a big blast of fire which engulfs the Warrior for a few seconds before he slices it in half with his sword.
OUTRO SEGMENT
INT. Shanty
WARRIOR: But it was worth it to get the ultimate reward...The Complete Scrubs Blu-Ray DVD Boxset!
Warrior says this cheerfully as he brings up the DVD boxset. Just then, a casually dressed smarmy git, who was on the table next to Warrior’s crew, butts in.
GIT: Oh yeah! I’ve got that boxset too! Except I just went onto HMV.com where I used their easy to navigate system to get the latest dvds, music and games delivered straight to my door!
As he says this, cut to a simple office where Smarmy Git is cheerfully browsing the HMV website on his laptop. View of laptop shows various different segments of the HMV website, ending with a ‘You’re product is on its way’ type screen.
Cut back to Shanty, where Warrior is frozen in a state of disbelief over what he just heard, with the Git just standing there with an oblivious look on his face.
EXT. Shanty
Warrior’s screams of despair can be heard from outside whilst Nipper can be seen sitting next to a discarded gramophone, slightly distracted by the noise.
CUT TO LOGO
HMV.com – Get Closer (without needing to go anywhere)

When I showed this to my tutor, he suggested that I alter it so that whilst the flashbacks are epic, the dialogue was just describing menial tasks (ie. dealing with traffic = cyber penguins). However, I just didn't see that working in the context of the whole tale telling thing. I then considered given Beardyman (let's call him that for now) a day job at the office, where he talks about the hassles of daily life (represented by the epic battles). However, in this contest, it'd be silly to think that he'd be working in an office complex and somehow not be near any multimedia stores.

So, foregoing the whole dialogue context thing, I thought up a new concept that manages to improve the message of the story. Basically, this involves giving ol' Beardyman a wife/girlfriend.

This new variation, to sum it up quickly, involves Wifey sighing about a film she wants that she can't easily get, due to living several hundred miles from the nearest shops. Beardyman offers to go on this quest to get said object for her beloved, and heads off on a journey frought with danger. Meanwhile, Wifey discovers an ad advertising HMV.com and goes about ordering the thing online. (I don't think the viewing public will question how a house in the middle of nowhere somehow has broadband toooo much...) The hero, clearly not enjoying his quest, arrives at the HMV to buy the DVD. By the time he returns with the gift for his wife, she is already happily watching it, having gotten it delivered straight to her door. Enter witty line involving going back to exchanging it, throw in manly weeping and you've got yourself an ad.

Inside a generally lower-middle class home, a generally semi-intelligent woman (something like that chick from Braveheart) is looking through a magazine of the latest filmy releases. She catches the eye of a particular new DVD release (example used: UP). (Dialogue optional)
WIFEY: *sigh* I would love to have this DVD.
Warrior, picking up on her wife’s sighs, boasts loudly, brandishing his sword and posing magnificently in some random light source.
WARRIOR: Fear not, my darling wife! I shall make my way to the nearest HMV and obtain this item for you!
Warrior rushes out the door of the house, which is situated in the middle of nowhere, as a map pans into view showing the long journey Warrior needs to take to reach the nearest HMV. (Hint: it is very long). The map comes up to a shore line.
Cut to Warrior manning a dinky little vessel through a stormy ocean, only to be abruptedly stopped by Radioactive Ninja Octopus, who brandishes a kunai knife and gives the hero the ol’ ‘Neo gesture’, citing the Warrior to pull out his sword and charge at him.
Cut back to the Wife who, still looking at the magazine and sighing, notices an advertisement at the bottom of the page for HMV.com, giving a decidedly ooh-ish response.
WIFE: Hmmm, HMV.com?
Cut back to Warrior, who is now in a snowy landscape charging full speed with a shield, screaming as rams into a crowd of several Cyber Penguins, who try to shoot at him with his lasers, only to be knocked into the air.
Meanwhile, Wife is sat at the computer, browsing through the website and using its navigation system to find the UP DVD, to which she gives a smile.
Cut back to the Warrior, looking a little ragged and dirty following his previous battles, and finding himself up against a Fire Sumo, standing in a sumo pose and breathing bursts of flames from his mouth. Warrior is not pleased.
WARRIOR: Oh you have GOT to be kiddi-
Before he can finish his sentence, Warrior is engulfed in a crapload of fire.
Cut back to the Wife who, after an obligatory close up shot of a keyboard press/mouse click, is presented with an ‘Your order is on its way’ message on screen. She gives a relieved smile and a small clasp of hands.
Cut to a typical HMV store, where one of the clerks has just cheerfully served a local customer. As the customer leaves, the clerk is a little disturbed to see a skulking, panting, drenched and all together disgruntled looking Warrior coming up to the counter with UP DVD in hand.
Cut to a while later back in the house, where the Warrior, looking somewhat crazed in an ‘I was almost killed but it was totally worth it’ way, bursts into the door brandishing a HMV bag in his finger.
WARRIOR: I’m back! And I’ve got the DVD you wanted!
His look suddenly turns aghast, as we zoom out to see Wife casually watching UP on the telly.
WIFE: Ooooh, sorry hon, I went and got it online whilst you were out. If you’ve got the receipt you’re free to go back and exchange it.
The Warrior, overwhelmed by the bombshell of the pointlessness of his epic journey, burst into loud manly tears.
We cut to outside the house, the crying still audible, where the HMV mascot, Nipper, is casually sitting outside his kennel, with the classic gramophone next to him. The logos fade in one by one.
hmv.com
get closer...
without going too far.

This new script gives the story a lot more substance. In the first variation, Beardyman was all mighty and powerful, but here I'm giving him limits to his strength, adhering to Ed Hook's rules about giving people obstacles that get in the way of their goals. He's not a guy who can slay a ninja octopus for the sake of it, he's a guy who has to slay an octopus to carry on his journey. He's not one bit happy, but he'll endure it for the sake of his love. It also gives the underlying purpose, promoting the HMV site, more exposure.

So yeah, now I'm reworking Beardyman to look a bit more human. For starters, this just means giving him a beer belly. One of the main problems I'm having drawing is his huge-arse muscly arms. I either have to tone them down, or look into ways I can animate them easier (and before you ask, no I blatantly can't reference myself for it).

The Wife, is another aspect I'm looking into, mainly in determining what kind of wife she should be. Given the general trend of adverts, I want to make her a rather pretty woman in mid to late twenties. One dilemma is deciding what she should wear. I'm currently torn between whether should be addressed more adhering to her husband, in some tattered dress of sorts (much like Braveheart's hot girlfriend), or if I should stick her in a nice jumper and make her a bit more modern, providing contrast to her husband and making his entrance more of a surprise.

Another dilemma is deciding the hairstyle, since when it comes to me, I always end up drawing the same few hairstyles pertaining to some of my existing characters, and I know if I do that I'll get the whole 'you're sticking to what you're comfortable with' garbage from my tutors.

So yeah, in order to get this done for the YCN deadline, I'm gonna have to pull all the stops next month.

As for what to do afterwards, it's generally been suggesting I should try and extend this idea into something more meatier for the final deadline (the assessment for uni). Since this new variation doesn't particularly seem like the kind of thing you could extend much, I figured trying an additional theme would be nice.

One thing I was looking into is the idea of promoting the one aspect of video games that never gets enough airtime: digital downloads. Services like Xbox Live, Playstation Network and WiiWare provide various original titles that can be downloaded for the fraction of the cost of a full retail game. These games include retro remakes such as Mega Man 9, Bionic Commando Rearmed and the upcoming Sonic the Hedgehog 4, original titles like Castle Crashers, Shadow Complex and Splosion Man, to the really experimental stuff like Flower, Braid and bitTrip that wouldn't stand a chance in the retail world. Right now, the only real games that have gotten any on-screen mention (at least in the UK) are the downloadable episodes for Grand Theft Auto IV (Lost and the Damned and Big Gay Tony, both later released in retail) and Bonzai Barber for Wiiware (in one of the their boring as heck 'celebrities play games with old ladies' ads. *groan*)



Since I'm very much an Xbox 360 man, I figured if I do go with this, I'd make something advertising the cool stuff you can find on Xbox Live Arcade. It'd adhere to the classic concept of young british male narrating the wonders of the service whilst going through the motions. In the example of this, it would involve me explaining the various types of games, acting them out as I'd go along. For example, I'd start off with a typical green screen of myself doing the intro, then enter into a 3D model of sorts (need to learn how to rig argh) for one game, then shift into flash animation to represent one of The Behemoth's stylish games, such as Castle Crashers, then go into pixel art (which can be done in Flash using an extension) to represent the 8-bit Mega Man titles (Mega Man 10 is released in March so it'd be good timing too), and I'd end up turning into one of the Avatars that are used for the Xbox 360 menus, and are also implimented into some games such as Bomberman.

Hi me.

Course the main issue would be figuring out how copyrights would work for that stuff. Even if I don't make money off it, using existing characters and game footage without the correct permissions would be tricky (though since I'm somewhat friends with Tom Fulp, co-founder of the Behemoth, I may get permission to use something along the Castle Crashers theme). Also for authenticy, I would need to have one of the official avatar models, as well as the splash screens from the commercials, and I dunno if there's a bit of cash handling involved in getting those assets.

But yeah, that's something I'll worry about once I get this HMV Brief sorted.



More sketches

Warrior Designs

Pop Sirens

Alternative design of Warrior for his day job