Update:After a long time of tinkering and we browsing. I have figured out why some of my work is being a pain to upload. Instead of converting to image files, they are becoming Text documents. Below the Original post will be a few images showing Another of my character's, a progress images of my concept art and a few panels from my storyboard. Once I have converted the other files back to Jpeg's I will upload them here as well.
Update 2: I have added the images and the thing I missed out into the OGR Presentation just to make it a bit more cohesive.
OGR 06/02/2015
ReplyDeleteEvening Lewis - and thanks for being patient!
First things first - I can say without a shadow of a doubt that your story is too long! It's written very descriptively, which makes your script feel long, when actually I'm sure you could make the action much more immediate. I don't know if we're going around in circles here, but I can't help thinking that you've got things in the wrong order; i.e. you introduce this circus, and then we have, inside of that, the bouncy castle - which just feels less important than the circus itself. This could be easily remedied by having the bouncy castle as the thing that appears randomly - and is the portal to the circus; don't you think it makes more sense to have a 'smaller thing' as the doorway to the 'bigger place' - and don't you think, if an evil taxidermist was seeking to bait children into joining his awful circus of puppets, then he might use a nice looking bouncy castle, as opposed to subjecting the children to a terrifying circus experience first? The whole dark carnival idea is lovely, but I just think your story is repeating its own imagery - i.e. a scary circus containing a scary bouncy castle; isn't it more magical and macabre if the jolly, colourful child-friendly bouncy castle contains the portal to the awful, nightmarish circus of horrors? More practically, I can see how you can jump-start your story much more immediately...
The children see a bouncy castle in the middle of a green field. They look at each other in amazement; they run towards it; they jump inside of it - wallop - they're in the dark circus, about to meet the taxidermist... In all truthfulness, it doesn't change your story at all, it just 'gets on with it'. In technical terms, I would suggest your script is 'over-written' in terms of description - it reads more like a short stort than a script; I think you could slim it right down and focus on the bare essentials and therefore get a better sense of it in terms of pace.
You've got some cleanly delineated character designs there - but a) why are they cross-eyed, b) why are you hiding their hands and c) isn't there a whiff of style creep getting started in there...? Lewis - you've got to commit to hands, feet and a more structural understand of faces etc - those big eyes and button noses will only get you so far, and there's no point hiding the bits of the design that you find more challenging. This is your opportunity to commit to those challenges, not swerve them. I think your taxidermist character is the most interesting of the three, because he's the least derivative; also, it's interesting that the sketches of your characters in the side panels are more authentic than the more 'off-the-peg' faces of your more completed versions. I'd like to see you continue to explore - there's some promising faces just getting started there...
Your concept art is evocative and epic - but isn't that a fairground as opposed to a circus you're depicting? Remember - one of the challenges in this project is efficiency in terms of workload, so make sure your concept art-ing the environments/assets/elements etc that actually feature importantly in your story. You don't have the time to commit to paintings of sequences or places that are not vital to your story. If you need an establishing shot of this horror circus, make sure it reads clearly and unambiguous as a circus.
Short version then: reconsider ACT 1 and the role of the bouncy castle; resist the 'manga habit' in terms of your character's faces - go find your own: ensure you're committing to the places and spaces that actually feature in your story, as you're too time pressurised not to! Onwards!