Unit 1: Simulated Work Experience

As an animator primarily working in 2D, I was assigned to Ethan for the simulated work experience. Both of our personal work involved comics and sequential art, so it was a good pairing. Ethan’s final year film was about a robot factory worker suddenly gaining self awareness and attempting to break out of the never-ending cycle of being remade and put back into commission. I was tasked with drawing keyframes for the first 6 shots in the animation. They were establishing shots, meaning there were no characters in it.

Seeing as I was capable of drawing keyframes, I asked Ethan for a slightly bigger workload with more complicated shots. The next few keyframes were of his character standing on a rooftop in different times of the day, plus lightning striking and shots of the character falling. There were also scenes in the animatic where some shots were undecided, so I was given creative freedom to draw my own. This is a work in progress.

I was quite fortunate to work for someone who was this organised. I was given an Excel spread of the shotlist, production schedule, and concept art. I really enjoyed doing keyframes for a project that isn’t my own, as it’s a nice break from my own assignments. I want to continue helping out Ethan’s animation even after submission.

On another note, I also picked up some work from another Year 2 student, because it looked interesting. Somto’s grad film will also be 2D animated – following a queer couple with themes of depression and self harm. Somto’s art style shared similarities to my own. Both of our character drawings draw inspiration from manga and anime; we both frequently gravitate towards the cyberpunk/citypop aesthetic; we both use similar colour palettes in our illustrations. I agreed to help Somto do the backgrounds for two shots.