Friday 23 March 2012

New Story Ideas

IDEA 1:

As we see a lone, run-down clock shop, the camera pans forward towards a lone cuckoo clock in the window. The sound of a shop bell ringing shortly before a man, who's upper half is out of view of the camera, picks the clock up out of view.
Later, the camera pans over a wall lined with singing awards and various newspaper articles about blockbuster operas and a pair of hands clad in a pair of strapping suit cuffs places the clock on the wall above a mantelpiece inside a living room. The figure leaves the room and closes the door before we hear a muffled clearing of a man's throat, followed by a song practice. The camera is focused on the clock the entire time. Eventually, the clock's face blinks like an eye and the central pivot where the arms are linked moves like a pupil towards the location of the sound through the wall.
Its pendulums move and act like arms as it raises them up and begins to sing along with him silently as the opera singer in the next room begins his crescendo mid-song. The rest of the animated piece would be the clock singing along before the opera singer stops. The clock reverts back to inanimate state as he does.


IDEA 2:

The camera pans out of blackness from a medium-sized crate back-stage of an opera. A pair of hands lifts off the lid and a ventriloquist lifts out a cuckoo clock, which winks at him as we hear an audience beyond the curtain and the ventriloquist sits on a stool behind the curtain as they're raised with the clock on his lap. Classical opera music plays and the clock begins to sing as the ventriloquist drinks a glass of water.

The rest of the animation would again pretty much be the clock singing Opera.


IDEA 3:

This idea doesn't have much of a story, per se. It's more of a demonstration of the clock's personality and movement. This idea involves the clock singing once again, but something a little different than opera.


Yes, yes, I know. It's the 'Trololol' song, but it would fit perfectly with my flamboyant clock! It's up-beat, the song itself is 'colorful', the deliverance is striking and bold and the figure singing it is conspicuously dashing.

The sequence would begin with the clock strolling on-screen atop its pendulums I used as arms in previous iterations, much like Eduard Khil, the singer seen in the video, followed by more or less similar moves to Eduard, but exaggerated seven-fold, accompanied by leaping bounds and spins similar to those found in ballet. The only thing there would be the clock. There would be no background besides a line to define the floor.

4 comments:

  1. Tom, when you say the clock sings along with the man, is it the actual clock, or the cockoo from inside? Don't forget you haven't just been given a clock! - the cuckoo is an important element! I also think you should have a look at producing an influence map for 'flamboyant', as at the moment, I'm not sure the stories above convey that idea convincingly.

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  2. That's a fair point, actually. Now that you mention it, I could have the cuckoo pop out during high-pitched notes, but instead of a bird, it'd be a tiny little wooden opera singer.

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  3. Hi Tom - I think you're still a bit guilty of over-complicating your story. You seem a bit fixated on 'pre-establishing' the flamboyance - as if the clock/bird emulates that trait. It seems to me that really this is so simple - and needs to be; the bird pops out and instead of just going 'cuckoo-cuckoo' - it pops out and does something much more, well. flamboyant...

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0DJC-ECU8IE

    I think the singing is fine - but do you really want to get involved in all that slavish lip-synching? I can't help feeling that you need to cut loose a bit and actually embrace the potential for 'animation' in your animation...

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  4. That video was-... *ahem*
    "FAB-U-LOOOUUS!"

    It's freaky, last night on the walk home I had the same exact idea for a bird to pop out of the cuckoo clock and perform something along the lines of that.

    I think you're right about my ideas being too complicated. A simpler one would be much easier and would be all that's needed. It seems I'm too fixated on some putting some kind of static storyline in place.

    I should start sketching up some ideas for the cuckoo bird.

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