A personal piece created to evoke and captivate viewers, using relatable themes and metaphors inspired from life.
Roles: Concept, Animation, Design, Compositing.
Evoke:
Moral: Persistence in the face of great struggle, can lead to the greatest growth.
Programmed Emotion deals with the struggles that come with being isolated from a person who is important to you, and the destructive cycle that follows.
Concept:
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This story is visualized through a man who is trapped in containment, and is forced to endure a treatment called "Programmed Emotion."
This treatment is an attempt to forcefully make a person relive their worst emotions through induced abstract dreams.
Structure:
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Houdini:
This was my first project using Houdini, and it was a huge undertaking. A lot of the effects I wanted to do were pretty complex, and would require more than what C4D could offer.
Each room had its own challenges.
The Lab: Electricity.
Despair Room: Melting Man and Growing Splines.
Sadness Room: Growing Crystals.
Anger Room: Growing Flames.
Typography:
A majority of the text animation was created using a combination of text animators in Adobe AE, and in some instances coding to create a cycling of emotions or numbers to represent the passing of time.
Storyboard:
When storyboarding, I was always reminding myself of the moral, and the intense message I needed to get out into this project. For me this story was very important to tell and I wanted to do it in the most effective, dramatic way possible.
Audio:
The audio went through many iterations. Initially finding music was a huge challenge, because I wanted something that encapsulated every emotion, while feeling dynamic, digital, and impactful.
I eventually found a track by an artist named Lorn, called "Yesterday's Pain" which I felt was perfect for what I was looking for, and received permission to use from the artist himself.
This track was elevated by the talented Sound Designer Kelly Warner!
Nuke:
After all the animation, design, typography, and audio was done, the last step was to improve the visuals using Nuke to color correct and color grade the final footage.
Cryptomattes were a massive help in this part of the process, allowing me to go very in depth with the CC of specific objects and textures.
Roto Paint was also very useful in painting out unnecessary glitches or distracting errors in renders.
Final Notes:
The completion of this project was a huge relief, since it was a story I really wanted to tell. All together this was easily the biggest challenge I've ever undertaken in regards to concept, animation, design, and just overall scope.
These notes placed around my desk probably contain at least 4 or 5 passes from this project, and are where my immediate thoughts would usually go.
