Bow Design Process
Transformation and converge of ideas will be happening at this stage of the design cycle, when we start designing and changing the look of the artwork and animation. This is by far the most difficult cycle since of very important decisions are going to be after the finalization of the script, the people working within the production team began separating the work load into four scenes. They also had the responsibility to separate the teams into one of the four scenes. The scene that I was assigned to contribute in was the first scene and epilogue part of the projection mapping. I have chosen to work with the bow because I thought that I had enough skills to produce and animate this asset effectively.
Basically, this bow will be formed from two different flags, one of them is the Maltese flag and the other is the EU flag. At first, the flags will be flying around the façade. This is going to be done by my colleague who will be creating this animation in 3-Dimension using Maya. When they collide together in the middle of the façade, they will form into a 2-Dimensional bow with the two flags. I will be creating the bow in 2-Dimension and then I will be animating the asset with an in-transition and the out-transition.
I first started to create a mood board that is related to bows that are fixed on any kind of present. I mostly looked at red bows since it is one of the colours that are related to Christmas. As one can see in image 1, there is a variety of different formed bows. I took the 3 most simple bows from the mood board and started to illustrator using Adobe Illustrator.
After finishing the bows, I place them next to each other add began to decide on which bow I will be using. In my decision, I had to make sure that I have enough time to tweak the design before animating the asset and that the asset is easy to animate for both the in-transition and out-transition of the asset before the deadline, which is on the 26th of November. I also had to make sure that both the Maltese and EU flag will be recognizable. Due to these factors, I had come to a decision that the middle bow will be the best option to work with.
After finishing the bows, I place them next to each other add began to decide on which bow I will be using. In my decision, I had to make sure that I have enough time to tweak the design before animating the asset and that the asset is easy to animate for both the in-transition and out-transition of the asset before the deadline, which is on the 26th of November. I also had to make sure that both the Maltese and EU flag will be recognizable. Due to these factors, I had come to a decision that the middle bow will be the best option to work with.
Animation
For the bow animation, I am trying to keep it as clean and simple as possible. From the start, I mainly wanted to work with particle animations. The factor that contributed to this decision is the Christmas themed and European themed and the animation needed to be combined with a visual effect that will synchronize with both the effects and visuals. Development of this project was divided into two, bow animation in and bow animation out. I have decided to work in a nested composition method through advise from one of the tutors that was given a few years ago. And since I am going to be working with particles, and particles do tend to take more time rendering. some feather to the masks so that the asset is introduced and leaving as smoothly as possible.
I have tested with two types of particle effects. CC Particle System II is found within the Adobe After Effects. This effect is called. Trapcode Particular other particle effect is a plug-in that can be installed separately into the software. In order to apply this effect effectively, I first animated the in and out transitions of the bow without the particle effect. I used masks to have more control of how I am animating the bow. I used position and played with the key frames in order to animate the out transition in a symmetrical way. In the case of the in transition. I only used one mask and reduce the time it took to scale the mask by again using key frames. Before advancing onto the next step, I applied featuring and and sure that other assets are transitioning out properly with masks. The following video is one of the test animations I have done.
I have tested with two types of particle effects. CC Particle System II is found within the Adobe After Effects. This effect is called. Trapcode Particular other particle effect is a plug-in that can be installed separately into the software. In order to apply this effect effectively, I first animated the in and out transitions of the bow without the particle effect. I used masks to have more control of how I am animating the bow. I used position and played with the key frames in order to animate the out transition in a symmetrical way. In the case of the in transition. I only used one mask and reduce the time it took to scale the mask by again using key frames. Before advancing onto the next step, I applied featuring and and sure that other assets are transitioning out properly with masks. The following video is one of the test animations I have done.