Explaining Research
Concerning secondary research; it has never been my strong suit. This is because I don't really take in information from watching videos and this is mostly what secondary research consists of. I am more of a practical learner so I take in more information by actually testing things out.
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However the videos that I have watched I think that I have improved extensively in actually thinking about how the information in this video and how I could put it into my own animation.
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Most of the videos that I have watched are just mostly tutorials on animation and the styles of animation. I have also been heavily inspired by watching David Firth's series "Salad Fingers" and the art style that comes along with it and I don't think that doing something like that will be too ambitious for me.
However I am not trying to emulate the style completely; I just want to take parts of it and incorporate it into my work.
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I was inspired by "Salad Fingers" because it has a disturbing/unique art style which I think I could do something similar to easily and it explores dark themes which has inspired me also explore dark themes and not be afraid to showcase something out of the box and make the viewers think and challenge them a little bit.
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"Salad Fingers" also showcases surreal images which is something I want to incorporate in my animation but I don't know if I would be able to that effectively.
This is because I am not experienced at animating yet so I wouldn't know how to make something look surreal but not messy at the same time.
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I do want my animation to have a sort of "Messy" look but I want it to also be watchable so if it is too messy but not on purpose it could detract from the overall animation.
I have also been inspired by "Jaiden Animations" YouTube videos. I have watched her videos because she is one of my favourite animators and content creators. This is because her animations are very professional and very nicely animated but she is also very real and interactive with the viewers in the stories that she shares.
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From Jaiden's videos I am taking the interactivity with the viewers from it and how her videos (although usually comedic) leave the viewers thinking.
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I don't think I am going to take much from her art style however. This is because the way she draws and animates is very different from the way that I do. This is because her art style is very clean and sharp whereas mine is quite messy in a way so if I tried to adopt her art style I think I would be focusing too much on making it look good that I wouldn't be greatly focusing on how good and put together the final product is.
Jaiden Animations
Moreover, the specific video of Jaiden's that has inspired me was her video named "Why I Don't Have "Face Reveal" " https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VhEATqXnXCI . This video is rather different from the videos that she usually uploads and in my opinion is the best animation she has made. This is because in this video the concept and themes that she explores are very heavy when compared to her comedic videos.
In this animation she shares her struggle with her eating disorder and anorexia and bulimia.
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The reason I'm really inspired by this animation was that she was unafraid to put out something that would be considered as shocking to many people. This really inspired me to try and focus on heavy themes as it could leave a greater impact on a viewer than if I did something joyous and with not much meaning.
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Furthermore the animation that goes along with the video is quite simple compared to how she would animate in her other videos. This is because in this video it appears as if it just the linework/the sketches that are animated and the characters/ objects are not fully fleshed out.
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You could argue that animating in this way could be seen as lazy or unfinished which I understand because from a technical standpoint the animation is missing a few things. Alternatively, I would say that the animation in this video is very cleverly thought out and really helps to extenuate what she is saying in the video. It also helps to capture the more sad/macabre mood that Jaiden showcases in this video and after watching really leaves you thinking.
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This is the effect what I want my animation to have. I want my animation to leave the viewers thinking and have a lasting impression. I think that I will be able to do this by having a unique art style and exploring unconventional themes.
Evaluating Research
In general I think that my secondary research has greatly improved since I first started the course. This is because when I am watching videos or reading articles that are relevant to my animation. I actively try to take in as much information as I can and try to think about how I could incorporate it into my animation.
With this project I only really watched videos for my secondary research. This is something that I can definitely improve on, in future projects I should strive to look in books or read more things for research instead of relying on videos to tell me things. I should actively search out solutions to problems that I may face.
I think this because in this project when I watched videos I did not take notes on it I sort of relied on just retaining the information. I am also unsure if all of the videos I watched were really relevant to my animation. This is because it took me a while to actually think of a stable concept I wanted to do. I was unsure whether I wanted to do stop frame animation or traditional computer animation so the research I did was concerning both.
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I think I should have tried to come up with a concept faster so I could have done more relevant research for my Final Major Project.
Lovely Lauren Research
Another piece of research that I have found to be useful for me was the channel known as "Lovely Lauren" on YouTube. On this channel, she makes lots of disturbing animations. They're mostly "meme" animations. Which is where lots of people do their own animations to go along with a song but twist it into their own styles. However she does also do original animations as well.
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Furthermore, her "meme" animations are not the things that I am inspired by. I am inspired by her original animations. This is because she creates her own stories and characters and some of them are based off of her own life experiences. I very much like her art style as it is explicitly disturbing/unsettling.
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A creepy art style is something that I would like to have as this will help me to put forward more creepy concepts and it will leave a more lasting effect on the viewer.
As opposed to having a style that I don't really know how to draw in, which is "Lovely Lauren's" style; I want to create my own style of drawing that is unsettling in it's own right.
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I was thinking about trying to emulate her style of drawing in an attempt to make my animation look more professional. I decided against this though. This was because if I tried to emulate her style to much, this would take far too much time. Mostly because I don't know how to draw in that way and I don't have the best of equipment all of the time. Commonly resorting to having to use the mouse and the smoothing tool on animate.
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One of "Lovely Lauren's" videos actually inspired me to make an ending to my animation. This being the "HYPNOTIC (MEME)" ending. A part that I was very much inspired by was the ending where all music stops.
The reason I decided against doing this in the end was because the idea wasn't original in the slightest and I wanted to make an original ending.
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Secondly, I wasn't impressed with the actual animation I did in this part. This was because I thought that was the animation was much too messy and unclean. This made the animation not watchable in my opinion and this detracted from the quality of the whole animation in my opinion.
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So instead of adopting her art style or using her idea I have learnt from her that you should be original. This is because she always puts her own twist onto whatever she does. However when I tried to do what she did. I ended up not making it original whatsoever, which is something that I very much want to avoid. I want to make an animation that is full of my original ideas while borrowing concepts and images from other media while twisting it to fit into the world of my animation.
Research Evaluation
Not an image from the video I mentioned but from one of her original videos that demonstrate her style and gives a hint at the way she animates which is evident that is quite different from the way I do.
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dRzyOrY9VFw
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In my animation I had some parts where I wanted to create a shadow or blur effect. Specifically the parts where a more tense atmosphere is supposed to be portrayed. I was unsure of how to do this so I watched a video that explained how to add effects to the animation. I did figure out how to add glow beforehand but I didn't know how to add a shadow effect. However it turned out I had just made an oversight, I should've gone through the same process for the glow and just select the blur and shadow effects. I just didn't see that they were options so I was struggling with how to add a shadow effect which would add to parts of my animation. I was aware that I could add a shadow and blur in Premiere Pro but I wanted to know how to do this in the actual Animate program so I can be more precise with where the shadows are placed in my animation. This is because Premiere Pro's effects can be a bit restrictive in what they do.
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The video that I watched was Uploaded on the 31st of July 2015 by Howard Wimshurst on Youtube
"Animating Shadow and Lighting Effects in Flash"
In my animation I also had a part where I needed the animation to sync up to the music. However when completing the animation I realised this was a bad idea because it didn't really fit within the style of my animation and seemed to not be part of the world I was creating. Nonetheless before I realised this I needed to add music to Animate and was unsure on how to accomplish this so I watched a video that clearly explained how to do this. Again I could have added the music afterwards in Premiere Pro but by doing this the animation wouldn't have been as synced up as it could have been.
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The video I watched was uploaded on the 10th of August 2017 by "Chris Did That" on Youtube "Quick Tip: Add Audio to Adobe Animate CC!"