Evelyn Alsemgeest’s Capstone R&D Blog

 PUPPET MAKING, PROP SCULPTING, MEETINGS This week I've been focusing on making my puppet. It's the focal aspect of my film so I want him to be perfect. My first version was a great learning experience, I found out that it was easy to make his limbs uneven and that for the Cosclay to work it has to be SUPER thin or else it'll break and I made his head waaay to big. So after that I set out on making a version 2 which has so far gone well, I did make his torso too long so I had to snap his stomach off and give him a new one. I also made quite a few props out of polymer clay. I'm not sure how many I will use but I thought they came out quite cute. They include: A laptop Phone Pot Mug Eyes Spoon Toothbrush And a box of food I also had a very helpful meeting with Miriam Harris on Thursday where she gave me some great tips. She told me that one of my peers is creating a puppet for her 3D Fabricaion minor so I might talk to her and see if I could perhaps 3D print some props or...

 STORYBOARD AND NARRATIVE REVISION, CHARACTER DESIGN, PUPPET SKELETON MAKING This week I started off revising my narrative as it was definitely realistic as a day-in-the-life story but it was boring. It was missing the heart so I decided to make my character go through an unsuccessful job hunt and at the end of the film he gets asked for an interview, creating hope.  I also did some character designs, I think I might incorporate some hair into his design as well, just tufts on top. Once I understood my characters design I started to make my puppets skeleton. So far for materials I’ve used various types of wire to create frames and joints, epoxy putty that cures to a rock hard plastic for the bones and structure and tin foil for the base of the head.  I’ve also exchanged skills with my peer Henry, he has been modelling a bus for me in exchange for compositing work later on.  Going forward I have a meeting with Miriam Harris an expert in stop motion on Thursday and I w...

 STORYBOARDING, NARRATIVE, CHARACTER ANALYSIS Getting into it. I was finding it hard to figure out a narrative so I went through my daily life and choose some mundane moments that stood out to me like brushing my teeth, food shopping etc. Then I took these moments and added a surrealist flare.  I got Hossein to read my first narrative rough cut and he gave me some great points about embracing the mundane and fleshing out the world and character more. This is why I did a character analysis on my main character, asking myself questions about his life and figuring out his name. I’m narrowing that down more.  I also made him out of blue tack as a fun exercise at work. Other than that I took my 2nd rough cut Narrative and made a storyboard which I will change many, many times. Going forward I want to design my main character a bit more as he looks a bit boring but I’m trying to keep it in the specs of what I can successfully create for my motion capture puppet. STORYBOARD ...

BRAINSTORM, MOOD BOARD, CHARACTER DESIGN, NARRATIVE, STOP MOTION RESEARCH First week back! Trying to solidify my idea. I created a brainstorm of what I want out of my capstone.  My main thing being MIXED MEDIA. I then made a mood board inspired by the 90’s, surrealism and childhood.  I used this as inspiration for a little bit of character design, I’ve only just started but I’m quite happy with the vibe that I’m getting so far. Heavily inspired by a stuffed toy that I own. I wanted my character to be a creature but not specifically an animal, a creature you can’t quite tell what it is. I also wrote down a very base narrative and decided what media’s I want used for which parts of my film. I want it to be a day in the life so I was deciding what parts of the day I wanted to focus on. I was thinking making breakfast, brushing teeth, public transport, supermarket, watching a movie, going to sleep. All of these will be very fantastical and not boring I promise haha I even did some...