Anim3005 extended module



for extended module we have to create a theoretical treatment for the project and it has to go towards the pre production and negotiated practice my idea for the module is to do about lighting in 2d animation mainly how lighting can create atmospheric emotion. lighting for myself is something i have a limit of knowledge of lighting.  i plan to research about light and lighting technique in live action and mimic it in hand drawn image when researching i will find opinion on if lighting create mood and opinion on methods on lighting situations and creating atmospheric emotions.

https://www.videomaker.com/article/c13/7980-light-source-in-the-mood-creating-mood-with-light

http://www.digital-photo-secrets.com/tip/3558/using-lighting-style-to-create-mood-high-key-and-low-key-lighting/

i researched in to high key and low key lighting high key lighting is where lighter colour become more higher toned and the dark mid tone become light tones. which i found is how i could use it into the film with the scene that involved Luna's mothers as she wears white. the backgrounds will have do be very high tones to achieve this if i used water colour will using mainly water on the brush and small amount of paint.


in a article in is states that low lighting is somber, mysterious and moody, dramatic and even ominous depending on the subject.

another article explains different types of moods and how to portray them with in the lighting with still using the basic lighting with a few extra lights.

setting up for certain emotions.

Neutreal and happy lighting set up

the first set up is high key lighting that you would find in game shows or tv sit coms. they explain that this lighting set up you cast less shadows making the atmosphere bright and happy. the placement of the lighting is to have a three point lighting on each actor. with there example they had two actor sitting having a conversation, in that situation two sets of three point lighting will be place for each actor. with the increase in lighting it will stake out solid shadows. then by adding in a diffusion

at first hearing about diffusion i then research out what diffusion were and how they effected lighting i found a few videos explaining and portraying the different in white diffusion and an explanation on different light gels and changing the colour temperature to match outside and inside lighting matching tungsten florescent and cold lighting.

set up for dramatic and serious lighting.

in this set up it is said to keep out spill of the key and fill light using the flag and the same with the back light making each light not spill on the other actor depending on how many actors there is on set. with this it will achieve a more tension and dramatic lighting which i find will be useful for my film with the scene in the cave as the only light will be from the torch which will work for low key lighting.

set up for strong emotional lighting

have the three point lighting set up but with out having the diffusion gel on. the key and fill light must be further apart the there is separation between the beams of light. these changes will effect the lighting dramatically because of having no diffusion the outlines  of the shadows will be sharper and defines the cast more. with the correctly flagged will create of dark strong emotion.

set up for high intensity lighting / cameo lighting

have the key light to be sixty degree above each talent. flag the lights so there is no spill at all on the wall. focus and flag the back light so it is only hitting the subjects. the back light should also be further away than with the three point lighting to give off lest intensity or add on a diffusion. this will create a more dramatic scene and will no spill it will be like the actor and suspended in mid air. this will be used to create a lot more tension and high drama with the shot director would use this if the character is about to or in a a dangerous situation.

set up for a intriguing lighting

the use of one single back light on the actor or actor if two actor its best to have the single back light in between  the two actors. this will create a another mood having a singular actor with the single back light will mimic a street lamp, creating a lonely character scene.


set up for silhouette lighting

having a single light behind your actor and having no spill onto the actor it will achieve the effect of creating a silhouette.

with this research i will be experimenting with these techniques with making test of one situation and changing the lighting with the use of colours. and lighting in digitally




Lighting in animation

in traditional animation the lighting is determined by how the image is coloured before colouring it is best to figure out where the light is coming from, the intensity and how many light sources there is. the video above explain why it is beneficial to use lighting the effects and emotion it has on the films.

having the used of tonal work in the colour of the animation will determined the lighting i would like to use the information i have learnt i would like to create the lighting in live action and use those images to mimic it in a hand drawing using the aesthetic medium chosen for the film which is soft pastel. which with the bright colourful aesthetics i am going for it should work well to use pastels.

this technique i will be creating an animation test using one point lighting like explained in the video.



lighting in main stream animation

i thought to research and analiys the lighting in mainstream and experimental animation i first looked at disney's alice in wonderland (1951) then tex avery's work looking at a number of his cartoons, Fleischers brothers, with betty boop and pop eye. and comparing them with experimental work such as tim webbs A is for autism , stuart hilton save me and 6 weeks in June, with finally caroline leafs work to see if the use of sand animations and with the streets looking at the lighting with in that film as well.

Alice in wonderlands

when looking at the lighting it was very bright a colourful towards the characters and majority of the character will have the use of high tonal work in colours, a rare indication of shadows being casted on the character.   if you notice with the image above that alice is very brightly lite with the only shadow is the drop shadow as being in a woodlands area normaly there would be casts of shadows from the branches above her in the imagery above there is non. it also depend on where the lighting is coming from and where the sin is shining. the background is very detail with colours and shading to indicate casts of shadows from the leaves above with the use of dark browns and greens. with the bushes there is more indication with them having half of the bushed being coloure in dark green and some part being coloured in more darker tone, almost using the darkest colour of shade black. this helps analys how to create shadow with in traditional animation and use it towards my own film.

woodlands scene

in the woodlands scene there was a lot more use of shadows being casted on the characters. for example with the image above is a better feel for lighting with shadows being casted. its seems that in this film the use of shadows and shades of colours being included towards the characters are only used for atmopheric and for emotion. which i find works well with in this animated film. and for this woodlands scene creative more of a curious and fearful emotion towards the scene which with the use of lighting works. with in the shot above the lighting is used to reveal certains character or situations for example in this shot alice is originally in the dark and stands in the light when aproaching the birdcage.

with the example above the character interacts with the scenery and lighting having the character walk into a shade and then coming into light this will be another light.

the image and video above is from the when the playing cards march. I really like the used of shadows being casted and that the way they are animated to move across the character which is more towards the lighting I wish to use towards my animated films. i felt that this will be a good to use as a test for this module and test animating shadow moving across a characters face. the line test will be used and coloured with a multiple different mediums to portary the emotion and lighting. with this shot the emotion being portrayed is more with how dominate these marching cards are. not only using the animation to portray this but also the the lighting the way the shadow is drawn being all even going out of the frame portrays this well and how little alice is lit because of the dominance of the shadow. 

i will be animating a test animation on shadows being casted on characters same as shown in the alice in wonderland example

peering over rock animation sit com.

Tex avery compilations of his work.

wolf blitz

tex avery's short animation is wolf blitz i thought of this first becuase it was set with world war 2 setting which i felt would have a dark and dindgy appeal to the set which I found it did which was great.  for example the image above take from the film the detail in the background have more darker tonal work to fit with the emotion towards the film.  once again like alice in wonderland the character are still a lot brighter and have less range of shades towards them.

with the image above this is very ranged with tints and shades. although this is part of the background, as ive mentioned with alice the background is made by the background artists and layout artist, which is more detailed and intricate colours painted which is great research to use in future with background designing and colouring the background for my future films.

Colour theory

i research into colour theory as in 2D animation colour is dermins the lighting with the use of hue tints, shade, highlights Tones.

The image above is the colour wheel this colour wheel consists of 6 hues these are also known as the primary and secondary hues primary being portray with the 3 colours central are the primary RED,BLUE and YELLOW.  Secondary being the outertriangles before the colour wheel which are the colours of GREEN,ORANGE  and  PURPLE/VIOLET. the final set of colours  are called tertiary colour these are PURPLE BLUE,  RED ORANGE  YELLOW ORANGE,RED PURPLE, YELLOW GREEN , BLUE GREEN. the Image below portrays the primary secondary and tertiary the image above show the name of the colours. Colours are very important to animation in animation colour is the only way to create lighting for animation. showing all these different colours can help with shadows and when more light is portrayed on certain areas of the characters and environment. Hue, Tints, Tones and Shade.

Hues are the colours that I mentioned earlier with the primary secondary and tertiary know as a pure colours.

Tints

Tints are when you add white to a hue every time you add white making the colour gradually lighter until eventually you will get white. the lighter colours as shown above are tints.

Tones

Tone are like tints but you will add more grey to it which is what makes it a tone and not a shade. This is the the more grey you add the darker the tone is until finally reaching to shades.

Shades

Shades same as tints and Tones but you add black same as tints and shades the more black you add the darker the shade until reaching black. 

Colour scripts

Colour in animation get put it to scripts for some if not majority of animated films.

Colour script are the plans for what colour for the whole film if not certain scene will be best for the film. Some certain parts of the film the colour can portray mood and fit to the characters mood of semiotic use of colour for that scene.

the video below is the colour script for cloudly with a chance of meatballs. its CG film but looking at the colour in the film will portrays emotions with in the story arc with the use of colour. i feel that this is portrays well to emotion for example  the bright warm orange portrays happier emotion with very bright lighting. where in others there is white and grey symbolising more boring lifeless emotion 

an example is used in a scene in pixars animated film incredible the scene when bob is at work High lighted with a red circle) the colours are really unsaturated is of mainly greys backs and whites not bright colour portray the boredom that bob and working in an office to what bob does is a boring work place.

 When the is danger or fire surrounding the danger (circled in green) it portray the semiotics of danger or bad by having the red to symbolize this another is with the scene of bob and Mirage having dinner the idea of dinner and Mirage giving Bob the new job portraying her as good but having the used of fire and red and orange symbolize that she isn’t what she seem which we find out later in the film that she is a bad character. Also like with sound motifs Syndrome have a motif colour of cyan and green shown in the scenes(circled in Blue)

 surfs up colour script

this colour script is completely different to the Incredibles in this the scenes are names and a colour pallet like ive shown before for tints and shades. This is portrayed as a block of colour split into small bars of colour ranges throughout the scene. Through out this film it goes from quite a range of blues to a nice chunk of greens and browns from looking at this assuming that they will be in forest with title being surfs up with the blues included in the film meaning that those scenes are when the character are surfing or water is in the scene. For example the scene 

above titled Lava Tubes with the colours of black brown and oranges and the tilte of lava you can see what will be happening in this scene., meaning that a volcano is involved. The fact that you can work out by the colours and the titles what is happening with in that scene even with-out the title you can gather some information about whats happening in the scene like the blue for water or being out side for the sky. The orange for the lava can be perceived as fire like the Incredibles or semiotics of danger having orange being neighboring to red and yellow and knowing this can calculate semiotics from this.

e Horton hears a who colour script has a blend of the colour script of the Incredibles and surfs up.  And split into acts like narrative are mainly split into 3 introduction, conflict and resolution. For the introduction for when the audience first see the Whos they have portrayed what the creatures are like using colour as explained in the colours script that the who are very energetic characters to portray this they have very bright energetic colours and with the pacing of the editing quick cut to each shot. Then to portray the isolation of a character then suddenenly more birght colours to portray the party to contrast from the isolation of the other character at this point named jojo. this is a great example of colour being used for lighting and creating emotion towards the audience through colour.

With  Act two the atmosphere has been portrayed with in the colour like in the Incredibles. Although using low saturation and very high tint with loss of hue definition beside on the characters same kind of pallet as the boring work place but in this film they have portrayed as mysterious and scary/ portraying the contrast of the atmosphere of boring and scary with the same low saturation. In this colours script they also explain why they are using the colours besides atmosphere. For example in act two again ‘stormy clouds with sun backing through to create drama’ they explained what they are using it for “storm clouds with sun’ then why ‘to create drama’.

In act 3 is explains the colour and how it continues the narrative. at this point it’s the lowest point in the film as stated below.  Using pink and carring that colours through the narrative dominating the framing in pinks and violets until the end when the use of yellow is to portray the resolution and portraying peace to the whos by using the colour of the flower in which they live on.

 the research of colour script portrays the emotion well this will hep with creating the lighting in the animated tests and planning before creating them.

Caravaggio

I research and looked at Carravaggios work and the lighting with the uses of hues, tints, and shades. this is exactly what i need to capture for my animation with this paint the light source is  coming from the bottom right. looking at where the light hits the men in the painting with the use of hints with the research the closer the subject is the light source the more tints are used the further away the more shades a used. 

looking at the tints and shade with the image above with any hue range the tints on the left are if a subject is close to the light source and shades to black. which with Caravaggio's work we can see it with the skin colour of the man in the fore ground to the left closest to the light source his skin colour changes as the shades are added as his body is further away from the light source. looking at his left arm has a wide rage of tints and shades. with the closets muscle with the highest tints. the same apply with the back ground. we only partially see an object in the background because of how close to the light source further away from the light source it black because to the men blocking the light source the background is black. this is the same with the men the cman at the back of the other two has shaded black because of the man on the right of him blocking the light cuasing the use of black to be used in this area of the painting.

My Practice with shadow casting

i found some great research on casting shadows

http://www.animationbrain.com/2d-light-and-shadow.html

with the research above i had the idea i want to use is adding a characters shadow with in the film with the image below the character is lit with the lighting coming from the right of the character behind the camera which works with the character but the trees in the background isn't lit with the lighting. i will have to add in the shadows of the tree and bushes.

drawing two

Final Tests

original and sit com lighting gangsters

this animation below is the original coloured animation of the gangster I chose to put this as another sit com/comedy lighting. it i felt that the animation was great but with out the background it make the skin colour come out more brightly than needed which portrays that the intensity is really high on the light which is what i need for the sit com lighting. I put this first because i cut out the animation in photoshop and cut of characters various boy parts by accident. 

gangsters sit com/comedy lighting test 2

this second test i did i added in a background besides the body parts disappearing. i found that it worked really well and portrayed the sit com high key lighting that i was going for which i was really happy with when i watch this i feel that it gives really laid back comedy vibe of four character playing poker. i think to improve this i would take more care on Photoshop as it will take off a lot of problem to face later in the production and editing of the lighting.

gangster film noir lighting

i experimented with the gangster animation and lit it using after effect as i didn't have time to paint the darker layer in order to create the lighting effect traditionally.i took reference for this from Martin Scorsese film goodfellas and the scene is also inspired from this with the poker scene.

 I felt that the lighting work well and really surprised about how replicant it is. there is a problem with the masking of the shadow that i did in after effects and another problem was that the character to the left of the screen smoking a cigarette his had disappears which i was not happy with this was from carelessly i cut out the animation in in Photoshop. from the original which is the first test. this test below is the shot suitable for the genre with little intensity but enough to keep the character partially lit.

to improve this i would sort out the cutting out problem from photoshop and sort the masking problem out, and rotascope the shading over the character. this would of worked better if I cut out the shaded character on photoshop and digitally paint over the charaters shading taking more of the opacity down as it got closer to the light source. if i had the chance to do this again and the time, i would attempt to paint it traditionally taking the time to put each layer of paint over and over properly analyzing it.

gangsters Dramatic lighting

with the gangsters i did a dramatic lighting with after effects. this came out better than the film noir test. because of how dark this test was i was able to hide the photoshop cutting out mistake.

i feel this portray the different in atmospheric emotion for the film noir test to this dramatic test as this scene the way it is lit above portrays more of a mystery if this was for a gangsters mob film this would portray that because the other characters faces are lit it portray that they could be powerful. 

Directional lighting

this test i tried to mimic the light source coming from the left of the characters i feel that this worked really well and portrays the direction of the light well. i feel that the shadow of the character are off a bit especially the other three away from the light source i feel that the shadow should of been more to the right. this way i've done it not very realistic for the lighting i trying to portray. although this is animation and creating lighting in animation it could be that the realism doesn't matter in animation. i could of had the shadows really exaggerated and completely over the top.

over all with this test i am very happy with this and it portrayed the lighting i wanted it reminds me closely to the Caravaggio painting early mentioned with the research having a directional light source towards the subject i am happy that i managed to capture this with the artificial light. to improve i would sort the Photoshop cutting problem i've mentioned many times. but over all happy with this test

Original Hand painted lighting

the animation test below is an hand painted lighting. i try to brighten the top half of the character as his head rises to look over the rock.

i felt that it work okay but could of been better. i would need to add more layers of paint onto the bottom half to create more of a shade which would of created the illusion of the lighting. another problem was the rock i should of painted half of the rock with more shading almost close to black. this half will be towards the character. i am happy that it was close but needed more improvement and more time to keep adding layer then scanning it in to analyze it then add the other shades the the character. the background is digital as the traditional background didn't scan in well and made it to bright.

digitally lit

this is the digitally lit of the same situation the animation below is what i was originally wanted to create with the hand painted lighting. looking at this i could of took the whole bottom the the fame of with shading it with paint and would of worked. although i find that creating the soft edges as you see on the digital, can be tricky to replicate in traditional painting. in traditional painting would use a soft stroke to imply the soft edge.  

i was happy with the result of this test and should of done this before painting it with a digital animation although this would of also took up a lot of time and still would have to make a digital artificial light source as i did above.

animation exaggerated shadow

i thought to have an attempt an animation lighting and stay way from the realism of lighting and have fun with it. i did the shadow for this which worked well as a non realism lighting ad surprised at the results. i think i could of soften the edges of the shadow more to make it look more natural. 

i create the shadow in photoshop by copying the animation and taking out the exposure and dropping the opacity down to 18% to get a great soft to the interior of the shadow. I like how the shadow animates with the animation and fits. I feel that using he animation as a resources isn't traditional but with animation we find way to make the animation we want quickly and efficiently. like animating on twos.

exaggerated shadow and light

with this test i added in a light in after effects. i felt that it made the animation lighting work. i thought it would be better to show the light source instead of just a bright light like i did before.

i enjoyed creating this one and exaggerating the shadow leaving realism un involved in this test. i feel that i should of softened the shadow more but i really like the hard edge of the shadow fitting the animation aspect of this test. overall pleased with this test and experimenting with animation and not stick with realism. 

close up high intensity lighting

i experimented with the shadow and had it more 2d like the animation is. the point of the light source is very close to the character almost pin pointed at him.  i did like this but i feel that the shadows should of been more behind him rather than slightly to the right of him.

i think the shadow still fit with the test. if i was to do this i would shift the shadow more the left of the frame directly behind the character the enlarge the shadow to create more realism. 

exaggerated shadow

I had a lot of fun with this a thought more with do what the camera can't do side of animation and blew the shadow up unrealistically big it creates a nice intimidated feel. if i was to do this again i would add more animation and have the character get afraid of his own shadow to create a comical effect.

i think it would of been great to do more un realistic lighting effects in this module. i really like how his head goes out of shot with the shadow. there is a problem with the bottom of the shadow not connecting with the bottom of the rock but i feel because i wasn't going for realism it makes it more fun and animation friendly which i really like. i did have lots of fun with this eventhough its short and should of done more. but with this module i wanted to understand about lighting in film and learn about it for future references.

Critical evaluation

This module I was to create lighting in animation and creating lighting in a number of animation tests with the help of the research and findings I have made. The research I found was valuable for me as an animator and as a film maker. I found that I am now able to understand how lighting works in traditional animation with the use of shades tone and hues. This help with the practice of the traditional painted lighting test, although it didn’t work as well because of the shading needed to be darker and tints needed to be lighter with traditional approaches it takes a lot of time and going back and forth with painting and scanning the animation, analysing my work then improving the lighting with adding more tints and shades until I will be happy with it. Because of this I resorted to digital lighting for the animation tests  due to time. The after effects lighting worked really well and I was able to mimic the light very close to the references although the problems mainly came with my visual effect knowledge and masking the shadow over the character didn’t stay rotascoped with character and moved around the scene creating unnecessary lighting issues.

The reference material help and I was able to decode how the lighting works and how it looks in animation exploring a wide range from mainstream to experimental was interesting to see the difference. And take from both to put towards my work. Analysing the shode and tints with in the live action and animation extracts.

 In future I would be best to cut out the character in Photoshop first and creating each element of shading to the character the uploading in into after effect this will save me having to mask over the character and rotascope over the character as well. I feel that with this task it took more of a trial and error and realised that the painting of frames, creating the lighting in traditional animation is a separate job  that a whole  colour and ink department and need to fully research into  colouring and more into colour than lighting for this module. The lighting research helped and I understand how lighting works in live action and where shadow are casted and how shadows are casted depending on the light source which is what I was aiming for this module  it was more the learnin about lighting  aspect than the practical but using practical as a practise bases to learn rather to achieve.  Taking from my experiments and realizing how I’ve gone wrong what I need to improve on creating that emotion more. The technique was hard and challenging with the approach to digitally, painting and the use of after effect help and I was able to learn about lighting in after effect creating light artificially, I will be experimenting further with lighting in the future.

The animation test were bad with lighting didn’t work as well and but still portrayed different emotions portrayed different emotions well. I felt that some test were repeated and should of explored further with different sinarios with in a scene and lit them as well using lighting only. The traditional test slightly worked after cutting it and re arranging it in Photoshop but I felt that should have added more shading to the character. Digital aspect work really well and I was surprised at the results. It was challenging to create the lighting in 2d artificially. Trying to traditionally capture the in between of tints and shades to portray the light dimming away as the range weakened. I was really disappointed with the work I produced practically and could have used more range of ideas and emotion to creating lighting for.

If I was to do this module again with the same topic of lighting, I would create the animation digitally rather than traditionally. Digital animation and colouring I will still be able to practice with shades and tints. Looking at the lighting  and shades and tints used, see the results and analyse it and improve on the error a lot more quicker than I would with the technique of traditional as this as the main problem was the traditional drawing of the animation tests which took up a lot of time. As I had to traditionally animate the scene which can take time before I can scan it in and analyse it and then painting it traditional scan it in and analyse it then make the changes the adding in any shades or tints that is needed. The technique of digital would still allow me to use digital lighting in after effect and see the results with that analyse it and make changes quicker and improve the work. If a character was blocking lighting like in the gangster animation it would be more feasible to edit and cut out the characters and be able to manipulate the animation better and efficiently. Over all I am disappointed in the animation tests but feel that I have learnt a lot from the research and need to experiment and practice more with in lighting to understand the traditional methods of lighting animation.