Background designs

These are the background designs for the animatic. The animatic is set in a city, so the backgrounds consist of cobbled streets, a wall or other feature in the immediate background and a silhouetted cityscape in the far background.

In the overall design of the background, I intend to keep the environments simple but effective so that the backgrounds will tie in with the tone of the animatic.

Script format

Scene one:
Set in a monochrome world.
+ Close up of the Pierrot's feet walking along the cobbled streets. (sounds of footsteps as he walks.)
+ Camera pans up to a long shot of the Pierrot walking.
+ Close up of the Pierrot stopping as a string appears from the sky. A side quarter view of the Pierrot as grabs the string and pulls the golen balloon down.(the balloon is the only object in colour.)
+ Close up of the Pierrot's face as he turns into colour. (A chime sound effect as he turns into colour.)
+ Long shot of the Pierrot as he strides down the street with the happy face balloon.
+ Long shot of the Pierrot walking over the bridge with the balloon.
Scene 2
+ Close up of the boy with a sad face.
+ Long shot of the Pierrot walking over to the boy.
+ medium shot of the Pierrot handing over the balloon, a diuplicate appearing and the boy takes this one. (the balloon slightly changes colour as it is duplicated.)
+ Close up of the boy as he smiles and changes colour. (Chime sound again as he changes colour.)
Scene 3
+ Long shot of the Pierrot striding away, down the cobbled streets.
+ Medium shot of the Pierrot walking down a road lined with trees and an iron fence in the background.
+ Medium shot of a lady sitting on a bench by herself looking sad.
+ Wide shot of the Pierrot striding past the lady, then steps back and turns towards the lady.
+ Medium shot of the Pierrot holding out the balloon and the balloon duplicates.
+ Close up of the lady appearing into colour. (Chime sound as she turns into colour. Balloon changes a darker shade as it duplicates.)
+ Wide shot of the Pierrot as he strides away.

Scene 4
+ Long shot of the Pierrot striding past a row of houses.
+ Long Shot of the Pierrot stopping.
+ Close up of the Pierrot looking up to a second floor window.
+ Close up of a girl crying at the window.
+ Long shot of the Pierrot looking up at the second floor window where the girl is looking out. Pierrot holds out balloon and the dupliacte floats up to her.
+ Close up of the girl grabbing the balloon and changing into colour. (chime sounds. Balloon changes a darker shade as it duplicates.)
+ Long shot of the Pierrot striding away.

Scene 5
+Scene one:
Set in a monochrome world.
+ Close up of the Pierrot's feet walking along the cobbled streets. (sounds of footsteps as he walks.)
+ Camera pans up to a long shot of the Pierrot walking.

Scene 6
+ Medium shot of Pierrot as he looks up to the balloon.
+ Close up of the balloon which has turned red and it's happy expression has changed to one of anger.
+ Close up of the Pierrot smiling and letting go of the balloon. The Pierrot fading back to black and white as he lets go of the balloon.
+ Long shot of the balloon floating away into the sky, the scene fading to black and white.

Pierrot profile and character rules

Character Rules:

1: He always holds onto the balloon, even when passing on the dupilcate to the other characters.
2: He strides along the streets in a confident manner.
3: He is always impassive and expressionless. His only other expression is a blank smile.
4: He is enigmatic, a bit of a mystery and no one really knows who he is or what his purpose is, yet they trust him.
5: He never talks.

Profile:

Name: The Pierrot.
Eye colour: Blue.
Facial appearance: white face make-up. Red tear drop under his left eye. Black cross over his right eye. Blue lips.
Hair colour: Black.
Physical appearance: Tall and slim.
Clothing: Black top hat. Black and white patchwork shirt with black and white neck ruffle with large red buttons and ruffles around the end of the sleeves. White mitten-gloves. Black trousers. Black pointy boots.

Balloon design

This is the design for the balloon. During the course of the animatic, the balloon changes state from happy (as shown on the far right) to angry (as shown on the near right).

The design of the balloon is simple as I was trying to create the effect of the character of the balloon being quite sinister. even though the balloon could be seen as an inanimate object, I was trying to create a bit of depth behind the character of the balloon. I wanted to create the idea that the balloon is not what it seems and this gave the inspiration for the balloon changing state through the course of the animatic.

The balloon changes colour gradually as it begins to change state and the only difference in terms of deisgn is the addition of frowning eyebrows and change of colour.

This was intentional as I wanted the balloon to seem quite sinister and i decided that the best possible way to do this would be to only slightly change the charater's design.

Final Pierrot design

This is the final design for the Pierrot. The design of the Pierrot's costume is the only thing that has changed.

I have incorporated elements of both of the initial costume designs into this one. The ruffled collar with the pom-pom has been adapted from the first inital outfit design and I have used the black and white patchwork shirt design from the second initial outfit and added ruffles around the ends of the sleeves as well as giving the Pierrot mitten-gloved hands.

The Pierrot also wears plain black trousers, which fan out towards the end of the trouser leg and he wears shoes with pointed toes.

it is undecided whether the Pierrot shall be wearing a hat, but I think at this moment that it is not entirely necessary as I feel that his character design is complete.

The Pierrot's face is painted white and he has a red tear drop under his left eye and a black cross over his right eye as this is incorporates both the clown and mime elements of his character.

Overall, I am very peased by the design of the Pierrot and I think that his character is depicted effectively. I think that his costume design suits the character and I feel that the character had been fully developed to the best of his potential.

Pierrot Design

This is the initial character outfit that I designed for the Pierrot.
The Pierrot is a sort of mix between a clown and a mime, so I tried to establish both types of costume in these initail designs.

In conclusion, I think that several elements of the design work really well. For example, I think that the black and white ruffled collar works really well, and I think that the fitted top is more suitable than the loose one, although I do like the patchwrok design on the second outfit.
I also think that it is a better idea to have mitten-gloved hands as opposed to finger-gloved hands as it will be easier to animate, and I think that the ruffles around the end of the gloves is a nice touch.
Another thing that I really like about these designs are the pom-poms on the second outfit, as i think that it adds a distinct feature to the character and I think that this is one of the features that I would like to keep in the final design. The pointed shoes is another feature that I really like in this design, and I would also like to keep this aspect in the final design.

Pierrot Character design

This is my character design of the Pierrot in the animatic.

I think that this deisn captures the character of the Pierrot effectively as it shows his pensive nature.