Set Built: Forest

As I was finished with the first set before the Forest set was completed, I decided to help out to make sure it was done as soon as possible so that I could get back to animating. It has taken two days out of my schedule, making me a bit further behind but I still think I can get this animation done in time for the deadline. 

First, we had to make some trees. We were lucky enough to find some tubes with bark-like texture at the S.C.R.A.P place, and we bought 6 of them which was enough trees for this set and we plan to reuse them for the castle set. We paper-mached some roots onto them to help them stand up, and secured them onto the board by attaching some foam to the board that was the same size as a hole we had cut in the bottom of each tube. This meant that each tree was easily removed without damaging them or the set, but wouldn't move if knocked while animating. We used PVA glue and covered the floor of the set with soil to give it a good texture and then spray painted everything with a black base coat. Once this was dry, we painted all the trees with a couple of layers of different shades of brown paint to give it a good texture. We then painted what would be the inside of the ring of trees a slightly more orangey tone to give the impression that the campfire that will be in the middle was lighting them. We did a similar thing with the soil, painting it warmer in the middle of the circle, and then elliot used some pebbles to create a ring where the fire would be and some sticks to make it look like a campfire. 

We then had to use some moss and sticks to hide the base of the trees as the paper mache had warped a little, making the bottom of the trees look strange.

Puppet Costumes

I bought a selection of materials from S.C.R.A.P that I thought would work well with each of my characters. I was able to cut just enough of each fabric and it was so cheap, S.C.R.A.P is just the best place to buy materials for my puppets.

I decided to sew all the costumes myself as I have never really sewn anything before and decided it would be a useful skill to have. most of the costumes were pretty straight forward, although some of the materials were difficult to work with. Some of the materials frayed a lot, particularly the ones used for Rumpelstiltskins outfit. A little bit of fraying wasn't an issue as it adds to the look of the character, so I hemmed the materials to stop them fraying too much and then cut the jagged ripped look into them.

The first puppet I completed the outfit for was the Miller. This puppets clothing was the worst of the four because it was the first, however he just looks a bit ragged and rough, which works for the look of the character. It also isn't too big of an issue as he has the smallest role in the animation.

With Rumpelstiltskins outfit, the biggest issue I had to overcome was the fact that when casting the silicon, the arms didn't get fully filled out somehow, so I decided to adjust the outfit in the character design to give him longer sleeves to save time and money recasting the silicon again.

The Millers Daughter's puppet was the easiest puppet to clothe, the only real issue I had with this costume was the corset because I found it really difficult to fit it correctly to make the right body shape. I also had issues with the low cut neckline as it was really challenging to get the material to sit and stay where I needed it to.

The Troll King's costume was easily the most difficult. I had a lot of trouble fitting the robe/ cloak and making it sit the right way. I also had trouble with the shoes, as I had to make the fake leather material fit both the feet and the legs as they are boots and it was very difficult to make them look right. 

Crit and Feedback

I had a crit today on everything that I have done so far. The feedback I got was really good and everyone seemed to like my project.

No one really had many comments to make about what I could be doing better but Annabeth suggested a  couple of good ideas for how to do the fire in the forest scene. 
She suggested some plastic LED tea lights to create the glow and a small fan underneath with some thin strips of coloured acetate or thin film attached to the sticks to give an impression of fire.

Props

I have been thinking about props. I thought I might be able to buy some of the props from ebay or etsy but i've been having trouble finding things that would be the right size. I was hoping to find the spinning wheel in particular as it would be most difficult to make but I could only find one that would be bigger than my characters and the others were all too small. I have asked elliot to make my spinning wheel out of wood. We bought some wooden curtain rings that we thought would be the right size for the wheel and some lollypop sticks and scraps. Also maybe a stool for Rumpelstiltskin to sit on while he's spinning.

I did manage to find some gold wire which I think will work well for coils of gold after Rumpelstiltskin spins the straw. I had to pad out the reels of gold with gold coloured plasticine as there wasn't enough gold wire to look like all of the straw was spun. I also bought a wooden brush head with bristles that I think will work well for straw. It's should be thin enough and the right texture to look like straw in the scale of the set and it's already the right colour so I plan to cut chunks of the bristles off and tie them into bundles with thread. 

Another prop I had to consider was the camp fire. I bought some little LED tealights that should fit inside the fire to give a little flickery glow. I was thinking we could drill a couple of holes underneath the campfire in the set and attach the lights underneath the set. This would mean the light would start at the bottom of the fire instead of half way up which would look better. 

I also need a baby, so I made a little babies head in plasticine, padded out the body with sponge and bundled it up in cloth. Hopefully the head wont be too visible, it just needed to look like there was a child inside the cloth. 

The only other props I need are two crowns, one for the king and one for the girl when she becomes queen. I was thinking of just making them out of air drying clay and painting them, then attaching some of the white trim that I will use for the kings cloak to the rim of each crown.

Animatic

I have put together a quick Animatic using the storyboard panels that Sophie sent me, and the voice over that I recorded the other day. This will give me an idea for timings and how the animation will flow, and also will help me to work out what I want the music to sound like so that I can send Sam this file and a page of cues. 

Storyboards

Sophie has finished the storyboards and mostly happy with them. There are a couple of shots that I will need to adjust slightly, like the shot where the girl becomes queen and is greeting her subjects, because I feel like this shot is unnecessary and I wont be able to make or animate a bunch of hands waving back at her. I also wont be making Rumpelstiltskin a hat and the last two boards after Rumpelstiltskin tears himself in two won't be included as they weren't part of the story, Sophie just added them in and I want the story to end at the scene where he tears himself in two as it's more dramatic. Other than these few changes, I am really happy with the storyboards. I now need to put the boards into an animatic with the voice over that I recorded the other day to work out the timings and cues, which I can then send to Sam to do the music.

Puppet Casting: Resin Heads and Painting

Once the silicon had set, I took them out of the plastic and had to cut into the blocks for the second two heads with a sharp scalpel to get the plasticine heads out of the middle. I did them with zig zag lines so that the moulds can spring back into the same place. The two part moulds were just separated and cleaned when the second half of silicon had set. I didn't do a plaster jacket for the second half because the silicon was strong enough to hold its shape without a jacket, unlike the first half.

 Once the moulds had been sorted, I made sure the Resin couldn't leak out by putting tape around the one part moulds to hold them together, and the two part moulds I had to secure by putting a wooden board on the non-plaster side and securing the mould together with an elastic band. I tried it without the wooden board but the elastic band pulled the silicon too tightly in the middle and left a gap at both ends so the board helped even out the pressure. Once both moulds were secured it was  time to add the resin. Resin is very hazardous and so I had to wear goggles and gloves to protect my eyes and hands from possible splashes. To mix the resin, I first had to pour the resin into a cup on the scales, measuring out how much I needed to fill each mould. The catalyst was then added which makes the resin cure. I had to add no more than 2% catalyst, otherwise the resin will generate too much heat while setting and would turn it yellow instead of clear.
Once it was mixed, I poured it carefully into each mould and then took them to Leon in Metalworks to use the vacuum former to get rid of any bubbles that might have formed inside the mould. I only did this for the first two moulds as Andy said after this that, as I'm painting the heads, the bubbles wouldn't be visible as they will be right in the middle and never rise to the edges.

Andy has warned me that when resin has set it can still be quite tacky and sticky for a few weeks, but suggested that I could take the heads to Leon and ask him to bake them in the oven for 30 minutes which will stop them from being tacky. This will allow me to paint them sooner. 

 The four heads have come out of the moulds just fine, a couple of the have little issues but nothing that can't be easily fixed before painting. The Rumpelstiltskin head has a couple of air bubbles on his chin but they've just caused holes which I can fill in and cover with paint. The Millers head is missing a tiny piece of his moustache but it will be easy to level it out. The girls head easily came out the best and I think that is because the mould was the simplest and smoothest. The Millers head came out slightly yellow which is apparently what happens if the resin overheats while curing. This would be because slightly too much catalyst was poured in when mixing. Fortunately this wont affect my puppet as I will be painting over it.
I put all four heads in the oven in metalworks for half an hour then left them to cool down over the weekend. 
Once they were cooled, they were much harder and I then drilled holes for the eyes and neck and cut off the extra resin that leaked out into the rest of two of the moulds with a scalpel. 
Once this had all been sorted and the heads were smoothed out, I set about painting them.

I have looked into how you can paint on resin by looking at forums and online posts by other artists that make things in resin. Apparently you can paint on resin with acrylic paint but it has a tendency to chip and flake off when handled too much, but if you use primer first it stops the paint from chipping. 

I sprayed each head with two coats of a matt finish white primer as the first coat peeled off a little as it got stuck to the board. After the second coat the all four heads were completely covered and once they were dry they were ready for painting. I gave each head a base coat of the main colour for their heads. The Rumpelstiltskin head will need a second base coat as the green isn't as thick as the other colours. I also made the Troll King's skin tone a little lighter as it looks too purple on my maquette and I think a lighter tone will be easier to duplicate for the silicon hands.

              

Once the base coats were completely dry, I started painting in the details and colours.

Puppet Casting: Silicon body parts

To cast the silicon body parts, I had to make sure that I first mixed each colour correctly. I had to use oil paints and then added a small amount of each colour into a pot of silicon. 

The first casts for the Rumpelstiltskin puppet didn't work very well, they were too gooey and thin and didn't set properly, so I'll need to re-do these. I think this must be because I didn't mix it properly. 

Luckily the hands for the Troll king and the Millers hands and feet and the Millers Daughter's body parts all came out perfectly first time which I am very relieved about, as if they hadn't I'd have had to buy more silicon which would have set me back another week. 

Once I'd taken the hands and feet out of the mould,I had to carefully cut off the extra silicon and trim it down as close to the shape of the arm as possible.

The second attempt at Rumpelstiltskin's hands and feet worked much better, and all the silicon cured correctly, however the silicon had run out of the mould some how in the arms, meaning that the hands had worked perfectly, but the arms were really thin and wirey. This meant that I would need to edit the costume to cover the arms because I did not have time to order more silicon and recast them.