If I only had a brain

Before commencing production, I hoped to write clearly my intentions for this shot.

I hope to animate the shot I hoped to animate in Canada, but my lack of experience prevented its completion. My attempts at animating a sneeze has provided some confidence and with this in mind, I hope to proceed. The shot is to animate part of the song 'If I only hand a brain'. The scene begins after our character, Frankenstein's monster, has dug up a grave and at last, his quest for completion is near... or is it?

The aims of the shot are:

1) Character. I have lived with this character for months, initially planning to animate him as part of a two character dialogue. Unfinished, he lacks a brain and feels a bit lost without one, but what he lacks upstairs, he makes up for in the warmth of his heart. It is important to note that Frankenstein is a villain and I wish to show this under core.

2) I will begin by animating the spine and head. Hitting the beats simply in the rotation x (forward and back). This will be the core of the shot, that will lay the foundation for the timing.
This is in a similar fashion to how my teacher encourages timings to be broken down into simple components. For instance, to animate the piano sequence from Tangled's I've got a Dream, he would plan out the core of the movement using a ball as follows:



3) The character is warm and friendly, but he has an essence of villainy inside him. I wish to draw inspiration from Fagin, particularly in the hand gestures. I am a fan of how much character can be presented in the hands, of particular note is Andreas Deja's scene where Jafar's cruelty is presented by his fingers wrapping around an amulet. I love how spindly they are.

4) Facial animation is going to be fun here. My plan is to note the key emotions/expressions I wish to hit and use the different head turns to help build asymmetrical poses. Knowing the different thoughts that enter the character's mind will help build the transitions between each pose.

5)  In order to complete the shot faster and stay in control, this shot will be produced as a single character shot. However, depending on its success I may later extend it to a two person, changing only a few key frames to do so.


The above shot was produced in Canada. Although unfinished, it could provide a few ideas when combining the characters together into one performance.