This project blog is about a short film project I've been working since early 2008. I have many things going on all the time so the first thing I didn't want this project to be is a stress causer. That's why I'm plannin to do the whole pre production entirely by myself and do this only when I have got time from other things. There is no time limit or strict deadlines so it's ready when it's ready.

I could've start this article earlier but I wanted to keep this project in background since I've never been too sure I can even finish this. That brings us to the ultimate goal of this project; learning new things! The most important thing to me is not how this project finally turns out but how much new things and objects of interest I eventually find out. My work in the industry has always been mostly modelling and texturing yet I'm also interested to do something else like scripting, art design, concept art, rigging, animation etc. There is no better chance to do that all but an own animation short movie.

The script

Writing a script may sound easy but it definately itsn't! This far I've had a million and one different ideas and fortunately after struggling for a year I've found a decent idea and scheme. I wanted the story to be built in a way it works as a individual movie but gives an opportunity to be a part of series of movies. The movie tells a story about a shrink and his assistant who happens to be a living moose head trophy. I've written multiple different script synopsises of stories but I ended up to one about a countryman from Savo (an distant area in Finland) settling into city life in Helsinki. This gives me opportunity to think about controversies between old and young people and people from different backgrounds and cultures. That's always very curious and thought-provokin issue. So, in conclusion the story contains three characters, one major location which is the doctor's clinique and mayby one or two other locations. I didn't want to do anything too massive, this is a short movie after all.

Art direction

I've pretty much finished the art direction already. That's something I've had in my mind pretty clear since the beginning. The style will be down to earth in lighting and textures with a hint of painted feeling but overall everything from characters to items will be sharp cornered and slightly bend and sclupted like.

This far

I've done "clay"models, drawn multiple sketches, written many versions of multiple scripts and modelled some elements and items in 3D. I also have good references and backgrounds for everything. The next very important step is to finally finish the script and continue with animatic. Couple weeks ago I started one of the major learning pipelines by watching hours of rigging tutorials for Maya. That's so cool to learn new things about that program.

I will post images and photos soon; actually as soon as I get my network HUB working again.