Itty Bitty Seeds (of Inspiration)

Imagination and creativity is always an animator's and artist's best friend, but sometimes it can be overwhelming. Well, of course always in a good kind of way :) As a junior studying animation about to embark on the tumultuous journey of producing my own senior thesis film, I have been racking my brain on what I should make it about.  I started thinking about possible story ideas since last fall semester, and studying abroad in Italy definitely gave me little inspirations here and there, most of them being cute little love stories. Italy is truly the land of romance :)

Then one day, this idea randomly popped into my head of creating a story about a blind boy. Whether he was blind from birth or became blind at a young age still has yet to be decided, but I was intrigued by that idea immediately.  Imagine not being able to see anything. Sounds fuel empty creations in your mind and you don't know where they came from. As an artist, color is such a huge part of how I draw and see things. Sometimes I even think in color. But imagine not being able to see anything... not even black and white perhaps... that thought was mind boggling to me. 

Being a lover of the beach and ocean, I automatically wanted it to take place by the sea.  What if he lived in a fisherman village...with his grandfather? What if his mental barrier was his fear of the sea and his desire to overcome it? That was a basic start, and I knew I had to elaborate on that... and that elaboration process is very slowly coming along. Most of the time, I'm stumped, but I have been coming up with a few random ideas here and there.

For my thesis, I know three things for sure. I don't want any dialogue, and I want one of my main focuses to be on landscapes.  That being said, I want the art style of my thesis to be AWESOME.  I'm going for something very stylistic, with paint strokes evident in the background, water color splatters or inked lines evident, rather impressionistic.  The challenge, if I end up doing a thesis about a blind boy, is how to portray what he "sees" in his mind.  And I believe I can have great fun with that :)

I started looking at some of my favorite artists to gain inspirations, from classic to more contemporary.  I love all different types of art style, and I want to find a way to be able to merge a variety of those into my film.

First off, I LOVE MONET.  I love impressionist paintings in general, because they capture the movement and spirit of a place or person, rather than just detail. Gestural and free. I love that. Monet's wispy strokes are great, and the glints of bright color and highlights is a beautiful contrast with the darker palette.

Love this color palette of soft pastel! 

The sky is is alive and breathing. 

I love this picture because it gives the essence of a village being shrouded by mist in the background. Soo,  if my thesis ends up taking place there, here's a good reference!

Some visual development artists that gave me inspiration...

Lindsey Olivares! I loved her thesis film and here is some concept art for her thesis.  I love her use of bold lines in the ocean- they give the water  a strong sense of movement.

The watercolor drippy background is a style that I would like to have in my thesis.   It looks so organic and fresh, like someone just painted right on the screen.

The ocean has depth, and I can feel the layers of blues, greens, and pale yellows.

Mike Yamada! I like how you can still see the brush strokes,  and it's not cleaned up completely.

Ryan Woodward figure drawings- the sense of movement is great! Love the lines of action. 

His figures seem to be melting into the background.  It has a great sense of depth even though they are all separate pieces on one paper. 

This is an example of something thats more clean cut but still works because it has a sense of depth and reveals open space.  Most of all I love the textures in the cliff,  very grungy looking and rough.

I love the stylized hills and trees. The mood conveyed is great.  

Some more Lindsey Olivares art work- I love the sepia toned theme in this piece. 

And more... I love the bold colors and how they don't completely melt into each other! Lots of great definition. 

Huge fan if Nico Marlet's character designs!!!  Since I have his sketchbook I can drool over the way he draws people and gives them their personality instantly.  He exaggerates everything, but never too much.