Dawid Batog
A blog/portfolio documenting each unit of my work
UNIT 5 - An integrated approach to 2D problem solving in art and design
To understand what makes a good public service announcment I've researched different animations available online and analysed them to see what makes them good or bad.
A cartoon showing three different ways in which you can cause a fire. The animation is very cartoonish and is most likely aimed to quickly grab attention and appeal to a younger audience
Pros:
-
Eye-catching
-
Gets message across in a fun way
-
Appeals to a younger audience
Cons:
-
Might not be taken seriously
-
Lacks in detail
-
Shows how to prevent a fire but not how to stop one
A short movie depicting a young boy expressing himself about the fire that just happened at his house. It creates a very grim atmosphere that gets the message across very well
Pros:
-
Provides a very clear message
-
Bound to be engraved into someone's mind
-
Appeals to a more mature audience
Cons:
-
Might cause distraught in viewers
-
Very unsuitable for young children
-
Provokes a very strong feeling of guilt
A short animation providing statisctics and basic tips in case a fire does occur near you
Pros:
-
Very Informative
-
Gets message of fire safety across
-
Appeals to all audiences
Cons:
-
Might be overlooked due to no eye-catching features
-
Lacks impact that a more visual psa might have
-
Although it appeals to all audiences it does not hold the attention of the viewer therefore leading them to stop paying attention to the video.
In order to create my own PSA I first need to think of different ideas that will give me an image of what I want to create and the different characters that will be present in the animation that I am creating.
-
An animation involving a christmas tree being set on fire because it fell over due to one of its decorations being too heavy.
-
Leaving the gas on, then a simple spark from something sets the gas making an explosion (in a comical way, not too graphic).
-
An animation that looks like it was created by a child (possibly making the individual objects look like they were drawn with a crayon) of a scene where a character runs around in panic because he was set on fire and then he remembers to drop and roll.
-
A black and white animation where the fire is the only thing with colour.
I've decided to stick with the art-style of 'Imitating a child's crayon drawing' as I believe that this style would be more appealing to children but I believe it can still convey a message that is strong enough. To make my fake drawings more genuine I've decided to use an image of scrunched paper as the background of my animation.
Character 1: Alice
I began by designing two characters that would be present in my animation:
Character 2: Jeremy
This girl character would be the mother figure. The character's design is loosely based on the stereotypical presentation of a girl drawn by a child, an example of this is shown below.
This character will most likely :
-
Be the one who is damaged by the fire
-
Be the one who puts the fire out and educates the viewer
There are two different versions which present a different style of a crayon preset for the photoshop brush.
This boy character is a grumpy and overall angry for some reason. The character's design is based on a stereotypical drawing of a boy drawn by a child, similarly to the drawing of the girl, an example of such stereotype is show below.
This character will most likely :
-
Create the fire
-
Encourage a character to create a fire
There are two different versions which present a different style of a crayon preset for the photoshop brush.
I needed to start to look at the different hazards that could be present in my animation, and so I came up with these ideas:
Kitchen on fire:
The message that would be put forward would be do not leave food on the stove and in case of fire do not try to put it out with water. The 'face' on the oven would frown to add comedic effect
Too many plugs:
The message that would be put forward would be to not overload a power socket with too many plugs as it can easily create a fire.
Flammable object:
The message that would be put forward would be do not leave objects that can create flames such as a lighter or matches in the reach of children as that can lead to a fire
Sleeping alarm:
The message that would be put forward would be to make sure the batteries in your alarm are not empty to make sure you are always informed if there is a fire.
Storyboard:
Afterthought : I could replace the fireman punching the fire with him using a fire extinguisher, the fire extinguisher itself would be a character and it would be the one saying the message at the end.
To begin with flash I first needed to familiarise myself with the software and to do so I've made two simple animations. One of the animations is a ball bouncing along the scene the other animation presents a simple walk cycle.
Script for final animation:
Scene 1:
Narrator: Meet Jeremy
Animation of Jeremy falling on sofa
Narrator: Jeremy wanted to be independent and so he started to make himself
some food
Kitchen door flies into the scene
Narrator: However Jeremy quickly grew bored and so he decided to play some videogames
Controller flies into Jeremy’s hand
Narrator: As Jeremy became involved in his game he completely forgot about the food he was making
Smoke rises from the kitchen door
Narrator: although (drag the word out) Jeremy was quickly reminded of what he was doing by the smoke coming from his kitchen
Jeremy jumps from the sofa in panic and runs to the kitchen
Scene 2:
Narrator: Upon seeing the fire Jeremy remembered that water extinguishes fire and so he grabbed a glass, filled it with water and poured it onto the flames.
The exact thing described by the narrator happens
Scene 3:
Narrator: What Jeremy did not realise is that fires that were created by oil cannot be extinguished by water and in fact make it stronger!
Jeremy runs around in panic as the screen zooms out and things in kitchen progressively get caught on fire
Narrator: Let’s see what Jeremy could have done shall we?
Scene 4:
The scene is split diagonally to represent two different scenarios
Scenario 1 presents Jeremy talking to Alice (his mother)
Alice and Jeremy slide into the scene
Narrator: Jeremy could have informed an adult of the situation, remember that adults will know what to do in a situation like this
In scenario 2 Jeremy is seen calling 999 and informing the operator of the situation
Narrator: Here we can see Jeremy calling 9 9 9 (pause in between numbers so children will remember) and informing the operator of his situation
Scene 5:
Narrator: After informing an adult or calling 999 a fireman will show up and extinguish the fire for you safely
Fireman slides into the same kitchen scene Jeremy was in just before pouring in the water
Narrator: The fireman will use his trusty extinguisher to get rid of the fire and protect Jeremy from its harm
The fireman then takes out the fire extinguisher character (which is also the narrator) and puts out the fire using it.
Scene 6:
The extinguisher character flies in from the left
Narrator: Remember kids, if you see a fire inform an adult!
Meanwhile the exact words said by the narrator are printed onto the screen in a speech bubble coming from the fire extinguisher.
END
This is an example of rotoscoping that I've been asked to create. Rotoscoping is the process of animating over an exising movie/image to create more fluid and human movement. In this animation I've animated over the walk cycle of a classmate
Evaluation:
In the end the animation has met my expectations however I felt like I could've expanded more on some scenes, especially since I had to drag some scenes out by using a screen capture of a previous frame. I also could've added more sound effects to the animation to create a more joyful atmosphere that would appeal to my younger audience. I do believe that I've stayed true to my research and I am quite happy with how the artstyle turned out in the end. I also had to use photoshop in order to achieve a crayon effect contrary to my classmates who mostly used flash and so I've had to overcome another obstacle which was learning how to animate frame by frame using photoshop.