P3: DEVELOP CONCEPT IDEAS AND SEQUENCE FOR AN ANIMATION TO MEET A CLIENT BRIEF
Concepts:
“Children’s TV Extract” - Bullying Story, teaches children to not bully and makes them aware of emotions and the impact of emotions it can have on others.
Set in the ocean, all of the blue fishes pick on the yellow fish which then makes the yellow fish sad and lonely. This teaches children that everyone should be treated equally no matter what they look like or if they look different to you. Also teaches children to not pick on people in general as it can emotionally hurt them, the children would be able to see the impact it has on the yellow fish by it's sad face and it always swimming on its own. This would meet the clients brief for a 'Children's TV Extract' as this would promote BBC's ethos to educate, inform and entertain. The animation would be very colourful with it being set in an ocean with different coloured fish, which also meets the clients brief as they've asked for it to be colourful so that it engages the target audience.
"Children's TV Extract" - Road Safety, teaches children how to cross the road safety, this is quite a relevant story as the target audience are of those that have started walking e.g. walking to school/nursery.
Set in a street, children would be familiar with this setting which would make the extract more personal to them. The character would be a dog, the reason for this is because it's an extract to promote road safety children would have to take on board what was being said/done so using an animal, especially a cute friendly dog would make children respond better as young children respond to animals more than they do humans. The dog would show the audience how to cross a road properly. This would meet the clients brief as the animation would be very colourful as it's set in a street so they'd be colourful tress, cars, houses etc. The animation would also educate, inform and entertain which is BBC's ethos. The central character would be very aesthetically pleasing for a younger audience as it's a cute dog which would appeal to children of young ages.
"Tell A Story" - Story about Starting School, relevant to many young children as many have started school or are starting in the near future.
Set in a classroom, an animation on the day in the life of a child named Leroy starting school. The animation follows Leroy and his day at school. This will give children an idea of what's to come and will teach things like what to bring to school, making friends, teamwork and learning. Leroy is the 'perfect student' which will encourage children to act like him in school and set a good example. This would meet the clients brief as it would follow Leroy who is the themed central character.Leroy could wear brightly a brightly coloured school uniform which would make him more visually pleasing to a younger audience. He could also be used as future promotional material.
"Teenage Stress/ Mental Health Video" - Puberty , something for teenage years. Target audience those who are 12+.
This would follow a boy called Ben who's in high school. Ben doesn't think he's as good looking as the other boys in his year as he has bad acne and isn't as tall as the other boys in his year. This makes him self conscious and he secludes himself from the 'boys group' because he doesn't feel like he fits in as he's not as good as sports as them and he can't get girls. One of the boys from the 'boys group' then notices that Ben is unhappy and after high school everyday plays football with him and then Ben gradually gets better and ends up on the school football team, with many more friends and he no longer feels ashamed about what he looks like as he's found something he's good at and people appreciate him for him not for what he looks like and how he's different. This would meet the clients brief as it would engage a teenage audience as it's using a problem that most teenagers go through at one point, it's about finding yourself and going through puberty. both of these are issues teenagers face.
Gary The Great
Final Story Concept: "Children's TV Extract" - Road Safety Gary The Great is a children's 2D digital animation that educates children about road safety as well as entertains them. This particular episode addresses road safety, but in particular being able to cross the road safely. The central character is Gary, who is a dog. The reason behind him being a dog is because it's an extract to promote road safety therefore children would have to take on board what was being said/done so using an animal, especially a cute friendly dog would make children respond better as young children naturally respond to animals more than they do humans. The episode is set in a street, children would be familiar with this setting which would make the extract more personal to them. With Gary being a cute dog it meets the clients brief of the central main character being visually pleasing to a younger audience, Gary can also be used as future promotional material for the CBeebies channel. Lastly,Gary has his own mannerisms such as wagging his tail and barking this also meets the clients brief as they've asked for the main character to have their own catchphrases or mannerisms.
The story line of this episode of Gary The Great starts when Gary wakes up in the morning and goes out for a walk, he is walking along the pathway and see's a bone on the other side of the road which then excites him causing him to run across the road in order to get to the bone without considering the safety of crossing the road. As Gary runs out into the road a car has to come to a sudden halt to prevent an accident from happening. The driver of this car gets very angry with Gary and teaches him how to cross the road safely using a zebra crossing. Gary then crosses the road again but safely and gets to the bone.
The moral of the story and the message the story is trying to portray is how to cross a road safely and to always use a zebra crossing as it is the safest thing to do, it's also promoting the message of thinking about others before yourself and to be considerate of other people e.g. in this situation the drivers and the safety of them as well as the safety of Gary.
This would be suitable for the clients target audience as it's an educational, entertaining and informing extract told in a very light hearted way which would meet the BBC's ethos and also be beneficial to the target audience. The target audience would also warm to the character of Gary with him being a cute little dog, by the audience warming to him it will mean they will respond to what he's doing and take note of the mistakes he makes and how he resolves them.
Storyboard:
Character Concepts:
Gary The Great:
Gary is a dog, always happy this is implied through his tailing wagging and the smile on his face.
Children naturally respond to animals more than they do humans, so giving a serious matter on road safely a light hearted approach and for the story to be told through the life of a dog will make children understand and educate them about road safety.
Gary lives in a dog kennel.
Gary is the main character and is branded as 'Gary The Great' as he learns from his mistakes and is seen to be a good dog to audience.
Gary's characteristics are happy and smiling, his good energy always cheers others up.
Angry Driver:
The driver gives the educational needs to the animation as he is the one who tells Gary to cross using a zebra crossing and never to walk out into the roads.
Children will be able to see the expressions on the drivers face, therefore can connect with what's right and what's wrong in the story based on his emotions.
The driver becomes happy once he has seen Gary cross the road safely, his emotions on his face change and children will be able to see this therefore learn what's right from wrong.
The driver's characteristics change as we first see him as an angry man who is quite intimidating and then he becomes a lot nicer and loving. We can see this from his facial expressions it turns from angry to happy.
The characters are all 2D and hand drawn by myself as it is a 2D animation. Here are pictures of all of my characters and props e.g. cars that I will be using in the final piece.
Environment Concepts:
Set on a street and Gary's home which is his dog kennel.
The environment in Gary The Great always starts with Gary waking up in the morning from out of his dog kennel.
The environment on the animation may look slightly bigger than Gary e.g. Gary looks small compared to his kennel etc as it's a good way to let children connect with the show as it makes them feel like they could be in that environment as they see everything bigger than what adults do due to their height.
Clear blue sky and sun in most shots, this is simply because it gives off a happy feel which is what you want in a children's TV extract as it's nothing sinister that might scare them.
All houses along the street are in a dog kennel style even though they're houses, this makes it more personalised to Gary and makes the audience realise the show is about a dog.
Running Time: The duration of this piece is 2+ minutes. The reason for this is due to the target audience of CBeebies as thats where this animation is going to be aired. The target audience of CBeebies are aged 4 to 6, therefore a 2+ quick animation with meaning would be suitable for this audience. One main reason why it would be suitable would because of the attention spans of children of this age, if the program isn't engaging then an audience of this age can switch off and get distracted by something else, so the idea is to keep it short but also engaging to an audience of this age.
Clearly identified target audience: As my show will be shown on CBeebies, I need to think about the target audience of CBeebies and then decide where my show fits. CBeebies is broadcasted on television from 6am - 7pm every day. CBeebies caters for both girls and boys aged 0 to 6 years, this is a very diverse and complex audience as 1 year olds are very different to 6 year olds for example. This is because the younger children (0-3) think about the moment, not the past nor the future therefore there minds are more focused on what's going on in that particular moment in time and the only people they share their lives with are parents, siblings and other family members etc as they're not at the stage of meeting new people at nurseries or school and even if they were they wouldn't have the skills to be able to communicate to make friends. The older audience of CBeebies are of those who have found companions at school or nursery therefore they have had the chance to be in real life situations of communication with new people. To an audience who are under 4 the world is happy, magical place but between an audience of the ages of 4-6 at this age they've had to come to senses with reality more which invades their looks on a magical world which helps them grow into the real world. However, the majority of these audiences have exposure to digital media on other platforms, children as young as 3 are using the internet and watching the TV unoccupied by an adult. They are already playing games online and looking for more sophisticated content, such as comedy. The CBeebies target audience are into comedy as it gives an aspect of silliness and it's simple and easy to interpret .
The target audience for Gary The Great is the standard CBeebies age range that is 0-6, but to be more specific I would target Gary The Great to 3+ as they'll understand and have more inkling about road safety than a 2 year old or younger would have, also as they're in prams at this young age they're not using the roads so they wouldn't understand the meaning behind the animation nor gain anything from it. My mood board helps understand the audience I am targeting. Children that are 3 years of age or plus would be a perfect audience for this show, the reason for this is because those in this age range are either already at school or just starting therefore they have more exposure to roads and need to start learning about the safety precautions behind it as they may walk to school/nursery with their parents or they may have have to cross roads for other reasons. It is also targeted at an audience with disposable income as it is on CBeebies that can be reached through many platforms such as on satellite TV and online.
P4: CREATE A PRE-PRODUCTION PLAN FOR THE ANIMATION
This is my proposed Gantt Chart for my animation production. This will help me keep to deadlines and outline the timescale I have to complete this task to an industry standard.
This is all of my finished final concept art, ready to be used in my 2D animation.
Animation Tests:
This was the first test shot that I helped put together with my fellow class mates, this was a stop motion animation where we got shots frame by frame of cyber men from Doctor Who. It was good to test different types of animations before choosing 2D as it gave me a clear inkling of what animation type I wanted to go with and what would be more suitable for the client.
M2: COMPLETE A SWOT ANALYSIS FOR THE INTENDED ANIMATION FOR THE CLIENT
Strengths :
My animation is unique in a variety of ways, firstly 'Gary' who is my central main character is a very recognisable for children so would be perfect for future promotional material within the Cbeebies channel. The narrative of my animation is also unique due to the fact there is not many 'road safety' children's programmes out there for the age of the target audience for Cbeebies, I believe that this is the age where most children are being exposed to roads such a crossing them and being generally weary. The narrative of Gary The Great also follows BBC's ethos to 'educate, inform and entertain'. The theme of Gary The Great is educational but entertaining, which is perfect for the target audience of Cbeebies, I see this as a strength because this age group are those who are learning new things every single day, so having a online animation that covers an issue such as road safety is important but yet it's done in an entertaining manner.
My animation uses generic conventions of a children's animation, one of the ways in conforms to the generic convention is the colours it uses to represent the environment, for example there is brightly coloured houses and cars. The environment in the animation is sunny, the sky is clear and there's sound effects such as birds tweeting, this gives off the happy but simplistic feel which is a generic convention for a children's animation. It is also very suitable for the client in the way it conforms to the convention of children's animations, as the client have asked for the main character to be visually pleasing of which Gary is to an audience of 0-6.
My animation meets its purpose, not only is it entertaining to the target audience and has a source of humour in it but it is also very educational and meaningful.
My animation would be engaging for my target audience in a variety of ways. Firstly the animation follows Gary, who's a cute dog who's very visually pleasing for an audience of ages 0-6 because he looks cute and friendly. Secondly, it's comedic - children's animations have to have a form of humour in to keep the audience engaged. Lastly, not only would children be able to take away something from this animation as it is educational but they will also be able to engage with the feelings the characters are feeling so for example when they see the driver of the car is angry with Gary they'll able to sense the emotion that he's angry which is also educational as it's making children aware of emotions and feelings.
Weaknesses:
Compared to competitors my animation is missing a voice over that is recorded with professional recording equipment, unfortunately I had no access to professional recording equipment as this was completed in a summer holiday. I am aware that this is a weakness of my animation as the voice over isn't to an industry standard. Although I believe it is still a good quality sound recording.
There are a few limitations when it comes to planned design, for example I had to muliputate some of my 2D hand drawn characters on photoshop to make them more suitable to animate, this meant I had to either slightly change the drawings or add things to them.
There are production obstacles that I might have to face such as software crashing and the potential loss of work, to get by this I'll have to make sure my laptop isn't over heating so I will have to take breaks from animating to make sure my laptop doesn't crash and no work will be lost. This could have an impact on my final product because if I lose work then I will have to re do it and it might not be to standard it was before.
Opportunities:
There is the potential to widen the target audience of Gary The Great, as there could be a potential sequel and different episodes could cover different topics each topic would be based on an issue young people in general face and the whole idea behind Gary The Great is he goes through these issues first hand and shows the audience how to overcome them.
There are opportunities for online revenue as Gary The Great could be used for future promotional material for Cbeebies therefore when Cbeebies advertise on YouTube etc Gary as a character would be shown which would make people more aware of Gary The Great and it would get more views.
There is definitely an opportunity for a sequel of Gary The Great as it is such a versatile platform to do more mini episodes on other issues that young people might face.
Threats:
A threat could be my main competitor, there are a lot of animation style shows on Cbeebies that could be a threat for example there is a 2D line drawing animation on Cbeebies called 'DipDab' that could be a possible threat for my animation as it's to the same audience and has similarities. Although, I believe my animation is much more educational as it uses spoken words and DipDab uses noises rather than actual dialogue.
I plan to distribute it on YouTube as it's a platform that parents will use to find videos suitable for their children to watch and also some children may already be using YouTube so they might therefore find it themselves. The only threat here is that the audience might not find my animation but to avoid this I could use tags on the YouTube video and it could also be embedded into the CBeebies website so it's delivered to the target audience.