Minor Project

Minor Project

Name : Chan Huei Lian (0351597)

Minor Project | Bachelor of Design in Creative Media | Taylor's University

Task 1 : Proposal

Task 2 : Production

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INSTRUCTIONS

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LECTURE

Week 1

The first day of the class started out with Mr Mike briefing us about the overview about the Minor Project. We would be choosing our intended project and collaborators to work with from 6 different projects laid out. We were advised to choose the projects carefully that is aligned with our specialisation and strength, as well as where our passion lies in. 

After much consideration, I chose to join the 5th project, which is a development project for a 2D Animation Series that was proposed by R&D Studio, our collaborator / client. The reason to it is because the nature of this project is more aligned to my specialisation, which is Digital Animation and also my personal interest, which is character design and story concept visualisation. The project is called "Sang Guardians" which is an animated series that is still under the development phase.

Week 2

On Monday evening, we had a virtual meeting with our collaborators, representatives from R&D Studio via Zoom meeting. They briefed us about their projects in more details, and also gave us a better understanding of the tasks that would be assigned to us to aid their project. 

The list of tasks we are assigned to :

- Side characters design : form sketches, lineup, turnaround.

- Environmental Concept Art Design.

- Merchandises.

We will start dividing the tasks among ourselves by this week by discussion.

W2 Lecture notes :

Design Thinking : 3 I

-Inspiration

-Ideation

-Implementation

Empathy

User + Need + Insight (target audience's deep feelings)

3 ways to get insights:

- survey / talk

- observation

- experiencing the target audience's life / situation.

Target the community leader / NGOs that matches your target audience as they are the individuals that have earned your target audience's trust, and holding the most information about the target audience's needs and wants.

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PROGRESSION

Week 2 - Contextual Studies / Research

We started on our contextual research, which I was tasked to work on researching about the environmental studies references such as spooky vibe schools in Malaysia, and wheelchair accessibility areas.

Week 3 - User Persona

We were tasked to complete our user persona profiles, I completed my part by doing a lecturer's user profile : Mrs Delima. We also brainstormed the interview questions together in class as a group. 

Week 4 - Survey & Interview

This week, we focus on working on our google form survey to gather general opinions from the target audience regarding animated series / cartoons and also to gain insights about the direction to designing authentic and relatable side characters for Sang Guardians. We also gain opinions about the environment designs suggestion from the respondents regarding the possible location in school that reminds them about the possibility of having paranormal activities. After the questions are being finalised, the form will be distributed to the public via different social platforms to gather input.

Mr Mike suggests us to create questions that speaks by the perspectives of children, since our target audience are majority tweens, aged 7 to 13. The questions should be as detailed as possible to keep them on track, not lost. For instance, ask about their opinions about the reference photo of the character, "is the hairstyle too wild or too plain?" " is the outfit colour too bright or too dull?" etc..

Question brainstorming on miro board.

Question designing on google form.

After the interview questions and survey has been completed, we distributed the online survey through social media and groups. We also interviewed 4 personas to help us gather more information and inisghts. Then we progressed into creating our problem statement and how might we questions.

WEEK 7 - Character Initial Sketches (progression)

popular girl wheelchair bound.

popular girl 2.

WEEK 7-8 : Proposal Presentation

After the slides are completed and approved, we had a proposal presentation with our collaborative client R&D Studio to share and discuss our progression as well as the direction of the characters and environment designs in accordance with the data that our research has accumulated.

Week 9 - Production Phase (Gantt Chart)

To kick start into production phase after getting the green light from Mr Mike and R&D Studio, we progressed into creating a gantt chart in order to make our timeline organised and clear for all members on specific tasks assigning.

GANTT CHART on spreadsheet :

Week 10 - Master Moodboard

Mr Mike recommended us to make a master moodboard to make sure all our designs follow the same art style in terms of lines, form, colours and texture etc. We also make sure to stick to the artstyle closely given by the concept arts R&D Studio gave us as reference, so that we don't stray away and develop our own styles which would not belong to the same world of the series. This is to ensure that all characters designed aligns to the environment concept arts as well. We are to insert the coloured characters into the environement art to test them out and ensure they are matching with each other.

Week 11 - Production Progression & Consultation

This week focuses on production progresses as well as consultation with Mr Mike.

My groupmates made progression such as logo designs and also characters sketches, and as for me, unfortunately I got caught up in other submission datelines so my side of progression got delayed.

Progression update by Haura (character sketches), and Hanrong (Logo Design).

Week 12 - Production Progression & Consultation

This week all of us progressed on our parts and produced more updates on our character designs and environment concept arts.

My side of progression on character sketches and colour pallette :

This week I focus solely on the 3 popular girls as I have already done 2 sketches of them since the proposal.

1. Popular girl 1 on wheelchair. (The confident & pretty leader of the trio)

Initial Design

Final Design

2. Popular girl 2 (Trendy & stylish girl)

Initial Design

Final Design

3. Popular girl 3 (School's famous dancer)

Final Design

Feedback on the designs : Overall good designs and anatomy. Popular girl 2's colour looks too soft and cannot blend well with other characters, make her shoes lines darker, and eyes maybe.

Group progression on Miro :

by Lianne and Haura.

by Athirah and Zetie.

by Athirah and Zetie.

by Athirah.

by Zetie.

Week 13 - Production Progression

This week we progress on our own to meet the agendas respectively.

My progression :

4. Angel airhead girl

Initial Design

Final Design

5. KPOP maniac girl

Initial Design

Final Design

6. Headmistress (Cik Nurlina)

Initial Design

Final Design

Facial Expression Sheets (All Characters)

Week 14 - Production Progression

This week we progress on our own to meet the complete agenda.

I had to make amendments for some characters to make sure they fit into the backgrounds, because as of now my characters are too soft in colours.

Pose Studies 

Poses Progression sketches

Character Poses

Week 15 - Production Progression & Presentation Slides

This week we progress on our own to meet the complete agenda. After everything is completed, we started on creating the pitch bible aka slides and also filled up the project tracking document. Once these are finished, we are good to go for submission.

Character Turnarounds

Final Presentation (Pitch Bible)

Project Tracking Document

Completed Timeline (Just wanna record it being all greeenn cuz im glad uwu)

Reflection

Minor Project has definitely been a tough journey but a rather exciting one as we are working closely with an animation studio! I would say it is definitely a mission impossible to me at first when I realised that I had to work on 6 characters in a go, with concept designs, facial expressions, poses and turnarounds to work with. I tried my best to catch up with the work quality that my teammates are striving for, and through these motivations I am glad to say that I found myself improving alot from the experience, although sadly I think that I could have done a better job, but oh well I do have some limitations in terms of skills and time. Im grateful for my teammates for working closely together and also being a moral support for each other throughout the project. I also thank Mr Mike for giving us genuine feedbacks and encouragement to us.