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Woman of the Moon - Setting

abimation
May 9, 2019
5 min read

Setting

Setting was one of the things I was tentatively excited about with this project. It wasnt something I had ever really done before. I had always kind of found a way to avoid it if I could but here it was integral to the story from the get go.

So I began trying to learn about environment design. Luckily though I had Fraser Mclean's book out all year and it was very helpful. In addition I found some tutorials by Laura Price who designs the environments for Disney's Tangled ever after TV series.

So I'll walk you through how I learned. It was actually a faster process than I anticipated. But I only scratched the surface of what's possible to learn and I know that.

This first board is my general inspiration board for the setting from the beginning of the film development. This meant that I was thinking shared home that was part artist studio and part engineer lab. I looked a lots of real places first and then also looked at dexters lab, games assets and professor utonium's lab. I liked the idea of an unusual shape to the room and some sky lights so they could see out into the sky whenever they needed to reflect on the moon.

That lead to these really very early ideas. All of which are terrible if I'm honest. You can see where I was looking at angled celings and unusual space arrangements and where I was playing with window sizes. I tried making the space seem as though it was inside a warehouse because it needed to fit a rocket ship into it. I even considered props and things here. On the left I was investigating colour schemes in the plans as well trying to figure out some kind of style that would help me spark some kind of plan for the room layout.

Then this is where lulu came in. She was soooo helpful I am so thankful I found her youtube. In her tutorial she took me step by step through her process when she's creating backgrounds. she starts at thumbnail and then she introduces just 3 shades to give a sense of dept, then she keeps adding.

So I sketched out some thumbnails of the first shot of the film. Trying to be careful with my visual elements, leading lines, framing elements, rules of thirds and so on.

This is what I ended up with. I think this whole process really helped me to become more confident with environments and their designs. It seemed so much more achievable with defined steps in place. But by the final render I felt like I'd made it to realistic to and not very me. But I really liked the more stripped back version in my tonal studies. So that's where the below image comes into it.

When I created Dissonance I made the background with the loop tool in photoshop. I defined areas and then I dropped colour in with the paintbucket tool. It created this very stylised faux vector look and I knew that was where I should start if I wanted to reclaim some of my style here. And I was right. It was closer! But still not right.

Then came the process of attempting to find my style through yet more work! I began to think about the next big visually striking scene in my film to see if that would help me figure anything out about the visual style of their surroundings. That scene was of course the crash scene. It was really helpful that I did this when I did because I was struggling to board this scene out and so taking some time to think about it in a sheerly visual manor was incredibly helpful.

I discovered a couple of tumblrs that investigated the visual identity of certain films or cinematographers which involved copious volumes of screenshots from films. What I did was find shots that were composed in ways that I thought could relate to the discovery of a large projectile and I drew them to match my scene.

And this was another incredibly helpful idea! I actually just love the way all of these turned out but in addition it allowed me to pick the kind of angles and shots that I found the most striking or fit the purpose best. I really enjoyed the ominously low angle of 22 July and a shot not too diss-similar found it's way into the final film. I also incorporated elements of a distant approach like in the endless.

With another couple of these thumbnailing mini compositions under my belt I took a bit of a leap of faith and just started drawing the shots I needed. I started with the more basic ones and built out, until I ended up with a whole set of backgrounds.

These backgrounds are largely where the looney tunes vibe comes into play. Cartoons like Roadrunner played a bit part in helping me find a visual style that resonated with me and really feels like somewhere my characters could be a part of.

I've also added my only piece of production design concepting that I got the chance to make. Pretty much everything prop wise in the film is picked up from this concept. It made life so much easier.

But there was one last background that I put more thought into: their home.

Above is the development board for Ingrid (astronaut) and Mona's (sculptor) home. In the final shot of the film we see domestic life play out (a scene I added after boarding and well into animation) and because of this I needed to return to layout and add another part I hadnt previously thought about. In fact I had been happy that I hadnt had to consider their home and because of that I had made bits of it seem vastly different from others. most of the walls have a dark wood grain along them however some are painted a lighter hue. But with the new scene I actually had to think about how the room was laid out.

I did so some mock up both by hand and in a modelling software but I dont seem to have any copies of those left so sorry about that. Shhh they never existed.

What i do have proof of though is the consideration on what went into their home. I wanted to stick largely to the themes I had been drawing the entire film. Moons and round objects made a prominent appearance. Lights that were both round and vintage in feel. Large bay windows to let in the light and dark stained woods to dampen it again. I even included very 50's styles of sofa's.

In the end this was it!

it's a lot more paired back than the board but ultimately I'm really pleased with it. I'm also really pleased with all I've learned through this process.