Media Product - Vanilla Twilight - Image Reel

"When Violet Eyes Get Brighter,

And Heavy Wings Grow Lighter,
I'll taste the sky and feel alive again."

Image and Lyric Breakdown:

• When - Clock / Time representation
• Violet - The plant, Violet
• Eyes - My dog, Bailey's eye
• Get - Online Adobe download message
• Brighter - Two versions of the same lightbulb in my room, with altered brightness of lens flare

• And - '&' key from my iPod Touch (took a photograph)
• Heavy - 'Heavy Load' sign
• Wings - Bird in Flight
• Grow - Plant Growing
• Lighter - Feather - as in 'light as a feather'

• I'll - Photo of me
• Taste - Two angles of a mouth tasting a lollipop
• The - 'Highlighted the T, H and E keys on a standard laptop keyboard in red
• Sky - Sky shot and edge of Victoria Mills, Saltaire
• And - '&' key from my iPod Touch (took a photograph)
• Feel - Hand feeling fabric
• Alive - Heart-monitor to represent life
• Again - Cover of the DVD '17 Again'
  

Below is the background image, so you can see what it would look like without the image reel over the top - although, again, I have kept it in the same comic-book style as the rest of the images. It is supposed to represent the song - by depicting a 'Vanilla Twilight'.

Vanilla Twilight - 'Oh, Darling, I wish you were here'.

The Lyrics for my Media Product

I have chosen the song 'Vanilla Twilight' by Owl City to base my final media product on.

There is only one key verse that I want to use, however. I will make a storyboard / image reel of literal photographs (in comic style) to accompany the lyrics below:

"When violet eyes get brighter,
And heavy wings grow lighter,
I'll taste the sky and feel alive again."

Unit 53 - Storyboard Project

This project involved researching and finally creating a storyboard, with an included character from a team-building exercise we took part in at the start of the year (this project being a 'Name the 100 Cartoons' quiz). The character I chose to work with was 'Kimba the White Lion', a cartoon character from an old anime. I had intended originally to work with a more 'scratchy' style of artwork - as I attempted to do on the image I made displayed above. This would have made for a more unique and original storyboard. However, time constraints meant I had to work as quickly as I could without worrying about altering the style of my artwork - it was more a case of simply getting it finished, rather than getting the style right. If I were to have more time to work on my storyboard, then I could have altered the style to fit with the 'scratchy' style I wanted, but as it is, time has run out. :/ Therefore, the end product doesn't completely match my original intentions - by the fact it isn't the style I was hoping for. But aside from the actual artistic style, everything else has worked out how I had hoped it would.


On the left is my finished hand-drawn version of the storyboard I ended with, which I have scanned in ready to recreate the digital version. It is a simple story; at an electronics store (near you) the show, 'Kimba the White Lion' is being shown on a flat-screen television. Kimba sees the TV, however. And jumps out. There's a girl in the store who is scared by this, but then Kimba gets scared at seeing the girl who is - once the shock wears off - incredibly excited. She chases Kimba through the store, but he escapes outside and runs off down the street. It has no violence or foul language, therefore it is suitable for a younger audience to view, and as Comic Strips are mostly targeted at young audiences, I have successfully created a storyboard to fit with my target audience.


On the right is my final digitally amended version of the storyboard. I have created this using PhotoShop CS3, after scanning in the original version to use as reference to redraw each box on a separate layer. I have added in text and a title - 'Kimba Encounters the Humans' and created a textured background to help bring the whole piece together using pre-installed brushes. I used a collection of 'Fractal' brushes for the background, and have used other techniques such as including gradients, paint and using the pen tool to get strong black outlines. My boxes are abstract and unusual, rather than simple square boxes. This is because I have tried to incorporate some of the different layout styles I researched to make my storyboard look more interesting. I had originally planned to use different fonts, as well. I researched into different styles but found when it came to putting them on my final storyboard, they weren't very easy to read. Therefore, I have stuck to a Comic-strip Classic - Comic Sans and am pleased with how it looks on my finished Storyboard.

I have successfully managed to meet the deadline of this project, although it has resulted in me altering the style of my storyboard from the one I wanted to a more simple, cartoonish style. This is the only problem I have encountered with regards to timing. I have learnt a variety of new skills on PhotoShop - prior to this, I had never been able to successfully use the Pen tool to create strong lines, and had simply struggled with the brush tool to make them as thick and straight as possible. This new skill will definitely be useful to me in the future.

Overall, I am very happy with my finished Storyboard, albeit without the artistic style I had intended. The only thing I would change is the style, and if I were to progress further and create the actual Comic Strip, it would have been good to make it Interactive, as well.