WEEK EIGHT, NINE AND TEN......

I have to be honest now, with the other five week project i have been struggling to keep working at this one - now o know three weeks is a long time to forget about something and it is definately something im not going to do again!

I can just say that it was knowing that the other project was due in sooner that made me focus mainly on that one rather than this transcription one.... a sily mistake... so for these few weeks i have not alot to show. I did manage to get some scenery images completed with colour like snapshots for my final piece. I can see what i want to create so very very clearly in my mind, the colours composition and camera movements around all of which, although i cant always create the best representation of this in my design process or at least all of the detail i know i want to include - but explaining it face to face with someone i can get all of the info accross. I did design my smaller robot character aswell and so the final images from 'him' are below.

WEEK SEVEN

This is the first stage of the music machine. It is a slightly updated version from a windup musical machine on a larger scale.


It provides the pretty much constant sound in the background and is the introduction to the whole song. After the switch is turned on it activates the cog on the end to start to turn and windup the machine. As the central cog turns the small raised sections nock on the metal poles and create pitched different sounds.

There is also a static sound playing in the background and this is coming from the stacks of broken television sets in the corner stacked like you might find cars at a scrap yard. As the electricity gets going it powers up a few of them but with no channels it just gives off the crackling sound.




The main bass sound for the whole piece is made by a similar design to the insde of a piano but against a wall. Instead of pressing keys small hammer type arms tap the central section and create the sound. Different length wires give off different pitched sounds. There is a hinge at the top which allows the hammers to move. At first only a few hammers move but after a few bars more join in until the beat has built up.






Below is the link to my animation i created to give me the timing for when these keys need to be hit. (it was slightly to large to be uploaded directly onto 'blogger.com')) Its very basic but gives me all the info i need visually. I can hear the sounds in this song seperately but needed to find a way that i could break it down into smaller chunks visually enabling me to look at the seperate sounds. I also felt i needed to do this as then i am able to work out what machine makes what sound and when and also if i have missed any sounds off.

this spoon mechanism makes the twanging sound, the spoons are mounted on a rotating cog that turns them and as they spin the pluck the strings. They are slighty offset which means that 'twang' is in time.



When i first heard this song it was the way that the song builds that interested me and so i need to keep this very clear in my animation.

Just like in 'STOMP' you can see how every sound is made....

The link to my animation:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5h1ZR8L2P8

WEEK SIX

MY ROOM PLAN:



Development of my initial animation mechanism - THE BEGINNING......

As I have already said earlier in my blog it is the rain that starts the animation and so below is my finalised diagram of why and how this gets the music started. The running theme of the mechanics in this project is similar to the domino effect, where everything happens as a result of the previous, and without it nothing moves at all.

The hole in the ceeling provides the place for the leak...
This then falls into an empty fuse box which is hanging on by only one screw...
As this fills up it overflows onto a mug that has been placed to start a circuit...

This is done so that after the robots power has run out the curcuit can start again when it rains so he can 'powerup'.

The mug is a regulation army cup (1940's) that has a bullet hole mid way up. As the water over flows into it it fills up the cup and makes it heavier. As it gets heavier it weighs down the sea saw mechanism and presses the button to start the 'music machine'. As the hole is only half way up the water is continually flowing out so as it stops raining that cup rises and it all stops... allowing it all to recharge.

WEEK FIVE

This week has mainly been looking at my research into parts of machinery and trying to come up with a more successful robot design. Below are my sketches that I have drawn up taking you to my final idea but i just want to go through my thought processes with the design beforehand.

My design idea for this robot is that he is totally self dependant, built entirely from scraps and bit and pieces he could find (how the building process ever began from nothing is not important in this project – just the fact that he is ‘alive.’) So taking his into account the final design would have to be very collage like, with components together only because they fit and not for any aesthetic design reasons. I really want the viewer to have the, ‘is that a...?’ moment when they look at him noticing everyday things or old things are making him up.

At first i had the idea of incorporating a cassette player into his body but then after researching that i found that cassettes were not designed until the 60’s, remembering that he is born out of the 1940’s that was an obvious problem! So i thought about using a record player. This was within the time period, plus it would have a certain amount of comedy to it when seen in the final animation, by this I’m not expecting a roaring laughter but more a smile.

Another point about my character is that he lives entirely for music, his life depends on it and it is his best friend so this had to show through in his appearance. I wanted him to resemble music machines for this reason and so his is why it features so largely in my final design. Although below i have said it is m final design I feel that he is still open for development or changes as this project progresses.

(i used this design for the chest section as you can see - it is a 1940's radio. I also tried to incorporate the amount of buttons and knobs into the robot design )

(1940's record player - for the heart/chest section on the character)

(1940's speakers - for the face/cheeks sections)

The chosen hinge mechanism

WEEK FOUR

(I did have all of my previous storyboard ideas but i have lost them as hard copies (sketches)and also the memory stick that they were on - i was hoping to find them before posting but ill add them at a later date however annoying it is!!!)


My final story idea:

The first scene starts with a mechanical sun and moon moving accross the window outside, they start off after some rain and them start moving fast to show the changing of days, then finally slow down. As they do it starts to rain again in front of the mechanical sun.

Inside, the camera pans accross objects in shadow and follows wires all linked together stragely until it reaches the corner of the room where there is a very small work bench. Above the work bench in the celling there is a hole that is letting water in from the rain, and below which is a small circuit designed to press a button once the convieniently placed cup is filled. The idea is that the machine that has been built in the room was designed for charging up the main character - a robot. The machine and the robot can only charge to a certain amount (indicated by lights) and then they both switch off so the robot has to have a way of re-charging even after he has run out of power - hence this strange circuit. Once the button is pressed the machine starts which is all custom made by the robot using objects from the 1940's, including himself. The lights also become brighter at this point. As the machine powers up so do the sounds building the beat. All the sounds are made from all of the objects i mentioned earlier that make up the machine.

Once charged the robot 'un-plugs' himself from the machine and walks towards the cupboard in the back of the room. Inside there is a smaller robot that has been made by him. The main robot then pulls a battery from a case on his body and puts it into the smaller one. As he does this the smaller robots eyes light up and the main robots eyebrows raise as if to be smiling.

He was using the power to build a friend..

Then the camera dips to black.

My final storyboard: