Library

An interesting week this one; it’s flown by but I have produced a pleasing little mound of work which various people now have to go off and interpret. My role has mainly been to come-up with a design for the set; a library and any props which are going to be modelled in 3D. I have also been responsible for the ‘look’ of the film in terms of the colour palette that is being used and I have had a little bit of input on lighting as well. I think Pete has done well in getting the best out of all of us which in many ways is down to him giving us free range over our own little segments which I think has avoided a lot of potential clashes.

The sequence I was responsible for was supposed to represent the whole DVD/video aspect of a library. I originally planned an epic escapade into the world of film which I dropped before I even drew up a proper storyboard because it just wasn’t working. My second idea made a lot more subtle references to particular films and I was quite happy with it but I think it was too much for an audience to take in in the thirty seconds that I had to play with. Instead we decided (I can’t remember exactly who) that it was best to stick to one film reference which was Hitchcock’s North by Northwest. This gave me a lot less creative input but I wasn’t too fussed as I had so much else to be doing.

I owe my inspiration of the library mainly to the good old Ikea catalogue, all be it in a somewhat obscure way (a lampshade inspired a pillar for example). I also went with a circular theme – the bookshelves are constructed around a circle, formed by the windows, and other props such as the telly are constructed out of circular shapes. I did have a look at some Disney backgrounds to try and get some inspiration but I have never really liked Disney films so I don’t think that I took too much of it in.

The colour scheme came mainly from Pete’s brief, which was along the lines of: something that was warm and inviting but not distracting. I have used yellow/brown/grey pastille type colours and tried to avoid using harsh shadows in my artwork which I think was quite important as a lot of the props are quite imposing. For areas that needed that bit more warmth, like the lamp on the information desk I mainly used the colour palette that we had agreed to use on the librarian. The sign above the desk was supposed to be like a beacon so I wanted to emphasize it, I made it blue because this is a universal colour for information signs and it stood out against the warm tones of the library, I just hope that it is not too cold.

That just about concludes this week’s blog, next week I’m moving onto the creature comforts project to do some animation which I chose to do because I thought it might allow me more freedom than some of the other projects then i’m back to the library for post.