Screen Project 2: Progress update 

It is now Week 11, and I’m drawing the final 2 scenes. I plan to finish drawing this week and put every scene together next week. I have come a long way with the project since my last progress update. This blog entry will consist of project documentation and clarification on the adjustments I have made to the storyboard.

The animated films I have watched and also my research on the same topic have reinforced my decision to incorporate my images into the video. First, I turned Scene 3 and Scene 4 in the 1st storyboard to a scene of the street. Honestly, I am not familiar with the guava tree because it’s often found in rural provinces, not the capital city. During autumn in Hanoi, I can smell young green rice and milk flower on the street the most. I chose to depict the figure of a street vendor selling young rice because of its lonesome yet intimate presence. Thus, it aligns with the mood of the poem while still being relevant to the city-version autumn. Secondly, I modified the background of the alley scene. The alley I first drew is based on a random photo online but then later I want to draw the alley where I live in. The new background still illustrates the verse perfectly while also carries a personal story.

Personal details were also included in later scenes. The wood floor in scene 5 (2nd storyboard) looks exactly like my room’s. The sight of a sidewalk iced tea shop is too common to Hanoian, but it is a significant image to me because my house is literally surrounded by 3 tea shops even before I was born. I would know about the weather shift first thing from the chatter between the people sitting in those shops. My main goal was to deliver the delicate, sentimental, and genuine language of the poem through animation, and I think adding elements that are genuinely meaningful to me is helping me get closer to that goal.

I had already finalized my brush choices and color scheme. I use dry ink mostly for coloring and the other 3 brushes are used for both outlining and coloring. The colors used in the drawings are built on the 6 colors shown below. Moreover, while my drawings are a bit childlike, they have that hand-drawn feel that I desired.

This is my current list of sound effects. Finding sounds/music early on in the project is a suggestion taken from an article on the topic of sound design that I discussed in a previous blog post.