Hi All.

I am having a little trouble with my upload, its all my side though so don't panic! The heat really effects the power lines here so I have to try and sneak in between power cuts. It will work eventually!

So in the mean time I thought i would post you a description or a wee teaser if you will of my project.

Basically the idea is bringing a popup book to life. By using "traditional" wildlife style footage combined with computer generated images and techniques like green screen usually excluded from the wildlife documentry tool chest.

With in the popup book six animals will make an apperance. I have choosen typical animals that children will have already encountered in other education media. These are

Lions
Giraffe
Monkeys ( cape vervet )
Rhino ( white )
Zebra
Elephants

Luckly for me I live on a game reserve so have access to these animals. The "book" will have information about the animals family or group structure all these choosen animals have visually intreasting names for there groups, ie A group of Zebra can be a herd , cohort or Dazzle! I bet you can guess which one i will focus on.

The Zulu and Xhosa names for all the animals will also be included, and if time premits I will also do an afrikaans and Xhosa narration. The narration takes the form of a rhyme and will be strongly supported by music.


I have so far done the research drawn story boards and prototyped the pop up book and some of the transitions from animal to animal.

I will put updates here but also on my blog OPTICAL NERVE (http://www.braiiins.com/OpticalNerve)
and of course upload my first footage. ( basically me saying this stuff with some more examples :) ) as soon as our power stablises.


cheers

Jennie

This will certainly make for a unique and interesting UWOL video. I'm intrigued by the idea, and look forward to how it will blend together. There could be quite a wide audience for it when you're finished. Especially if you have multiple languages. That's quite an undertaking.

It's good that you have a lot of the planning figured out, it will make the rest of the process a lot easier. I've definitely got more to do for planning parts of my video.

Hey to organize my self i have been using celtex.( celtx - Integrated Media Pre-Production (http://www.celtx.com/) ) After this weekend I am going to have totally completed my story board stuff. If you sign up as a member you can share "projects" so you will be able to have a look at what i have done.

Its quite a nifty little application and really is handy for international collabaration. Found it through an editing blog i follow :)



jen

Wow...that is a really cool idea!

I am looking forward to seeing what you come up with. Is your target audience going to be kids?

Jeff

yup sure is.

I am targeting the 5 - 10 age group basically the primary school age. I want it to be visually stimulating enough so that the five year olds gets something out of it with out having to understand every thing that is being said.

As soon as my internet stablises ( if its not the heat its thunderstorms! ) i will upload my first ever wildlife film thingy for you to haev a look at too its basically a visaul ABC poem.


cheers

Jennie

Hi Jennie,

I think you can reach a very broad audience with your project. Not only the kids are facinated about those animals.
The book concept is interesting and I think the kids will love it.
Good luck, and I look forward to see your finished video!

Hi Jennie.
I like your idea of making a book.
Also your choice of animals :)
Looking forward to se more of it.

All the best.
Geir Inge

Jennie, interesting story you got there. Look forward view your progression. I've always been facinated of African animals.

Hope your upload is going well, and that the thunderstorms will pass!

Hi Jennie,
I'd have to agree, the pop up book idea sounds like a great one. I will be very interested to see just how you go about it with all the fx that you have mentioned. Certainly sounds like there will be no shortage of your subjects to film either. I think if we can get our kids interested in wildlife at an early age, it will stay with them forever. I am already looking forward to see this one when it's done.
Good luck, & good luck too with the upload.

Bryce

Jennie,

What a great idea!! when you are finished you could likly market an educational DVD if that intersts you!!

you working with after effects?

Intriguing!!!

so many great ideas for this group!!!

This is a brilliant idea Jennie. I am really looking forward with anticipation to see how this evolves. How did your green screen work go this weekend?

Hi every one thanks for all the coments I was a bit worried about the idea but I am back to being really excited about it again :)

I am using after effects.

here is a link to my 3 minute footage part I have had to upload it to my server... it should play in a browser, my internet is so flakey :) if you click the index link or you can do a save as.. sorry about the crappy quality. had to make it small to upload between power cuts !

any hoo its here.
oh and yeah my accents weird !

http://braiiins.com/UWOL/STENHOUSE_POPUP_UWOLLongForm.mp4

You have a good idea for your film. I think this concept will be easy to stretch to the long form. Not all of us can be so sure of our plan.
I am longing for your next step with rhyme and music .

Finn-Erik

Hey Jennie,
I just watched the first part of your film. Wow you're so imaginative & creative! You & Cat Russel would work very well together i think if you ever got the chance. I love the idea & am sure it will appeal to all ages. Can't wait to see the next part.
Bryce

Jennie,
This is so good I’m already looking past it and can’t wait to see what other great ideas you come up with in the future. If you put it out on DVD have you considered making the disc cover be a simple pop-up? Good luck with the green screen compositing. I have also found this site Cow a help with AfterEffects:

VIDEO COPILOT | After Effects Tutorials & Post Production Tools (http://www.videocopilot.net/)

His sense of humor can be a little strange. Speaking of weird- your accent’s not, mine is. Have you considered using 3D animation? Seems like a good fit for this project. 3D models of all the animals you list (and books) are readily and cheaply available and now some very good render and animation software is free. I’ll send you links if you like. Let me know.

The green screen went well this week has been hectic though so this coming weekend i hope to tidy it up and show you guys :) every thing is very very diy the main problem i have been encountering is the lighting of the scene so that there isn't a whole bunch of colour bleeding, but its great fun!



Also I am totally intreasted in marketing it. I am surrounded by game reserves with plenty of curio shops, also I was thinking that it might be a project that i could get the local aids orphanedkids to be involved in, by being the kids in it and I hope that i have designed the pop up book ( the real one ) in such a way that its construction could be a township project .

that way they get to be in something cool and also have proceeds go to a good cause. Well a bit of a brainstorm at the moment any way. I am quite interested in the humantrian vs environmentalist issues so being involved in projects which work with benifiting both people and animals is pretty cool.

Mike-
I love his sense of humor, recently repeated his earth zoom out the after effects version not his proposed weather balloon idea :) I am going to be using soildworks for my 3D stuff once it gets here, african post is something else! I was kindly dontated it. I am more familar with the pre autodesk maya though, in my previouse game programmer life i used to write intergrated artist tools for it but i can't wait to get cracking on it. there are somethings i just can't get paper to do!


Jen

Hey Jennie

Well firstly, a very creative idea and I can see that for the target audience it would be a fun method of getting over the information. I have to say I usually don't struggle to visualise peoples ideas but I'm having a little trouble with this one. I get the core concept but I'm just struggling with how it will work over a 20 minute piece !? Some great footage, I'm very jealous of where you live, it must be stunning! By way of critique it could use some grading (some shots were quite washed out) and some better use of composition.

Anyway, I think you are certainly going to bring a new flavour to uwol and I look forward to seeing things 'unfold'....bum bum :-).

Keep it coming!
Mat