Study of a nestling - Senior Thesis film
A semester long project created, directed, and produced entirely by individual students. The focus for my film was a personal connection to birds and the inevitability of growing up - taking flight, per se.
Initial Exploration
I originally pitched three themes: freedom & birds, the story of all the inter connected places I visited throughout college, and how light and sound are perceived. My advisor and I agreed that exploration on the bird idea would likely result in better passes later on, so I continued to design around the small snippets of poetry I kept finding.
Focusing on the idea of birds, I pushed the design style to be heavily graphic, which generated a variety of style frames. But, I wasn’t happy with how I’d been planning motion with these frames, so I kept experimenting with how they functioned in the larger context of a moving thesis.
production
poetry, problem-solving, and the inevitability of birds
My script inspiration was poetry written months prior during the lull of daily meetings, empathetic of the perceived freedom that birds must feel. This later evolved into the focus on fragility and metaphor for growing up, more aligned with the newer personal message I was trying to incorporate. I worked on various copies of the script, tweaking the flow until I found a solution that would amplify a motion piece. I developed storyboards and a working animatic at the same time to tie down timing of the script, as well as the mood of the voice lines I would eventually record.
I think a lot about birds.
They hatch full of promise—like our early dreams.
Do they know how fleeting their time is?
How fragile their wings are?
They look at the world with trusting eyes.
They’re brave, taking a plunge into the unknown.
They simply fly—free and unbound.
Sharing an open sky, limitless to even the trees.
Final Script
I kept playing with how the windows would function in the context of the overall piece, experimenting with some of my earlier exploration. This would eventually turn into the focus on windows and “breaking free”, as well as the more dynamic transitions throughout the piece.
Finding A Style
I primarily focused on simple, smooth animation, adding limited exaggeration in my earlier tests. I found later on that I need way more ease exaggeration to help the smoothness of the piece, eliminating any linear spots that I could identify nearing the end of the project.
beginning Animation
Earlier animation pass with unfinished frames (proof of concept for advisor)
Breakdown of final animation’s phenakistoscope layers
post mortem thoughts & Premiere photos
Overall, I think the project went extremely well, but I think more passes of initial design experimentation would’ve helped me later on in my own process, especially when I started to find the final look.
In the future, I think I’d like to experiment more with the original exploration’s frames. The heavily graphic style may not have been perfect for motion, but I could easily see it in editorial frames or some print marketing touchpoints I could produce.