I created this artistic animation using true spur of the moment inspiration.

The animation has a message behind it, and that is as the title suggests to 'Find Another Way'. The hammer in the animation relentlessly hammering away at the nail symbolizes the monotony of modern society. The fact that the nail isn't moving suggests that despite people's best efforts, their actions to not always bring them their desired outcome.

The revelation is had towards the end when the nail is merely pushed in with a finger. This says that things are easier than you think. Hammering a nail in is commonly known as an action which requires much force. Sometimes people can be disillusioned by how easy something really can be.

I took inspiration for this because I came towards a time where I realized that I should stop hammering the nail and instead find another way.

I used a variety of methods to achieve the look of this animation. I recorded video of myself and then imported this into Adobe Flash. I then set the frame rate to 8 frames per second and began to trace around each frame using a Wacom tablet.

Once I had all the animation I wanted I exported it as MOV files with alpha and brought them into Adobe After Effects for stylizing. I added a pale blue glow mainly.

The most complicated scene in this animation is the part where the main character appears to be walking over a city of light. For this I firstly created the walk cycle in Adobe Flash, then exported using the same method as above. Once in Adobe After Effects I made the scene 3D and created 3D blocks made of animated grids I also created in Flash. It was then as simple as positioning them all in the right places and animating a camera path.

The final step in the process was bringing it into Adobe Premiere for editing. I imported After Effects Projects into Premiere as this ensures maximum quality as saves time because I didn't have to render out a high quality version of the different effects passes.

The sound was created by my good friend Dan Thomas (A.K.A. Auditree)

 

Client:
Myself

Category:
Animation

Date Of Completion:
January 2010