3. FMP: Context/Research (Chinese Landscapes and Chinese Plants)

For my FMP project, I desire to create a battle-scene animation which is contextually accurate to Asian culture. In order to succeed with my contextual information, I created a Pinterest board inspiring me for ideas revolving around China and its landscape.

All the images in this Pinterest board are based around modern day China, and has a wide aspect of nature involved. This is important for my work, as I will be able to delve deeper into the shrubbery and foliage that grows in China, in order to base the back imagery of my animation on the real plants in the region.

After creating this moodboard, I decided to make a mindmap to broaden my knowledge on the different types of plants that grow in the country.

Separating each type of plant into the categories of trees, flowers and fruits, I now have a wide variety of shrubbery and foliage to add to my scene if I so choose to base the scene on Chinese territory. By having a list of plants at hand, I will be able to do further research on each plant when the time comes to start designing my background.

Harvard References:

http://www.miriad.mmu.ac.uk. (2014). MMU | MIRIAD | Tales from a Chinese Garden | The Plants and Planting. [online] Available at: http://www.miriad.mmu.ac.uk/tattongarden/planting.php [Accessed 7 Feb. 2022].

Rue, J.L. and Green, J. (n.d.). Difference Between Tangerines & Tangelos. [online] LEAFtv. Available at: https://www.leaf.tv/articles/difference-between-tangerines-tangelos/ [Accessed 8 Feb. 2022].

2. FMP: Idea and Nationality Mindmap

To start off the process of working on my Final Major Project, I decided to create a mindmap with my initial ideas of what I would like to create to submit for the deadline.

Zoom in to view. Can’t scale it up for some reason :’]

For this project, my main ideas revolve around my strong suit of character design and character-based interaction.

I would have considered something landscape-oriented, but my lack of experience with 3D modelling and sub-par expertise on the subject made me scrap the idea pretty quickly.

As I developed my ideas with the character-based project prompts, I realised I could mix and improve my landscapes with the idea of a project that follows a game cutscene-like animation style, such as a war zone and fight scene between two original characters, where I can hone in on my strong suit of character design and simultaneously work on skills like animation, camera angles, poses, expressions and backgrounds, to make a scene and my creations come to life.

Now that I have decided on what the basic outline of my project will be, my next task is to figure out who these characters will be. In order to continue forward, I will need to create another mindmap bringing attention to what sort of characteristics I would like my characters to have. But before all of that, I will need to decide on a nationality to base these characters off of, heavily researching into culture in order to allow my designs and portrayal to be culturally accurate.

By choosing a selected few countries from each continent, I managed to widen my range of nationalities of which I could choose from for my characters. After some serious thought, I decided to go for the Asian countries of China and Japan to base both of my characters off. I chose these two countries due to my great interest in the mythical in both Japanese and Chinese folklore, mainly the impact of Yokai in Japanese tales, which is something I would love to merge into my work. I also take great interest in learning about the differences between both countries, and would like to find out more about the origins of modern day China.

My project will use the element of fantasy in order to differentiate from any real-life China-Japan war scenarios. I will not be basing my work on any true to life historical battles, and no link between any scenarios are intentional. I will use a wide range of historically accurate context to form my own reality for my final project, but will not include any documented tragedies in the form of wars as a sign of respect. General culturally accurate assets, such as armour or weapons from their respective countries will be used or referred to throughout the project.

FMP: Project Proposal (First Draft)

To start off the FMP, I created my first Project Proposal, which ultimately outlines all of my ideas for this project.

This Project Proposal will allow me to plan my work according to the prompts I have given myself, acting as a checklist to fulfil all of my ideas.

I will continue to refine my ideas and proposal as time goes along, and by the time the project is over, I will have a solid layout and product.