Mighty Oak
What is my animation about?
•My animation is based off the poem called
the ‘Mighty Oak’ written by Kathy J Parenteau. The poem describe her grandfather as an oak and explains why.
•Stand
tall
oh mighty oak, for all the world to see,
your strength and undying beauty forever amazes me.
Though storm clouds hover above you,
your branches span the sky,
in search of the radiant sunlight you
count on to survive.
When the winds are high and restless and
you lose a limb or two,
it only makes you stronger, we
could learn so much from you.
Though generations have come and gone
and brought about such change,
quietly you've watched them all yet still
remained the same.
I only pray God give to me the strength he's
given you,
to face each day with hope, whether
skies are black or blue,
Life on earth is truly a gift
every moment we must treasure,
it's the simple things we take for granted
that become our ultimate pleasures.
your strength and undying beauty forever amazes me.
Though storm clouds hover above you,
your branches span the sky,
in search of the radiant sunlight you
count on to survive.
When the winds are high and restless and
you lose a limb or two,
it only makes you stronger, we
could learn so much from you.
Though generations have come and gone
and brought about such change,
quietly you've watched them all yet still
remained the same.
I only pray God give to me the strength he's
given you,
to face each day with hope, whether
skies are black or blue,
Life on earth is truly a gift
every moment we must treasure,
it's the simple things we take for granted
that become our ultimate pleasures.
•I liked the poem as I could connect with
and understand what she meant by referencing her grandfather to an Oak tree and
although my granddad has not passed away, he is a similar figure in our family.
How has my research helped with the development of my idea?
•I researched how the tree would move in
certain situations, for instance in the ‘wind’ scene so that the shape of the
tree was right. This helped me to accomplish the right shape so it looked like
a tree all the way through.
•I also researched the style, focusing on
an animation called ‘The Art of Drowning’ by Diego Maclean – I liked how his
style is sketchy and not perfect ad I tried to create this style in my piece. I have the video in a earlier post.
Did i chose the right style and techniques to create my animation?
•I feel I chose the right style as the
topic of my animation was death and someone grieving and so I chose a sketchy
style as this went with the topic well. Death is not perfect and so I didn’t
want my animation to be.
•I did go through different styles though.
I had drawn my tree in Photoshop and then started to create the animation in tvpaint,
so it came out differently. It was very bright and did not go with the theme of
the animation so I then exported it and coloured it in Photoshop.
tvpaint tree
photoshop tree
Did I have enough understanding of the software's I chose to use?
•I have learnt a lot using the different
software’s. I had a enough knowledge at the beginning but as I went through I
learnt more and more and now I feel really confident with Tvpaint
and Photoshop. Anything
I didn’t know I could ask other members of the class and/or google it. I
chose to use these software’s as they were the best at creating the simple
style I wanted for my animation.
What could I have done better?
•Next time I think I need to work on my
time management as I felt I was rushed at the end because of not having a good
workflow and planning it around the other modules.
•I also feel I need to work on my timings
with the animation as I notice now that when the wind is blowing the tree
doesn’t bend fast enough and small things like that need fixing.
•I think I restricted myself too much with
the poem as I had to have each scene fit to the timings of the narration and so
sometimes I felt as though I was adding things just to make scenes longer and
having to cut things down. If I ever do another animation about a poem I will
take this into consideration.
Has my project helped me to develop advanced knowledge and skills in 2D animation?
•I feel I have developed my knowledge as I
think more about why I am doing certain things in the animation more. For
instance the park scene, I chose to have a background that was similar colours
to the tree but not as colourful so not to take the focus away from the tree. I
also chose to have the people in the park in a black sketchy outline as I also
did not want them to distract too much away from the tree. 
•The beginning scene I chose to have the
camera follow the tree as it grows so the audience felt like part of it.
Overall I am pleased with my animation
although I feel that I could improve it in certain places.
