Story Story Stor - Animating with Blender: How to Create Short Animations from Start to Finish - page 21

All you need is a title, stage directions, and dialog. The division of the stage directions is a bit arbitrary, but is
analogous to paragraph breaks in standard writing: Each little group of stage directions should represent a unit
of action. If you are already visualizing how this will look in 3D, those divisions will occur naturally, and they
often represent camera cuts in the fi nal production.
One thing you may notice is the absence of all of the theme elements we discussed previously. Traditionally, a
screenplay has been a common reference for the actors and director, and, while some writers like to put cer-
tain details of set and action that support the theme directly into the script, it is not necessary. The art direc-
tion, the actual content of the action, and even the way the actors perform are all managed by the director
whose creative vision and sense of theme will make or break the production. Because you are the writer, pro-
ducer, director and “actors” of your production, communicating such things through the script is unnecessary.
Of course, if you have any particularly good ideas that you don't want to forget, you can always include them.
The script is a living document—always available for revision, inclusion, or omission.
Story Scope, Your Resources, and Reality
You've really sweated over your story so that it works in all the ways we discussed in the previous section.
There is another pitfall, though, that could send you back to square one: producibility. Whether or not you
can turn that story into a fi nished animation will be a competition between the combined might of your
personal discipline, available time, your skills as an artist, and the unholy alliance of distractions, the desires for
sleep and human companionship, and the mountains of work that lay ahead.
And so it is a good idea to make sure that you actually have a shot at completing this task. How much time
will it really take? While I cannot tell you that doing this or that will take exactly x or y hours, I can say that
the work that you face will be a function of several distinct things: the number and complexity of sets and
characters that appear in the animation, the amount of special effects such as water, hair, and clothes, and the
actual amount of time that each character is animated.
If you haven't done so already, watch The Beast on the included disc.
Not counting the credits or the still images at the beginning and end of the animation, the amount of “live” time
for which animation was required is around 3 minutes. The story features three characters: the mother, the bad
dog, and the Beast. Although there is a second dog, notice that it never leaves it initial pose and does nothing but
pant and move its head. It is little more than a complex prop. In several shots, all three characters appear together,
which requires correspondingly more work. Mostly, though, each shot focuses on a single character.
For effects, you see hair for the mother and the Beast, fur for the dogs, a physics simulation for the crashing
fl ower pots, and some particle work for the sprayed water.
Think about your resources: Are you working by yourself or with a partner or small team? Remember, you (or
your team) will be responsible for every aspect of the production: storyboarding; the modeling and surfacing of
all characters, sets, and props; the rigging, skinning, and animation of all characters; rendering and compositing;