Animated Narratives: Week 1

Premise Wiki

A fairy in a pot swearing at people.

FOLIO DOCUMENTATION

This work examines the idea of misunderstanding and miscommunication between different species. By showing the transition of swearing voice to a rather lively chirping sound when the centre of the story shifts from the fairy to human, and the happy reaction the people have for the fairy energetic behaviour, I am able to show that the human doesn’t understand fairy’s language at all. Therefore, misunderstanding and miscommunication happen. By using the medium of animation, I am able to convey this more western cartoony type of story with simple characters that are created with primitive shapes.

This work is similar to the animation ’The Ant Bully’, which the protagonist was transformed into an ant after attacking an anthill to take out his frustration of being neglected and bullied. As a human, he doesn’t understand the ant language at all. That’s why when a specific ant character wants to communicate with him, he doesn’t understand. Similar ideas are also embedded in the ‘Madagascar’ series and ‘’The Secret Life of Pets.

By examining ’Game Design as a Narrative Architecture’ by Henry Jenkins, I reflected that idea environmental storytelling is equally important as the story itself. Thinking through this, I decided to change the environment design in the storyboard, adding cupboards and jars into the background to enhance the impression of a kitchen. Also, by ending the fairy’s disappearance with a bunch of chilli, it will explain the reason behind the out-of-a-sudden swearing.