The first idea that I had was to make a film about my favourite person in the world, my Auntie Anne, who died when I was 9. I would have been about all the things that made her really special to me, and all the little things that we did together that I will always remember and that meant so much to me.
The film was going to be simple, childlike drawings animated on top of photographs, or pieces of film, like the video below. This is still a film that I want to make, however I decided that it was not the most appropriate idea for this course, as it is such a personal subject that I would probably not want much critique from others during it, and I come onto this course to learn from others.
I then changed this idea to a more general one. It was going to be about things that trigger memories for people. This was going to use photo animation with simple, hand drawn animation composited on top.
This was an idea that I worked on for a while, but I didn’t really feel passionate enough about it to consider it for my final film.
Another idea that I toyed with was a film about ‘tomorrow’, inspired by the quote “Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it, every, every minute?” from Thornton Wilder’s play ‘Our Town’. It was to be a fractured, slightly abstract narrative about a person who feels like things should be better, and how every time they have a chance to make it better, they think “i will do that tomorrow”. You would hear small snippets of random, unrelated, chaotic thoughts as they are walking through a city to work. You realise through the film that though the person doesn’t seem to notice it, their life is not bad, it is completely normal, but like everyone, they just want more.
I had gathered together a collection of quotes and ideas that I wanted to use in this film, and I wanted the visual style to be sparse, the people to seem transparent, both as characters and visually. My design inspiration for this film was ‘Rabbit Punch’ by Kristian Andrews, as well as wire sculptures by Alexander Calder.
Another idea was inspired by some drawings by Saul Steinberg, colours of Jonny Hannah’s work and ‘Svanire’ by Ludivico Einaudi. It was going to be about a musician who is walking through a busy town, full of people who are talking themselves up, ignoring his presence. He walks silently through town into a concert hall, where there are more people bigging themselves up and ignoring him. The next shot is inside the theatre, which is full of more of the same people. The musician walks on stage with a cello, and his music is more powerful than the meaningless words of those in the audience.
Saul Steinberg
Jonny Hannah
Concept Art and Animation Tests
In the end I decided that this idea was not suitable for my final film as it involved animating a lot of people, and this is not something I am terribly good at, however it is an idea that I would like to go back to in the future.
The final idea that I had over the summer was inspired by a friend’s dad. One of my flatmates last year’s dad is Jack Bond, a surrealist filmmaker. He once made a film in Caerleon using a bear and 50 patients from the mental hospital, all of which he lost in the woods and the bear was never re-captured. He came to stay with us last year and I know that he is a real character and I had the idea of interviewing him about the event. I would then animate a bear into some live action footage of south wales, trying to fit in and live a normal life.
Bare 
