Lille: Marathon de Animation Day One

Today was day one of two of the Marathon de Animation that I signed up for as part of Féte d' l'Anim'. Before today's briefing I knew nothing about the event other than I'd be animating something as part of a team, and what days I was going to be doing it. I soon found out that we were going to be given an image that had been designed by an industry professional, and this image was to be the start and end of our animation. We could do what we wanted with the animation, so long as it was 1080p, 16:9 ratio, 25FPS and 10 seconds long...

...and we had less than 48 hours to do it.

I was teamed with Paul, an illustrator who had graduated from LCA, and Theo, a French animation student. This proved to be an added challenge due to the language barrier (though Theo spoke very good English, there were miscommunication issues), but I was very excited to work with new people in an actual studio. It was definitely something I've never experienced before.

Initial Storyboard Thumbnails

We were able to come up with an idea for the animation relatively quickly; we opted for an animation that mimicked old school cartoons such as Popeye and Mickey Mouse. I sketched out an initial storyboard, and when we were happy with the shots, I made up a quick animatic in After Effects whilst Paul worked on background design, and Theo on the character.


Today has definitely been a stressful one. Due to the short deadline, I'm feeling a massive pressure to get the work done, which is only amplified by the fact that I can't do much until other components have been made and sent my way (I'm animating them in After Effects). It's also been quite stressful because I have had to take on jobs that weren't originally assigned to me, and we only have a day to turn this animation around. It's been great to experience a new way of working that is out of my comfort zone, as it's really challenging my animating ability, but I think i'll be glad when this is over and I can go back to animating in programs that aren't set-up in French.

Let's hope tomorrow goes well.