After watching Chuck Jones - The Evolution of an Artist, I found another video by the same person, Every Frame a Painting, discussing Edgar Wright's style of comedy. Even though this isn't directly about animation, I decided to watch to see if anything can be translated between the mediums to help our film comedically.  

The first thing that is commented on in the video is how many modern films only make use of dialogue to provide comedy, rather than using the full amount of what film has to offer. There is a lack of visuality for comedic value.

The video states that the key between a mediocre director to a great one is the ability to take simple mundane scenes and find new ways to do them. So once again not going for the obvious and thinking more outside the box.

There is an emphasis on the framing, specifically  how things enter and leave the frame, which can be done in a comedic manner. Does the frame hide anything that can later be revealed by a pan or a zoom?



Sound effects and dramatic lighting can also play a big effect in the comedy of a scene.


What I've learnt from the video and from Edgar Wright, is to try and make the use of all aspects of the film, rather than just what the characters are saying. When writing the script I'm going to be considering what else will be going on the scene at the time to add to the comedic value. I definitely want to play around with sound, framing and lighting to see how it can all come together to make a piece, especially within animation. 


Items Used
  • Wooden Base
  • Saw 
  • PVA and Super Glue 
  • Synthetic Grass
  • Glitter 
  • Beads 
  • Acrylic Paint
  • Synthetic Soil
  • Markers and Pencils
  • Ruler
  • Scissors
  • Foam
To begin with the base I took the measurements of the entire board and then marked the point where I wanted to cut to make the set smaller. Then using a saw I cut down this line as best I could (I'm not the most proficient with a saw) until I had two separate pieces of board. I selected the larger of these two to work on. 




I marked on where I wanted the house to be on the board, using the pieces of house I had built as a guide to the size and angle to be placed at. I made the area of the house bigger on the board so as I could include a garden and fence surrounding it. 



I also sketched in where the path would lead up to at the door of the house. I also marked on a continuation of this leading across the entire board, as well as placing a stream outline in front of this.



After this I cut out pieces of foam that went over the top of the board, everywhere other than the stream. This was to elevate everything and allow the stream to seem lower than the rest of the set. One layer of foam was placed, other than around the stream, where an extra layer was added to deepen it further.  This was then glued using PVA directly to the board. The foam required a lot of pressure to maintain it's security to the board so I advise having an extra pair of hands around (in my case my mum!) to help keep a larger area pressed down in order to make sure it will continue to stick as the glue is drying! The outline of the path was re-marked on top of the foam using a yellow marker. 






After allowing the glue to dry, I decided to give a base coat of blue to the stream. To get the colour I wanted I used white acrylic paint and added a hint of light blue. I then carefully painted this in between the gap of the two pieces of foam. 




I then got a roll of synthetic grass to apply over the top of the entire board. I laid the roll over the set and then cut following the line of the stream underneath as a guide. Using a paintbrush I then placed glue underneath the grass cut outs and placed them carefully around the stream, making sure to push it in between all the crevasses, as I didn't want a smooth appearance.





I cut out a piece of spare foam in the shape of the path and placed this on top of the grass so as I could keep track of where it was going. I then painted on a brown path line on either side of the foam across the board, as a guide for the later placement of soil. 


After this I went back to sprucing up the stream. I painted on some PVA glue the entire way along it and then sprinkled on some bluey-silvery glitter. Beads were also added around the edged to give some more definition. 





Next I used some synthetic soil on top of the path line to give a more 3D effect. I did this in a similar way to the stream, placing PVA glue first and then sprinkling on. This time the small granules had to be pressed down more than the glitter, as they were a lot heavier.




The final look was something like this : 




This section of the set took the most time and effort to complete, as it required a lot of measuring and working out angles etc. so this blog post is most likely to be quite long! Although I have tried to simplify it a bit just to give the idea of how it was built. 

Items Used
  • A1 White Foam board
  • Miniature lolly pop sticks
  • Ruler
  • 2B pencil
  • Corrugated cardboard 
  • Craft Knife
  • PVA Glue
  • Super glue 
  • Acrylic paints in various colours
  • Various sized paint brushes
  • Cello tape
  • Soft brass brush

To begin with, using some miniature lolly pop sticks as reference to gain an appropriate size for the windows, I drew out the front of the house on an A1 sized piece of foam board. 



Each lolly pop stick was laid out 2mm from each other, doubling that for the door space, and then marked with pencil on the foam board.


The pencil marks were extended to complete the window shapes, as well as the door, with 'X' used to mark the areas required to be removed. 


The exterior line for the front of the house was cut using a craft knife to separate it from the rest of the foam board, leaving the rectangular shape. 


I continued with the craft knife to cut out the window and door sections, being very careful to cut them straight and as accurate as possible. 



Next I designed three 3D roof top windows to show an upstairs externally to the house. These consisted of a pentagon, with a rectangular window in the centre. These were cut out in the same way as the rest of the house, using a craft knife. 



I laid the cut out sections of the house together in order to get an idea of how the house was looking and whether everything had been sized accurately.



When I was happy with the design I did a test to make sure the pieces fitted together using cello tape to easily assemble or disassemble the pieces as needs be. 





In this test I discovered for the roof to fit securely I had to change the side pieces of the house from rectangles to pentagons. 


To make the roof I tried a bit of trial and error. I cut two rectangular pieces of foam board that were about half an inch longer on both sides, than the front and back pieces of the house. This was so that the roof would sit slightly past the edges of them. The two roof pieces were placed together at the edges  and placed on top of the assembled house, where the angle was adjusted to fit with the pieces below. The two roof pieces were then cello taped in place at this angle just to hold them together and then eventually glued to each other using superglue. 


With the roof in place I was able to assemble the roof top windows at the perfect angle to coincide with the angle of the roof. These pieces were super glued together and then painted white.


I cut some corrugated cardboard into strips at half an inch in width and the same length as the roof pieces.  



These strips were then glued using PVA and overlaid on top of each other on the roof pieces, to give the appearance of tiles.  This was completed on both of the roof pieces. 





I tested some colour on some spare corrugated cardboard I had and finally decided on a dark grey. The entire roof was then painted this colour. Making sure to get in-between the gaps of the cardboard proved to be difficult as I would always come back to find white gaps, and the requirement of another coat of paint. 



Back on the main pieces of the house, I pealed the plastic coating off the foam board to show the spongy foam underneath. This would allow me to carve easily. I began by drawing the brick onto the board using pencil, to hopefully allow me to be more accurate when carving.



Then using the craft knife, I carved into the lines to give them some depth. This took a long time due to having to be careful and accurate about how you were cutting. The slower you go, the less chance of mistakes. I had to be careful not to cut too deep as well, or else the entire piece would collapse in on itself. This step was created for every piece that required bricks. 




I used a soft brass brush to hit the foam repeatedly with, over the bricks, to give them more of an uneven and less perfect texture to make them more realistic.



Before painting on the actual pieces I made a quick test version to practise colours and see what looked more how I wanted. Initially this test panicked me a bit, as I couldn't really get it to look very good. However it did allow me to see what I needed to do and what I shouldn't be doing. It also inspired me to use a grey colour in the carved out areas as cement to distinguish the bricks from one another. 




I then began to work on the actual pieces. I began by painting the cracks grey, as this was a very messy job due to how thin they were. It was very hard to get a small enough paintbrush to fit, so paint would often go on to the actual bricks themselves. However this was not a problem as the beauty of working with acrylic paints means that paint can easily cover previous paint and rectify any mistakes. I used this to my advantage and individually painted each brick on top of the grey. This was repeated for every piece that had bricks.




Here are all pieces collectively together:


A chimney was made from the foam board as well which was then carved and painted in the same way as all other bricks. 



Cello tape was added to all of the windows in order to give the impression of a reflective surface, and an old shirt was cut up into small rectangles and glued to the inside of the windows as curtains. 


The door measurements were taken, and a foam board rectangular door was cut out. The back of this was made wider so that it could slot into the door's gap in the front of the house without falling out. The door was then painted using acrylics and a door knob was made using an old pin, where the end was painted silver. 




Small rectangles were cut out from the foam board, measuring slightly longer than the windows in width, and painted grey to resemble window sills. Roof pieces were made for the tops of the upstairs roof windows, in a similar but miniature way to the main roof. These were also painted in the same dark grey from earlier.




Finally the house was assembled using a mixture of PVA glue and super glue. 






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Lauren Fox
Third year at UCA studying Digital Film and Screen Arts
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