Level 2 - Exploring Animation

Animation Timeline

Ophelia

       The painting was painted, 1851-2

       It was painted by Sir John Everett Millais

   The painting shows Ophelia singing while she floats on the river before she drowns. The painting shows Act IV, scene VII from Hamlet in a speech by Queen Gertrude.

    The painting is done with oil on canvas.

       

The painting shows an image of Ophelia singing as she floats on the river before she drowns. It is said that there is a raccoon painted in the foliage in the riverbank on the right  

       It depicts Sir John Everett Millais’ interpretation of the scene of Ophelia’s death in Hamlet. The flowers shown floating with Ophelia where chosen by the artist to show Shakespeare’s explanation of Ophelia’s garland. The colours of flower are meant to represent the Victorian theory of the “language of flowers”, the prominent red poppy represents sleep and death.

Kahoot

https://play.kahoot.it/#/k/5d493612-0f2c-4210-9b9a-f603d1964fac

Mind Map

Platform Game Research

My interpretation

This is a painting I did of my interpretation of the painting Ophilia, I used a variety of soft and hard brushes, the colours used in this painting are very dark except for Ophelia's face, which is very pale. I used normal brushes and the liquefy tool.

Action Plans

Mind Maps

Backgrounds

This is the design of the game level I have designed, I used the forest landscape of the painting to create this 3D background, I used a soft brush to create the background using a variety of colours, I used a grass brush to create the texture of the grass and the liquefy tool to make the pool. There are three different layers involved in making this background, there is the far, middle and near layer, they all fit together to create the full 3D background.

  
Level Plan

Construct Work

On construct I did all the programming, using a variation in parallax, using basic behaviours and commands and also different layers, I have managed to make a working game. I used Shiams video tutorials and sheets to help me to programme the event sheets.

This is the programming I have done for the enemies to destroy the player. Character

I chose the raccoon because of the rumour of there being a raccoon hidden in the painting. So the character both fits in with the painting and also serves as a very, very subtle Easter egg.

Walk Cycle Animation

Gameplay

Finished Gameplay

Blog Analysis 

  This project was Exploring Animation, in this project I have made a working game based on the painting Ophelia, painted Sir John Everett Millais, in 1851-2. I have done extensive research into animation through the years, to see how art styles and methods have changed; research has also been done on the painting to help me find out about hidden details in the painting I could use in the game as sort of like Easter Eggs, e.g. I have made the character a raccoon which is a hidden animal in the painting, research has been done on different platform games to see how they are laid out and how the story progresses, I have then crated a fully working game including; a playable character, Easter Eggs, collectables, moving platforms, a switch mechanic and also working enemies.

    I came with my ideas by using the painting as inspiration for the; art style, characters, and collectables. The art style was decided because the painting is set in a forest so the setting was pretty easy to come up with, it was quite vibrant, with light green plants with some saturation, to contrasting darkness in the trees and water with low saturation. The character of the raccoon was thought of because the painting is rumoured to have a raccoon hidden in the bushes on the left side of the painting, this is very useful because the character also serves as an Easter Egg for the game. The collectables in the game where inspired by the flowers Ophelia has on her garland, the poppy which was used as the collectable has a meaning of never ending sleep or death. The enemy was thought up because mosquitos are insect’s people really don’t like, so the enemy connects with people on a realistic level. I tested the game each time I made a change; this was ensure everything worked and looked and ran correctly. I also used different backgrounds to see which ones would work better. I used construct 2 to make the game, construct was difficult to start off with but as Shiams tutorials where there to help I got by on construct pretty easily. I used gifs to show the walk cycles, I used event sheets on construct to make the game and programme it fully.

    I used sketches and silhouettes to develop my ideas into the characters used in the game. I used rough sketches to figure out which background was the Far, Middle and Near layers. I used research into the painting to help, me decide on the assets of the game and what suits the theme of the painting. I used construct to add animation frames to the characters and bind the animation to what key is pressed. I have learned about Parallax, which is the different speeds of the backgrounds, The Power of 2, this is the sizes of the assets that are used in pixels to fit in the game, Sine, which is the movement of an asset, and Magnitude, which is the speed of the Sine.

    The painting Ophelia is my influence in the project because the game is based off the painting. The painting helped me to decide on the assets, characters and theme of my game. I liked the forest theme to it because it was interesting to draw and I enjoyed making the assets and textures. I chose to make the game kind of dark, with quite bright colours on the near layer. These choices made it so my game worked a lot better and looked a lot better as well. I had some problems with the parallax; I solved it by editing the background layer so that the parallax movement was visible.

    I was very happy with the outcome of the game, I was happy with my game because the game has turned out to be very successful, the mechanics worked really well and I managed to fix the problems. I did not the walk cycle animation because it didn’t turn out quite how I hoped it would. I would have spent more time on the walk cycles and added a game over screen to the game. I really enjoyed the construct programming the most. I could have managed my time better so that I could have added more detail to the game and but more time into the stuff that needed improving.