Thesis Progress Update #1
Pastas that have sibling energy? They also have the gift of life?? What could this mean? Obviously they have to turn to a life of crime. With each second of consciousness, these pastas grow hungry for a heist. Bowtie and Elbow bring us on an adventure around the kitchen, scheming up to steal the Secret Family Recipe Book. Their every move? Calculated with ravenous precision. They are craving the ultimate prize, your family’s sacred recipes that your Nonna has passed down from generation to generation. The Great Pasta Heist 3D animated short film is meant to bring elements of nostalgic coziness to you. (To satisfy your appetite for humor.)
Welcome to the first blog post dedicated to my senior thesis project! I have officially gotten started on so many elements of this project so far. I have a gorgeously organized spreadsheet with all of my schedule milestones, to-do lists, shot lists, and an asset list. The past 2 weeks I have been making great progress on rough storyboards, asset modeling, and even experimenting with lighting for the set. The set is very close to my heart because I am basing it on my childhood kitchen. I want to be able to capture a playful and nostalgic energy with the set design.
Since all 3D aspects of this project will be created in Blender, I want to use the cycles render engine. The positives of using the cycles render engine revolve around how I can explore more lighting techniques and my material textures are not as limited. I believe I can achieve a very cozy warm look with my lighting and textures. One of the hesitations I have about using the cycles render engine is how much longer it will take to render. Since I am severely limited by the capabilities of the computers I have access to, I have been getting creative with how I go about storyboarding. To combat the long render times, I am attempting to limit the render time to about one to two minutes per frame and I am going to budget my zooms/ camera movements. Some of my camera movements can be mimicked in after effects with a large matte painting. This will save a lot of time rendering one background frame instead of a hundred. The characters can be layered over the background matte painting in the post production phase. I am allowing myself two (MAYBE three if I absolutely have to) camera zooms. The two zooms I have planned really support the storytelling in my storyboards so far.
The story progression, as of right now, is as follows: The pastas Bowtie and Elbow come to life! With each second of consciousness, they grow hungry for a heist. Their target? The Secret Family Recipe Book. In an epic parkour filled journey, they adventure around the kitchen. Then the real struggle begins. This hefty book is no match for Bowtie’s strength. Good thing Elbow is here to shove it off the counter, landing open on the floor with an enormous THUD. It isn’t long before the pastas realize that a human heard the drop! They quickly transform back to their base form (a regular pasta) and hide themselves until the human leaves the kitchen. Overjoyed with their heist’s success, Bowtie and Elbow go to read the secret recipes, ready to be enlightened with their prize…
I can’t wait for the next update I add to see how my progress grows and my little pasta’s story evolves! Stay on the lookout for the next update about this project! :D
