Specialist Study 2- Part 2 Finding a monologue

Rightio, it has been a while indeed from the last time I have blogged on this website, reasons being is due to the fact I have been taking the pleasure of doing something truly special as part of my new creative projects. This involved filming and editing the last remaining days of my final year at university, which is quite a significant moment in my life at the moment. If you want to check some of, I've embedded a video to below.

Uni Life

Anyway, lets get down to where I last left off, from January blog post. So, I was thinking about animating a monologue, where this will give me the chance to use camera angles to convey the story and emotion of the character, but most importantly, to focus on the character performance much more and the animation principles as well.

I had spoked to a couple of people whom I knew, that could help me, as they were part of a drama course, or that they taught the subject themselves. Anyway, I spoke to a friend of mine "Holly.P" who was a drama teacher. She then had a student who had learnt her monologue and so, all I had to do was record her via video, audio and take notes on her performance.

Priya acting her monologue

The girl performing was by "Priyasasha. K"and though she had showed spirit and perseverance in her character, from her performance, my tutor, thought that I needed to find someone with a bit more experience on acting, so I can capture the dynamic output and translate that, through the animation.

So, round two, the hunt was still on! Just like with Holly, I then asked my friend "Simon. H", who is currently is his last year at 6th form, in his drama course. Now honestly, I didn't expect much from my friend, (shame on me), but when I had set all the recording equipment up, and was all green....his performance took me by surprise.

Take 1

I really liked the fact that it was from Shakespeare, something I never really had enjoyed during my time at school. But, seeing this from a much more mature and educated point of view, made me realise the potential of what I could animate, with this piece. The only downside was that I had to, borrow equipments again and record this, as I left some of it behind at uni.....

From the first video I recorded, I felt as though the character "Mark Anthony", needed to take a second or so to re-collect himself,to compose his speech a bit more, so that we can understand how his character feels, and soon realise, he's breaking down. So I broke down the script and you can see the difference in personality, from the video above and below. 

So, with a slight positive outlook on deciding what I was going to animate, I recorded another session with my friend Simon, so that I could use his voice for the audio, in the animation. 

Take 2

Now, I had pretty much recorded and got what I needed, I felt that I had to show my tutor with what I had gathered so far. Unfortunately, not good news.....well, not exactly.

Monologue

So, the main problem to which my tutor had found with the audio, was that it was "weak, un-energetic, amateurish". This was my fault, as I wanted this kind of feel, but in the end, it needed to be more theatrical. So my tutor just said to me, just use the audio from the film. In some way, this would relieve the pressure of having to animate a 2 half minute piece down to a minute and a bit. But still, retaining, the theatrical energy and vibe from the audio. 

I'll be updating the rest of the work I have done so far, over the next few days!

Andycodex