As part of a study in Animation, I've written a poem called 'Girls Day Out' which involves ladies enjoying the delights of the Seaside and on the lookout for men.
It's all part of a study of the rise of women in creative roles in the northwest since the 70's. It's a sort of celebration if you like.
These are very rough test that I made to see how facial parts can work together in an animation to give a nostalgic blend of styles and shapes.

The first test was done on an ipad with an App called the 'Granimator' Created by UsTwo.

I have used this App a lot recently as it's a great tool for manipulating images and rotating and scaling them easily. I actually believe that with some extra features and experimentation that it could be used generally in the future as a tool for animation.

In the first test movie I chose an artist pack from the Granimator that emulated shapes that Picasso might use as this is a feel I would like to introduce into my film. I would not use clean vector images in my own film, but more collage and hand painted material. However, the test movie enabled me to see the feasibility of this approach and how it could be used to create guide frames for painting or performing stop motion animation.This test also helped me to further understand timing of imagery with sound.

For the second test, I took the initial Flash animation that I produced from frames created in the Granimator App and I overlaid that in Adobe Premiere with a film from a penny arcade that I created on my Flip camera.This was a process I had to learn as I have not done it before.

The noisy arcade sounds are an important aspect of this film, I also wanted to play with blended overlays to see how the images from the 2 different films would interact and cut into each other. I like the idea of layering images over each other to create blends of ideas.

In the 3rd test I experimented with a torn paper collage of a varietyof imagery related to beauty makeup and facial parts. I took images of eyes, noses and mouths from a variety of sources.

I used material from celebrities such as Marylin Monroe, Diana Dors, Twiggy and  Kate Moss to give a feel of the change of style across the decades since the 50's and I also mixed these images in with stereo typical images drawn from Picasso paintings. I had the idea of using an assortment of lipstick kisses to create the mouth movement. The lip synch is extremely rough for now but it may work if it is approached in a methodical way. I looked at many examples of phonemes to get information for the mouth shapes.

The 4th movie shows the collage images and pieces that went together to make my collage test film. I used Dragon software and a Canon camera to set up the stop motion scene.

The 5th Movie is a reference movie that I took on my flip camera of a vintage makeup demo as I felt it may be useful reference material as part of my storyboard planning.

Images of a Seaside town

As part of my research for backdrops for my film I took a series of photographs of Lord Street in Southport, which should feature quite strongly as an environment.

I'm planning to produce background images in a similar style to those in 101 Dalmatians, which was always a favourite approach for setting a scene.
I also produced a second book full of inspirational photos of the seaside elements of the town where I live. I'm particularly fond of the bright and saturated images of photographer, Martin Parr. I organised the photos into two separate books which I have ordered through Photobox.

Click on the images below to sample the books.

I did a series of tests with the photos to see how they could be used for rerence for background paintings.

See example below.

And the book of the Seaside.

'How was media influential in encouraging British women to follow opportunities in the creative industries in the 70's compared to today?

I am currently asking a series of questions until I find the pathway that is most pertinent to my chosen area of research

QUESTION

'How was media influential in encouraging British women to follow opportunities in the creative industries in the 70's compared to today?
How was this particularly manifest in the northwest?'
OR
'How has the media influenced the perception of opportunities for British women in the creative industries since the 70's?'

OR 

'Has media influenced the perception of creative opportunities for Northern British women since the 70's?'

OR

'How has the media influenced the perception of creative opportunities for women in Northern Britain since the 70's?'

OR

'How has media been influential in encouraging aspirations in Northern British women in the 70's to follow opportunities in the creative industries, compared to today?' 

For practical research.

As part of my initial exploration I looked at comical verse surrounding the topic of a night on the town. I was influenced at first by the poetry of John Cooper Clarke

This album was recorded at Pluto studios by my partner, Phil Bush, in the 80's and in this sense it has a nostalgic value and evokes the time and atmosphere of the creative buzz in Manchester during the 80's
'Salome Malone, Queen of the Ritz' is one of my favourites and I have often thought of illustrating this poem.

I also like 

'Majorca',
'Valley of the Lost Women'  

'I Mustn't Go Down To The Sea Again'

This lead me to the idea of animating a girls night out and at first I thought of a poem written by a friend who is an animation director, we worked in a team on many animated titles together in Manchester during the 80'.

This mode of thinking led me back to John Cooper Clarke and his poem, 'Salome Maloney'
But... then I thought, don't use his stuff, choose something more personal and I remembered a poem that my friend, Jean Flynn, wrote about us
'Girl's Night Out'
Jean and I were at Manchester Poly together and worked together for 12 years at Cosgrove Hall.
She went on from Animator, to Director and Producer and is currently directing 'Everything's Rosie'

In this sense there's a tentative link between the research I'd like to do for my written work and the film I'd like to make.
I have Jean's permission to use the poem for inspiration but I've now doctored it quite a bit to suit my needs and only used the first verse as a starting point.

I'd like to animate it with a combination of media, hand drawn, stop- motion and collage- a bit like Angela Anaconda but with my own style which will include layering and overlays.

I began to construct verses based around the idea of women celebrating together and considered looking at this topic over a period of time since the war. 

I aimed to include references to relevant artists from different decades and to conjure up images from the words.

I have written several verses which I will post soon, but for now the work is still in turmoil.

For now here are a couple of sample verses. First verse, courtesy of Jean Flynn, otherwise my own words.

Pile on the slap and coiffure the hair,
It's a girl’s night out,
and we just don't care!
The town awaits
in its sea-side glory,
But the weather's really crap!
It's the same old story!

We have Hairdos and tight undies  

enough to make us faint
that have lines and shapes and contours
that would make Picasso paint.
In a heady haze of scent and sprays
we focus on the eyes,
painting a mask with Egyptian charm
that adds to our disguise.

So sisters three, come out with me
it’s time to weave our fate
Let's dance around our handbags
and conjure up a date.
In the view of Magritte,
the word on the street is raising the anthem again,
'Girls, it's time to celebrate!
Hallelujah it's raining men'.
 

At last we're off!
We all decide to go for cocktails first
And start a drinking session that
will make our bladders burst.
Carry on from pub to bar
and then a club or three.
We'll probably go anywhere..
..so long as it‘s all free.
 

Since World War 2 the air's been blue
with 'Girls nights out' galore.
We flirt and romance, we pose and dance
until our feet are sore.
With Jitterbug flips and off the cuff quips,
We twist and we shout and we grind,
we 'Boogie on down'
with the best of the town,
leaving the last waltz behind.
 

And so tonight ..
let's find ourselves a really dishy man.
Make him rich and handsome
with 'no wife' - if we can.
A millionaire would be quite nice
but things aren't looking good,
All the blokes are plebby,
and act like blocks of wood.
 

Disco Chic, quite unique
in ultraviolet glare,
The chat up lines are weird and sad like
"Let me sniff your hair"
Despite the lack of millionaires,
Seurat would have a ball
the blokes are short and spotty –
not what we want at all.
 

Time to go, find a phone
The disco beat has faded
Taxi home, it's been a laugh,
but now we’re rather jaded
Join the queue, it’s ten past 2
The taxi takes forever.
The queue all sing and tell daft jokes
Despite the awful weather
 

Now we’re home.
Let’s get in, gotta find the key
High heels off,
In a spin- desperate for a wee 

We've had some fun and now it's done  

So let’s all say ‘Good night.’ 

We'll all set out again next week
to look for Mr. Right.
  
I made a trip to York this last weekend and found some inspiration there in the York Art Gallery where there was an interactive set of cells featuring eyes, nose, mouth and hair which could be intermingled and mixed around.

I played with this for some time as it gave me ideas for practical animation experiments I would like to try.

Below is some film footage from the tests I performed.

See Film Here.

There are also some still images here.

Introduction

I have chosen to study MA Animation at Uclan this year on a part time basis alongside my full time role as Senior Lecturer in Games Design.

Having worked in the animation industry for 12 years over the period of the 1980's as a background artist on children's TV shows such as Dangermouse, Duckula, Wind in the Willows and many others, I am fortunate to be familiar with the traditional process of animation.

Later I worked in the games industry as a 3D environment artist at Travellers Tales Ltd.

However, I have not actually worked as an 'Animator' and as this role is of interest to me and also plays a part in the world of games design, I felt this would be an ideal area for further study.

Working with students and staff at Uclan inspires much creative discussion and reflection which gives rise to a myriad of buzzing creative ideas on a daily basis. It will be valuable to use the structure of the MA course as a formal focal point for the practical expression of some of these concepts.