Design Practice

Ident 04: Hellraiser

Production & Design Development

This was one of my favorite designs for the idents, the film itself was one of the most iconic and the approach of idea that i seemed to have would be fantastic, but how to execute it? How would you make pins leap out from a heart without it seemingly taking forever by animating each one?

My initial ideas were about simply having two layers of content, the heart in front of the the spikes behind the spikes would then move forward in a fast motion to appear as if coming from beneath the flesh of the heart. However because they were not 3D shapes they would not slowly move through they would come through individually but in one layer. It is very hard to describe but i was sure that it would not work, then I had a brain wave.

01. I started to split the layers into 4 parts; Heart, five logo, squared pattern and nails. Using the layers they would appear at different times, therfore appearing as if emerging differently in a sequence of events.

02. From here with an initial motion established i started work upon creating drips. In a similar Way to ident 2 that drips could be added as a distraction to keep the viewer unaware of what is about to happen. so using the motions that i had created previously on ident 2 i simply copied and added the exact same motions slightly tweaked for a bit of diversity then added a long pause inbetween the drip and the appearing spikes to add key suspense which would be successful in the interaction with the viewer.

03. I then moved on the adding the spurts of blood that would emerge from the flesh of the heart as the spikes emerge, this adds to the realism of the scene where the reaction of the heart can be seen at it's unfortunate fate.

These drips may seem simple but in terms of getting a realistic movement there were several things that i needed to consider. First was acceletartion and motion speed, the drip would come out and splat quite quickly, but it would come out fast initiall then slow down under its own weight. Using the Graph Editor too here was key to the success and slight adjustments make all the difference between something that looks real and not.

I then also added more drips that would emerge from the single drip that splatters. As water or most liquids do they 'shatter' into several pieces from say the one droplet and so i added several small droplets that splatter outward as the initial droplet hits the surface. Again here i had to djust speed and accelleration to consider momentum, although it may seem small and insignificant because it runs for less than half a second it does in fact have much more realism than simply using a continusous movement.

also here as a spatter occurs it no longer retains it's original shape, it merges out ad flettens to the surface with gravity, so as the droplets hit the surface i altered the anchor points so that they move as the splatter occurs, this small movement again makes a huge difference in realism.

Again i added more drips here playing on the motion of the drip and as the spikes receed blood begins to ooze from the heart from being inpaled by the spikes, based on time availability i chose the have only two main drip that splatter in the scrren simply because i was unsure how much longer they would take to animate as each one is unique to the next.

04. This is the key part of what makes the motion so successful. Because although the motion of the heart was there it still lacked a certain depth and again that realistic quality, simply just by guessing what would happen i added to the nail and square layers a change of opacity where by they would move into place much more smoothy as oppose to instantly. It works to a great success and they seemed to flow much more naturally. I even went further from here and looked at how the nails would emerge, and i ended up working on the ida that the would expand outwards from a point, as if 'emerging'. With the change in opacity i added a scale change in the nails, combined it appears as if they are emerging outwards not just from infront of the heart where they actually are but from behind.

i then also added a shudder movemnt to the heart to react to the emerging spikes, simply by changeing the position and having a slight rotation.

from here the ident swifty came together. i then added an additional camera to the action which in time with the shuddering of the heart also sudders, echoing and emphasising the impact of the spikes upon the environment.

To finish the ident off i started to experiment with 3d space again and played on the idea of splattering of blood from the emerging spikes. i chose to alter the design and add a droplet which emerges not to the side but at the camera, giving the audience a sense of perspective and space to the idents that some of the other designs lack. It was fairly simple really, i did not have to consider any spacial rotations simply adjusting the acceleration again and adjusting the anchor points as it moved though space.

As i final design alteration i experimented with the focus of the camera so that as the droplet splatters it becomes less focused, much like a normal camera. To finish the ident off i added simple sounds the echo the effect of the bursting of the spikes, and the droplest as they splatter against the background and the camera.