Thursday 24 March 2016

Orchard Pig: Brainstorming

So after we have done some initial research our next step was to have a brainstorming session. So Wing and I sat down and wrote down a few of our ideas-
1.The notorious pig- gangster pig smuggling cider into the farm.
2.Famous movie scenes but with pigs
3.Pigs making cider.
 With the first one we thought we could do an animation or a series of posters responding to the way the client described itself in the brief "Notorious P.I.G." which referenced the Notorious B.I.G.,the hip hop rapper. So the first words that come up when you think about it is "gangster, bad boy". That is how we came up with the idea.
The second one, Wing came up with. She thought it would be clever to reference pop culture, since the brand is going for a contemporary approach and it would nicely play to the target audience. However I thought the main flaw with this idea was where to does the cider part fit in?
And then after talking about the first one we talked about the farm, what we imagine it's like, what do the animals do. Then we though about the cider making process, surely enough immediately we made the connection between animals and cider= animals making cider. But then we thought it would be even better if it was just pigs making cider because it would be more of a response to the brand than the theme.
After we discussed how we could further improve the ideas and build from them, shortly enough one of them seemed better than the others so we picked the last one, because it provided more space to be creative. We thought we could make a series of posters showing the old techniques and ways of making cider and then from those posters make a series of gifs which could be useful in web advertising. So we had an idea we were happy with and we ran with it.

Responsive: Orchard Pig

So for the collaborative part of their responsive we were asked to make a few slides that represent us. The idea was for all the animation, illustration and graphic design students to showcase their work and what brief they were interested in. I presented my slides how ever I was not available to show up at the meet and greet part of the thing, so I missed out on a pretty crucial part of the collaboration. Since nobody approached me afterwards I emailed Mike asking if anybody still needs a partner and apparently Wing needed a partner so we paired up. On our first meeting we went through the briefs and discussed which one we want to pick. Wing had no strong opinions about any of them so I suggested the Orchard Pig because it seemed playful, fun and it did not ask for any specific deliverables so it gave us a lot of creative freedom. So we did some research and went through the brief:
What do we mean?

Based on the background, history and current position of Orchard Pig we believe it is the only ‘craft beer’ like cider in the market today (craft liquid credentials, modern positioning and tone of voice) – this needs to be amplified in an integrated campaign across Communications, Packaging, Point of Pour, Point of Sale and Innovation.

Background and Context

Hog History: Orchard Pig’s Home in West Bradley Orchards is well and truly rooted in Somerset’s cider-making history, dating back to the 1850s, and W.T. Allen’s award-winning Somerset cider.

Orchard Pig: Started in the noughties…just outside Glastonbury when Andrew and Neil were enjoying their home-made cider and hog roast with friends….

The Creative Challenge

Your challenge is to tell, inspire and engage consumers and customers with our brand and what it stands for – Bold, Mischievous, Inclusive, Rooted in Somerset. We want this to be an integrated campaign, so we are keen to see how your ‘Pig Idea’ comes to life in more than one channel or medium.

Target Audience

Everybody and anybody that espouses the same values as Orchard Pig – Generation Z, no demographics apply.

Our Principles

• “Stay rooted” is what we say to the world.

• We appreciate simplicity…and cider.

• We like to poke fun at the world and ourselves…and each other.

• We are ALL about the cider…

Our Values

BOLD
Dare to be different

CIDER
It’s all about the cider

ROOTED IN SOMERSET
Proud of where we are from

MISCHEVIOUS
A catalyst for more fun

SIMPLE
Simple brand and simple product

INCLUSIVE
For anyone and everyone

Some Context

Most cider makers have a family name on the label and/or a picture of an apple…or a tree. We have a pig. We are relatively new to the industry. This gives us license to do things differently…

White wine and red wine are not marketed as different industries, why should cider and beer be?

Beer and cider are both ‘long alcoholic drinks’ consumed from bottles and pint glasses in the same places on the same occasions. The making process between beer and cider is very different (cider is far more like wine making), and the manufacturers control the message… cider makers and beer makers do very different things, but we don’t care about them and are focused on our consumers and customers…so more like a craft beer than a craft cider it is then.

History

Orchard Pig’s home in West Bradley Orchards is well and truly rooted in Somerset’s cider-making history, dating back to the 1850s and W.T. Allen’s award winning Somerset cider... and Orchard Pig have carried on that fine tradition.Who knew… apples from Somerset Orchards make the best tasting cider. Following this happy discovery Orchard Pig arrived out of a shared thirst for great cider, great food and Old Spots, the original Orchard Pigs.

After we checked out their website  we noticed that they are very playful with the way they present information and surely enough all of it is pig themed. So we decided to work around pigs and farm themes. And from their website design we noticed that they have a very fun and contemporary look but hinting for rustic and farm like.

Wednesday 16 March 2016

Sisters:Animating

So for animating I went with Flash again, because I am comfortable with it and I feel it was the quickest way to it done.
So I broke the character down in to parts that will be animated and the parts that won't. The one that weren't were turned into symbols,  which was the body and and the head. I did move the slightly but I did not have to redraw them whenever I would move them. The hands I had to animate frame by frame. After I animated the pulling hair action all it was afterwards was just mirroring the scene.
 (The character deconstructed into symbols)


(Animated character. Eyebrows, mouth and hands animated separately)
(The animation work space with the animated backgrounds)
As mentioned in the last picture I have animated the backgrounds by cutting out the windows of the car and making a looping animation on a layer beneath. I did not encounter any major issues while animating so in not time the animation was complete and ready to submit.
Here is the final piece:
 





SISTERS storyboarding

So once I got my idea shaped and ready to go I did a storyboard!
I figured I should not be over the top because it has to loop so I thought it would make sense to make the fighting as minimal as possible, or even subtle. Basically, it's just sister pulling each others hair.
So the since I am working on this project alone and I don't have to pass this information on to somebody else to animate I kept it simple and just drew down what what for myself.

SISTERS character design

So for the Loop De Loop brief the next stage is character design. I wanted the sisters to be not as much children as teenagers, just because I feel that is the stage of life when you fight with your siblings the most, well at least for me it was.
So lately I have been trying to develop new styles character design wise, so I felt like experimenting with some of the features, like making the eyes really big, making the shape of the face more round, playing around with hair styles and such.

Also I played around with the colour schemes a bit. However I ended up using the colors that suited the background the most. As for the background, I did not have a lot of time for the pre-production stage so I was trying to save as much time as possible, I had an idea of stylizing a real photo, because drawing in the back of the car would have taken quite a while, and also backgrounds are not my strong suit. When I've put up the background on flash to see hoe to stylise it so it goes with the characters, I have noticed that what ever I drew did not work with the characters. So I had an idea of using the actual reference image, cut the windows of the car out on photoshop and putting back up on Flash. And it seemed to work really nicely and it saved me loads of time. Then I colored in the characters trying to  make the pop out of the background.
(color and hairstyle considerations)