Dorothy

2D Cel animation

An experiment in texturing cel animation in aftereffects. A celebration for newly emptied space, and what was one there.

Dorothy is an exploration of memory, tone, love, and a flower that links those ideas. Using various texturing and lighting to bring together imagery that is hyper-specific but still evokes a sense of loss and wonder.

Tools Used ToonSquid - Procreate - TVPaint - Adobe Photoshop | AfterEffects | Audition - Houdini (Dust particles from a friend)

The Caribbean Golden Trumpet Tree

The Caribbean golden trumpet tree (Tabebuia Aurea.) Its common name is misnomer as it’s not from the Caribbean, instead its home lies in the neighboring area of South America. When moved to the Caribbean they flourished. It bursts with gorgeous golden-yellow blooms from Spring to Mid-Summer. When their blooming is finished, the dying flowers pool at the roots beneath the tree.

The story of the tree its transition, rehabilitation, flourishing, and beauty even in lifelessness. How cherished it’s color and presence are made it the perfect subject to personify the story.

Initial Animatic

The initial concept for Dorothy was a piece characterized by dynamic elements, showcasing vibrant colors, and sweeping transitions. This approach was intended to convey a sense of fleetingness, how quick life can change. However, as the development progressed, a more subdued narrative felt more appropriate and reflected the specific ebbs and flows the mood of this piece needed.

Rough Pass 2

After the large transitions were removed it gave way to space for short quick movements with heavier easies that were more appropriate to the piece. Decisions at this phase were mostly tie down methods and if something needed more frames.

Color Pass

All tie-downs are done and each cel layer was prepared for export. This phase was pretty quick, but managing files and ensuring everything was rendered separately on alpha to import to AE was slippery. If this would be re-done I’d keep aware of the export settings in toonsquid and what may be best done in other programs.

Textured Frames

How we got here

The color blocked frames were taken into Adobe Aftereffects and lighting was added. Then edges textured in Photoshop.

  • 01 - untextured

  • 02 - untextured

  • 03 - untextured

  • 04 - untextured

  • 05- untextured

  • 01 - textured

  • 01 - textured

  • 03 - textured

  • 04 - textured

  • 05 - textured

  • 06 - textured

  • 06 - end card

Post Mortem

Though this project was incredibly fulfilling to explore and produce there are a few things that I would keep in mind moving forward from this. The first would be the limitations of each of the applications used, i.e. why I would use an Ipad application like ToonSquid over TVPaint and visa-versa to avoid exporting bottlenecks or creative ones. Enforcing a consistent workflow within cel that’s intended for compositing in Adobe AfterEffects. This could be ensuring frame rates within the cel animation aren’t varied wildly (some frames on 2’s and then random 3’s and 4’s mixed in) so when a composite layer is posterized in AE it moves appropriately. Or doing shadowpasses in cel to avoid complicated shape layers in AfterEffects.