It Was The Mashed Potatoes!

I just went through a second round of reviews for the storyboard of my final project. It's a story about a little girl who hates the dinner that her mother fixed for her, tries to eat it and then finds herself in a battle with the food when it came alive. Some of the ideas came from Calvin and Hobbes, specifically the part with the mashed potatoes hurling itself at the child. The girl eventually defeated her dinner by throwing it into a blender, but in the end finds that there is more where they come from...

I enjoyed conceptualizing the characters and actions on paper. The frustrating part was figuring out the shots and what cuts made the most sense. Unlike life-action films, having a long cut in animation is very labor-intensive as the animator has to draw every frame in the continuous shot. So we always try to have as many cuts as possible without diminishing how well the story is told. I had a really hard time with it as I really saw the story as one continuous shot with the girl and her plate of food front and center. After the first round of reviews, which was a bit of a disaster, I went back and rethought how the story could be told. I ended up with 44 panels/drawings/cuts when I went back to the second round. I'm pleased to report that it was a huge improvement from my first vision, and I believe through the painful process I learned a good lesson about filming. I still have some work to do to make it even better before handing it in as the final revision.

Here is the initial concept of the character and story, which I doodled in class. With the exception of the one in the ponytail, none of it ended up in the final storyboard:

Even though I always start my drawings on paper, I've made it a habit to transfer them into a digital form for the final revision by redrawing them in Flash. It's not a requirement or even a preference of the professor, but I prefer the clean digital version; and it's a good way to practice drawing with a tablet.

Here are some panels from the storyboard before the final revision. Most of them are pretty sketchy and drawn over several times:

Mom scolding Katie after her disgusted reaction to her dinner.

Katie after her first bite.

The attack of the mashed potatoes!

Victory after defeating the mashed potatoes; alas it was short-lived.

The meatloaf hurling the peas at Katie.

Katie retaliates by sticking to it.

(I ended up replacing this panel with the one below, even though I really liked it)

Take that! Meatloaf!

(This replaced the panel above. It fits better into the overall sequence of shots and has more intensity)

The villain meets its end...or does it?

Oops, forgot to put on the lid.

It's not me! It's the mashed potatoes!