Lighting Techniques workshop

29/10/2012 - James Isaac, who's practice is 3D lighting, spoke to us about the importance of lighting in any work we carry out as visual communicators.

This was an extremely useful and enlightening discussion. Though his practice is within 3D, his advice was more general and can be applied in any visual practice.

"Light and illumination are inseparable components of form, space and light" (Le Corbusier - Essential CG lighting techniques for 3DS MAX, page 1, Darren Brooker)

"Lots of students focus on realistic lighting..by adding character, style this will make it interesting..." Pixar

thought:
As an artist I have heard this said often, Draftsmanship and technical drawing skills are useful to any artist, but audiences respond to art work that is visually interesting. Photo's can pick out detail and realism, art is to make the real more fantastic! I've always felt art is a representation of how the artist see's this world. The way we see things is affected by many things, not just by whats in front us (e.g. their mood, life experiences and what they appreciate)

When adding light into your work, its important, whichever medium you choose (3D, 2D, paintings etc.) to analyse ALL light sources. (indoor lights, lamps, flame etc.)

Studies on the different types of lighting and its effect on audiences and the story or message being portrayed in the visual work.

Case study -Pirates of the carribean

During the workshop with Isaac, I noted a particular comment he made, regarding the use of lighting, which was:

Your audience will notice when a film/scene is not lit well, though it looks correct, the audience may 'question' it, as they will understand that something is missing.

I remembered this comment particularly as this made sense, as I (as a member of the audience) have experienced this before. As a pre production artist, whilst watching films I will always Analyze each scene in its composition, form etc. However, I understand the use of lighting, until now I had never fully understood the power this truly has to communicate a scene to the audience. Light is the only way we are able to see things, therefore this makes perfect sense that the use of light should be considered as 'part' of the scene (what describes the scene).

As an example, to demonstrate this point, I will look at two films from the Prates of the Carribean franchise, 'Curse of the Black Pearl' and the latest 'On Stranger Tides'.



I had noticed the lighting and how it had been very cleverly designed and used in the 'curse of the black pearl', creating a dramatic atmosphere in the film.


I noted a particular effect, where the light had been designed in such a way, so the shadows were used to only reveal what part of the face you are intended to see.

Below are stills from the film to show the effect. I also made a quick sketch as an example of how I would storyboard this image. The light seems quite deliberately used here to focus the audiences attention.

The light through the prison bars, illuminates the characters eyes when he is listening.
The shadow across his mouth indicates he is silent.

When he speaks the light illuminates his mouth as well. 

Here his whole face is illuminated as he pushes his face close to the bars,
 to show this as an intense moment!

Compared to the latest edition of the series, 'on stranger tides'. I watched this and I noticed something did not make the film the same quality as the first had been. It was in the workshop that I realized this.

The lighting in this film is fairly basic, making the scenes seems 'flat'. The composition, characters and set design were all of the same standard as the rest of the series, however the lack of design and clever usage of lighting (for me) unfortunately let this film down, making it less impressive.

A couple of points to note from this study:

• Lighting can add depth to a scene.
• It can be used to focus the audiences attention to a specific area/character/feature etc.

Story and Beat boards

These links are a small collection of storyboard artists and their portfolios. I felt this would be good to look at, so I have a better understanding of the type of work I should be producing as a pre production artist:

JP Vine Studio
http://jpvine.com/2012/07/15/pirates-band-of-misfits-storyboards/
http://jpvine.com/2009/12/16/feature-beat-board/

Game storyboards:
http://jpvine.com/2009/12/20/game-cinematic-storyboard/

Scott Weiser - character animator
http://scottwiser.blogspot.co.uk/p/storyboarding-portfolio.html

RIDLEY SCOTT
I came across this interview with director, Ridley Scott who created films such as Alien and Blade runner. One of the first things he mentions when looking at a scene, he will notice the lighting first (another confirmation of the power and importance of lighting when negotiating a scene).


http://www.openculture.com/2012/05/ridley_scott_demystifies_the_art_of_storyboarding.html

He describes a method he uses, when starting to storyboard a scene. His technique is to create the look, mood, form etc. in a detailed drawing, then use thumbnails to depict the action or how the scene plays out. In this way the storyboard becomes more of a sophisticated 'comic'.

I had a look at some of the storyboards he created for the film ALIEN. You can see from the drawings how he has planned the scene. Using shading to show light and dark areas of the scene. Also, as it is storyboards for film, he notes a lot of camera angles and actions.

Another technique he suggested is to add abstraction to the design of his shots he will create an image in the storyboard, combining shapes and patterns into the scene.

This image is a recreation of the abstract example Scott uses to explain
how he uses this technique in his storyboards.

In this example, you can see how the abstract  design of the image
can be transferred through in cinematography

  images from: http://aliensarchive.tripod.com/aliens/production/storyboardlisting.html



LOU ROMANO
Lou Romano is an art director for Pixar studios, his work is published in  http://www.louromano.com/bio.html Originally published in 1904, Kwaidan was the culminating life work of Lafcadio Hearn (1850-1904) a writer of Greek/Irish descent who devoted the last 14 years of his life to living and working in Japan, writing books about the culture and translating into English the Kwaidan tales.
These images show the process Romano goes through







 http://louromano.blogspot.co.uk/2011/03/kwaidan.html

Another Technique I learnt when it comes to creating storyboards is from the advice of an animation workshop I attended, at the Barbican centre in London. Some key points they made are as follows:

• Most storyboards will be made in sequential order
• Important to note - how the images are arranged will inform the audience how they associated together
• Every scene should contain these four elements - character, scene, object and a value change e.g. lost to found, positive to negative etc.
• When writing a scene, remember - setup (establishing character and scene), action then resolve (value change)

Purpose of games

The purpose of any game is first to benefit all those who have opted-in. Even though the game may seem dysfunctional from the outside, the players all get something from playing in it. There is thus an underlying ulterior purpose.

The benefits of games are divided below into the broad purpose identity, control and avoidance, and then into sub-categories.

Identity games

One of our fundamental needs is for a sense of identity, and hence drives much of what we do. Games allow us to boost our sense of identity through our interaction with others.

Attention

Attention is a major and simple way of boosting a person's sense of identity, and if we are not getting any attention, our identity suffers. It happens when other people notice us and interact with us.

Even painful attention is better than no attention, which is why 'solitary confinement' is so often used as an extreme punishment. It is also why children who are not getting the attention they want will misbehave. Adults, too, use ways to get attention that often fall outside the realms of what is considered 'good behavior'.

Sympathy

Another way of getting attention is to evoke empathy or sympathy in other people. This has the greater advantage of people thinking kindly of us. It also may be reminiscent of child states where we were hurt and our parents comforted us.

Control games

Another fundamental need is for a sense of control, without which we may feel threatened and unsafe. Game players invite or coerce others into playing the game in which they are the rule owner and referee.

Social capital

Social capital appears as the balance of favors we owe one another. One way of gaining control over other people is to increase what they owe us. In dysfunctional games, this may be done by asserting or implying that they owe us one, even if this is not really true. In fact in many games, both people end up believing that they have gained social capital, which is a very good basis for further gaming and feuding.

Power

With power we can achieve our goals, and many games are about acquiring power, by whatever means. Power can be squandered, but in games it is often used to create more power. Just as the robber barons used their muscle to gain more power, so too do many people in the games they play.

Revenge

Vengeance games use aspects of power and social capital, and they are often retaliatory in nature, attempting to rebalance the social capital by punishing a person for their sins against the persecutor.

Falsehood

Making agreements that we do not complete or otherwise persuading through falsehood. Telling lies and appearing to be nice helps me in the short-term, but in the long term breaks down trust.

Avoidance games

Other games are intended simply to help get the player out of a hole. They may include control and identity aspects, but the main purpose is to save the player from having to act or accept responsibility.

Escape

Sometimes people just want to get away from things that hurt them.  They may also want to escape from having to face up to themselves.

Excuse

Excuses allow a person to attribute a cause outside of themselves for things they have done. If it wasn't me, then I am ok. It also allows the person to repeat the behavior without contravening their values.

Displacement

Displacement occurs where a person takes something that is troubling them and puts it somewhere else. Thus, for example, anger at your spouse may be a displacement of frustration at work.

http://changingminds.org/explanations/behaviors/games/game_purpose.htm

Purpose of narrative

Purpose of narration

Narrative derives from the latin verb narrare, which means 'to recount'.

Along with exposition, argumentation and description, narration, broadly defined, is one of four rhetorical modes of discourse. More narrowly defined, it is the fiction-writing mode whereby the narrator communicates directly to the reader.

dramatic structure of narratives are

• exposition (the introduction of setting, situation and main characters);

• complication (the event that introduces the conflict);

• rising action, crisis (the decisive moment for the protagonist and his commitment to a course of action);

• climax (the point of highest interest in terms of the conflict and the point with the most action);

• resolution (the point when the conflict is resolved); and

• moral (the learning from the story, why the actors or players in the story did what they did; was it good, was it bad, did it have a good reason for doing so, was it guided by good choices; were these choices the founding value of the society the people live in)

http://answers.wikia.com/wiki/What_is_the_purpose_of_a_narrative

I want to explore a little of the science behind narrative and why they have developed it on such a way. (could this be genetic?)

http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/books/2012/05/can-science-explain-why-we-tell-stories.html

This comment is from one of the film directors of the 3D animated film, by Disney, TANGLED:

"The story is an acorn from which everything else grows"

NATHAN: "I think everything comes from story. If your story’s not working, if your sequences aren't right, then you have nothing...Your story will tell you what your lighting needs to look like, what your characters should be designed like, all of those things. If you don’t have your story down, if you don’t have your beat board working, I don’t know how you do the rest. That’s why with animated films, even with some of the Disney ones that haven’t been as strong, the ones that haven’t worked, it’s because their story wasn't in place."

http://www.bleedingcool.com/2011/01/28/nathan-greno-and-byron-howard-on-tangled-animation-storytelling-and-their-next-action-movie/

Blitz games

Blitz game studios is an independent game company, at Leamington spa, UK. The work they carry out for games can be divided into 5 divisions:

• family
• mature
• serious
• game technology
• education

They also hold open days for students, who are interested in games and animation. This link is to the next one, to be held 2013:

http://www.blitzgamesstudios.com/open-days/sample-briefs/

To attend the open day, students must hand in work relating to a brief, distributed by Blitz games. They say, in the games industry everyone will work to a brief (description of a task for any given project). The brief you receive will be based on what you choose as your proffesional practice  I had a look at the sample briefs, to find out what work would be required for a game Artist:

Game Designers

Provide an analysis of a piece of level or games design work you have completed.

For a design of an entirely new game or new level for a pre-existing game that you have made (individually or as part of a team) simply provide:

• Full video walkthrough with voice over (or subtitled commentary) focusing on game flow, pacing and player experience. Tell us about the process you went through when making your demo, what decisions you made, problems you faced and where you diverged from your original plan and why.

Optionally:(game artists)

• Planning documentation you produced to show the intent when designing your game or level (e.g. maps, game-flow storyboards – tell us what you were aiming to achieve when you set out).
• if you are submitting a game you have made, please provide us with a copy of it and the means to run it.

GAMES - pre production

I'l be investigating the pre production processes for designing games. I have researched the methods associated with film design and animation, for the purposes of the live brief (PICTURING TIME animation). I can make comparisons between these processes, the aim being to explore how the final animation would be converted into a game.

The 'Pre production' phase

The link below:

http://uk.ign.com/articles/2006/03/16/the-game-production-pipeline-concept-to-completion

goes through the production pipeline for making a game. The pre-production team usually consists of producers, designers, programmers, artists and writers. All the games design documents are created in this phase of the process.

High concept

 which will start with the 'high concept', often just one single line describing the game. Such as a futuristic racing game or ninja tournament game.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_game_development#Pre-production

Pitch

After the 'high concept' has been established, the next step in the pre production phase is the 'pitch' a.k.a. 'concept document', 'game proposal'. This step is where the idea for the game and its profitability is pitched to a publisher. Often it will be pitched within a company to managers. This may be verbal, but publishers usually like to see a written documents. If the pitch is successful, then the game can do into development.

Concept 

Once the game reaches this stage of development the 'concept document' or 'game plan' is created, and is much more detailed than the 'pitch'. 

Game design document

Pre production artists role

the link below:
shows a job description for a pre production artist. Though its outdated, I found the job description to be quite useful in understanding the skills I would need to demonstrate, to progress as a pre production artist.
http://www.cgarena.com/job/3357

Key skills listed here include:

• the ability to storyboard
• Draftsmanship/ drawing skills
• knowledge of Photoshop, illustrator and flash
• knowledge of 2D animation
• Staging and composting skills

Another example here is a job descriptoon for a concept artist for a games company (Konami):

http://www.indeed.com/viewjob?jk=2c128e9e2c9154bb&qd=DgxYZa-nqPVrOtYWnIqDF9gkM9Udsrexu7YsWHdddbJoqzlmMZFZuANI_UXpbeUPi9ySgRR091YwtrWwLrVP9Jh2Af4EP_fuveFn4icmDTxb9Ho5RRIV4qLYqP_LX5FE&rjs=1&atk=17aejatj718a14tg&jsa=7527&inchal=apiresults&utm_source=publisher&utm_medium=organic_listings&utm_campaign=affiliate

Key skills here include:

• Drawing skills traditional/ digital
• Eye for light, value, weight, colour and composition
• Ability to understand and translate gameplay elements in visuals that enhance these elements
• strong visual story telling skills
• 3D skills here (maya,3ds max) are a plus

(I have not listed qualities such as experience, as I am focusing, at this point, on the skills I will need to develop as a pre production artist.)

It seems it is important to understand animation processes. Understanding 2D and 3D will be more of an advantage. 

Composition, colour and value can be all be developed by looking at paintings and other art (in particular art with a narrative) as well as work by pre production artists. Hans. Bacher claims (dreamworlds) a film that seems great is not usually so by accident. Most great films are composed and designed in a way that each scene will be able to communicate the mood, atmosphere and narrative through composition, colour, value etc. to the audience.


As an example I've chose a few well known paintings for there use of light and composition.

Bal du Moulin de la Galette by Pierre-Auguste Renoires

The painter here uses light to show the people outdoors. You can tell its a sunny day as light seems to shine down in patchs, as though through the leaves of trees. Shadows are not dark in this painting as light would still shine through the leaves, so light/pale blues are used. Cool colours are used to represent shadows. The characters in the painting stand out more this way as they are contrasted against the background. The weight of the Painting flows from the right forefront, and appears to taper round to the horizon.

This quick sketch shows how I might be able to show this in a story board

 

Cafe terrace at night by Vincent van Gogh

This painting is done in portrait view, which works beautifully with the composition of the painting. Below I've tried converting the composition and lighting effect into a storyboard image. Storyboard images need to show images that wil be suitable for a screen format (landscape)
  I love this painting as it shows an effective method of using light to stage the action in a scene. Also the use of depth points the eye towards this part of the 'screen'

Sunday afternoon on the island of Grande Jatte by Georges Seurat

This painting divides the screen almost into three parts. 

The colour at the front is very cool, showing characters at the forefront in shadow, detail with block, contrasting shadows. The warmer colour make up the middle of the image.

I experimented with this composition of colour, so that the image moves from cool to warm in opposite order to how they are usually used. For example, when we see an image like this:


  We can tell by the tones and colours (as well as the depth and composition) that the car is sat on the grass in front of us. As the fields and trees extend into the distance, the colour we percieve these at become duller and 'cooler'. Cool colours are blues, greends, pale colours etc. Warm colours are reds, yellows, oranges etc. and bold

Animation about Time

Professor Philip Zimbardo conveys how our individual perspectives of time affect our work, health and well-being. Time influences who we are as a person, how we view relationships and how we act in the world


Whilst looking up other animations about time I came across this animation. Very simple technique, but relays information to the audience very clearly and effectively - as the story is drawn it forms a mind map.