Animatic and Storyboard

My initial storyboard can be seen on the first two pages, however I established that the length each of the shots were held for, was too long and while my intended time is acceptable for the genre, it didn't match with the length of the shots and this was fortified through feedback from the teacher. Therefore, I needed to add more shots to complete the time, and to make my opening more engaging and effective and I changed my storyboard and animatic by adding additional shots.



Feedback: I received positive feedback for my animatic - people were able to recognise quite well that it was a children's TV drama for young audience, which was said to be fortified through the background of the 'swirls' and the presentation of the characters. What's more, what interested people by watching the animatic was how the characters would be presented, for example would I use stereotypes or look at using characters of a different culture and race? Additionally, the audience were able to engage with the group of characters being a gang or a group of friends, which has encouraged me to name my piece 'Our Gang' to really allow the audience to understand the theme of the narrative.

However, I was informed that the editing style I used was repetitive that resulted in the animatic losing audience engagement, so for my final piece I will use a different editing style. In addition to this, the editing style resulted in the presentation of characters becoming quite similar, thus losing focus on the representation of the characters.

Conclusion and Evaluation of animatic:
Therefore, I am pleased with my final animatic; I feel that the feedback I received and from watching my animatic back will aid with my final piece and what I am going to change, and what issues I will develop - such as using stereotypes for my characters. Moreover, as making the animatic was an independent project that meant using the Adobe Premiere Pro software, which I struggled with at the beginning of creating the animatic, I now feel confident with using the software.

Furthermore, while I am pleased on the most part with the final animatic, I do feel that the style I used is quite repetitive and continues with the same theme, thus I intend on using, not just a different editing style, but also a different style of animation - with each character having animation and a background that reflects their characteristics and personality.

Final decision

I have decided to go with a teen sit-come drama, as I have collected some ideas and now have effective ideas to meet the codes and convetions, and to target the intended audience of 7-13 years old.

Codes and Conventions of the sitcom genre

Common codes and conventions:

- Diegetic sound is rarely used, only background music
- Main characters introduced central on screen
- Typically under a minute in length
- Action montage - e.g. The Addams Family and Malcolm in the Middle



I now need to decide whether I will subvert the codes and conventions or stick with them in my own piece.