Little Creatures

By Alex Frater BCT Year 3

Semester 1

Creature and Character Concepts

From the start of little creatures I was assigned the role of 3D modeller and anima-
tor. This would have to come later as this type of work would arise near the end of
post production. I focused on the script and concepts for the creatures and environ-
ments. As we were a large group motivation played a large part in the project, and
so it decided to help create the little creatures t-shirts. I had to find out what the
Little Creatures group was about, what direction were we heading in and so I start-
ed creating concepts to help get an idea of what we wanted, to get the feel for the
project. I researched creatures and environments first, to better understand what
everyone had in mind for the project.

Seeing what people liked or dis-

carded allowed me to focus on
certain aspects of the story and
characters. Before I could start writ-
ing the storyline I needed to know
what the creatures, characters and
environments were going to look
like so that I could base the story
around them, a story needs these
things in order to develop correctly.
The group had to get a feel for the
type of creatures we would use. My
first concepts were too scary for our
young audience so I had to tone
them down a lot, heading towards
a style of cuter cuddlier creatures.
These creatures fit into the style we
were looking for but were too un-
believable to use as we wanted to
keep a high tone of realism within
the story.
There was a lot of discussion and exchanging of ideas for these script concepts
and it didn’t seem like the group could come to a decision on what they wanted
although a few amongst the group seemed to agree with the work I put forward.
Some storys were put forward but were discarded, I thought it was time to start
getting a script together that most of the group could relate to. Using the group
discussions as a basis to see what people liked and disliked allowed me to start the
development of the story.

While creating the story I found out that the concepts for the environments were
fairly loose and so I started to create more of my own to see if the group was in
agreement as to what the environment should look and feel like.

Once I got the environments down I could start writing the script. As this was the
early stages there were a lot of changes happening to the characters and creatures
but the environment stayed fairly similar through the whole process. Changes to
the story had to be made because of this but I mainly stuck to what people origi-
nally liked. As most of the script ideas were discarded I had to make sure I could suc-
cessfully pitch the story the the rest of the group. Instead of just creating concepts
without anything to back them up I decided to research topics, create concepts for
characters, creatures and environments in which I could use to support my script.
This made it easier for me to convey my ideas as I could also visually represent them.
Graveyard
This shot shows a section of the bad guys island called the graveyard, We thought
the story was heading away from its main theme of the little creatures island be-
ing located somewhere within the Bermuda Triangle. We wanted more of this to be
present in our script and so this shots intended purpose was to tie into the theme of
the Bermuda Triangle. This scene is located on the bad guys island at a place called
the Graveyard. All the planes and ships that have been rumored to have gone miss-
ing within the Bermuda triangle end up here.
One of the main ideas within our script was having giant turtles large enough to
support a small city upon its back to transport creatures and characters from island
to island. As most people within the group liked this concept I decided to develop it
further creating concepts for the script to help visually back up the storytelling.

I wanted to create a more in-depth ver-

sion of the turtles as this would allow
me to explain certain aspects of the
story in greater detail. This is conveyed
through the matt painting, showing the
turtle emerging from the sea using the
city as the focal point for the shot.

The further development of our

script and ideas led to the creation
of more detailed concepts in this
case I created a virtual environment
containing the layout of the islands
and the way they connect to each
other through the ropes and turtles.
I found out that most of the scripts that were being produced were too complex,
this may have been due to the fact that the group was unsure of their target audi-
ence. Once Hayden and I presented our storyline and ideas to the rest of the group
it became the main script but we did have to make a few changes in order for it
to suit everyone. The storyline was simple and to the point which is what we were
looking for but some aspects were still to complex.

Once we found out that our target audience was around the age of 10, with the sug-
gestion from Gabriel, Hayden and I created a children’s storybook, the idea was to
present this storybook to our target audience and to evaluate their responses and
thoughts on it. I found working on the storybook interesting as it changed a lot of
the story. The original script contained the main ideas and themes but was not in a
storytelling order. Creating the book allowed us to simplify the story a lot by having
to fit only the main points into each page with a limited amount of pages. Doing
this allowed us to develop the original script ideas into an actual story with a begin-
ning middle and end. This ment that we could create more visuals to support the
book and our ideas. Generating new ideas through the development of the book
I re-wrote and re-imaged the original script. We presented the storybook to other
group members which seemed to like it.

Second Semester

During the second semester the Little Creatures group became a lot more organ-
ized, assigning each person a specific role within a particular department. This gave
the group as a whole the momentum needed from the start, everyone had a de-
partment and a job within that department, this gave everyone focus as we knew
what was expected of us by the end of the year. Once this occurred a whole new
style and themed script was presented to us, we were not going to make a finished
trailer with characters and main creatures anymore but a teaser trailer showing
small aspects of the intended film. The group expected to have this completely fin-
ished by the end of the first semester next year. The 3D aspect of the project is what
I was interested in as it was my assigned group. Even though it seemed the 3D de-
velopment would take place next year I wanted to bring something I was interested
in, into the project.
Now that everyone was assigned a group it was much easier to collaborate. As most
of the script and environments had been decided upon it allowed me to start creat-
ing models and animatics. I had a pretty clear understanding of the type of environ-
ment and objects present in it, including the type of animation and camera angles
they wanted the for the final teaser, from working with the script group, so I based
my research around getting these things right. Even though we were not intending
to have a 3D animatic of the final teaser I wanted to create one not only because I
was looking forward to doing so from the start of the project but it would bring the
script and the Little Creatures project to life being able to view a moving visitation
of our work.

The plane was the main focus in the animatic and so I decided to work from there
by researching varying plane designs. I started off with a war type model as I
wanted to tie it in with the history behind the Little Creatures island being located
within the bermuda triangle and the myths behind it such as planes and ships
going missing, I thought this would be a good place to start. Although the plane
may have fit into the islands history and the earlier script it didn’t fit into the new
Little Creatures story, and so once I had a better understanding of the new story
I started to look into small family planes that a father and son could have built by
themselves. My first initial thoughts were to create a small sea plane similar to the
ones used in around most islands in the pacific. The other groups liked the idea of a
normal small two or 4 person plane and so I focused towards that.
I created the plane in 3D using Maya, this allowed me to experiment with varying
but similar designs. Once a final design had been chosen I modled it using reference
images as guidelines. A roof winged plane was the best choice for the teaser as it
has a common appearance in the mystery island styled movies and animations, one
of the more well known ones being Jurassic Park. This would create a relationship
between the teaser and audience or clients as they would feel some type of similar-
ity or comfortability towards it.
Once the plane model had been completed, the next stage was to create an envi-
ronment similar to the one shown in the script. The next main focus in the animatic
was the bridge as it was the main object within the money shot. The style of bridge
was unclear and so once we had researched the type we thought would suit the
story, we began to model these designs to view them in a virtual space. Although
some of the bridges suited the shot within a 2D environment once we started to
create models of them it made it clear as to which ones worked and which ones did
not.

The next stage was to make the actual environment, this ment making the ground
and vegetation. We modelled the environment using the images present on the
script storyboard to stay as close to the story as possible. To reduce render time and
to have a set of concrete shots, we modelled some of the scenes in different maya
files. This allowed us to focus only on those particular shots and their environments
and animations. Once we had the feel of the scenes down we moved onto the ani-
mation of the plane.

In the storyboard, the plane flies through the canopy of the forest with bits of its
hull flying off until it crashes into some rocks coming to a standstill at the edge of
a waterfall. The main character flies out of the plane becoming caught or catches
onto an old bridge hanging over the river. The first part we had to get figured out
was how and in which way we were going to make the plane explode. We didn’t
want a huge Hollywood explosion of the entire plane as this wouldn’t allow anyone
to realistically survive the plane crash. We played around with different types of
explosions as to which areas of the plane would fly off and which areas would stay
intact.
We animated the plane in the scenes using the same camera angles as seen in the
storyboard. Our intentions were not to create the actual teaser but a 3D animatic of
the storyboard showing what the teaser would look like at the stage of post produc-
tion and from seeing it in this manner we would be able to expand and develop on
the ideas, concepts, timing and environments. Some aspects of the storyboard were
loose so we filled them in ourselves making the planes tail explode and fly off by
hitting a rock. The only aspect of the teaser in which we were unsure about and we
thought needed development was how the main character survives the plane crash
at the same time becoming separated from the plane but we wanted to create an
animatic that closely represented the story so it was easier to see where develop-
ment was needed.

We created a place holder character for the animatic as the main characters look
had not been developed yet. The animation of the character is a bit rough as we
were still unsure of his landing but once we got this down we added in some extras
such as the birds into the last scene as this would become the ‘money shot’.

I think the 3D animatic is an accurate representation of the storyboard showing the

environment, textures, models, animation, timing and camera angles but I would
have also liked to implement lighting into the scene as it is used to set the mood
and feel of each shot but this would probably come in later once the story and been
completely developed. I would have liked to see the 3D animatic used as a baseline
for the next stage of development giving us the chance to alter and expand off the
existing one. All of the departments within the Little Creatures group have worked
increasingly well together towards the end which made it easier to collaborate and
finalize concepts and ideas. A good degree of the post production has been com-
pleted with the script for the teaser, environments and animatic semi finalized to a
point where development can carry onto the next year.
 Script
Transportation

(How the little creatures and humans travel around the island or from island to is-
land)

Having a giant turtle as the mode of transport would be a good idea, being am-
phibious the turtle could move onto the land allowing the creatures and humans
to embark and disembark freely. Grass and trees would grow on the turtles body
mainly his back shell. A different type of species live on and control the turtles, con-
trolling the flow and transportation of the little creatures between the islands. The
turtles are large enough to house the inhabitants along with their buildings or pos-
sibly even cities.

Turtle Creatures

Torti

(Torti - creatures living on the turtles)

The torti only live on the giant turtles, they are an enigmatic, peculiar and wise race
that keep to themselves. Their cities are built on top of the turtles shells surrounded
buy a jungle, resembling an underwater forest. The cities are of an ancient architect
resembling a mix between American Indian, Aztec and Mayan) What the main char-
acters don’t know is that the torti also control the islands in a manner of speaking.
They keep the islands hidden from the outside world. [The main characters could
have gotten onto the island because there was a disturbance with the torti, possibly
the first attack of the bad guys], this momentarily created a pulse of visibility show-
ing the islands to the real world, in which the main character “fell through” so to say.
The torti are very superstitious and so they never set foot on dry land in fear of loos-
ing their spiritual link with the turtles, backing up their culture and beliefs. The torti
also manage and maintain the cosmic link between the islands (possibly through
rituals)
Linking The islands

Each island is linked to the stars above them forming a cosmic triangle in the night
sky. The giant turtles along with the torti keep the connection between the islands
and the stars flowing, traveling from island to island. This draws the invisible path
of connection between the islands, forming the pattern of a triangle. There are four
islands in total one for each corner of the triangle, plus one island in the middle
which is the forbidden island. There is one giant turtle between two islands linking
those two islands together (3 turtles in total). Located at the center of every torti
city is a massive structure, a large temple dedicated to the stars and the path. This is
the path the turtles follow in order to get from island to island. The torti along with
the turtles keep the little creatures islands hidden from the outside world. The stars
and their paths connect each island together allowing or holding the “flow” of invis-
ibility.

Turtle eggs

Saving The Turtle Eggs

(main characters mission)

A suggestion for the main characters mission and reasoning behind his sudden
appearance on the little creatures islands is to save the turtle eggs. Every now and
then a new hatchery of turtle eggs is laidon the forbidden island and it is the job of
the main characters to protect the eggs. If something were to happen to the eggs,
then the whole little creatures world would be in threat. Without the new turtles to
replace the old, the connection would become faint and weakened over time. No
turtle means no torti to look after the connection, eventually weakening the link,
leading to the emergence of the islands into the real world.

Eggs location

(hatchery)

There is an abandoned island in which the giant turtles lay their eggs. The island is
linked to the another islands, though this island is abandoned because the torti do
not transport anyone to and from it. The eggs are laid in a sacred location, whether
it be a temple, underwater cave or underground labyrinthine. The torti find out
what the bad guys are up to and seek the help of the good guys and the humans,
hence becoming the first ones to set foot on the forbidden island since the time of
the last attack.
Bad guys, living location and objectives

Bad Guys

(location and Objectives)

The bad guys live on their own island where they were banished to stay forever.
(Because they stole some turtle eggs during the first attack) This island is dim,Greyy
and desolate, representing the mood of the bad guys. The bad guys live on the
ground usually inland, this emphasizes the separation between the good guys and
bad guys. They live inside cliff houses which are situated on or close to the ground.
With the myths behind the Bermuda triangle suggesting planes and ships going
missing, a graveyard scene for these vehicles could be shown on the bad guys is-
land. The torti left the bad guys land when they became banished isolating them
on their island, though the torti still maintain a small connection to the island it is
still slowly slipping into reality. Being isolated by the others the bad guys hatred and
spite for the other little creatures has grown over the years, knowing their island is
going to fade into reality soon, they set out to bring their own fate upon the other
islands. Over the years they eventually found out a way to get across to the other
islands (possibly from one of the eggs they stole in the first attack). Their evil inten-
tion is to destroy the new turtle eggs, in doing so dooming the other islands future.

BACKGROUND

(History)

Another point of difference between the good guys and the bad guys is how they
reproduce. The bad guys lay hard eggs in nests while the good guys lay soft eggs
in water. The bad guys nests are usually located inside a nest house located at the
center of the village. This is where they will store the giant turtle eggs once they
have stolen them.

Good Guys, living location and objectives

good guys

(location and Objectives)

The good guys find out what the bad guys are up to and try to stop them with the
help of the main characters. They help to protect the turtle eggs. The good guys
live on their own island separated from the bad guys. If we are focusing towards
an aquatic lizard (for example a salamander) it wouldn’t really make sense for them
to live high up in the trees, living in trees is, in our mind a bit cliche. A better en-
vironment would be to have the good guys living near the sea on top of or inside
of giant shells, this means they would be safe from predators and near the water.
These shells could be empty allowing the good guys to live inside them or they
could house giant crabs, with houses and structures attached to their back, this
would also allow the good guys to move their village freely from place if threatened
(creating a sense of a nomadic culture). Their architecture is colorful and vibrant
representing their nature. The first human/s to arrive on the island (the one/s al-
ready there) are living with them, taking on their nature, colors and design. These
human/s know the area well and show the newcomer/s (main character/s) around.

(Main Good Guy)

(poko poko)

The kid already living on the island has a main good guy as his best friend. This
good guy will be used as a cute comic relief character. He travels around with
the kids on their adventures helping them out or getting them into trouble. He is
around the same age as the kids though acts more immature.

Background

(History)

The good guys have spawning pools for their offspring situated in sacred areas
around the island. These spawning pools are shown to the main character by the
old kid as it is one of his “hang out spots” These spawning ponds and the areas sur-
rounding them have a mystical glow about them. This could be one of the money
shots, showing the more mystical attributes of the little creatures islands.

Island Location relative to the real world

Island

(visibility)

The bad guys island connection is faded and dissipating slowly. Every time a part of
the connection breaks or splinters a flux occurs bringing the island into visibility for
a short time. This leads the ships and planes to the island (disrupting their naviga-
tional systems). Making them crash into the island.
How the main character crashed on the island

Main character crashing

(From a plane or ship)

The bad guys tried to break the good guys connection, leading to a flux of visibility,
this led to the main characters appearance at the point of visibility. When the main
character awakens on the beach he becomes surrounded by the bad guys. The old
kid swoops in and saves him, leading to the first introduction of the two humans.
The old kid shows the main character some of the island, eventually leading him to
the good guys village (briefly explaining the island and its inhabitants history along
the way).

(ship)

(How the kid actually gets to or crashes upon the island).

At the moment it seem like the kid is the only survivor of the plane crash, we think
this may be a sensitive issue in the storyline as we wouldn’t want to bring the notion
of death into the story right off the bat. An idea we had to solve this issue is:

“It is the kids birthday and has just turned (10?), his father is the captain of a con-
tainer ship and had told his son that when he turned 10 he could take him on one
of his voyages. On a stormy night the kid looks out the window and sees something
that looks like a mysterious island. He tries to tell his dad but he is told to go to his
room, as his dad is fighting the storm. This makes the kid slightly angry making him
disobey his dads instructions never to go outside in a storm or without supervision.
The kid puts on a life jacket and rushes outside into the heavy storm to look at the
mysterious island. Squinting his eyes trying to see the island in the distance he leans
over the ships side rail. A large gust of wind and rain and a flash of lightning catches
the kid off guard and its just enough to push him over the rail, sending him into the
stormy water. He tries to fight the waves and shout out at the ship calling for his
dad, but the storm is too loud for anyone to hear. He watches the ship and its lights
fade off into the distance. A large wave blocks his vision of the ship and crashes on
top of him. The kid is then shown washed up on a sunny beach, waves sliding up
next to him. He wakes to find himself on the mysterious little creatures island.
main characters motivations

The main character wishes to leave the island and return to his dad. The only ones
who know how he would accomplish this are the torti but they are very secretive
and keep to themselves. He makes a deal with them, offering his services to help
save the turtle eggs in exchange for a way to get home.

Children s book

Look at the storyboard

Reasoning behind Having Humanoid creatures

Relationships

(characters, creatures, humans, audience)

If we are going with the concept of having bad guys and good guys, which may
make the storyline easier to create and follow. These two sides need some type of
intellect, (possibly just below a humans). This would allow the audience to relate to
some of the creatures more easily than if the creatures were just ‘semi’ beasts, [with
a slight intelligence of showing the main character the way]. This would give the au-
dience something to relate to other than other humans, allowing the little creatures
to have different personalities and traits gives an increased sense of character and
story. Giving the little creatures some higher form of intelligence would allow for a
more open storyline in which we would be able to refine. A larger variety of envi-
ronments and settings would also be available to us. As suggested earlier, a whale
having a city on its back wouldn’t make much sense, who built the city? Where did
it come from? Did the little creatures build it even though they are not humanoid?
Unless the mystery behind it is its intended purpose.
StoryBook
Contextual Statement
Early on in the projects development stages, the little creatures group was fairly
unorganized and so the roles of individuals within the group varied significantly.
Originally I was focusing on 3D modeling and animation although before this role
can take place certain aspects of the post production needed to be set in concrete.
I found the production process of the project interesting and engaging as it closely
represented the type of future working environment I may be working in. I took this
as a new learning experience and so, wanted to get a handle on the different as-
pects of post production.

As my main role was focused towards the end of the project I took on script writing
and concept art featuring environments and creature concepts. At the beginning of
the project the desired final outcome was to have a 30 to 60 second trailer in which
we could use to help promote Little Creatures. I created varying scripts and con-
cepts in order to get an idea of the direction we were heading in.

The scripts and concept art seemed to be too complex and not focused towards our
proposed clients or audience, which ment we had to simplify the storyline and idea.
We created a media for the story in which our audience would be able to relate to in
the form of a children’s storybook, this showed me that we needed to make signifi-
cant changes. Having a target audience allowed me to concentrate on and gave me
direction to further develop my ideas towards specific goals and specifications.

It was apparent that the Little Creatures group would not be able to complete the
originally planned trailer and so decided to completely finish the post production
aspect of it. As the groups ideas concerning characters, script and environments
narrowed, I began exploring and experimenting with these concepts in 3D in order
to visually represent and present concepts to the group. I looked into the anatomy
of creatures and people to get a better understanding of how muscle systems and
joints work, this would be vital if I were to create any such characters.

Although we weren’t having a trailer I thought it was necessary to create 3D con-

cepts and an animatic of the trailer to give everyone a better understanding of how
the different camera angles, environments and props would look on the screen. This
lends again to the production process in which I was interested in, the cooperation
within the individual groups plus the coordination between the different depart-
ments, the back and forth development and exchanging of ideas between the vary-
ing departments was a learning experience in itself.
I would have liked to complete the actual trailer by the end of this year but the
disorganized first semester slowed the momentum of the project and so the end
outcome had to be changed. In the end, the goal was to have the post production
completely finished and use it as a platform to continue developing into the next
semester. I like how the post production has worked out, we have set up a strong
starting point which will make it easier to start developing onto the next stage if
Little Creatures was to carry on into the next year. It was apparent that the Little
Creatures group would not be able to complete the originally planned trailer and so
decided to completely finish the post production aspect of it. As the groups ideas
concerning characters, script and environments narrowed, I began exploring and
experimenting with these concepts in 3D in order to visually represent and present
concepts to the group. I looked into the anatomy of creatures and people to get a
better understanding of how muscle systems and joints work, this would be vital if I
were to create any such characters.

Although we weren’t having a trailer I thought it was necessary to create 3D con-

cepts and an animatic of the trailer to give everyone a better understanding of how
the different camera angles, environments and props would look on the screen. This
lends again to the production process in which I was interested in, the cooperation
within the individual groups plus the coordination between the different depart-
ments, the back and forth development and exchanging of ideas between the vary-
ing departments was a learning experience in itself.

I would have liked to complete the actual trailer by the end of this year but the
disorganized first semester slowed the momentum of the project and so the end
outcome had to be changed. In the end, the goal was to have the post production
completely finished and use it as a platform to continue developing into the next
semester. I like how the post production has worked out, we have set up a strong
starting point which will make it easier to start developing onto the next stage if Lit-
tle Creatures was to carry on into the next year.

By Alex Frater BCT Year 3