Animatic Update, Color tests

In the last week of the fall semester, I fully animated the shot of a ladybug flying onto a clover with an aphid crawling over it. I don't love how it looks, and it made me realize that if I try to color in this project in TvPaint using local color for everything, I'm not going to get a sophisticated color palette.

For now, I am using Photoshop to paint some color keys with techniques like underpainting and light washes of color, using square and triangle painting brushes. I plan to use as references for when I render my backgrounds with the pixel brush technique.

I worked on a color script and some background color keys. It helps to see the whole film's palette on one page, but it is still too dependent on local color. Getting away from rendering things the way they "should be" is really hard, but I want this cartoon to look interesting!!!

I particularly like the city shots and Lorraine's bedroom. I think this film really works best when the backgrounds don't draw too much attention (some of my classmates even said they think I should keep it black and white except for the bugs). So at least this color script was helpful to figure out what I DON'T want.

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​Taking inspiration from Fritz the Cat's cityscapes, I think I will be leaning away from the simplicity of UPA designs and lean into adding details in my backgrounds, while keeping each scene in an almost completely monotone color scheme.