Mouuth// OCT 2016 Visuals at Headrow House

Mouuth is a Leeds based music experience, containing the talents of Alex Podraza and James Grimshaw. You can find their FACEBOOK PAGE here.

I've been working with the pair creating illustrations over the past few months, such as an icon for their Social Media pages. Yesterday MOUUTH preformed at Headrow House in Leeds with animated visuals I'd created for the gig. The projected visuals was a 5 second looping animation of a mouth; the mouth made 4 different expressions, each expression lasting roughly 1 second each and each expression had a different identifying colour.

The Brief 

Original MOUUTH animated GIF 

MOUUTH asked me to create some visuals for their gig. I had already animated a little gif for their social media, of a mouth opening and closing and they both wanted something similar. We discussed the possibility of me triggering certain animated clips manually but because of time constraints and lack of software, I was asked to create a self-looping animation. I animated the first GIF using a 'rough' rotoscope technique. I first filmed someone opening and closing their mouth and then in photoshop, traced loosely over the lip moment. I added the teeth, tongue and shadows/highlighting myself. MOUUTH wanted the same 'feel' to the visuals and requested I produced something similar to the GIF they were already using. I had about a week to create the animation so began working from the first briefing. 

Creation 

I filmed my own mouth as reference footage for this brief, all together I filmed 15 expressions and then picked 5 of what I thought was the best (most disgusting). Using photoshop I created a set of different Video-Groups in the Timeline feature, in order to quicken the animation process. I animated different pieces of the mouth on separate layers, to produce a much cleaner animation and much faster animation process. Using separate layer groups also allowed me to shadow certain parts of the mouth little by little - like placing depth on the teeth and not the entire inner mouth, by shadowing the corners of the teeth animated layer.  I rendered each 1 second animated mouth out in photoshop, as well as a 'base' posed mouth that was slightly animated to maintain movement within the animation. 

Reference Footage

Using Multiple Layers

Post-Production

Finished mouth (mouth 1)

In post I used After Effects at university to bring together all of the rendered clips. I had also created a 3-framed (24FPS) texture animation that would give the animation a slight sinister disturbing tone, that would work with MOUUTH and their music perfectly. To do this I changed the opacity of the textured animation to 20% in order for the animation beneath to be seen and still carry across the texture.  After adding the texture I rendered out the looping animation to check for mistakes...

I planned to have each mouth change its own colours with each expression, so within After Effects I took the rendered animation and applied a HUE over the top of each of the different mouth segments. I moved though the colour wheel in the hue opinion to change the over all colour theme from purple to red to yellow to blue. Finally, I rendered the finished animation out.  I also rendered out a slightly more 'faded' animation, to give MOUUTH the opinion of a more faded grungy visuals if they wanted; but they fell in love with the neons. 

Live 

That my Mouth and MOUUTHs Mouth

At the Headrow House venue the gig space seemed massive, light up with netted fairy lights and spotlights that could maybe blind. The venue space was already fitted with the projection screen and a projector, which was build into the ceiling above the stage. My laptop was plugging into the over-head projected and pushed up into the ceiling whilst MOUUTH preformed. Before MOUUTH began I started the loop and left my laptop up on the vents. Although I wasn't controlling the animation manually, the rhythm to the visuals worked well with the live music. MOUUTHs set lasted about 30 minutes and after the gig I was approached by other artists that played that night about my visuals. I really enjoyed working with MOUUTH and can't wait to work with them more. 

Breif// The Lifting Tower - Xmas Projection Project

The Brief:
''Propose 3 visual concepts for a set series or sequence of 1 minute animated projections based on the theme of Independent Creativity at Xmas. Your visual concepts will need to communicate a contemporary, creative and ‘cool’ representation of a xmas or winter theme. Think - Harvey Nichols meets the independent music scene in Leeds or John Lewis meets the Brudnell Social Club. Your response will need to appeal to a wide audience of 18 to 50 year olds who look beyond the traditional but still want to feel festive. The client is not looking for traditional representations of Santa in a sleigh or cheesy looking elves dancing around. They are not asking for a critical or moral discourse on the validity of xmas. They want cool, festive and creative. The moving image based projections will be mapped onto the Lifting Tower building on Wellington Street (see attached images) and should aim to interact with the features of the surface. The scale of the projection will be approximately 10m x 10m and so you will need to work to a square format. You will also need to consider the use of simple high contrast imagery on a dark background in order to maximize the effectiveness of the projection media and surface.'' ''The client is not looking for traditional representations of Santa in a sleigh or cheesy looking elves dancing around. They are not asking for a critical or moral discourse on the validity of xmas. They want cool, festive and creative.''

The Brief (Project Aims):
''Leeds Bid is a private sector driven initiative to enhance the perception of Leeds as a vibrant, culturally significant and economically viable centre in the north. During the build up to the xmas period, a number of projects, events and initiatives are being planned to enhance the retail experience of visitors to Leeds city centre and the surrounding work-based/residential developments. The projects will be funded by some of the leading retail organisations in Leeds and will aim to showcase the breadth of creative talent that Leeds has to offer.''

Important Things To Focus On:
- 10 x 10 Animation Format
- 3 different animations within a 1 minute set
- Aimed ages 18-50
- Only able to work in these colours:Black, White, Red, Green and Blue

Rough Idea:
- Two 'families' (Perhaps Students and a settled family) approaching christmas in different creative ways but still coming together to celebrate the se thing at the end
-  One set with one, one set with the other and then the final set with both celebrating
- Set one (20seconds)  Set two (20seconds)  Set three (20seconds)

Final Idea:
The animation I'm planning on developing will document the different family/family-like units in Leeds approaching the christmas holidays creativity and then coming together at the end to celebrate. The first sequence will show students, which in my experience has been a family like setting, celebrating Christmas in their own way creatively - The second sequence will show a family doing the same thing - And finally the last sequence will involve both 'Families' interacting with the same experience in Leeds (The Christmas Market). Visually I want the characters (animated in white) to begin creating their Christmas together, by drawing it. The drawings will be represented with Green, Red and Yellow. This represents the creativity this holiday holds for families.


Character Design: 
Student Family: 4 students, representing the diversity within the student population in Leeds.
Modern Family: A gay couple and their daughter.   (Designs are featured on the 2nd A3 sheet below)

Setting up A3 Sheets: