Boom-da-Kat

My New Portfolio Blog

2010-04-20T03:14:00.000-07:00

Check out my new Portfolio Blog filled with my animation work, sketches, and other interests:

Aaron Lenard Art and Animation

Boom-da-kat 2nd Animatic

2010-03-27T12:45:00.001-07:00

Watch the video

If you are having problems with the Video margins, right-click (PC) or ctrl-click(MAC) on the video and click on "Show All" or "Zoom Out"

Blip.tv link to the Animatic

2009-03-31T10:58:00.000-07:00

This website is where I upload all of my movie and transfer them to different. The Animatic on this website is much better than the weird conversion that was made to the animatic on this blog.

Animatic on Blip.tv

Boom-da-kat 2nd Animatic

2009-03-15T04:11:00.001-07:00

More Art Direction & Inspiration

2009-03-15T03:41:00.001-07:00

When I was sketching my characters and working on my pitch poster, I noticed that the way I was designing Friend A and Friend B felt a lot like a combination of the Jim Jinkins's "Doug" and Craig Bartlett's "Hey Arnold!" NickToons cartoons I remembered watching many many years ago. When I started to look through more cartoons I've watched in the past, I also came across Danny Antonucci's "Ed, Edd n Eddy" and immediately remembered how visually wacky and inspirational the characters and animation was. So this, along with the other art direction image, will be just more inspiration I can look to when working on this project.

The Pitch Poster

2009-03-11T13:55:00.001-07:00

Rough Scene Designs

2009-03-11T13:52:00.001-07:00

This is a rough sketch of playground games I want to put in the park. While they will be a part of the park, it will also become a part of the turnables aspect of the design for the park. For example: the merry-go-round resembles different dials on a turntable.

Theses are the designs of the hill overseeing the park. In the animation, the park will resemble turntables and the hill that the main characters will be placed will resemble the pattern of a microphone.

Character Sketches

2009-03-11T13:36:00.001-07:00

Costume Design for the Main Characters

Friend A Character Design

Friend B Character Design

Character Ideas

2009-03-11T13:29:00.000-07:00

The character ideas come from some of the famous beatbox artist that I've been listening to ever since I was a kid.

Proposed Schedule

2009-03-11T13:26:00.000-07:00

Characters
1. 2 Main Characters – Modeled, Rigg
2. Park people – at least 7+
3. 3 Painting Clients/Sellers
4. Friend B’s Fiancé
5. Friend A’s 3 Blind Dates
Scenery
1. Turntable-influenced park design – 3D
2. Microphone-influenced Hill design – 3D
3. Playground design – 3D
4. Friend A’s artist studio – 2D
5. Friend B’s work station – 2D
6. Expensive Restaurant – 2D
7. Dance Club – 2D
8. Cheesy Club – 2D

Script

2009-03-11T13:20:00.000-07:00

(Subtitled Beatbox Font – beatbox that is subtitled within the scene)
(Expressive Beatbox Font – it’s expressed through pitch change and mood in the scene than the actual spoken word, it is not subtitled)

01 High FS
Various people are playing basketball. Beatbox is heard in the background

02 High FS
Mothers and Fathers playing with there children on the swing set and play pen. Beatbox is heard again.

03 high WS of the park and city outskirts panning up
Two men sit on a bench at the top of a hill (bg) overlooking a neighborhood park (fg). Camera pans to the title in the sky then tracks to a FS of the two men relaxing and watching families enjoy themselves in the park.

04 Eye Level MS two-shot (high MS of Friend A & an OTS-CU of Friend B)
Friend A’s arms are crossed and looks toward the sky, enjoying the sunny, breezy weather. Friend A to camera left

Friend A
“Brings back memories, huh…”

05 Eye Level MS two-shot
Friend B’s shifts his weight to the side bench arm and looks at the people in the park.
Friend B to camera right

Friend B
“Absolutely…”

06 Eye level CS
Friend B turns to look at Friend A
Friend to camera left

Friend B
“So how’s it goin man?”

07 Eye Level CS two-shot
Friend A to camera left. Friend A has a 2D paint brush in his hand. He drops different paint colors on his hand and creates a colorful miniature version of his artist work space.

Friend A
“I’m a painter now…”

Friend B
“That’s great”

Friend A
“(Laughs), yeah, finished some gallery work recently.”

Camera tracks to a miniatrue version of Friend A on Friend A’s palm to introduce the 2d transition.

2D transition of Friend A’s miniature workspace aligning themselves to their actual sizes

08 FS Eye Level
It’s a collage of various scenes of Friend A painting on a canvas, struggling with concepts of his painting, hands his painting to gallery curators and is rejected and accepted by different people.

Friend A
“I love to paint, I love the process, the challenge, the success and failures of it, ya know. I did it so much…”

Friend A’s art canvas rotates to the position of the next screen.

09 high FS gallery space
Friend A’s paintings are hung up with others in the gallery. People are looking at the paintings in the gallery. The images move with the beatbox in the background. Friend A is holding the gallery scene as the camera pans back to bench in the park. He quickly wipes the scene off of its hand like water.

Friend A
“I wanted it to be my profession…What about you?”

10 Eye Level CS two-shot
Friend B to camera right back in the park. Friend B displays with his finger a diagram of working in Finance in a boring manner. The diagram is a 2d effect

Friend B
“Use to work in Finance, got boring so, I’m an Electrical Engineer now”

11 FS work bench
A collage of various scenes of Friend B working with various circuit boards from various machines.

Friend B
“I worked with circuits boards mostly… ”

12 High FS
It’s a huge scene of industrial machinery, (motors, turbines, etc.) Friend B is testing out the controls that activate the machine and is assessing the results of the machine and machine parts running its course. He has a checklist in his hand and checks off what works. Camera slowly tracks back to the park bench from Friend B’s diagram.

Friend B
“It pays well, and I enjoy the different projects I work on with people, yeah it’s a great job”

13 Eye Level MS two-shot
Friend A
“Glad to here it”

14 Eye Level MS two-shot
Friend B nods his head.

Friend B
“Appreciate it, thank you”

15 Eye Level MS Bench
Friend A & Friend B to center camera
Friend B leans over

Friend A
“So I gotta know....you have a soulmate, a girlfriend, what?”

Friend B
“Happy you asked…”

Soft dissolve to the next scene

16 Eye Level FS
Friend B is in a CD/Vinyl Shop looking for music. Friend B is talking to the owner of the shop.

Friend B
“I 1st met her at that CD Shop across the street”

17 Eye Level CS Friend B
The bell on the top of the front door rings as someone walks in off-camera, Friend B turns around and is shocked and mesmerized

18 Eye Level WCS Fiancé
The fiancé walks in the shop, she turns and smiles. Camera slowly tracks to a MS

Friend B
“The first time I saw her…..MAN she was gorgeous”

19 Low MCS Friend B
Friend B fixes himself up and approaches her.

20 Eye Level FS Pan (L-R)
A Collage of Friend B and fiancé begins as they go from the expensive restaurant for the 1st time to dancing in a club, to enjoying a picnic at the park. Both smile and laugh enjoy their time together. The camera continues to pan as the events happen in real time.

Friend B
“She’s smart, She’s down to earth, She’s funny…She’s exactly the
soulmate I’m looking for”

21 Eye Level CS two-shot
Back to the park bench. Friend A Speaks

Friend A
“I wish that luck, I’m still dating….unbelieveable what I went through”

22 Eye level FS
Friend A is in a cheesy looking club sitting on the left side of the table while his date is sitting on the right side. It’s a collage of different women who have sat on that same chair dating Friend A. The camera slowly tracks towards Friend A and after each cut of a different woman, Friend A slowly becomes more annoyed.

Friend A
“I don’t seem to have that time of “Luck”"

23 Eye Level FS profile shot
Both Friends laugh out loud on the bench
(Friends are now speaking English)

Friend B
“It’s good to see you again”

Friend A
“Same here, happy we caught up on lost time”

24 Eye Level MS bench
The friends are in the foreground overlooking the park in the background.

Friend B
“You wanna do this again next Saturday?”

Friend A
“Sure, why not”

Friend B
“Sounds cool then, take care of yourself”

Friend A
“You too.”

They shake hands, get up from the bench and leave in opposite direction. The camera pulls back into the sky showing the bench and the entire park.

The Art Style

2009-03-11T13:08:00.000-07:00

The Art Style comes from very abstract, but design-heavy music videoes such as the art from the Chrome Children CD from Stones Throw Records and Kid Koala's "Basin Street Blues" and "Fender Bender".

Treatment

2009-03-11T13:04:00.000-07:00

Beatbox is an artform and technique that consist of mimicking drums, trumpets, DJ turntables, cymbals and other musical instrument through the mouth of an individual. How would an animation be structured if beatbox was the standard language and not the actual spoken word? As a theme behind this question, it is taking something that is very common in our society, (talking, communicating, conversing) and changing it to a certain language limitation where it requires a greater method of expressive movements in the body, hands, and face.

The "Boom-da-Kat" short film is a study on the movement, actions, and reactions of characters through the culture of beatbox as they find themselves talking about their experiences using the artform to both generate and influence where they have been and where they are now. It is a film of unorthodox, vibrant expression through representative audio and visual symbols of occupations and marital statuses using 2D animation and effects as the flashback tool for the CG main characters in their 3D setting. The style and atmosphere of the characters and the environemt is derived heavily from simple, graffiti-inspired, abstract Animation. The graphic style will be the same in the 3D universe as it plans to be in the 2D universe. The main characters will look different than the general public, but will entice a sense of beautiful rhythm their movements as well as the setting. The environment designs will combine the structure of a standard community park and playground for families and aspects of the Hip-Hop community and principles. The park will generally look like a park, but the design and placements of the content within the park will resemble turntables and a microphone while the cityscape will resemble large "boombox" stereo systems. Through common occurance and actions, reveal beautiful rhythmn and an unforseen melody.

Story Outline

2009-03-11T13:03:00.000-07:00

The story is about two best friends who communicate with each other more efficiently by talking in the language of beatbox. The two friends sit on a bench over looking a communal park and begin to expressively beatbox. Over the course of their conversation, the beats and different rhythm patterns they make with their mouths affect different aspects of what’s going on within the park. As they beatbox, kids begin to rock their heads to the beat while they play on the swing set/play area, cars going in circles, in an out of the parking spot, people and dogs jogging to the beat, people fishing and catches fish to the beat, etc. Each friend asks the other what he is doing nowadays; Friend A says he is an independent painter and Friend B says he use to work in Finance but now works for as an Electrical Engineer. Both friends explain where they are in their professional career and the most recent they’ve done. Friend B discusses the new love he has encounter in his life and experiences he has went through. Friend A congratulates Friend B and brings up the various dates he’s had to go through looking for a soulmate, but is still single. Friend B laughs at the experiences Friend A has gone through and understands the complications of dating. As they beatbox their experiences, flashbacks will occur showing the family and settings involved as well as the beats and rhythms that influence the different situations. When they finish their conversation, they schedule another meeting while returning to speaking English. The actions in the park are returned to normal and the two friends, part ways.

Story Synopsis & Description

2009-03-11T13:02:00.000-07:00

"Boom-da-Kat" is a 3D/2D Animated Short film of two friends communicating with each other throught the language of beatbox.

It is a study on the movement, style and culture of beatbox as it influences the actions that take place within the characters and their environment.