I Just Want to Play Video Games
Animations based around losing power in a snowstorm.
Prompt
There was a day when I was sitting at home wondering what I wanted to do, loathing the work that was on my plate. As I went to procrastinate further, the worst possible thing in the modern era occurred: I lost power due to a snowstorm. Initially I didn't know what to do with myself, but then I was struck with the sudden inspiration to make a series of animations based around my annoyances and woes with my situation. The idea was this: showcase a person around a house that has lost power sitting and doing nothing, as most things focused around entertainment in the modern era focus on energy.
Reference Photos. Images from Google.
I began with five separate designs: a bright candle, person next to a window, a person in front of a fireplace, a melting candle, and just a window. After finalizing how I wanted them to look once animated, I turned three of them into animations, being the person next to a window, just a window, and the melting candle. All of the animations use text as a way to showcase the snow or other particles, and the designs were kept simple to convey the lack of options that I felt at the time.
Concept / Initial Designs
First Design Iterations
While the first animations did loop, I wanted to make it so you could potentially watch all of them in succession of each other in order to tell a more comprehensive story. The loops now begin and end with the candle, serving as the major connecting motif of all the individual animations. Aside from that, there were only a few minor changes. On the person looking out of the window, the person now walks toward the window and then puts his head down as opposed to not moving; the melting candle was changed to a matchstick reigniting it, and the lone window is now panned to after looking at the candle.
Feeling that the first three animations were in a decent spot, I animated the other two concepts I had, being the bright candle and the fireplace. For the fireplace, there is a set of three candles on the top and a fire begins to roar after a few seconds of zooming out; the bright candle was switched to now instead showing the power flickering back on for a moment, only to go out again. The switch for the bright candle was made as I felt the initial concept was weak as it showed no real staying interest, as showcasing a glimmer of hope for the person depicted was more intriguing to myself.
Second Design Iterations
Final Animations
For the final animations, there were a few alterations I made here and there. Now both windows showcase a person, however both have different tonal atmospheres: the first one still showcases someone who is sad that it is snowing, while the second now shows someone simply checking if it is still snowing. I added the melting back to the matchstick candle so it now tells a fuller story. For the fireplace animation, a person now ignites the fire with one of the candles, only to then blow it out afterwards. All of the animations have been combined with music in the section below.