WEEK 5 SUMMARY

WEEK START - 22nd of October

WEEK END - 28th of October

Week 5 was the beginning of our new project on Character Design, and also included a talk on the uncanny.

MONDAY
On Monday, we were introduced to our character design unit, lasting from this week to the end of week 8. We learnt the fundamentals on Monday, using a template to create various unique characters out of abstracted shapes and forms. To see full coverage on this session, see this post. 

TUESDAY
Tuesday was our character research talk on the uncanny, and the uncanny valley. Uncanny, in a nutshell, is the look of something that seems slightly off, but throws the entire sense of comfortability around it. Common examples are motion capture films (e.g. The Polar Express) and video games that opt for more realistic graphics (e.g. Mass Effect Andromeda). For my full post on the uncanny, see this post.

THURSDAY
Thursday was more character design workshops, this time working on how to design a cast from scratch. This involved taking different materials, symbols, etc, and making silhouettes out of them. We added details and little features to give the silhouettes more character. Eventually, we created a full cast in groups of 4 - 5, making one character each for a fictional show, movie or game. For my full post on cast designing, see this post.

SUMMARY
Overall, I'm happy with how this week has gone! The introduction to character design was a lot more interesting and engaging than I originally thought it'd be. Being able to learn how to make characters with shapes, colours and more variables to consider more carefully is definitely going to be beneficial going forward. I think the sessions will also help me to break out of my style more, but it'll take some forcing from myself to move away from my comfort zone. 
The lecture on the uncanny was an interesting one for sure, but considering it in terms of my essay is somewhat tricky. Emmet has surpassed the uncanny valley, managing to reach the point where people question if he's an actual LEGO minifigure or really convincing CGI (it's the latter). I think it'd be important to bring up Emmet's realistic looks in the essay, but maybe not with the perspective of the uncanny and audience confusion; probably more with how the realistic look serves as representation of the LEGO brand accurately.