Elmwood: Day Eight

Good day today. I'm starting to enjoy myself at Elmwood a lot more now.

Today was another day of tweaking my animation and trying to get it just right. I think one of the reasons I'm enjoying myself more is because I'm actually pleased with, and proud of, the work that I'm producing. Thank God for that. This morning I was working on Version 7 of the animation I'm making, and by lunchtime it was complete. When I showed it to Alex I got a really good response. He seemed to really like it, and said it was looking exactly how he had wanted it to. It's a bit of a departure from my usual style of animation, particularly as it deals with a serious issue rather than a lighthearted, whimsical one, but I'm really pleased with the results.

The only significant problem with my animation, is that it doesn't fit in with the client's new brand identity, which as of yet, is still being decided upon, from a choice of three different concepts. I mentioned this to Alex, who agreed, but said there's not a lot we can do about it until the identity has been finalised. Apparently he's having the same problems with his own work; he's going down to London tomorrow to present to the client and show them the work he's been doing on their new website, but without a clear identity to work with, he's said he's finding it difficult to come up with anything interesting or particularly relevant to do with the site.

It really surprised me that they're working like this. Surely you have to come up with the new brand identity first, and then create the website and other promotional materials to fit in with and support the new identity? Alex said that normally that would be the case, but this project is a bit of an exception, as they've got very little time available. Apparently this would normally be a six month job, but instead they've only got two months to do it.

I get the impression that they don't quite know what to do with me now that I've finished the animation. There's not much point in giving me a new project to start working on, because I'm only there for another three days (or two and a half actually, as I need to go into uni again on Friday morning). There are still some things I'd like to tweak on the animation, so I can get with that, and Alex suggested that I try exploring ways of making my animation work with the new identity, or at least what we know about the new identity so far. As I've already mentioned, they're still throwing around three different concepts at the moment, but there are certain things I can work with, like the fact that the colour for the new brand will definitely be blue for example (blue, that's original). And also, there's one identity which the guys from Elmwood in London seem to be favouring more than the other two (although whether the client will is a different story), so I can try and take some of the visual elements from that and attempt to work them into my animation. The guys at the London office have even come up with an animation of their own, to demonstrate to the client how this identity could be implemented, and I can safely say that it's one of the worst things I have ever seen. Now, I should mention, that the animation wasn't actually created by Elmwood London, instead they commissioned a specialist animation/illustration agency to produce it, so I don't know who's actually to blame for the terrible end result. I can't figure out if it's a terrible concept that's been well executed, or a strong concept that's been poorly executed. Either way, it's not the kind of thing I would expect a company such as Elmwood to present to a big client. Perhaps if they cut the first half, and used only the last half of the animation, it would be alright, but as it is, I personally would be embarrassed to show it to a client.

Anyway, I suppose I've criticised it enough now. I'd absolutely love to put a copy of it on here to prove just how atrocious it is, but I'm not allowed to of course.

God, I hope no one from Elmwood stumbles across this blog.

So, yes, my afternoon was spent trying to make my animation tie in a bit more with the potential brand identity, and by the end of the day I thought I'd done quite a good job actually. I showed it to Alex before I left, and he seemed to think so too, so that's all good. Christ knows what I'm going to do tomorrow though. Try and make my animation more 'blue' I guess.

----------

P.S. I almost forgot to maintain my tradition of complaining about the commute. It took me two and a half hours to get home today! Bloody horrendous!

0 comments:

Post a Comment