What are the "Behind the Scenes?"
I'm glad you asked! It's a lot of file management, excel sheets, and communication through Discord! So many files...
Communication
There is nothing more important in teamwork than communication! One needs to be able to give enough information when assigning cuts, communicating deadlines and whether one is able to make it or not, critique for revisions, and doing regular check-ins and keeping everyone to date. The bigger the team the more easily confusing it can be, so it's important for the team to be up to speed and communicative with who is doing what and where they are at.
A snippet of the discord server we had to facilitate communication and feedback
File Management
Managing, updating, and having a system with naming conventions and a drive is extremely useful and important to highlight what needs to be done, where people can find the files and info to work on it, and be updated of the in-progress work.
Master google sheet and background sheet made for in-progress animation for the film. Credit to Victoria Aldrich & Marjorie Hsu for the google sheet and credit to CJ Alvarado for creating and managing the Background Google Sheet.
Style Guide
If you're going to work with multiple other people it's very helpful to provide style guides to keep the art more consistent, just like how character turnarounds assist animators to draw the characters consistently. For backgrounds, CJ created a detailed master sheet with color palettes, style examples and guides, and photoshop brushes for specific kinds of rendering.
Snippets of Background Design
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Background style guides and master sheet and some color palettes. Credit: CJ Alvarado
Snippets of Compositing Guide
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Process style-guide for compositing. Credit: Victoria Aldrich
Snippets of Clean-up Guide
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A peak at the animation clean-up guide. Credit: Gabriella Curtis & Marjorie Hsu
References
References are what help breathe life into art. Because the film was so inspired by Native Brazilians there were a lot of references photos to get a better idea of their livelihood, textiles, and customs. It was challenging because there is not enough internet resources or documentation on Native Brazilian tribes especially due to previous genocides and lack of preservation of their art and way of life in Brazil. In addition, there are multiple different tribes and each of them have their own take to life. SOTW folklore is specifically based on Tupi-Guarani mythology,
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A great example of a photo reference visually translating to a background. Background Credit (right): Dalton Davis
Another example from reference to work. The characters in SOTW were inspired to have similar outfits to Native Brazilians. Character model sheet credit (right): Victoria Aldrich
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