Rhia Crouch's Blog

Fig 1. Repulsion poster (1965) The 1965 film Repulsion by Roman Polanski is one of few that gives us an insight into the mind of someone who feels out of place with the stereotype of the time period. “Seemingly the last virgin in London, she (Carol) soon finds herself fighting a rear-guard action against the sexual revolution.” (Kehr, 2009) Polanski made the film at a time when women were starting to take control of their own lives. The 1960s saw the introduction of contraception meaning that they could decide the outcome of having sex with whoever they please. Beforehand sex was only seen as something for making children, and not something for pleaser, therefor consigning it only to those who were married. If a woman had a child out of marriage than she would been shunned by society but contraception started to stop this stigma. However, the main character Carol wants nothing to do with sex, men in particular. She seems to be psychology scared of them as they make their advan...

Merry Christmas! Here is a four legged walk cycle to get you in the Christmas mood, however there's a mistake with the legs as I couldn't work out how to switch them round on the horse so the same step repeats. I will try to do a walk cycle were this doesn't happen.

Fig 1. The Shining poster (1980) Just like he did with 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), Stanley Kubrick once again shows his talent for creating a film that leaves the viewer guessing what is going to happen next as the suspense builds (until they are jump scared by something as simple as the days of the week popping up on screen). The Shining (1980), based on the book of the same name by Stephen King, makes the audience feel trapped with no way out even though they are in a large space with several places to hide. Like Black Narcissus (1947) the film deals with isolation but this time it is the isolation of being pushed away from someone and being unable to reach the outside world. Most of the time the characters are shown to be in different parts of the hotel and it is only when they cross each other’s path does the tension start to show, especially with Jack when his wife Wendy investigates what he is doing. “The isolation and its influence begin to take a toll on Jack, who ...

I really tried to push myself with this project and improve on my mistakes and weakness from the last one such as trying out different ideas for my thumbnails, using real world references and trying to better understanding the software that we are using. However, I still feel that I am still failing with my final outcome at the end of the project and might need to change my mind set to create something that shows what I am truly able to imagine. I feel that I have improved using Photoshop but still have some way to go until my work has a professional feel to it. Maya on the other hand is still a challenge and that I held back my final building designs by making them as simple as I possible could so that I didn’t spend too long trying to work out how I needed to do something and not have anything to show on crit day. Overall, this project has made me take a step back and made me think about how I should go about designing and creating something from scratch along with seeing that t...

"Art of" Presentation by Rhia Crouch on Scribd

Final Review by Rhia Crouch on Scribd

This is a rewrite of my travelogue for my city. When you first see Musia on the horizon it can seem baffling to the eye. What you see many would describe as just an infant child’s drawing just as they start to understand the basic concepts of lines and shapes, but to the well-trained eye it is a city that is always thinking and moving with its people. The residents of the city are just as happy to see a face they recognise as well as a new one, and if you are one of these new faces they will gladly show you around and tell you the tricks that you will need to know so that you can enjoy Musia to its fullest. These tricks mostly explain what you will expect to see if you go to a certain part of the city and what is the best way to get there so that you don’t become lost and overwhelmed by being in an unfamiliar world. I do have a word of caution to all new travellers planning to visit: do not be put off by the resident’s sudden eagerness to talk to you about how you see the ci...

Production Designer Profile by Rhia Crouch on Scribd

I tried to use the background of my concept art as a base for my matte painting and add in more detail over the top of it so that I could keep the image at the right angle.

Background taken from concept art Finished Matte painting

These are the base colours for each part of the buildings. This is so that I know what coloured textures needs to go where when I plugged them in. The balloons, and their respective shapes, will be different colours but the robe and bolts will be the same colour as what is shown here.

This is my new finel concept art for my city and this time I have placed the angle lookeding up inside it. I have also done the colour code to show what parts I am going model. I know that the night sky looks abit dark but hopfuly I can bight it up when I create the matte painting. Green = model, Red = matte painting

Fig 1. Black Narcissus Poster (1947) The film Black Narcissus (1947), directed by Michael Powell and Eneric Pressburger and based on the book of the same name by Rumer Godden, can be called something of a dark fairy tale with the themes that it explores and the way that it shows it. The themes are not even shown in a discreet way as they are shown in nearly every scene in several different ways be it the through the sets used or the character’s clothes and actions. The main focus of Black Narcissus is isolation and that effects that it can have on the mind. The Nuns are not only separated for the local village but also the rest of their convent meaning that they don’t have that many people to turn to when their new home starts to put a strain on their vows. The mounts of the Himalayas start to bring back memories that they have long since forgotten because of their devotion to God. This strange new location, as Thomas Pryor explains, shows that “Religious zeal is dependent on ...

Sand texture Robe texture Metal texture

As we didn't have a model this week we looked at stills from different movies draw from them. We mostly looked at 4 still images from  The Birds  (1963) by Alfred Hitchcock that where taken the final bird attack scene. One of the stills Still from Bugsy Malone

I've had to rethink the angle that I will be useing for my city as it looked like I was pushing the viewer away and not showing what it is like to be in my city. To get round this I created a mockup of the buildings in Maya and started to move around it to find a better angle, this will also help me eliminate some of the buildings that I need to model if they don't appear in the shot. To tell the 6 buildings apart I colour coded them, the colours used are not the finel design for each. The angle I can't use Out of the four new angles that I was able to create I find that #1 and #3 are working the best as them show the sky clearly, which is something that I want to features, and the monolith in the background. #2 and #4 are the same view but I moved the camea in abit and placed it on the ground to see if the  angle looked any better if it showed the floor. Angle #1 Angle #2 Angle #3 Angle #4

Fig 1. Edward Scissorhands Poster (1990) Tim Burton’s Edward Scissorhands (1990) is a personal story that everyone can relate to at some point in their life. Based on Burton’s own struggles as he tried to fit in with his suburban up bringing this story, as described by Derek Malcolm, is a “Dark, oblique fairy tale.” (Malcolm, 1991) It is almost like Burton is holding up a mirror to society and making us see how we treat those who are different from us. Fig 2. The two designs next to each other (1990) The two main settings for the film, the castle and the suburb, have very distinct styles that make them juxtaposition one another. The two styles used, German expressionism and 1960s home decor, give the idea that these two worlds should never have met, even at the beginning of the film when we first see Edward’s castle we find our self’s asking - “How long have these two locations lived side by side and not interacted with each other before?” One thing that stands out with ...