Working Title – Tangled
Genre – Animation
Duration – 30 seconds maximum
Target Audience – Age 15+ teenagers and young adults of any gender. This demographic will often use music streaming services on a day to day basis. As they can listen to music in any location at any time, they will use earphones to do so comfortably. Many experience the common struggle of tangled earphones – this is evident in the way in which earphones are marketed as ‘tangle-free’ to appeal to customers. This is a comedic take on the mystery of how earphones become annoyingly angled when left alone.
Outline – The animation follows earbuds on pair of earphones differing tastes in music. This results in the pair getting into an argument that gets them tangled together. They end up having to work together to get out of the knotty situation.
The earphones will be plugged into a phone with music playing sitting on the desk of a bedroom. Right earbud will be enjoying the music playing whilst Left earbud will not. Left earbud changes the song and starts enjoying it. This makes Right earbud annoyed. They begin fighting over which plays until Left earbud gives up in a state of anger and tries to move away. This drags Right earbud and the phone towards the edge of the desk so Right earbud pulls in the opposite direction to try and stop the other from moving. They struggle and end up pulling the earphone jack out of the phone. The momentum throws them off the desk and into a bag on the floor. They struggle frantically to try and get out of the bag, eventually pulling themselves out and onto the floor. After landing on the floor, the find that they’ve tangled their wires. The earbuds begin to quarrel and become exhausted.
Character Breakdown – The left and right earbud on a pair of earphones are siblings. The earbuds on a pair of earphones. Left earbud is a hot-headed and impulsive character whilst Right earbud is stubborn but more mature.
Visual Elements / Mise en Scene- The animation is set in the bedroom of a teenager or young adult with the main scene taking place on a desk. In the scene there is a bed and, on the desk, there is a laptop, lamp and picture frame as well as the phone and the pair of earphones.
Audio – Two songs featured as diegetic sound – one that left earbud will prefer and one that right earbud will prefer. I will also use spot and Foley effects with audio such as a phone dragging across a table and dropping to the ground.
Rationale – I chose the idea of earphones as it will be able to demonstrate an interesting character relationship. For instance, it allows me to look at how siblings or even twins might interact in a situation where they struggle with being connected at all times. The fact that they are earbuds isolates their actions and means that they need to do everything together – which is bound to cause dilemmas.
In order to animate this project, I need to learn:
- How to model complex wires and be able to connect them properly to the earbuds.
- How to rig wires for smooth, dynamic movement.
Primary and Secondary Research – I have primary research on how earphones and their wires move from taking videos of my own. I have watched many online tutorials of how to create and rig wires which has enabled me to think about how I will animate wires with complex movements.
Requirements and resources – I will need:
- Compatible desktop/pc
- Maya 3D modeling software
- Video editing software (Adobe Premiere)
- 3D assets for my animation
- Video reference for wire movement
Constraints and Contingency – The Maya software is difficult to navigate and things can go wrong very easily. I will need to set out a to-do list of processes that I need to complete for my animation to be successful. For instance, creating the scene, modeling assets, rigging etc. Where I am unsure of how to complete certain tasks, I will use tutorials from the Autodesk website and YouTube.
Legal and ethical considerations – I am using music and so I need to ensure that I use royalty and copyright free music.
Budget – Were I using copyrighted music, I would need to look at buying the license to use the music in my animation. I might also need to think about how I’m accessing the necessary equipment – whether I need to hire a workspace or purchase the software.
Schedule – My animation could potentially take 3 weeks to complete. If I were to be running low on time to animate or learn how to achieve certain aspects of my animation, I could simplify my idea so that there is less to do but it is still of good quality.
Below is my storyboard:
Jasmine Cooper 