What If? Metropolis - Travelogue

When entering Stenberg you are greeted with colour, dark reds and strong yellows alongside dull blue, almost greys. The structures range from tall buildings, that tower over the inhabitants to smaller blockier houses, more geometric in shape and sharp at the corners. The paths all lead to the same place, some straight while others twist and turn as you walk, curling around houses to the centre of the city. The houses change the closer to the centre you get, the smaller, blockier buildings in the outer portions of the city leading into the taller buildings in the centre of the city.

The city’s inner buildings are tall and imposing, towering high above the buildings in the outer city and requiring the people to crane their heads back to see the top, they are supported by beams and poles that carry the weight of the topmost parts. The buildings are made of metals like steel and aluminium as well as cement, painted in bold colours and striped patterns that accentuate the angles the architecture provides. Windows stretch high and wide, sometimes covering entire walls yet other times remaining sparse across the building.

The city of Stenberg is one that is in motion, reaching out and stretching across spaces. The inhabitants too are caught in a momentum, moving constantly yet completely content. There is a sense of business and of organised chaos, of structure and reason underlined with playfulness and adventure.

The further out from the centre of the city you get, the more plants can be seen. Bushes and flowers planted in front of people’s houses, gardens filled with greenery and trees are all around. In the inner city there is less to be seen, a potted plant here and there, some trees in a park long abandoned. The people hardly seem to notice, except for when the go to the outskirts and see the greenery that’s missing from the streets they walk.

At the city centre is a space used for markets and lines with shops, words on signs decorating buildings to guide people where they want to go. The area gets decorated during holidays. On one side of the space lies the theatre and on the other lies the college with its glass windows, low to ground yet wider than the buildings around it.

What If? Metropolis - Crit Presentation

What if? Metropolis by Alex on Scribd

What If? Metropolis - Final Render

What If? Metropolis - Maya Scene Progress

Models

Beginning UV Layout

Full UV Layout

CG Artist's Toolkit: Animation and Character - Animal Walking

Bunny running through Forest

Film Review - Edward Scissorhands

Fig 1. Movie Poster

Tim Burton's 1990 film Edward Scissorhands is a story 'told gently, subtly and with infinite sympathy for an outsider who charms the locals but then inadvertently arouses their baser instincts.' (Lee, 2014). The story is that of the character Edward who is brought down from his castle to the quiet suburb by the Avon lady, Peggy.

Initially the suburbs community is welcoming and curious about Edward, seeing him as something new and exciting. Edward is revered to a celebrity status by the community until he is involved in a crime and their idolism turns sour causing the people to 'turn on him, eventually driving him out of the community. Meanwhile his wistful and impossible attraction to Kim (Winona Ryder), the Avon lady's teenage daughter, adds another layer of tension.' (Dawes, 1990).

Fig 2. The suburban town in contrast with the castle.

The idea of a community that wants to be different while ultimately all buying the same things is apparent in the film through the design of both the suburban environment and the costume designs of the community. The movie shows this through 'an entirely artificial world, where a haunting gothic castle crouches on a mountaintop high above a storybook suburb, a goofy sitcom neighbourhood where all of the houses are shades of pastels and all of the inhabitants seem to be emotional clones of the Jetsons.' (Ebert, 1990). Edward himself is completely different in all this, living in a greyscale almost Victorian castle on top of a hill and dressed all in black leather, leading him to be the character that's most individual to himself thus making him completely ostracised by everyone else.

Fig 3. Edward and Kim

Bibliography:


Dawes, Amy (1990) Film Review: Tim Burton’s ‘Edward Scissorhands’ - http://variety.com/1990/film/reviews/edward-scissorhands-1200428433/

Ebert, Roger (1990) Edward Scissorhands - http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/edward-scissorhands-1990

Lee, Marc (2014) Edward Scissorhands, review: 'a true fairytale' - http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/film/filmreviews/11298442/Edward-Scissorhands-review-a-true-fairytale.html

Images:

Figure 1 - http://www.manizalescity.co/img/actividades/Manizales-Cine-Eduardo-Manos-de-Tijeras2.jpg

Figure 2 - https://filmgrab.files.wordpress.com/2012/10/1214.jpg

Figure 3 - http://www.hippoquotes.com/img/edward-scissorhands-old-kim-quotes/enhanced-buzz-28880-1395200323-8.jpg

Life Drawing - Session 10

Ink and Water

Marker and Water

Charcoal