Final Major Project: Final Designs

Character Designs:

As my project includes a character at its centre now, a ballet dancer going through her routine, I had to think about the design and appearance of her in my project. This is important so that each motif can be seen as continuous in the sequence. Therefore I thought about outfit, hair style and colour scheme, considering different possibilities but in the end I kept it as simple as possible to avoid problems. My final design is a woman wearing a simple leotard so that I do not have to worry about the movement of her clothes as she spins and her hair is up in a bun. I kept to the colour scheme picked out earlier and consequently she is in a blue leotard with red ballet shoes. I'm not very good at drawing faces and am worried about the problems of replicating a face to look like the same person over and over while also having to worry about appropriate facial expressions and so left her faceless. Hopefully this won't look too strange and mannequin-like in the final outcome. One detail I did allow myself to include was that as the storyboard progresses I plan to have my character's hair slowly begin to fall out of the bun. Hopefully this detail will add some personality to my designs and give the impression of an energetic dance routine:

Final Character Design

Now with these details determines I felt capable, after my research watching ballets and familiarising myself with the different steps, of drawing out a storyboard of all the components of my final garment. I spent some time looking at various dance moves and picking out those that I think can be effectively represented through imitations of pre-cinema animation devices. I then visualised them to consider how they could work in a sequence that would look like a natural progression of dance, essentially choreographing the whole thing. As I don't know much about dance this was rather difficult, but my research helped and eventually I settled on the storyboard below:

Final Storyboard

With this storyboard and my previous design as reference I was able to design all my components. Having formulated my final idea I realised it was too complex to design the final garment before making all the components as I am not entirely sure how it is going to turn out. As it is, it looks like my final garment will be a kind of patchwork dress. If I had quite a lot more time it would be nice to create mock-ups and plan in great detail so perhaps I could make a garment with more structure. However, as it is I am still happy with my idea and hope to make up for lack of construction techniques in surface design and detail. I have ended up with a total of 18 different motifs, nine different device designs and six different making techniques:

Appliqué Thaumatrope Onto Point

Fabric Paint Magic Lantern Slide Plie

Digital Print Zoetrope Reel Port de Bras

Digital Print Anaglyph (to be scanned in and edited for 3D effect) 4th en Pointe

Machine Stitching Flip Book Spin

Fabric Paint Flip Book Arabesque

Digital Print Phenakistoscope Arabesque Spin

Hand Embroidery Stereoscope Back Pose

Free-Hand Embroidery Camera Obscura Fan Kick

Hand Embroidery Flip Book Jump

Fabric Paint Stereoscope Combre

Fabric Paint Magic Lantern Slide Spin

Digital Print Phenakistoscope Jete 

Fabric Paint and Machine Embroidery Camera Obscura Jump

Fabric Paint Magic Lantern Slide Landing

Digital Print Anaglyph Pas de Deux

Free-Hand Embroidery Zoetrope Reel Top Body Spin

Digital Print Film End Screen Kneel

I thought about different techniques n my designs, deciding what move would look best as single motifs or sequences etc. Altogether there was almost an overwhelming amount to think about but I managed and I decided to finish with an end screen from old movies to bring together the idea of a narrative having just being witnessed in the form of 'Pre-Cinema' animation. I am very happy with my designs and can only hope they'll translate well onto fabric. My peers and tutors also were positive in their feedback, saying that my designs work well as a sequence. However, some still find it difficult to picture how my work can be made into a garment and I guess my only course of action is too make it all to see how it turns out. I have been advised not to undertake quite so many, as 18 different slides is a big undertaking. Though I am worried about how time consuming it will be to make all of these I feel dedicated and feel the outcome will be work better with a wider range, therefore have chosen to continue with my designs as planned.