Summer Holidays

Hello all and happy summer holidays! I've been looking back on the year this week and thought I'd share some things with you. Thing number one; I found this photo of me from the day I finished animating. Take a look at tired-but-happy me with my stack of frames!

So tired, but so happy!

Thing number two; the lovely Bethan has posted some more of the backgrounds she coloured for me. Check them out here!

Thing number three; a production test for which I used AfterEffects for the first time ever! A big shout-out to Amber (one of the lovely third years) who helped me work out how AfterEffects works!

Production Test from Julia Young on Vimeo.

Thing number four that I should have mentioned a while ago; I went to see 'The Wind Rises' in London before its official release and my review of it has been published on Skwigly. 

I Tawt I Taw a Tweety Bird

Once again, I apologise for the title - I just couldn't resist! You've seen enough mouse sketches and tests to be forgiven for thinking that the mouse is the only character in the film, but he's not! Enter cuckoo:

Cuckoo Entrance from Julia Young on Vimeo.

Bringing it Together

Another animation test. It's the first piece of animation I've ever done that involves a camera move and so I put together the animation and background in Premiere to make sure that it actually works!

Composite Test from Julia Young on Vimeo.

The End of Second Year!

Hello all and welcome to the end of second year! I have handed in my final film, gone on holiday to Ireland with my lovely big brother, been nominated for a Glammie Award and written another article for Skwigly. All-in-all, it's been a seriously jam-packed few weeks!

Before I finally unveil to you my finished film, 'A Midnight Tale', just a quick word about the other bits. Here you can find the latest article I've written for Skwigly. It's about the Brian Boru exhibition at Trinity College Dublin, illustrated by Cartoon Saloon. It's a great exhibition and if you have a minute have a look at the article! I had a great time in Ireland and here are just two of my sketches from the trip for your enjoyment.

A few faces of fellow passengers on our eight-hour
ferry trip from Liverpool to Dublin. Pencil.

Sketch of two little islands of the coast of Howth. They were covered in
birds! Ballpoint and brush pen with some blue coloured pencil.

The next thing I mentioned was that I was nominated for a Glammie Award. For those of you who don't know, the Glammies is the annual showcase/awards show for animation from the University of South Wales (formerly the University of Glamorgan) and this year was its twentieth anniversary. I was nominated in the category 'Best 2D Animation' and, once the site is up, I will post a link to the page where you'll be able to see all the nominated and winning pieces from the Glammies. The show went really well and I met some lovely people at the networking event afterwards; all in all it was a great day!

Now, without further ado, here is my final film. I hope you enjoy it!

A Midnight Tale from Julia Young on Vimeo.

I would like to thank again all those who I've mentioned in my credits and special thanks and give you links to those who have work online because you really need to check them out!

Daniel Lewis - Soundtrack

Tad Davies - Run Cycle Animation

Bethan Davies - Backgrounds

My incredible tutors:

Nikki Marlborough - Darren Fereday - Brian Fagance

My wonderful housemates:

Georgia Dutton - David Holland - Amy Little - Lucy Morgan

My ever-awesome coursemates:

Saeed Ahmed - Josh Cranton - Hugh Parry - James Stafford

Backgrounds and Collaboration

As some of you may remember from posts past, I have the good fortune to have a wonderful friend and part-time collaborator called Beth. She kindly agreed to take on the task of colouring some of my film backgrounds and now I'm posting them here for you all to see! She took my sketches and made them into something beautiful!

In style, I want to give the film a storybook/fairytale quality and Beth, being of the concept-art-strand of my course and up for the challenge, really delivered!