Visual Diary: Character Development

Since the main character is suppose to be an ambiguous figure, finding a character online was going to be relatively simple. I went straight to my favorite site for fully rigged characters - www.animationbuffet.com.

I looked for a generic human male figure. I found this some what scary looking androgynous character - http://animationbuffet.blogspot.com.au/2008/07/rudy.html

The starting base for the Rokk Mann character

I'm not sure who created it, so I can't credit the person. But the original file can be found here.

So Rokk Mann will look like a rock - rough and jagged... not an androgynous figure with human skin. He will also look a little more asymmetrical, having distorted limbs and head. I will also add some seams as observed with the rocks around the shoot location.

Rocks around the shoot location showing seams through the rocks. This would have been formed from the volcanic activity in this region a while back.

Also, some elements will have to be added to help with the small story plots that progress over the 30sec film. For example, a limb, or at most 2, will be dismembered during the short. I am inspired by renaissance sculptures especially Michelangelo's, and how their limbs are never finished, mostly cut off below the shoulder, or legs buried in the marble (unfinished).

Unfinished sculpture by Michelangelo. It look like it's emerging from the rock.

Venus de Milo. It looks like it suppose to be armless considering the cleanliness of the stump, but it's assembly was never found and complete.

Torso Belvedere by Apollonios son of Nestor. One of my favorite sculptures. "Legend has it that Pope Julius II requested that Michelangelo complete the statue fragment with arms, legs and a face. He respectfully declined, stating that it was too beautiful to be altered, and instead used it as the inspiration for the majority of the figures in the Sistine Chapel..." wikipedia.

Inspired by the great sculptures of the past, Rokk Mann will emerge from the rock and, from the brittle rock, sustain a severed limb, which will be his demise.

Within the thirty seconds of footage I will try and weave a small narrative through the movements of Rokk Man. There will be 2 main phrases, firstly the birth and rise of the young, impatient Rokk Mann. Youth, impatience and his fierce attempts to exit the rock will be his down fall. He will sustain a severed limb while attempting to stand.
With the injury, we move into the second phrase, which will coincide with the afternoon and setting sun. Rokk Mann cannot stand any longer and as the sunsets so he does back to the rock from where he came.