Terraverde ends!!!

So, we just finished handing in our final assignments. And between you and me, I'm glad to be done.

My teammates were a dream to work with. Well, the procrastination could have been lesser, but then again I'm just as guilty on that. I do love how everyone has their own strengths. I was better at words, so I did most of the writing and presenting. Maisha was our organizer and also took up the Sketchup parts, and lynz did the final touches on the report, combining and printing. And the rest of the work was divided up equally among the rest. Everyone took part and participated (Except for Terri who kinda just disappeared in the middle of everything. Not cool.)

I think I'm very proud of my team. We did a good job, considering the amount of procrastination that went into these projects.

I think the idea of Terraverde really developed as we went into the details of the microsite, the event day, and the merchandise. Here's what we have up on our discussion wall on facebook.

Lets start from the beginning.

So these are the backgrounds that I made for the microsite. We wanted each page to have different backgrounds. So, I had to make a few.

This one is just a simple forest background with a tree stump. I got the face off of the internet and put it in the tree. Blue flowers and mushrooms are also edited and put in.

This one is my favorite. I just got a picture with a close up of mushrooms and edited and painted on it. They look like magic mushrooms!

I really like the rays of sunlight streaming from between the leaves. 

This one was tricky because of the dark foreground. It made the fairy lights look less natural. Not that fairies are a naturally occurring phenomenon. 

Now, for the merchandising, I made only two. But I tried to compensate with my charismatic charms during presentation. Hahahahahaa.... (yeah right)

This is a pen drive, shaped like Etta's sword. Minimal editing on this one. I just changed the colors of the rhinestones and smoothed out one side of the sword to put the logo.

These are pendants. Our target audience is mostly female, and we girls have a fondness of personalization on our jewelry. It makes us feel special and what not. 

For the event, I was in charge of the function of the booths and what goes inside them. So I made signs and such. The event was based on a festival in the movie, Midsummer's eve festival which is also an ancient festival during medical times to celebrate the summer solstice. Read about it here.

These are Booth signs. Hung on the side of the poles.

This is for the costume and photo booth.

Gaming centre and merchandising for games.

Merchandise.. duh.

This is the food booth, where we have a selection of delectable pies!

Here, we have gaming stations for the contest and for just gaming. 

This is where the photo booth is. Also a wide selection of costumes.

Merchandise booth selling all of our stuff we made last time. Also, lucky draw contests to win merchandise!!

Delicious medieval themed pies!! Actual medieval recipes! And apple cider served in a viking mug :P

Well, it has come to an end. That was fun though. The storyline could be better, but I'm not that good at making plots. Loved the details of this movie though. I could see myself falling in love with it <3 <3

Teaser Poster!!

Just wanted to share with y'all the completed teaser poster and Design Proposal. The proposal I had updated with the revised story. This isn't the same one I handed in with the poster :/

These pixies are trippy! <3 them! Notice the dragon between the trees ;)

Blah.. Probably can't read it :( 

Here:

Plot

Etta Mars is an orphan who was raised in an orphanage since before she can even remember. When she turns 18 she’s entitled to her parents’ inheritance, and she finds out that her parents have left her a house in this town in the middle of nowhere. So, once she moves into the house, she finds a cellar door hidden behind a bush. When she opens the door, she’s pulled into the doorway by a force and she finds herself in a beautiful forest full of magical creatures. As she explores the forest, she meets a unicorn steed by the name of Acorn.

Acorn then tells her about the kingdom and about the King and Queen. The King and Queen were cherished and respected for decades, ruling the kingdom of Terraverde. Then, one day, 17 years ago, an evil Dragon Witch killed the king and queen. Upon realizing the threat of danger, the queen’s right hand maiden and closeted sorceress, Willow, took their one-year-old baby, Princess Etta and cast her out into the real world and away from the evil clutches of the Dragon Witch. The Dragon Witch continues to destroy the kingdom under her rule, letting evil magic and creatures from the dark forest to occupy most of the magical green terrain of the kingdom. Little does she know that Princess Etta still lives on and is destined to fight for the throne as the rightful heir.

Etta realizes that the Princess he talks of is herself. She’s never known anything about her parents, aside from what the old house holds. At first she doesn’t believe the unicorn. As if the unicorn has gotten her mixed up with someone else. But as she spends more time in Terraverde, she starts having dreams of her parents. And it all seems just too real. As if the dreams were from her distant memories. She realizes it is her duty as a princess to fight the Dragon Witch, reclaim her place as the rightful heir to the throne and release the kingdom from the cruel tyranny.

The movie will portray her struggles in fighting the Dragon Witch before finally claiming victory and restoring the kingdom of Terraverde to it’s former glory.

Genre:

Fantasy with a touch of horror.

Design Hook: 

An enchanted forest with hidden magical creatures and floating luminescentfairy lights in the background.

Visual Concept:

I wanted to do a very magical yet eerie look on this poster. I chose a picture of a young Caucasian woman in draped in a white hood, with very harsh dramatic lighting from above, illuminating most of her face. Then I used an image of a dark forest on a foggy morning with nice soft light and lots of talls tree trunks. I put in an overlay of white mist to make it look more mysterious and creepy. Then, I different images of magical creatures such as a white ghostly sorceress, a unicorn and a dragon and implemented them into the background. To add to the magical effect, I dotted in little small white specks and added a slight bright yellow outer glow to make them look luminescent and bright. Then I also hid unidentified silhouettes in the distance to show presence of other creatures. I intended to make the poster look like a fairy-tale magical forest, and I believe the luminescent fairy lights in the dark forest really captures that.

Updated story!

So, after much consideration and discussion with a variety of people (one including the voice in my head), I've revised the story a bit to give a movie-like quality. Movies are so complicated nowadays.

So, Etta Mars is an orphan who was raised in an orphanage since before she can even remember. When she turns 18 she's entitled to her parents' inheritance, and she finds out that her parents have left her a house in this town in the middle of nowhere. So, once she moves into the house, she finds a cellar door hidden behind a bush. When she opens the door, she's pulled into the doorway by a force and she finds herself in a beautiful forest full of magical creatures. As she explores the forest, she meets a unicorn steed by the name Acorn.

Acorn then tells her about the kingdom and about the King and Queen. The King and Queen were cherished and respected for decades, ruling the kingdom of Terraverde. Then, one day, 17 years ago, an evil Dragon Witch killed the king and queen. Upon realizing the threat of danger, the queen's right hand maiden and closeted sorceress, Willow, took their one-year-old baby, Princess Etta and cast her out into the real world and away from the evil clutches of the Dragon Witch. The Dragon Witch continues to destroy the kingdom under her rule, letting evil magic and creatures from the dark forest to occupy most of the magical green terrain of the kingdom. Little does she know that Princess Etta still lives on and is destined to fight for the throne as the rightful heir.

Etta realizes that the Princess he talks of is herself. She's never known anything about her parents, aside from what the old house holds. At first she doesn't believe the unicorn. As if the unicorn has gotten her mixed up with someone else. But as she spends more time in Terraverde, she starts having dreams of her parents. And it all seems just too real. As if the dreams were from her distant memories. She realizes it is her duty as a princess to fight the Dragon Witch, reclaim her place as the rightful heir to the throne and release the kingdom from the cruel tyranny.

The movie will portray her struggles in fighting the Dragon Witch before finally claiming victory and restoring the kingdom of Terraverde to it's former glory.

Wow.. I could probably make a cool TV series about this story. Very Merlin meets Alice in Wonderland.

I have some developments on sketches.

Please excuse the goofy drawings. I haven't done this in a while.

Hmm.. she looks very Eastern European in this. But you get the point!

I'm still thinking about the costume design. I'm indecisive about either having her in modern clothes or cute renaissance fair clothes. (I mean medieval of course!)

This is a doodle of the old house. And some ideas on the games :)

This is a mood board to give y'all a feel of the movie: Terraverde (http://pinterest.com/saraaznan/inspirasi/)

You tease!!

So, for our first assignment, we would have to come up with a single story idea that will be translated into multiple platforms. Meaning that this one story will be used to make different medias, like a movie, or website, or a video game.

Due by Week 4 is our Teaser poster. The poster should be something that gives the audience a little taste of what is to come. Not necessarily giving a clear idea of what the movie is entirely about, but just enough to get people interested to watch the movie. IT IS THE POWER OF ANTICIPATION!!!!!

So basically, I wanted to do a really creepy, magical story with a young woman as the protagonist. Her name...... is Etta. (You know, like Etta James. Etta is the name of a bank robber back in the old western days. I wanted to use a very strong female character in this so I had to use a strong name) In this story, she is a normal young woman, caucasian, aged early to mid twenties, and she is a writer, so she spends most of her time by herself (hence why there is no one else with her because she lives by herself). She moves from a new town and into this suburban area and moves into a big house with a  creepy cellar door. As she is discovering this new house, she opens the cellar door and gets sucked into another dimension!!!!

Let me paint you a picture of what this place looks like. Think medieval times, witches, warlocks, unicorns, goblins, scary monsters, creepy dark forests. It is basically an old fashion kingdom, riddled with magical creatures and sorcerers. Imagine  the TV series Merlin, if King Arthur ever accepted Merlin's magical powers and all of his kind openly and let them use magic but the evil sorcerers started to conquer Camelot and everything was covered in this misty evil that clouds the entire kingdom.

So yeah, that's what this other dimension looks like. And Etta is basically trapped in this world, and she doesn't really know how to get out. Because portals to alternate dimensions always close up after you go through them.. duh.. And she can't find the door. So, she basically has to fight her way through all these dark creatures who are trying to suck the life out of the kingdom. 

The problem is.. I'm not sure how to end this story. The teaser poster will be set in this magical dimension evil forest place... I also need to find a name for the alternate dimension.. But in this version below, you can see my ideas kinda trying to find its way. Basically, its a twist on Wizard of Oz and Snow white. She needs to find a particular wizard/sorcerer in order to get back to where she was before. And she meets all these funny characters along the way. And in the middle of it, this huntsman who is paid to kill her falls in love with her!! JUICY!! More later!

All about Entertainment!!

Ahhh... To be entertained is like constantly occupying your mind with something. For me, it means bumming around and listening to other people's ideas. 

Entertainment design is about movies, games, music, TV, theme parks, and so much more. 

First of all, I didn't know the Jews brought Hollywood into America. That is pretty amazing. Jews are great, I tell you. It's amazing how they have actually created and sculpted Hollywood into what is it now. I guess it's not surprising, considering one of the greatest directors ever is Jewish, and he doesn't even try to hide it. Of course, I'm talking about Steven Spielberg. duh...

Aww man.. Video games are great! They have come a long way since when they first came out. My video game peak was definitely when I was in college in 2007. Well, I was dating a gamer at the time, so I guess it was more of exposure than actual interest. But yeah, my ex being the video game enthusiast himself, he was into old video games as well as new. So, I was able to compare the quality of older versions of games with the new ones. Graphics and colors are always pretty important. 

Music of course has always been a part of my life. So it's very easy to relate to.

Influences of Media

The other day, me and Eugene were having lunch at Old town at the lake, (my tummy was demanding some wantan noodles.) then le wild chick shows up and asks us if we would do a survey for her assignment. She was in Communications or something of the sort.

And in her survey were all these really deep (to me anyway) questions, most of them revolving around how much the media affects the choices you make. (social life, music, sex life, fashion) Now, I didn't really have a lot of time to ponder about those questions right then and there (mainly because the chick was hovering over my wantan noodles to get her survey back) so I just said 'maybe' to everything.

But it's really interesting though. Just how much of the choices we make in life are actually influenced by the media? By media, I'm assuming TV, radio, the internet, etc. (I doubt a lot of people my age actually read the newspaper. I read newspaper articles, but only when people post them on Facebook. Heh.) I'm guessing it all boils down to whether you're going to follow the stream or not. But now, it's considered cool if you go against what's mainstream. (Nowadays, these people are called hipsters. In case anyone didn't know. Click on this link to find out more about hipsters!) I don't consider myself a hipster. Even though I shop at thrift stores and buy second-hand clothes at bazaars, (this is partially because I'm constantly broke and I believe in recycling because I'm a hippie like that) I sport a shaggy hobo-like hair cut, (only because it takes too effing long to do my hair in the morning and also because I'm too stingy to pay someone to cut my hair. Yes, I cut my own hair. Shut up.) I occasionally wear plastic rimmed glasses, (but only because I'm partially blind and I can't wear my contacts all the time. And also because quality Ray Ban plastic rims are lighter and more durable than the metal wire ones. I step on mine a lot. And they come in all shapes and colors too!) I am currently pursuing a degree in Graphic Design, (but in my defense, I've been in the Arts stream since I was 16 long before I found out about these hipsters) I listen to indie music, (mainly because I think there are a lot of talented people out there who are being under-appreciated) and I only date guys outside my race.

Oh god. Maybe I am a hipster.

Damn it.

But still. I'm not entirely convinced it was the media that influenced me to become this way. I think it's the people I hang out with. Or used to hang out with. Forgive me, I went to community college with other left-wing liberals. I also used to date an uber-hipster for a large portion of my college life. Who was also a left-wing liberal. Huh.

Trolling like a boss!

So, me, Vandy and Eugene (Lynz would have been there but she was seduced by the sandman and getting her snooze on.) went out on a day of trolling. We were supposed to go to the zoo and give our free shrugs but it was raining. (Boooo...)

Then, we just decided to go to Timesquare and eat! We went to this awesome steamboat restaurant where we discussed how we were going to spend the day trolling random people. It was oodles and oodles of fun!