Totem - An Animated Short
Totem was created as my senior thesis at RIngling College of Art and Design. The film took two years to make, starting with a 3 month pre-production that included pitching and developing several other potential thesis ideas. Once Totem was decided to be the pitch to bring into fruition, I spent the next 19 months carrying it through the CG pipeline: modeling and texturing my designs, rigging characters, laying out storyboards, character animation, lighting the scenes, rendering everything out and compositing and editing into the final film. Check it out below!
With my new story in mind, I drew this image to pitch the idea for a two-minute film to my faculty.
During this pre-production phase, I went on to research the artifacts, style, and environment of various Pacific Northwestern tribes, while discovering the look of my characters and the environment of my film. Scroll through to see exploratory designs and the final orthographic images I created to help in the modeling phase.
