Major Submission Post | Major

 

Pugwash and the Young Adventurer

When approaching the subject of what I wanted my major project to be, I wanted something very personal to my own experiences, and something that would take me down an entirely different path to the other projects we had previously completed. I felt that it also needed to give me an outcome that was directed towards the career path that I intend to pursue after graduation. I am interested in projection mapping and bring animation into 3D and performance spaces, to break the barrier between animation and the ‘real’ world. This led me to wanting to produce a more experimental film that forced me to learn new methods of producing animation, outside of the standard 3D pipeline we are taught throughout our three years on the course. As a self-directed project, this seemed like the perfect opportunity to discover something new. 

After exploring a number of different narratives and concepts, one particular story or memory presented itself. Some parts of what happened I couldn’t quite remember, and some parts were definitely misremembered, but it was easily the most visual of all my memories, and the one I could have the most experimental fun with. 

The day I met Captain Pugwash

"Many people have an inspiring story that led them to animation. I think mine is one of the more topsy  turvy paths. Thinking back, my first experience of animation , outside of watching movies or TV, was a chance meeting with a truly incredible man, who created amazing adventures and wonderful worlds from his own garden shed.

The gentleman I met was John Ryan, the creator of Captain Pugwash.

I was about 5 years old. I was at a business meeting/party with my mum in a big fancy hotel. I remember feeling incredibly small and unimportant compared to all the tall, well dressed men. They were all drinking posh alcohol (I think it was port), and smoking large cigars. To me, from my tiny young point of view, they looked like giant mythical creatures of great knowledge. All of these creatures were bustling around, shaking hands and making booming, raucous chuckles. I felt very out of place but was also delighted by how busy and fine everything was.

Clinging to my mum’s hand, I was introduced to a blur of faces, all with posh names and large stomachs. I was getting tired and a bit overwhelmed so I was found a table with a large chair and a colouring book to keep me occupied quite happily for a while, completely oblivious of the world around me. I remember finding the chair quite amusing as it was a lot bigger than I was, and I couldn’t get in or off on my own. The ground felt like it was a million miles away.

I don’t know why, but for some reason I looked up, to see a gentleman with a friendly face looking at me. He smiled and went back to scribbling on the piece of paper in his hand. I guessed that he was writing some important notes from the meeting. I went back to my colouring book for a good while. As the evening went on, I told my mum about the man and she told me who he was.

He was a famous animator of a much loved cartoon.

I was taken over to meet the man. I learnt that his name was John and he asked me what I had so carefully been doing at the table, and I showed him my colouring. He said he was very impressed. I asked if I could see what he had been drawing, after taking a quick glance at his bit of paper. He made me close my eyes and when I opened them, in front of me was a charming caricature of me, ringlets, freckles and all. I was blown away. He said he wanted to give it to me as a present. He got a fresh piece of paper and drew me a very cheerful Captain Pugwash, addressed it to me and signed it, then handed it to me along with my portrait.

He said he was going to have to leave soon as “he was getting old you know” but that he was so happy to have met me, and that I made his night.

I think I could say he made my life that night."

This memory sparked an interest and a world of pirates and imaginative adventures in my mind, and I loved the idea of telling the fairly unique story, of what I guess could be called my origin story as an animator. 

As well as simply learning some new techniques. I also wanted to text and expand the way my brain thinks inside animation arts programs, finding the quickest and most efficient ways of doing things. 

My goals for “Pugwash and the Young Adventurer” were to create a new animation that was not trying to recreate the Pugwash episodes in any way, but with respect and understanding, use it to tell the story of myself meeting Pugwash’s creator John Ryan, and the influence he had on me as a young child, and the way that this has shaped my life. Of course, as Pugwash is an established and owned character, it would have been unacceptable to use any of the parts of the Pugwash intellectual property, so before even considering using this concept, I had to gain permission from John Ryan’s relatives. I found contact details for his daughter Isabel through an old exhibition page, and she quickly replied and invited me to meet her and discuss the short film at an exhibition based on her late father’s work in King’s College London. It was amazing to meet her and see some of the original cardboard and paper puppets used to film the original series, as well as the huge range of John Ryan’s other work in the show. Isabel was amazing and gave me permission to go ahead, as well as sending me a large number of photographs to inspire me and to use as reference. 

Knowing that I was working with someone else’s idea and legacy put a lot more pressure on the project. This meant completely respecting John Ryan’s legacy. I decided to keep the animation cutesy but informative and made sure that it comes across easily to the audience just how inspirational John Ryan was to me. I also wanted to make sure the film overall had a storybook or children’s tale feel to it. 

In terms of exactly what I wanted to produce, my main focus was on ensuring that whatever I produced respected the original Pugwash style and ethos, while applying modern technology, methodology and mixed media process to my own project. This presented itself in the form of a 2.5D short film; creating 2D characters in Maya and placing them into a mixture of 2D and 3D environments and props, in order to create a world that was cohesive but combined a number of techniques, both established in my toolkit, and new ones. I was less focused on the length of the film than the success of the world building and multimedia methods used in the film.

Premise submission: Premise Crit Post

(Please note, no Minor submission as I elected to take the Extended Dissertation module instead)