Cosmic Clash
What happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object?
Role:
Writer / Director / Editor / Compositor/ Sound Design
How it started
A few artistic friends and I wanted to see if we could actually produce a narrative animated short film.
Development
Believe it or not, Cosmic Clash was originally scripted with a lot more characters and dialogue. The film started off incredibly ambitiously, but we had to cut a lot out for development time considering we were all full-time college students. For our team’s first animated production, it was best to simplify the film to the core idea: what happens when an unstoppable force strikes an immovable object?
So with simplicity in mind, I spent a couple of weeks developing the animatic.
During development, I had a large wake-up call: when making animation, you have to make everything. Yes, of course. That’s quite obvious. But you realize the extent of the sentiment once you’re making an animated film. How will it look? How will it move? There were a million stylistic choices to make and I didn’t originally realize how much experimentation was involved. Animated films need time to explore.
Animation Tests
Finding the right look for Cosmic Clash took several passes. This, a more atmospheric version of space complete with anthropomorphic planets, was one of many versions exported.
Final Animation
Although not all of the original ideas were used, many of the styles and looks in the animation tests contributed to the final composite.
The Force went through a several design iterations, taking inspiration from several objects and animals.
An amateur sound designer’s nightmare
Another particularly difficult part in making the film was the sound design. Not only did Cosmic Clash need sound implemented completely from scratch, but the story was set in the vacuum of space. Technically there is no sound in space, but no one wants to listen to vacuum. On one hand, that gave me, the sound designer, a lot of freedom. On the other hand, it created a lot of headache for I am not a sound designer by trade.
Cosmic Clash proved to be quite an amazing experience to work on and learn from. I’m glad I got a chance to work with incredibly talented artists and try some new filmmaking techniques. I can’t wait to produce more animated projects in the future.
