Original Idea:
The original idea I proposed in tutorial is about the hypocrisy of parenting. I thought of arranging the frames in a circular form, and having the thought bubble in the last scene link to the first two scenes. I wanted to portray the vicious cycle of bad parenting in the original narrative.
There were concerns about it being cliche. Other comments included exploring space and frames, and how different colour palettes contribute to different moods.
Over the weekend, I decided to revamp my story into a more subtle one.
Final Idea:
I wanted to highlight the stresses of society. Initially, I attempted to create an easily discernible narrative, by starting off with the recent news about the suicide of an 11-year-old boy due to his poor grades.
I then decided to go with the more subtle route, basing my narrative of poems and metaphors. The first step I took was to create a storyboard to plan my narrative.
After that, I decided that a booklet would be a better medium for my narrative, I wanted the medium to parallel part of the narrative which included books.
Here, I also changed the first establishing scene from the original 'drowning in homework' scene to a 'lecture hall' scene in order to portray the idea that everyone has a toad (symbol of something that holds one back) in them. In the original storyboard, I wanted to depict the slow downfall of the individual by making him/her more hunched-back as the days pass. However, I figured that putting all the "stressful" elements onto the same page would be more effective in portraying the overwhelming nature of the stress.
Here, I made a prototype of the booklet to see how the individual scenes would look. In the second scene, the main character is actually reading a motivational book about chasing dreams. I had wanted to mimic the act of flipping the pages of the book by drawing those pages onto the booklet.
Below are the final illustrations I ended up with. They are greatly shortened from the original storyboard so that the narrative would be as succinct as possible, and yet still be able to tell the story.
I also changed the second scene to try to portray the character from a top-down angle to make her look powerless. By using a top-down angle, the spread of assignments and the book she is reading can be seen more clearly.
I then removed the frame of the main storybook as,for one, I thought it would be more visually appealing. The two pages were placed in frames to mimic the pages. By arrangement this page this way, I had intended to inform viewers that the two pages were part of the storybook.
Arrangement Drafts
I decided on the green font to match the green toad motif that was present throughout narrative. The font was also changed numerous times (based on feedback from friends) in order to improve readability.
I decided to put the pages side by side as that created a better flow.
Finally, I decided to have two green pages before the end instead of just one as having two better shows how the main character is "consumed" by the toad, rather than being abruptly disrupted by the text.
The choice of dull and unsaturated colours contribute to the depressing mood of the narrative. Although unsaturated and more pastel-like, orange and blue are still complementary colours on the colour wheel. Using complementary colours make the narrative sequence more visually appealing. I experimented with different complementary colours before I decided on blue and orange. Reason being, orange and blue are the colours of National University of Singapore (NUS), top Asian university, and one of the main causes of tremendous stress.
The structured frames mimic the rigidity and unforgiving nature of society where individuals are trapped in. When one is thinking of defying one’s toad, the frame disappears. Only within the clutches of one’s toad, the frame reappears. The futility of the fight is wholly represented in the final green pages, where one is being "consumed" by the toad.
Physical Copy
I decided to print my narrative sequence on drawing block paper as it is thicker and more substantial. Arranging the pages in the right order on powerpoint before printing was very hard for me as I have never done it before, resulting in a lot of failed attempts.
The Right Order
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