tHis Is
GEORGE
Stories
anD hIs
George, is a visual storyteller.
And he is weird
George loves stories. Stories with unexpected twists. Stories with magic and wonders. For him, stories are comfort he seeks, lessons he learns, and the elixir he uses to save a dying conversation. He uses graphics, animation, and things that you see to tell a story. You wouldn't recognize his works by the art styles because he is always trying something new. We recognize his works by how he tells a story, imaginative with a sense of humor.
George often finds inspiration in life. With his strong associative thinking skill and keen observation, he can create something imaginary but you can somehow relate to. He would always wonder "what would happen if things went a different way?". And that, my friend, is why people usually tell him "man, you're weird.". But to be honest, we can all use something "weird" to escape from reality, right?
What makes me fell in love with animation in the first place is the ability to bring pure imagination to life. I especially love giving inanimate objects a voice and personality for I've always wondered what they would be like as a real person.
What kind of story they would be telling?
ONCE UPON A TIME...
I once had a question. "What if all the fairytales happened in the same universe but were just told separately?" Therefore I started the story with a simple concept - interactions between characters from different fairy tales. Only this time, they all had something in common, a similar experience.
Upon further investigation, I found out that a wolf has often been used as a symbol of evil in many fairy tales. So I put all the characters who have encountered a wolf in their story on the same stage. Somehow, they were forced to face their worst fear once again. It was really exciting to see how the story would go.
My Once Upone A Time
Graduation Project / Jun 2012
Animation / Illustration / Storyboard Character Design / Narrative
Creative Direction
Like it was implied in the title, this was my "once upon a time", my interpretation of classic fairytales. I intended to look at these well-known stories in a more realistic perspective. For example, the Big Bad Wolf did many things that we would consider as felonies in real-life. So I drew several mugshots to implied that he was arrested for different crimes he committed. This approach could also help the audience to connect the past of the characters with the wolf entertainingly. The portraits of the four classic fairy tales at the opening were their iconic moments that I thought could best represent each story. Of course, I also added a little interpretation of my own at these portraits. There is no way that the only maid of a mansion could still be pretty after a day of housework plus a midnight party.
Choosing Statues as the game being played in the story was intentional. Because I found the similarity between Statues and the principle of traditional animation. When you turned your head to see other players, they are static, much like a single frame in an animation. In a way, turning our head frequently to see the progress of people marching towards us is very similar to animation producing the illusion of motion from a rapid succession of static pictures. I have always admired the production process of traditional animation. Unfortunately, due to the lack of training, I couldn't create this animation traditionally in a limited time. The least I could do was to adopt this frame-by-frame principle as part of my animation. You can see the result in the animation where Liar was running towards Piggy at the end of the game.
poster design
Character Design
All of the characters' personalities are based on the original fairy tales with some alteration based on my imagination of how their encounters with wolf changed them. The interesting part of these character designs is to think beyond the parts we've been told as a child. What's going on after the big "Happily Ever After"? Is that all?
Take Freaky the Goat for example. Freaky is the youngest goat of his siblings from The Wolf and The Seven Kids. He is a little bit jumpy and he suffers from serious PTSD. It's understandable given the fact that he witnessed his siblings being devoured by the intruder right in front of him as a kid. To emphasize his psychotic condition, I added dark circles under his eyes.
early concept of Freaky
During this project, I have learned that storyboarding was a crucial process of animation production. It helped me organize the sequence of events and provide an overview of how visual elements work in conjunction. It also minimized the construction of unnecessary scene components.
When it comes to fairy tales, the word "bedtime story" immediately came to my mind. Therefore, before I imported all the graphical components into After Effects, I made a recording of the narrative myself. To make it more like I was actually there telling the story to the audience, I talked to the audience from time to time and made some comments on the current situation. It is very important to do the recording before moving on to the animation process so that the facial expression and the gestures of the characters will be more lifelike by synchronizing the narrative and the motions.
Production
storyboard at the early stage
YOU BETTER WATCH OUT...
Since 2011, I started to draw my own Christmas card every year. In 2014, I decided to make a difference. Instead of a static picture, how about an animated Christmas card instead?
While I was thinking about the plot and storyline on my way home after work, I found myself being annoyed by phubbers again. Suddenly, an idea popped up in my mind. Over the past few years, text driving has become one of the main reasons for traffic accidents. During Christmas holidays, there must be tons of people driving a long way back home. Therefore, I decided to implant a message in this video, to say Merry Christmas as well as telling them how dangerous text-driving is. Once I made this decision, the story started to show itself in my head piece by piece. Question, who always drives around during Christmas? Santa!! Thanks to technology, now he has something to do with the annual delivery. Is it a good thing though? Let's check it out.
Santa Crash
Christmas greeting video / Jan 2015
Animation / Illustration / Sctipt
Character Design
My initial goal is to create a playful atmosphere by mixing real-life phenomena into a fictional environment while delivering a message.
Making Santa do texting while driving was a perfect coincidence. For it not only provided an imaginative and logical explanation to the question "how does Santa pass the time during his long journey, but also indicated that there is always a dire consequence of texting while driving. In this case, the consequence is quite a catastrophe. There will be no gift this Christmas!
The additional purpose of this animation was to indicate the problem of texting while driving/walking in real-life. Therefore I designed the visual elements based on the existing objects that we are all familiar with in real-life. With this method, I hope that my implication is straightforward to the audience.
Creative Direction
the design of notification system on Santa's tablet was based on the system of iOS which had become one of the popular operating systems of smart devices.
UI and graphic design of Christmas Crush
Design of Christmas Crush
By 2014, Candy Crush Saga was the most successful and popular mobile game in the world, even my mother was addicted to it. Therefore, when it came to designing a fictional game that made Santa entirely hooked on, Candy Crush was the obvious role model.
The most interesting part of this production is to design the made-up game-Christmas Crush, especially its UI design. I had never been involved in a game development before but it was something that I was highly interested in. Though I didn't really design the whole system but merely simulated its performance with animation techniques, it still required some keen observation and attentive calculation. I spent quite some time calculating how many bricks would disappear, the chain-reaction they brought and the acceleration of their fall. Time-consuming though, the process was fun and also made me respect the engineer behind each game.
One of the experimental techniques I tried in this production is the multiplane camera. When the camera zoomed out from the house to the entire field, I wanted to create a realistic sense of three-dimensional depth in a 2D setting. It was a technique I observed from various Disney films, such as the opening of The Beauty and The Beast. The principle was the same but I used a digital camera instead. The tricky part of this technique is to extend the edge of each visual component as much as possible in case of unwanted gaps appearing during the movement of the camera. The arrangement of the positions of each component on the X-axis was relatively important as well.
Multiplane Camera
background setting from 360° view
3D Rendering
In order to create an accurate perspective, I built a 3D model of the bedroom of the opening scene in Maya. After rendering pictures out in B/W, I imported them in Illustrator for coloring. In this way, I have a more accurate perspective as well as the control of color and light. This method works better when you don't have much camera movement.
NO WORRIES, I'M HERE
Our studio was approached by iWEECARE who wished to make two explainer animations about their product-Temp Pal, a smart thermometer patch. The real challenge was not creating an animation. It was to identify the connection between the product and the target audience and then sell the product with a story.
iWEECARE - TEMP PAL SERIES
Commissioned Project / JUL 2017
Animation / Storyboard / Script
Creative Direction
To find a connection between the product and the target audience, I had to understand both of them first. Take the first video for example. The target audience was women planning for pregnancy. I found out that in order to know the precise moment of the beginning of ovulation period, you had to wake up early in the morning to take a 5-minute temperature measurement. Imagine doing that for one to two months continuously. That was the problems I identified and the problem that the product could solve, hence the connection.
Once I found the connection, I could then develop a story based on that connection. The strategy of the storytelling was to point out the problem at the very beginning to catch the attention of the potential customer, creating a resonation. Then we introduced the product to the audience with its pros to keep their attention. Lastly, in an attempt to seal the deal, I showed them how their situation could be improved with the product.
Strategy and Storytelling
storyboard of iWEECARE Baby
early narrative demo for Mom episode
iWEECARE hoped to design a character based on the product. Since the product was too tiny to be aware of its existence and it was also attached to our body, monitoring our temperature all the time, the concept of a guardian angel began to form, As a result, Temp Pal was created. I set Temp Pal as the narrator of the whole videos and made interaction with the audience from time to time. My favorite part was when the camera zoomed in on the cradle in a way like an audience was marching towards it, Temp Pal stopped the audience and the movement of the camera became like tip toeing. Through this style, it was more friendly and intimate as well as adding playfulness into the story.
Like most of the animation with narrative, I made the recording before the animating process. To ensure the voice actress delivers the personality and emotion I desired, I made a demo recording in advance. This was also a critical procedure to make sure the length and the tempo of the narrative meet the client's expectation so we could get the green light for the official recording.
Creative Direction
Visual Design
iWEECARE set the primary market in Japan and northern Europe. After further research, the graphic designer and I agreed that the art style should be clean and simple to fit in both Japanese and Nordic market. And because this is a product for women and babies, we wished to establish a warm and harmonious atmosphere. Therefore we created a style with simple graphics outlines while highlighted the details with mid-saturated colors. The overall success was that the viewer can comprehend the message that we sent in a relaxing mood.
color scheme for iWEECARE series
Summing Concert
Commissioned Project / AUG 2016
Animation / Creative Direction
Our studio was approached by Suming's team who wished to make an animation poster for his concert. Thrilled to be able to get into the backstage of a stage afterward, I suddenly realized a problem. The only material they offered, is a poster.
WE DANCE AND WE SING
With limited material, I still saw the potential in this poster and the playfulness its animated version could bring. After Suming's team explained to me that the pile of paper sheet were the postcards that the fan sent and was very meaningful to him, I immediately had a vision in mind that this pile of paper pouring into Suming's house. That was the moment I decided to make this a stop-motion animation.
I asked his team if they still saved the photos that weren't selected after the photo shoot. They did. Therefore, I rearranged the photos according to their poses and facial expression so I could place them in sequence to create a plausible motion. With the help of our own photographer, I also recreated the scene of postcards pouring in. The client and I were both very satisfied with the final result. Not only it presented the original idea of the poster design but also matched Suming's playful personality. I felt blessed when I saw fans' positive reaction at the concert and I was glad that I didn't give it up at the beginning.
Creative Approach
the two key ingredients that breathed life into this project
The motivations of my illustrations are mostly epiphany in life. It is that moment of realization that drives me into countless creation. And because these artworks are all somehow related to my life,
I can always draw with a big smile on my face.
Silent Night was the Christmas card I designed in 2013. I am deeply inspired by Alphonse Mucha and his decorative art style ever since I first saw his works. The meticulous attention to detail and the well-orchestrated composition of symbolic graphics are what I admire the most about his works. The other reason is that the characters he designed are always so elegant and peaceful. That's why I wanted to adopt his art style to this year's Christmas card. I wanted Mary and Baby Jesus to radiate the same grace and peace in the picture. To match Mucha's style, I gathered all the elements that are relative to both biblical and modern Christmas. It was a great practice to visualize the elements and compose them into a harmonious layout. I was very satisfied with the result. I hoped when people see this picture, it would remind them the original meaning of Christmas.
A new hope for peace.
Silent Night
DEC 2013
more stories awaits