Concept by: Nate Horsfall
Original Concept:
The original Concept for FVR was to take two character models that I already had done, the Fox model and the Red model (taken from a modified Unreal Tournament character), and make them have a battle. One of my friends, Eric Ronay, kept pressuring me to making something new for my new demo reel to send out, and after awhile i finally got an idea for it.
This was a time in my life where I really wanted to do something for myself, and it had been years since I did an animation that wasn't work related. I figured, just use those models, and do a funny battle sequence. Showing off animation was my key plan, since that tends to be my strength. And not worry about spending lots of time on the characters themselves, or the background. Or anything. Just animation.
There was no real concept at this point. I simply wanted to have them battle, and why? because it would be funny. Thats it.
Then I told friends my concept, and before I knew it, I had a team of artists willing to help me with it. Just because they thought it sounded "really cool".
Well.. time to make a concept now.
New Concept:
I had been kicking the idea of a fake videogame when I started, but after talking it over with more friends, I decided to go full into that direction.
The idea is that people sit down to play this game, but then we go into the game itself and watch what happens in the "game" world.
This would also be a comedy/action piece, and the comedy would come from how they fought, and how well they faced off against each other.
The other concept to this is to do it entirely without storyboards. Storyboards are valuable in short films, especially with multiple camera angles and shots, but I wanted to try doing this entirely improv. I had done this before with shorter films, like 60 sec or so. But this was longer and more intense. Still, I wanted to give it a try.
With a more complex concept in mind, I knew my original plans wouldn't work, so I hired another artist to help me, and set out to redo everything, especially the background. I also had far more design work ahead of me now, and the focus on just animation, was gone completely. Now I was pretty much a real director, of a real animation short. Not something for kicks.
We'll see how it all turns out when it's finally finished.
-Nate
