Axis Animation
Tale of Three Brothers
Axis Animation is a Glasgow based animation studio which are behind several 3D Animations and Models used in Adverts, VFX and Video Game production. The company is probably most known for its role producing this animation for the highly successful Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows film winning the company Best Film/TV Graphics at the British Animation Awards.
The animation produced for the film is a highly stylised 3 minutes 22 second long animation following the narrative of a tale about Three Brothers in the Harry Potter universe. Axis animation generally create highly stylised animations for a variety of reasons such as the animated 3D short Codehunters and 2D animatic styled animations for the film Sucker Punch.
It is hard to place an exact style for the company as it consists of several smaller studios and independent artists helping their studio have a wider range of potential jobs.
This animation in particular uses a very dark style incorporating a lot of dramatic lighting which helps give the characters a more sinister look as the narrative is around the topic of death. Around the 20 second mark when a bridge is growing out of plants, the low frame rate of the animation gives a feel similar to stop motion or pixilation, a technique which I have always found to look quite sinister when used correctly.
The animation is nearly in silhouette due to the dramatic use of the black and almost sepia colouring helping to give an aged look to the story. The further enchance the aged look, the lighting in the animation fluctuates throughout giving the impression that the animation is lit by candlelight or a flickering lightbulb making the animation seem more dark and sinister.
Because the animation has decided to follow this style, the characters for the animation have been designed as very skinny, skeletal figures who are draped in cloth, helping bridge the gap between silhouetted figures and 3D characters while at the same time showing off the lighting and particle effects.
The story begins with all main characters in one place but splits off into 3 strands eventually ending with the death of the 3rd brother. This storyline is similar to the majority of traditional fairytales which were used to try and teach children some sort of lesson but in this case the story is set in a magical world. Rather than building momentum and having more action towards the end of the animation, the animation seems to meander through and eventually fade out. This differs from the majority of short story animations I have seen in this style. I believe this is because the story is designed to be more of a recap for unfamiliar viewers and the fade in and fade out helps to stop the viewers immersion being broken whilst still adding valuable information to the film.
It is hard to place an exact style for the company as it consists of several smaller studios and independent artists helping their studio have a wider range of potential jobs.
This animation in particular uses a very dark style incorporating a lot of dramatic lighting which helps give the characters a more sinister look as the narrative is around the topic of death. Around the 20 second mark when a bridge is growing out of plants, the low frame rate of the animation gives a feel similar to stop motion or pixilation, a technique which I have always found to look quite sinister when used correctly.
The animation is nearly in silhouette due to the dramatic use of the black and almost sepia colouring helping to give an aged look to the story. The further enchance the aged look, the lighting in the animation fluctuates throughout giving the impression that the animation is lit by candlelight or a flickering lightbulb making the animation seem more dark and sinister.
Because the animation has decided to follow this style, the characters for the animation have been designed as very skinny, skeletal figures who are draped in cloth, helping bridge the gap between silhouetted figures and 3D characters while at the same time showing off the lighting and particle effects.
The story begins with all main characters in one place but splits off into 3 strands eventually ending with the death of the 3rd brother. This storyline is similar to the majority of traditional fairytales which were used to try and teach children some sort of lesson but in this case the story is set in a magical world. Rather than building momentum and having more action towards the end of the animation, the animation seems to meander through and eventually fade out. This differs from the majority of short story animations I have seen in this style. I believe this is because the story is designed to be more of a recap for unfamiliar viewers and the fade in and fade out helps to stop the viewers immersion being broken whilst still adding valuable information to the film.
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