A Tale in the Stings: Hallmark Production Diary 1

The setting is established in the first scene, when the camera pans from top of the window towards the table, then zooms in to the cup. I did the pan on After Effect by vertically translating the assets, while zooming in is just scaling up the object and positioning the cup to the center of the screen.

Initially, I used the Keylight (1.2) effect to omit the green part of my pixilation. However, I find an easier way to get rid of the parts that I don't want from the pixilation by animating the path of the mask in After Effect. I made the mask by drawing a path using Pen tool as the pixilation footage layer is selected. Animating the mask make use of the keyframe animation in After Effect by changing the position of each anchor point, so that its shape would change accordingly.

Scene 2

As I finished making Scene 2, I realised that I forgot to add the slowmotion water drop footage. So, I rendered out the entire Scene 2, and trim them in Premier Pro, so that I got Scene 2a and Scene 2b. Scene 2a will end when the water has dropped, while Scene 2b will start afterwards with the Hallmark logo surfaces from the tea.I also use mask on the water droplet to include it in the scene.

Scene 2a

A Tale in the Stings: Hallmark Storyboard

A Tale in the Stings: Hallmark Settings

These are backgrounds for my Hallmark idents developed with Photoshop from stock images that I found online. 

I used Photoshop to combine an image of clouds and a garden to create the view outside the window. The gradient tool, with a little bit of feathering, flawlessly blends the edges of the two images that meets.

A view from inside the dining room, where the sunlight shines directly at it. I don't think that this scene is real enough, although I have been making attempt to create shades and put textures. I think the issue is because there is no light rays on the edges of the window. Unfortunately, I don't know how to add lights to an object in Photoshop, so I decided to keep it as it is. I created shades by making a silhouette of the plants, distorting it, and put the Gaussian Blur effect on it to feather out its edges. Whereas, I played around with the opacity of textures and adding gradients in some parts of the set to make it look as realistic as possible. 

The second scene that takes place in the dining table. The shot is zoomed in so that it can focuses on the animation of the tea being poured into the teacup. I removed most of the white background of the teapot and the teacup images with the Magic Wand tool, and did the cleaning up with the Polygonal Lasso tool to ensure that there will be no jagged edges present on the objects.

A Tale in the Stings: Hallmark Brainstorming

The brief has quoted that the tone of voice that the Hallmark Channel reflect is for their audience to cherish their life's special moments. Hence, the ident needs to be heart-warming. Initially, I thought that making a kinetic typography animation with watercolour and pastel colour scheme would be a great idea, like those watercolour typography in greeting cards or some motivational quote on Instagram. However, I think it would not be appropriate because the company specifically look for animators instead of graphic designers to do the job, so the company would prefer something that more animated than just kinetic typography.

 

By keeping this in mind, came up with two possible ideas based on what I would personally associate to the key phrase 'celebrating life special moments'. I consider making an animation by using After Effects because I would like to make a realistic style ident as all the previous idents that Hallmark had were made from realistic imagery or footage. The first idea is to have a silhouette of a boy and his father stargazing, while the Hallmark logo fades in slowly into the screen. Personally, I don't think that this idea is great as there will not be much movement invloved.

I could not get an idea that I am satisfied with by looking at just dramatic moments, so I decided to look it at another perspective. I derived the second idea from the simple things in life that warms my heart, which is having an afternoon tea in a sunny afternoon. I talked to Martin about it, and he told me to go for it and to keep the design simple.  

The animation will take place in a dining table, where a teapot and a teacup is sitting on the table, and someone will pour the tea from the teapot into the teacup. To keep it simple, the assets would be developed from image stocks that I found online.

A Tale In The Stings: Hallmark - Tea Pouring Pixilation

I decided to make a pixilation because I could not find a tea pouring footage that I want online. I made a small green screen set by sticking a green paper on the wall and another on the table and shine constant lighting on the set. I did the shoot in the stopmotion studio with Eleanor as the person who pours the tea into the teacup. The outcome is blurry, but I think the blurriness would not matter since I only need the tea for the final animation. 

A Tale in the Stings: Hallmark Research

Hallmark channel is dedicated to helping viewers celebrate life's special moments, and screens mostly heart-warming family films or romance comedy. The company started off promoting Christianity, but it went through several rebranding. As a part of American cable and satellite television network, the channel is well-established worldwide.

The first thing that I came across upon googling 'Hallmark idents' was this comment:

Some of their idents made in early 2000s does reflects the comment above, and they don't show the tone of voice of the channel. Especially in the one below made for their Latin franchise, with rapid motion graphics which does not allow the audience to digest what is being presented in the indents.

The UK channel had went a rebranding in 2010, using plum colour as their main colour palette. I like the simple concept of layering textures on top of the channel logo. It works better than the previous elaborate motion graphics done for its Latin channel. The tone of voice of the channel is clearly presented through the homely design, which sets up the mood to celebrate moments by giving the audience a sense of leisure.

Another ident made in for Hallmark Channel South Africa, showing effective design with simple effects. The two idents evidenced strong representation of the channel's tone of voice, although their moods differ. For instance, the first is cheerful, while the second is relaxing.