Age of Umbra – Title Sequence

Following on from my storyboard and animatic for the title sequence, I created it fully in After Effects, complete with colour, sound and proper transitions. Here is the video:

 

 

As always, I began with making assets for each of the characters and the castle which is shown later on in the clip, making sure to think about layering and how I was going to animate the joints. Since this was my first time animating people in after effects, I was new to the process of making a movable character, but I thought about which parts of the limbs I wanted to animate and made everything on separate layers. The very first part I created was Dara running in front of the diamond, which I wanted to be accurate to my animatic and original idea but also to have something extra to make it more interesting. I first made the very essential animations, however, which were the background and Dara running on the spot.

 

 

Doing a complete running cycle was probably the hardest part of the whole sequence, and I struggled to get her looking natural. I also had trouble with the loop expressions I added to each limb (so that I didn’t have to copy and paste the same keyframes over and over). I had to triple check that I had the same keyframes from the start of each animation at the end, and that everything was lined up and started and finished at the exact same time. I kept having to go back and tweak the animated limbs because my loops weren’t working properly and kept speeding up. I found out the hard way, that I had too many keyframes, and I had to simplify the animations in order for everything to be smooth.
Other than that, animating the other elements of the scene weren’t too difficult, and I had fun making the diamonds overarch and playing around with their transformation in the graph editor.

 

 

Unfortunately, after finishing the whole first scene, I lost my work due to some issues with my files. I had to start all over again, and whilst this was incredibly frustrating, I was grateful that I had a chance to start over, now knowing everything I should have done from the start. I finished the scene twice as fast and I’m happy to say that Dara lools much smoother and more realistic whilst running. I added easy ease to almost every movement (not the bobbing up and down) and this also helped massively with making the cycle more natural.

I wasn’t completely finished with the first scene, but I then moved on to doing a different part, which was the last scene of the animation where we zoom in to see Lesedi standing on the edge of a large window. Here, it was a matter of making everything 3d, arranging the layers and then animating the camera. It was really fun to apply the skills I had learned with the AE camera to my title sequence, and whilst it was only a simply Dolly with a slight truck and tilt, it looks much more professional than if I were to just animate the scale and position of the comp.

 

 

I knew that in my animatic, I had clouds in the sky, but I didn’t want to overcomplicate the background which already had a gradient. The focus was on Lesedi and the castle, and the details are heavy in front because they follow along nicely with the camera movement and allow the viewers’ eyes to hone in on the red-haired figure whilst also absorbing the environment at the same time. So, I didn’t add any in, but then it felt too static for a real environment, and to combat this, I wanted to add something dynamic in the first few layers. I decided to add fog/mist, creeping in from the sides, using fractal noise and I think it helped a lot with making the scene more alive, but I wish I hadn’t made them so subtle, as, in the final animation, you only have a few seconds to see the foreground before it disappears.

 

 

Like last time, I had to do some character animation by rotating Lesedi’s arms to lift up as she’s casting this spell. As I had already done this, I knew what to avoid and had it ready relatively quickly, but animating the puppet pins for the hair and dress took way longer as I wanted them to look smooth and realistic blowing in the wind, and some of the more jagged edges made that difficult. But, after adding in the loop expression and refining keyframe positioning, as well as adding easy ease, it looked good enough to add into the main composition.

 

 

Something that I wish I had spent more time on here is the orbs of light that Lesedi creates. I added a glow effect and tried to edits the colours slightly to fade from white to purple but it is hardly visible, especially since the whole screen then fades to white. Next time, I will ensure that the glow is more intense so it really catches your attention, and feels more fantasy-esque.

Once I had Lesedi casting the spell and making the screen white, the next part was to fade to the title of the series. I had originally planned for there to be a beam of light flash in front of the test, but I recalled a lot of sci-films and series had something similar in their intro and I really wanted to hone in on the fantasy. So, I went to Youtube to look for some inspiration and found a plethora of tutorials for fantasy type titles, mostly for trailers. One, in particular, caught my eye and it didn’t take that long to create! Here’s the awesome tutorial which I followed along for the main steps:

 

 

 

I was pleased that most of the tutorial involved using techniques I already knew, like fractal noise, feathering, parenting and track matte, but there were also quite a lot of things I was unfamiliar with, such as effects like CC glass, CC Blobbylize. This made it really interesting, as the method involved a range of different skills and a lot of layer building. It was fun to see everything come together and I learned some cool new effects which I can apply to text animations for the future.

 

 

After Effects didn’t offer a wide range of fonts so I used an online font generator to create a text logo. I’m really happy I found a font that practically screamed ‘fantasy’ and was perfect to use for my title sequence.

 

 

My favourite part was adding effects like drop shadow to the text, as it made the title look more 3D. As for the colour, I was initially set on black but this blended in too much with the background so I changed it to another prominent colour in the show’s palette: red. I’m really happy with this change because it gives the impression that the series is dark and dangerous, which is the sort of atmosphere I’m aiming for.

 

 

I attempted to add a light layer but this didn’t work out as the light wasn’t appearing no matter where I put the layer. I had to stick to the way shown in the tutorial.

 

 

As you can see, the end result is quite similar to the tutorial, but I did add my own twist to some of the steps, and edit the sequence according to what I wanted. I included firey embers instead of snow, because of the link to my poster, and used black lava for the background texture, which again, fits the style of my genre. I think I could have chosen some better light rays, but I included them because they add a subtle polished look to the title, which I like. I also like how although it’s mainly dark, like the series, there is some light or hope which comes through the three characters helping each other find their humanity. I also like the zoom, and the darkened edges, which give the title a more cinematic appearance.

Once I had finished that, I moved onto the second part of the sequence, Kreo. Like the previous two times, I imported his asset and went through the steps of organising and renaming the layers, pre-comping, animating the limbs and pins of the cloak. I learned that it involved a lot of back and forth and I had to save frequently for fear of losing all the keyframes and details I would not be able to repeat. Once again, I found the cloak to be the hardest to animate. I now have a personal aim, to improve my animation skills of characters and clothing, and I will be doing some research on how fabric behaves in the wind. After I had animated Kreo to a satisfactory level, it was time for the fun part!

 

 

I dragged in the rendered version of the third scene, with the castle, into the composition and placed the layer underneath Kreo. In my animatic, Kreo moves across the screen and in his cloak, we see the castle and are taken to the third part. I knew that I wanted to have double exposure in my title sequence, and including it within a transition was a good opportunity, and one that I think turned out really well.

 

 

I did face a couple of problems, however, namely, animating the mask in order for Kreos top half to be shown. This would have been much faster had it not been for the sword which moves in front of the cloak. I had to rely on the feather tool to blend everything together and make it more seamless without me having to position each individual anchor point perfectly around the sword and top half. I was grateful for the speed at which Kreo moves across the screen because the slightly lazy masking is hard to notice. Despite everything, this is one of my favourite aspects of the title sequence and I think it puts the audience in the mood for magic and fantasy.

I had my three sections (now two) and before assembling everything, I jumped back to the very first scene with Dara and added some fire rain using CC particle world. I thought this would be a good idea as embers and fire are a prominent theme within Age of Umbra and can be seen in the final seconds of the animation and the poster. I also think it makes the background more interesting thanks to the dynamism, as before it was simply a static diamond.

 

 

I also added in the text ‘Netflix Originals Pressents’ to link it back to the brief and make it unmistakably clear that this is the intro to a Netflix original series. I think that it also gives the viewer something to look at when they have already grown bored of the repetitive motion of Dara running. I made sure to animate the opacity so that the last word ‘presents’ appears a few seconds afterwards so that there is adequate time between each element.

The next step was to choose music to include alongside the animation. After my legal considerations in an earlier post, I already knew that I had to have a non-copyright song so that my video would not get taken down, and already had a youtube channel for that kind of music ready at hand. I scrolled through the epic fantasy music that was available and it was quite hard to select a song to use, as I knew only 30 seconds were going to be heard, and in that period, there would have to be a clear beginning and end, for it to sound like an intro. Eventually, I decided on Fire and Thunder by Cjbears, which had a cool sound effect at 1:24 that sounded like it could be a finishing point.

 

 

In my opinion, this genre works well with my title sequence because of the deep sounds, and repetitive melodies which make it fast-paced at times, like an intro. I also think that the name and tone of the song work really well with my series.

Finally, it was time to assemble and render. For the audio, I cut to around 32 seconds of the section of the song I wanted and animated the volume at the start so it fades in, in time with the diamond. I used time remapping on the animated parts too, to make sure the pacing for everything felt natural and moved things around slightly so that they all flowed nicely and felt cohesive. I am really pleased with the overall result, and whilst there are things to be improved, such as Dara’s running cycle, Kreo’s movement (could be more natural and not as stiff), the speed of the zoom in the third part (in my mind, the whole movement was more swift and smooth) and the fact that the text cuts off a little bit at the end, I believe that overall, I have done a good job at portraying what kind of series Age of Umbra is.

 

List of Skills Used:

  • Staggering – for the diamonds at the start
  • Atmospherics– fire rain (embers) in the background at the start, mist (fractal noise) in the foreground of the castle in the second scene
  • Double Exposure – Kreo’s cloak in the transition
  • Parallax – the castle layers and zoom
  • Camera Movements – the castle and Lesedi, in the second scene

 

 

I created a quick comparison between my animatic and final total sequence by putting them side by side stretching out the animatic to 31 seconds to play in time with the title sequence (it was originally about 10 seconds). I think that I made the sequence quite accurately to my original plan as most of the elements remain the same, but there are definitely changes and improvements such as the atmospherics 2.5d aspects and added text. The part that has changed the most is the title itself, which I originally wanted to appear in that classic trailer-like way, with the beam of light that shrinks as the text builds/spins. I much prefer the final result, however, as it reflects the mood of my series, and the concept themes much better. Personally, I think the beam of light wouldn’t have measured up to the dark textures background and embers, which make it feel like dark fantasy (it reminds me a little of the anime Attack on Titan which is, in some ways, also dark fantasy).

 

Conventions

 

Please refer back to my title sequence research post if necessary. Let’s take a look at what conventions I have included in my title sequence.

Firstly, does it show the cast? Technically, yes, but being a 2D animated series, it shows the main characters, which shape the story and play the most important roles (hero, reluctant villain, villain). It doesn’t recap the story, but through the actions of the characters, we get a sense of how they affect it. For example, Dara running represents her constantly trying to achieve something or reach her goals, the main one being reaching her sister both literally and emotionally. The diamond and fire rain in the background which are both larger than her represent Kreo and how his presence prevents her from doing so. Kreo himself is a transition, which gives him a sense of power as he literally changes the entire screen and puts Lesedi in the picture, exactly like how changes Unitaris entirely under his reign and allows Lesedi to see herself as someone powerful and worthy of respect. She is shown in his castle, casting a spell that fades to the title, a symbol for how his influence over her is what makes Age of Umbra, as she eventually defeats him and helps him realise his mistakes. I didn’t include any hidden icons but there are certain elements that foreshadow the general direction of the series such as the embers in the title which link to anger/murder/fear/fire and hint at Kreo’s downfall.

I have two conventional transitions, the wipe (Kreo) and the fade (Lesedi) which are seen quite a lot in title sequences, and one unconventional one which is the diamond at the start. I feel that shapes/patterns are seen in title sequences, but aren’t used all that often in fantasy. The use of diamonds (Kreo’s symbol) is what makes my title sequence unique to my show, as the shape and colours represent the villain and the main character. I think that the variety in transitions makes it quite interesting because rather than being very clear cut, like a wipe from one scene to another, which would be very jarring, they all link to each other and create a flow pleasing to the eye. The text and fonts are also conventional, from the positioning and fading to the elements around, like light, it all works together to draw attention to them and/or relay information. It was not my intention to misguide the audience so I did use the colour palette of the series, and it is relevant to the aesthetic and themes, which gets the audience in the mood for dark fantasy. The overall style also does this, by setting the mood for epic fantasy.

Overall I think I have achieved a good balance between conventional and uncommon title sequence features and the use of double exposure, fire, setting and magic all make it clear that Age of Umbra is a fantasy series.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *