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MARIN
by Alexandre Bernard, Pierre Pages, Damien Laurent
“Marin” tells the intimate story of a sailor who travels through a sea of dunes with his fish in a dried-out world, searching for water. After a roaring sandstorm and shortly before dying of thirst, the protagonists ultimately manage to save themselves in cool water. The lovingly designed, quirky 3D world is perfectly supported by graphic elements and thrives on the story’s depth and the character design’s powerful expression.
659 (film/short film), Directors/Animators: Alexandre Bernard, Pierre Pages, Damien Laurent; Music: Louis Boulloche; Producer: Supinfocom Arles, Anne Brotot; Distributor: Premium Films, Annabel Sebag - 3ds Max, Photoshop, After Effects, Premiere
Cruise through a Dusty Dry Dock
“Marin” tells the intimate story of a sailor and a fish in a world without water. Damien Laurent, one of the three French lead animators, explains how the exceptionally expressive animation was nevertheless implemented “fluidly.”
With our 3D short film “Marin,” we wanted to create a self-contained story with a concrete plot, intense interaction between the protagonists, and depth. Our small adventure in its closed universe was intended to feature characters with whom viewers would form an intense bond and whom they would support until the final second.
“Marin” contains many opposing elements and contrasts: the sailor is strong while the fish is fragile, and they are searching for water in a world where the sea has disappeared. The production is built on these basic elements. The film’s colours also develop throughout the story and carry meaning. There are three principal colour worlds: light brown for the lifeless, desert-like environment; steel blue for the underwater sequences, symbolising the return of life; and red as a key colour for hope, appearing in the fish’s scales, the sailor’s shirt, the boat’s paint, and the guiding lighthouse.
Source of Ideas
Our first remembered vision for the film was simply a sailor travelling in his ship through an abandoned area where all water had disappeared. This was a good foundation, but something was missing to bring an outstanding story to life. Only later did we think of expanding the scenario with the unusual friendship between the sailor and his fish. Their mutual relationship with water makes their affinity clear.
For the sailor’s character design, we chose an appearance reminiscent of a hero from Greek mythology. He was intended to seem like a courageous Odysseus or Noah, though one awaiting a flood of sand. We also gave him a likeable, paternal presence to appeal to the audience’s emotions and intensify the relationship with the fish - which, incidentally, also contains adapted character traits from the sailor. The character designs are based on stylised, simple forms with just enough physical features to animate them effectively. This helped us draw attractive contours and silhouettes and realise clearly defined poses.
Flood of Sketches
Our pre-production drawings were extremely useful and provided important support in creating the screenplay - a scribble can be made quickly and discarded just as quickly if it does not serve the story. Ultimately, the storyboard defines precisely where plot and action begin in the film and how best to realise them artistically. Alongside the storyboard, we created a 2D animatic to review the sequence of scenes continually. A much more precise 3D animatic showed whether we could implement the planned scenes technically and within the available time. It was necessary, for example, to analyse the number of shots and determine their respective difficulty. The 2D design preparation for the characters and environment was also useful because it allowed us to test in advance whether everything fit together graphically. Thumbnailing was another effective way to experiment spontaneously with movement for the animation. In seconds, this manual method allowed us to realise individual poses or movements instead of spending minutes activating hundreds of controllers on a computer.
Although we created all animation three-dimensionally on the computer, we always kept in mind that the final rendered version would ultimately appear as a flat product on screen. The rules governing image composition, shadows, and contours are almost the same in the 2D universe as in the 3D world. Although the film’s sandstorm was created entirely in 3D, it is simultaneously supported by stylised waves to match the graphic look of the rest of the film.
Pre-production is therefore crucial when making a computer-generated film. It is difficult to generate vitality or artistic sensitivity inside the PC afterwards. For us, a computer is more a tool for realising visions developed beforehand. We therefore attempted to capture the artistic strengths of the 2D concept designs and merge them with the concrete ideas in our storyboards for the animation.
Depth
In our view, good animation results are also based on developing personal powers of observation. Gesture drawings of people from everyday life or television train the targeted eye needed for later animation. At Disney, many animators attended Walt Stanchfield’s classes, which dealt intensively with this subject. They learned not only to draw what they saw but also to caricature a character’s expression and movements and make them appear more credible. Glenn Keane’s work provides further impressive examples of movement studies: they are rough yet pronounced, and their vitality can almost be felt. We remain open to other drawing styles and continue to be enthusiastic about anime films by Hayao Miyazaki (“Princess Mononoke,” “Porco Rosso”) and the work of Alexander Petrov (“The Old Man and the Sea”), although our production style in “Marin” tends more towards classic Disney films. by Damien Laurent/jb
