This semester for our motion Design Module we were tasked with creating a motion piece inspired by a Seamus Heaney poem. 

To start with, I began researching his poetry. Three poems stood out to me:

1. Exposure

2. Twice Shy

3. Song

For Exposure, I liked the fantasy element and thought it might give me a lot to work with when creating an inspired piece. For Twice Shy, I liked that the imagery suited a short filmed piece. For Song, I liked the description of nature and the passage of time as something to focus on. 

Early on in our research, we visited the Seamus Heaney Homeplace museum for inspiration.

While at the museum, we learned a lot about the poet's life and the events in his past that he drew inspiration from when writing. While I did feel more connected to his works the more I learned, I also found it more difficult to draw inspiration from Exposure and Twice Shy, which were directly inspired by events in his life. My own life is so different to how the poet's was, so there was a level of disconnect there.

For Song, though, I could still appreciate the descriptions of nature and history, and the passage of time for humans while the landscape endured. After our visit to the museum, I settled on Song.

I did some research on the poem itself once I had settled on it, and discovered more about the Celtic mythology that it's based on. The Rowan mentioned in the poem is also known as the Traveler's Tree, and was said to give protection to travellers. It's also mentioned in druidic culture, and the old druids would use wood from the Rowan tree to make wands, rods, and staves. The Alder tree is also mentioned, and was also prominent in druidic culture. The wood from the Alder was used to make ritual pipes and whistles, and the tree itself was said to have concealed the door to the supernatural realm. 

I also learned more about the musical language used to describe the scenery, such as the "immortelles of perfect pitch". The musical theme was also continued with the quote "the music of what happens", which was said by Fionn Mac Cumhaill in response to the challenge to name the finest music in the world.

This informed my own interpretation of the poem; that the Rowan tree stands strong while time passes by, and generations of people come and go.

With the Celtic theme in mind, I started to research imagery on Celtic style illustrations of the Rowan tree. 

I then did a few of my own sketches based on the research.

I also started to create the leaves and smaller branches in Adobe Illustrator to test some colours. 

I made a basic tree also in Illustrator to test out the leaves and small branches on.

I became somewhat stuck at this point. I wasn't fond of the imagery I had produced so far, and I also wasn't sure exactly where I was going with these illustrations. I knew that I wanted to animate them somehow, but other than that, I needed more inspiration.

I started to research other poetry in motion pieces on youtube and vimeo, and in the process I stumbled across a time lapse video of a Rowan tree.

This time lapse gave me sudden inspiration; I could use the Illustrations I'd created already, and animate the Rowan tree slowly moving through its seasons. With this idea in mind, I decided to also expand more on the Celtic theme and find new imagery to base the design of the tree on.

I preferred the Celtic knot style, so I started sketching out a tree of my own. I did a basic sketch in pencil first, then used reed pens and black ink to line it. It wasn't very precise, but I wanted to use the reed calligraphy pens to have a more authentic experience trying to draw it, and I could always tidy it up in Illustrator after. I then used lukewarm water and teabags to stain the page, and re-lined the tree in darker ink.

I then scanned the final piece, and brought it into Illustrator to trace it and make edits so that the knots were more visible. I left it asymmetrical and uneven as I preferred that it wasn't perfect.

After I had done this, I used a blank stained background from Pexels to do up a quick mini-screening.

I had no music on the mini-screening, and with the general concept so well developed I then decided it was time to work on the music. Before searching for songs, I had one in mind from the Disney Pixar movie Brave. I liked the tone of this song, and wanted to create a piece based on it, but with my own touch. 

I knew that I could play the tin whistle to accompany the base of the piece, but other than the tin whistle I am not musically inclined, so I reached out to my brother for help. He and I spent a few days listening to the Noble Maiden Fair piece from Disney, and working on making a similar base to it on guitar before working on the whistle part.

After we settled on something, I booked the recording studio at college. However, I became ill with pneumonia a few days before my booking, and we weren't able to record as my breathing wasn't steady or strong enough to play. I remained ill for quite a while, and once I felt well enough I booked the studio again. This time when we arrived at college to record, we discovered there had been an issue with the booking that I hadn't been informed of due to a network glitch, and there was no staff present at the college that day to open the studio for us. 

While I wasn't pleased at not being able to include our original piece on time, I quickly moved on and with the help of a classmate settled on a song by Adrian Von Ziegler. This classmate had previously contacted Von Ziegler to inquire about his stance on his music being used by students in their work, and he enthused that he was more than happy for us to do so. The song that my classmate picked out for me turned out to be perfect for my final piece.

During the time that I was ill, I continued to work on the visuals at home. First, I tea-stained a blank piece of paper after putting a fold in it where the roots of the tree would be placed below. After this, I scanned it and in Adobe Photoshop I put each stage of the tree's cycle over this background, and I had my frames.

First, I brought these frames into Adobe Premiere Pro to create the base cycle of the tree. I used a gradient wipe between each frame to have it fade from one stage to another. 

I exported this, and brought the exported file into Adobe After Effects. In After Effects, I used camera layers to add more motion to the piece.

I also created a short Title and Credits in After Effects.

I exported the After Effects compositions, and put them all together in Premiere Pro.

While I was somewhat pleased with how it turned out, there were several issues. I hadn't accounted for the frames losing image quality when the camera layers zoomed in on them, and there were also some parts that appeared to jump and skip. I knew this was quickly remedied, though. 

I started to remake my frames at 3840x2160p. Bringing the larger frames into Premiere Pro and exporting them to After Effects in a 1920x1080p composition meant that when I applied the camera laters again and zoomed in, the loss in quality was minimal in comparison.

I recreated the entire piece, starting the editing process from the beginning but using the same title, credit, and music piece. 

I also changed the ending. In the earlier piece, I had the tree complete once cycle and then fade out, but this did not follow my interpretation of the poem where the Rowan tree remains as generations pass by without end. So instead, I had the tree fade out while continuing to go through its cycle.

Overall, I was pleased with the final piece. The project was definitely challenging at times, especially given that I was so ill for an important stage, and given that I was definitely not fond of Seamus Heaney's work when I started. I did enjoy it, though, and the entire process of conveying a feeling through motion.