The Calling

by Stan Kuo
Working clock tower set for a 7th Term Environmental Design animated film
Emphasis: Entertainment Design Independent Study
Norm Schureman & Mark Dillon Advising

The Calling was an independent project I put together with the help of Norm Schureman and Mark Dillon during my sixth term at Art Center. Independent studies are fantastic because they allow you the creative freedom of bringing your ideas to life. I used the opportunity to develop a story I wrote for a film about a man and an abandoned clock tower.
The story begins as our hero enters the tower and sees an enormous staircase spiraling up into darkness. However, instead of ascending, he falls through the first step and into the tower's underworld. Braving traps and strange creatures, our hero finally makes it to the top of the tower where he has to reactivate the clock. Yet to do this, he must give up his own soul and hence his very existence so that the clock can live again.
The film was to be shot using stop motion animation. This called for detailed sets to showcase the characters and tell the story. The script included four main sets: a chamber of heads, a stone rotunda, a mining shaft, and the clock tower control room. I selected the clock room, mostly because I was looking forward to constructing a realistic engine in miniature using various gears, pulleys, and other machined parts. Relying on an initial storyboard version of the clock room scene, I began by sketching out the general dimensions of the room and its main parts such as the clock face and weight shafts. Designing the engine was difficult because I had to rely on readily found parts. I basically bought a bucket full of metal gears and pieced them together one by one.
Once the engine was built, I fabricated stone walls using foam and wood. I designed two of the walls to be removable, along with two sections of the roof, to allow for a more flexible array of camera angles. Finally, I gave the bronze pieces of the set a patina and rusted the steel gears to give the clock room an old weathered look. To light the set, I approached Edward Effron for advise. To illuminate the clock room with a full moon type of light, a seventy watt spot with a light blue gel was used. A second spot with a rose colored gel was used for ambient light. Placed in back of the set, the light came through the open window and lit the ceiling to show off some of its detail. From the pictures, you can see that the overall effect was quite believable.

Photoshoped Image
 

For the opening shot of the film, I built a miniature version of the clock tower out of foam and wood in 1/4" scale. The model was photographed against a blank background, then scanned. Using Photoshop, the image of the clock tower was then placed on an empty field.