Gastronauts is a short film created at Hollowpixel Studios. It was our first project together as a team as the 6 Apprentices.
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The brief started with each of us concepting and pitching an original idea for a short film based around telling a simple joke to our director Chris McFall. (That would be around 1 minute 20 seconds long). And then out of those pitched, one would be selected, and all of us would then work together and bring it to life.
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Gastronauts was my pitch for this brief and was the one selected! Although the (undoubtedly genius) name came later on from Ariana Plesa.
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Its a silly joke about Astronauts farting in space, or well... one very farty astronaut, and another one who is none too pleased about that...
Meet the Characters
Buzz Lightweight
Uptight and oversensitive. Not quite to infinity, and certainly not beyond... That would just be silly.
Neil Fartstrong
A bean eating fart machine.
If there's anything at all that he loves more than beans, he hasn't found it yet.
My part in the project
I had a large role in the production of this short film, and was present in (Almost) every step.
Designing The Characters
Designs from the Animatic
In the design stages of the project I was tasked with designing the characters, based off of the animatic drawings by Chris McFall. The design of the set and the props was assigned to Anthony Richards, so we collaborated together to find a style that would complement and work with each other. This is where the visual aspect of "Chunk-ifying" things came from, which you can see in the details like the monstrously sized zips on the characters, "Chunk-ifying" things was a theme that carried over to the set design as well.
Early Character designs
Modelling And Texturing The Set and Props
It was then the time to create all the assets we wanted for the project. We had all discussed what we wanted the set to be like and had settled on a hexagonal shaped room with a table in the centre, beds on the side and an airlock and a ladder on opposing ends, with a variety of Greeblies, terminals and padding scattered around for some visual interest.
Room / Set Layout by Anthony Richards
I took on the task of creating the padding to go on the walls, I used some really fun methods to get the inflated fabric look. ...By literally inflating them with a cloth simulation.
Which is way more fun to watch happen than you might have thought.
To make the torn and battered padding I created a Geometry Nodes set up that allowed me to place geometry of rips and tears in random spots and scales across the asset.
Which made the process of assemling the set a breeze as all you had to do to get a uniquely ripped padding ws to press a button.
(I put a couple little easter eggs into this terminal model)
The most fun set dressing to make was the two photo frames.
Each showing the characters personality.
I had to model the Bean tin specifically for this one bit, and I dont regret it one bit... Worth it.
Animation
Gastronauts has 26 shots in total, which were divided between the 6 Apprentices. I ended up animating 6 of the 26 shots for the film.
Here are my six:
SHOT_040
SHOT_080
For this shot I was channelling the old episode from the Simpsons "Deep Space Homer", in particular when he's sping eating a crisp.
Deep Space Homer
SHOT_110
SHOT_180
SHOT_200
SQ_02_SHOT_010
I realised after animating, lighting and rendering that this shot reminded me of something. I had a good think about it and realised exactly what it was...
It's like they're twins.
The animation was a really fun stage in the production. Everyone would do their passes and look for feedback from each other. It was great discussing with the others what we thought could make each shot better.
We used a pipeline management software called Kitsu to keep track of our shots, and submit them for review to our Director.
Lighting
I was put in charge of the ighting for the short. Which meant I would oversee the other apprentices and make sure that the lighting was consistent and looked good for the short.
Summary
You can watch the short here:
I'm incredibly proud of what we achieved making this short, and I had a great time working on it.
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I look forward to doing more projects like it.