Mermaid Identity.

While I am designing the mermaid, I feel that it looks odd and similar to other mermaid design. I was trying to add and change some features of it and did some research on how should I make it looks special.

As I consult my specialist tutor, he told me that people had the shape and the idea of how 'mermaid' looks like, half body and half tail. It is not necessary to change it as it may not be a mermaid anymore but some creature with a given name mermaid.

Therefore, I decided to stick with this design and not making it looks 'fancy'.

Title Design

For the title of this interactive narrative artefact. I made a few choices and in the end thinks that 'Journey of the Sea' will be the title. As the story is a journey and exploration of the underwater world, I think that the title will bring a brief idea to the audience that they will see a sight or a story that is related to the sea and ocean.

I tried to sketching the title and wanted to put in the scene while the user can straight away click and play with it. But without a title page, I think that it does not looks complete. Therefore i choose to make a landing page.

After some try and error of title design, I came out with the final look of it.

I blend in the title to the sand as it looks like written on it. I also added some waves as nobody touches or interacting with it so it will not looks static and user doesn't realise that is it playable.

Coding - Test

** scene one **

While I start coding, I draw the image in flash and make the animation all within flash. While everything works, I export all required media from psd to flash and make the actual coding.

While I am scripting the artefact, there are many bugs that makes to animation not working. I found solutions by the help and guidance of my specialist tutorial.

Scenes and progress

I had made a few differences as Im creating the scene where the mermaid and the girl meets. In the picture below, it shows that I first created the scene where it can only see the back or the girl and the mermaid. This is not a good perspective as the user cannot see the expression of the character clearly. So I changed again but this time it broke the 180 degree rules that make the scene looks disconnected to the previous one. In the previous scene, the mermaid is shown to be at the right but current scene it switched places with the girl. This will make the user feels confusing as the placement is not placed correctly. 

Then, I digitized the scene in a different way. As seen in the picture below, the placement is now better and relates to the previous scene. In addition, I use speech bubble to make the character chat but not voice over as picture can tells a million words and it is intenationally understood, there will not be any language barrier to understand the narrative.

I may implement to create some comic panels to show what is the character trying to show in the scene. But my initiative is to allow the user to just understand and see the interaction in a big scene. So I will just put this aside first and while I am doing user testing, I would find the best solution to narrate the story.

These are some digitized sketch of the scenes underwater. I will further refine as it looks very rough and the colour looks dull and dark.

interaction design

I start designing the interaction design by making notes and using key element to pin point the main interaction. As this is designed for kids to interact, I try to make the interaction simple and direct as the main focus is the narrative.

I've drawn an overall scene and where the interaction is added to. I also made some notes to detail out the things that I need to create.

Scene 1

I first started doing the first scene which is the scene at the beach where the little girl meets the mermaid while she is playing at the seaside. 

I did some sketches to find the best position to put the character in place.

I made a digitized outline to test and draw the walkcycle and character movements.

A overall look of the first scene. I sketched the outline first before adding colour to it.

This is the final look of the scene. I am testing and trying to add more things in the scenes as the user can find some interesting hidden clickable items.

storyboard

While I am doing the digitizing, I have my story sketched in frames so that when I refer and make changes as I am use it as a reference. 

Making a storyboard that shows the full story of my animation makes it easier for me as I want to refine my story and adding in interactions.

I draw a linear story plot to pinpoint the important event in the story, while using Alice in Wonderland's plotline as a guidance. When I do so, I also think of ways to add in elements that is related to Alice in Wonderland, for example, adding the tea party scene in to the story or using a similar character that mimic the behaviour of the cheshire cat.