Inspiration:
For my exploratory individual project, I began by researching visual references and narrative ideas that focused on the relationship between humans and creatures. I was particularly inspired by a music video by Zara Larsson that explored the connection between a girl and a monster as they gradually became friends. I was also heavily influenced by the animated film Abominable, which tells the story of a friendship between a young girl and a yeti. The emotional connection between the characters and the visual style of the film strongly inspired the direction of my project.
Visual Research:
To develop my ideas further, I researched references on platforms such as Pinterest and Instagram, focusing on creature designs, fantasy environments, and the relationship between monsters and their human companions. During this research process, I discovered an Instagram artist whose work particularly inspired me visually and helped influence the atmosphere and aesthetic direction of the project.
Concept Art:
After researching monster imagery and creature–human relationships, I began generating AI images to help develop the visual direction of the project. Instead of creating traditional sketches, I used AI-generated imagery to build a storyboard showing interactions between a young girl and a monster. This process helped me visualise the environments, colour palettes, lighting, and overall mood much more clearly. Using AI-generated concepts allowed me to quickly experiment with atmosphere and composition before deciding on a final storyboard direction.
Final Storyboard:
The final storyboard: a young girl is having tea in her garden with her teddy bear when the teddy bear falls to the ground. A large shadow appears, and the girl quickly reaches out to rescue the teddy bear before running away in fear. She runs into the woods, becoming increasingly panicked until she trips and falls. Believing the monster is going to hurt her, she instead discovers that the creature gently picks up her teddy bear and returns it to her. The storyboard then transitions into a sequence showing their friendship developing over time as the seasons change around them, highlighting the passage of time and the growing bond between the girl and the monster. The story ends by returning to the opening scene of the girl having tea in the garden, but this time the monster is sitting beside her, replacing the teddy bear and showing how their friendship has fully developed.
Environment Design:
Once the storyboard was established, I moved into environment development in Unreal Engine. I created five different environments using Megascans assets and additional 3D models to explore possible locations and moods for the story.
Testing Scale and Composition:
To test scale and composition within these environments, I temporarily placed a creature model asset (Sulley from monster’s Inc) alongside a young girl character. This helped me understand how the characters would occupy the space and interact visually within the scenes. However, the final intention is to design and model my own original monster character rather than using an existing asset.
Lion King Inspiration:
A major inspiration for the storytelling and transitions came from The Lion King, particularly the sequence showing Simba growing up while walking across the landscape. I was inspired by the emotional progression and smooth visual transitions used in that scene, and I wanted to create a similar feeling of growth and passage of time within my own project.
Testing Transitions:
To test how these transitions would work, I created a rough animatic sequence and added sound design to explore the pacing, atmosphere, and emotional flow between scenes. This helped me understand how the visuals and audio could work together to strengthen the storytelling.
3D Storyboard:
I then began building rough 3D versions of the opening scene and forest environment. These early models were not intended to be final designs, but instead acted as visual prototypes to help shape the story structure, camera angles, and environmental layout before moving into more detailed environment building.
Green Screen Shoot:
As part of the production process, I also organised a green screen shoot for the live-action footage. Since I did not have access to a child actor, I performed the role of the young girl myself in order to test the concept and continue developing the project. Although I understood that I did not physically resemble the intended age of the character, this approach allowed me to experiment with performance, composition, and integration between live-action footage and the digital environments while working within the limitations of the project.
Compositing:
After developing the environments and filming the green screen footage, I moved into Nuke to begin testing the compositing process. I selected one of the environments created in Unreal Engine and removed the green screen from the live-action footage in order to place the character into the digital scene. This was an early compositing test designed to evaluate scale, framing, and how naturally the footage integrated into the environment. At this stage, the scene was not yet fully colour graded or refined, as the main purpose was to explore the initial visual relationship between the live-action element and the 3D environment.
After completing the first test, I experimented with placing the footage into the other four environments to compare how the character interacted with different spaces and atmospheres. I also added a temporary monster image into the scenes and tracked it within Nuke to test positioning, movement, and composition alongside the live-action footage. These tests helped me understand how the monster and human character could coexist within each environment and allowed me to evaluate which settings created the strongest visual and emotional impact for the story.
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