Animation - The Caledonian Forest Scotland

The final brief of the semester was to create an animated infographic in Adobe After Effects, the choice of topic was one that was of our own desire, something that was a passion or an interest. I chose to do the Caledonian Forest of Scotland. This forest once covered large amounts of the highlands and is now sparse in parts such as Glen Affric and the Cairngorms. The challenge of the infographic was one I was happy to tackle, I am keen to learn new skills and already had inspiration of how I wanted my animation to look. 
I started off researching previous infographics to get some extra ideas, after this I began watching Youtube tutorials, to give myself a basis on what I would be able to achieve. 

Research

Storyboards and Research

After getting the idea of what potential direction my animation could go in, I began researching information about the Caledonian Forest. It was important to get as much information as possible to be able to sift through the facts and figures, this was I would be able to know what information I wanted to inform my viewers with, then be able to make sense of my story boards. 
I began with rough sketches then eventually moved onto more definate and clearer thumbnails. 

Imagery

Once I had my story boards figured out, I sourced the web to find the imagery I would need. This took time as in my head I had a clear picture of what I wanted my images to look like. I realised I needed a mix of vector and illustration, this was difficult to come by without needing to pay for the items I needed. Therefore, I found images on stock websites and edited them in Photoshop so that they all looked the same and matched the theme, rather than have a random selection of imagery that would off set the design ideas.

Youtube Tutorials

Once I was ready, I began watching tutorials on how to make my animation real. It took alot of time going through so many videos, however, eventually I found everything that I needed. 

Development Work