Stacie Evans

Stacie Evans is a multimedia artist and graphic designer with special interests in typography, animation, digital illustration, and UI design. She learned the foundations in all of these and more during her time at TCNJ, and continued work on her own time to improve her skills. Stacie interned at Alfa Art Gallery in New Brunswick as a graphic designer to create promotional materials and virtual exhibits as an alternative to in-person shows in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. She also  worked collaboratively to create the informational YouTube channel Trenton Makes for the Trentoniana museum, as well as the branding for the channel. Aside from interactive multimedia and graphic design, she is passionate about the environment, animals, and inclusivity.

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Blot: An Animated Short Film

Blot is an inkblot character who exists in a black and white ink world. He carries a fountain pen, which allows him to draw things to life in black ink. When Blot starts seeing creations made of red ink, he immediately sees them and their creator as a threat that must be dealt with. It takes time for Blot to embrace individuality after being so adjusted to the colorless norm.

The basic idea of Blot is something we see throughout our lives: people generally have a hard time adjusting to new situations and accepting people who are different from themselves. It can be scary, it can be uncomfortable, but it can lead to beautiful things when we learn to live in harmony. Blot’s world is changed for the better once he sees that his red ink counterpart is nothing to be afraid of, and they can work together to improve their surroundings.

Blot serves as an experiment with simple color and forms to create a story that can be universally understood without dialogue. This short film is accessible to a wide audience regardless of language or hearing status, but also features Dizzy Gillespie’s instrumental “Night in Tunisia” alongside homemade sound effects to help guide the story. Blot also blends together aspects of 2D and 3D animation, with 2D textures on 3D models as well as some hand drawn 2D elements. The topic of blending the two together has been on my mind since seeing Klaus, which is 2D made to look 3D, and Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, which is 3D made to look 2D with scattered 2D illustrated frames. This is a topic I’ve had fun exploring, and would love to continue experimenting with!

Process

Blot was mostly 3D animated with Maya, and many of the textures as well as some 2D animations were created in Procreate. I recorded my sounds with a can of spray paint and my phone. This project was actually my first shot at rigging my own model, and it was certainly a challenge! Rigging is not something I had a chance to learn in my two years at TCNJ so I relied heavily on free online tutorials, but I was determined to learn before leaving. Choosing something I’ve never done for my thesis was a risk, especially since it was my third idea and only decided a couple weeks into my second semester, but I am very happy with my decision as it was a great learning experience. 

While I was unable to animate the full story as I’d hoped due to various obstacles throughout the year, my progress will be on my YouTube channel where I intend to upload my finished project later this summer.