Week...4? Panic.

Somewhere along the way I got lost in my days and 2 blog posts are happening one day after the next. I’m not playing catch-up, honestly. I have a strange feeling this was somewhat due to my idea completely changing after having read some Alan Moore, one quote in particular shattering my illusion, illustrating that design and creativity need to be changed at the most basic fundamental level before concepts can begin to be original once more:

"You can produce a comic about bright and interesting new characters, have a computer draw it, publish it in a lavish Baxter package and colour it with the most sophisticated laser scan techniques available, and the chances are that it will still be tepid, barely readable shit."

It made me think about how generic my story and characters I had in mind were, so it was back to the drawing board, however that is where they’ll stay as it’s really time to do the research part.

At the moment I’m thinking about how to structure my project report and what areas to tackle/research. Characterisation is a big one, how does one create a ‘Han Solo’ character that everybody loves? He’s not the star of the series but he certainly stole the show. Hell, you could even agree that Darth Vader is more popular than Luke Skywalker…poor Mark Hamill.

My pro MSPaint skills can only mean good things for my final design

This got me thinking though: everybody loves a rogue; the unwittingly charming, devilish one with and edge or some mysterious back story. For example, a few off the top of my head:

Han Solo: Swashbuckling rogue

Captain Jack Sparrow: Swashbuckling pirate

Professor Snape: Wand…buckling Wizard

Dexter: Knife-wielding homicidal nice guy

The Joker : Batshit crazy (GEDDIT?!)

Agent Smith: Logic defying, world-breaker

Jack O’Niell: Sarcastic space crusader

These characters are all loved for a variety of reasons. This is the point where I sign off and learn how to make my own Jack Sparrow.

Until next time!

-MS

Week...I've already lost count

After a short first couple of weeks back in the swing of things, the project is starting to take a little more shape. I've been spending most of the time "researching" other popular franchises and by no means ever partaking in the fun they offer. (and shamefully I STILL have yet to complete Final Fantasy XIII).

I still don't see how her outfit makes her battle-ready

In all the sucessful franchises there is a non-coicidental trend I've begun to notice. They all have incredibly striking names. Think about it, think about the games you go home and slave over or the TV shows you brainmelt, I mean, immerse in. "Grand Theft Auto", "Warhammer", "Final Fantasy", "Dead or Alive" and guiltiest of all: "World of Warcraft". Their names have power over you, the consumer. We can't help but be tantalised by the titillating tease of word-ology(that one's on me, dictionary) of marketing geniuses. (Geniusii?). Half the time they don't even have to make sense or have any correlation to the product they're advertising. I can't even count on both hands how many times there has been a "FINAL" Fantasy. I do wonder though, what will they do when they actually come to the last game in the series? They've kind of shot themselves in the foot there. But, let's be serious here, we all know Square Enix will never stop making Final Fantasy, it's more or less a license to print money.

Moving swiftly on. Although the names have credence to make little to no sense, there's more to a franchise than that. Focusing mostly on games and tv shows here, "products" (I feel a bit mercenary calling them that) tend to have a very well developed storyline especially when it comes to Eastern developed products, a background derived from a modern take on

ancient histories or mythology. To list a few:

Bleach/Death Note: Japanese Anime/Manga taking a different approach to their legends of "Shinigami" or "Death God"

Naruto: Another Japanese Anime/Manga wherein several of the characters are designed around and ancient tale of the slug, toad and snake.

Stargate: Based mostly around ancient Egyptian mythology.

Having a strong interest in ancient history and mythology myself I'm thinking this would be a great road for me to take. I just need to pick from THOUSANDS of histories which would suit best. Ancient Rome would be a good one, however it's quite overdone and they definitely have more than a few taboo areas which might not go down so well with the marking scheme.

This belated post was brought to you by a burned out from reading student.

-MS

Week 1: Enthusiasm

It's that time again, summer has ended, the easy days are over and we all have a few shameful alcohol pounds to shed before the inevitable Christmas binge. This also means it's time to start putting all the ideas I've sketched down on receipts, notepads and whatever other ink-able surfaces together to form one cohesive project. I don't know about you but I'm optimistic already.

So, after an unintentionally long break from blogging, it's time to get started again...and of course by "start" I mean: "create a pretty banner" which took far longer than it should have. Procrastination will be my downfall.

Now that the introduction is over with I can get to the focus of this post: My Honours Project.

So far, my idea consists of creating a franchise from scratch.

What's in a franchise I hear you say? Well, I'm glad you asked because I don't really know either. Never fear, Wikipedia will save the day:

"Franchise generally means a right or privilege."

Ok well not quite what I was looking for, let's try again:

A media franchise is an intellectual property involving the characters, setting and trademarks of an original work of media (usually a work of fiction), such as a film, a work of literature, a television program or a video game. Generally, a whole series is made in a particular medium, along with merchandising and endorsements. Multiple sequels are often planned well in advance, and (in the case of motion pictures) actors and directors often sign multi-film deals to ensure their participation.

That's more like it. In short, my idea is to create a story which can be developed into a franchise. Ideally, less focus would be on the story as the project would be more about the applyability(is that even a word?) and deliverables, however I believe that you cannot have one without the other. I will now end this post abruptly as I have a lot of research on popular franchises to do.

Fare thee well readers.

-MS