The first concept I had planned on doing was to start with the NHS logo and have the lines move to make it into a £ sign. After looking at the concept, I decided against it because I felt it was very simple and did not give the message I wanted.
It was from there, I really started to think about what message I wanted to give with my animation. I wanted it to be interesting and shock people (potentially into action). It was then that I decided to use this project as an opportunity to educate people on the effect pressures on the NHS has on the staff. It’s not something that is widely spoken about in terms of the NHS and its something that may shock people.
For my chosen concept, I decided to start showing a doctor looking stressed, which then zooms into her eye, making the stage black and leaving a white circle (part of her eye). It will then lead to animations of her at graduation and then leading to more stressful scenes.
I then created a storyboard with the following happening in each keyframe:
Keyframe 1: Starts with a doctor looking stressed.
Keyframe 2: The camera zooms into her eye.
Keyframe 3: The white of her eye bounces down.
Keyframe 4: It bounces back up and the circle becomes her head, revealing a scene of her celebrating at graduation.
Keyframe 5: Bouncing motion continues and reveals her comforting a patient.
Keyframe 6: camera zooms to reveal her face, and a mask appears on her face in a popping motion.
Keyframe 7: the ‘COVID germ’ appears behind her in a popping motion.
Keyframe 8: Face zooms back out to reveal a manager shouting to work faster.
Keyframe 9: zooms back into her face to reveal a squiggle moving about in her head to indicate mental health issues or stress.
Keyframe 10: camera zooms out to reveal other health professionals all with the same squiggle.
Keyframe 11: the words ‘Health professionals are up to 4 times more likely to commit suicide’ fade in and out of shot.
Keyframe 12: the words ‘that’s 2 per week’ fade in and out.
The following is my final storyboard, complete with character design:
