that is very good, thank you

OK.. This is mind-blowing!
Congratulations Diederick!
I am so glad I had the chance to see your work here and online too, you are truly gifted.
And many thanks for your help through comments and replying on the discord channel, you have been a great help :)
hope to see more of your amazing work.

Hey Alaa!

Wow, thank you so much for your compliments! I really appreciate it :)
I'll check your final submission out in a bit, since I'm really curious what you came up with.

Hope to keep in touch with you!

Hello Diederick!
Awesome story man, everything is so clear and really enjoyed to watch it!
Congratulations for all you hard work and all the feedback you provided through this program.
I hope to see more of your art in the future. All the best!

Omar

Hey Omar,

Thank you so much for your compliments, I really appreciate it!

Wow, this was amazing! I loved that you were able to tell your story without words. I also love the your choice of music for the background and sound effects, it really made your piece even better. Other than that, amazing job!!

Hey Rebecca,

I really appreciate your kind words about my story reel, thank you so much!
I probably have to change the music due to possible copyright issues, but that's something for the near future, haha.

Thanks again!

Diederick!

This was incredible. Your story was so seamless and so clear to understand.

You set up the story so well in the beginning , with the father nearly losing his son , a strong driving force for him to not practice his powers. As well as the joy that the son had while he was practicing his powers , which made me understand why the son would try to learn it on his own.

Then the recklessness and all the powerful action you brought to the story with your camera shaking you can feel it through the screen.

The resolve at the end with the father handing him over the drum and letting go of his control and then joining him side by side was great! I was left wondering if they both agreed to have the powers be present in their life. But maybe this could be left to the viewer to interpret.

Phenomenal Diederick! Congratulations you deserve all the praise for your hard work

Hey Daisy,

Thank you so much for your compliments on my story reel! And I'm very glad that the story is easy to understand :)

I'm glad that I eventually removed the mother from the entire story, since I thought that the father-son relationship would work well on its own. Your comment confirms this, which is so good to hear!

And your last question about the power in their life is an interesting one! Yes, they both agree to have the powers in their life, because they found out that together they stand stronger! That's also the reason why they don't rebuild the totem pole anymore, since they're ready to attack now, instead of living in fear.

Thank you so much!

Well done! It's incredible to see where the final story landed. This is a pretty significant creative journey you've been on from your initial concept to this final submission. I really like where there story landed and love the relationship between father and son. I like your use of color to help differentiate the magical powers of good and evil. It really helped keep the story organized and didn't create any confusion. I thought your use of sound was really effective at conveying the drama of the scenes and really helped elevate the tension. I also really liked your bad spirit character's design. It felt both culturally relevant and still had an original feel to it. Well done and congrats on completing your story!

Hey Alex,

Thanks a lot for taking the time to respond to my final story reel. I really appreciate your kind words about it! I totally agree with you regarding the creative journey of the story. It's been quite the ride with a lot of changes over the weeks, but I'm happy how the final story landed! I'm also very glad to hear that you didn't experience any confusions throughout to story. That's something that I often had worries about, since it's quite a big story with a lot of elements.

And as for the music and sound effects, I'm going to add sound design in the near future, accompanied by music that is copyright free, or even composed for the short. Who knows :)

Thank you so much responding, and I hope to keep in touch with you!

Holy Moly! This needs to be a PIXAR movie so I can watch it! Top-notch! I had to pause it to pop popcorn and drink soda! I could see it in my head finishes. Having time to animate it is incredible. Excellent story! Your incredible skills with editing, composition, drawing, sound effect, and music are so professional. If i had to offer anything, is it was dark in some parts and I didn't know what was going on. I got confused with the son and the assistant as well. I must know how the credit to the music! So I can play it when I need to be motivated! Great job!

Hey Michael,

Thank you so much for your compliments on my final story reel, I greatly appreciate it! I feel absolutely honored that you'd like to see it as a Pixar movie!
I would really like to know which dark parts were a but confusing for you, so I can try to improve it! And with the assistant, do you mean the woman that hands over the drum to Gregor while he's fighting the demon inside of him? Would love to know!

And it's fantastic to hear that you enjoyed the music that I've used in the short! Although I probably need to change it due to possible copyright strikes when uploading it online, you can still enjoy it for the time being.

Here's the tracklist of the music, with the accompanying movies. Some of them have strange numbers in the title, but that's because those are tracks of the movie's recording sessions (yes, I'm a big soundtrack fan, haha) Enjoy!
1. Ludwig Goransson - Wakanda Origins ALT v1 (From Black Panther)
2. Ludwig Goransson - The Jabari (From Black Panther)
3. Hesham Nazih - All Your Fault (From Moon Knight)
4. Daniel Pemberton - Assassins Breathe (From King Arthur)
5. Hesham Nazih - The Inevitable (From Moon Knight)
6. Mychael Danna & Jeff Danna - The Spell (From Onward)
7. Ludwig Goransson - Killmonger vs T'Challa v1 (From Black Panther)
8. Hesham Nazih - Take the Body (From Moon Knight)
9. James Horner - 5m2a Jake's Banshee (From Avatar)
10. James Horner - 3m5 Jake Sleeps (Alternate) (From Avatar)
11. Bobby Krlic - Murder (Mystery) (From Midsommar)
12. Harry Gregson-Williams - Managing The Estate (From The Last Duel)
And on top of that, quite some Tuvan (Siberian) throat singing!

Thanks again so much for you kind words!

Congratulations!!!! Sorry for the delay, yes the part I was getting confused on (Maybe it's just me, my family and I watched the awards and they understood what was going on), but I thought the little girl or son at the beginning playing became older, started learning Shamen magic on their own and then messed up on a spell and caused the magic fence to come down. Comments mentioned the assistant, so I was confused that their was the Shaman's kid who grew up, or was there an assistant as well? Yes, I believe the woman that brought the drumstick to him was the assistant? From 4:28-4:38, it was dark for me and didn't understand where to look. Prior to that, the character were either a little lighter or darker than the background and had good contrast for me to understand. I have copied and pasted the music to help motivate me when the time is needed. Thanks again for the inspiration and get some well-deserved rest when you can.

Hey Michael,

Thanks a lot for getting back to me, and no worries about the delay! Nice to hear that you've watched the awards with your family.
And regarding the confusion, you're right: the little kid at the beginning became older, and started learning Shamanic practices on his own. It was indeed Gregor's son at the beginning, not an assistant :) And the woman that brought the drumstick was someone of the tribe who fixed the broken drum (after Gregor's son fell off the roof), but I agree that this could've been clearer.

And thanks for your comment on the darker contrast between 4:28-4:38, I will work on that! Besides that, were the compositions clear enough, or too complex as well? Would love to know.

I took a little bit of rest last weekend actually!

INCREDIBLE! It's like I'm watching a movie. Also really satisfying to see how it turns out after all these weeks following your progress! The relationship between the shaman and the son are much clearer. Though I'd like to see son turn into "shamaning" (is that a word?) a little bit later in that story, so we can build that suspense of their relationship reaching to a breaking point. The battle w the devil is very epic! I hope to see this produced somehow :D

Hey Ivan!

I'm so glad to hear that you like my final story reel! And on top of that, I feel really honored that it felt like you were watching a movie, thank you so much! Besides that, glad to hear that the relationship between Gregor and Bruno is clearer now; that was a little pain point for the last couple of weeks, haha.

What exactly do you mean with your comment about the son shamaning? I'd love to know, in order to consider for improving it :)
The next period, I'm going to make a couple of sequences of the story more detailed and I'm going to add sound effects as well, to create a fully immersive experience!

And hopefully the next step would be to make a real animated short out of it, that'd be awesome!

Thanks again for you comment :)

what I meant was to have the son practicing the shaman to happen later in the story, kinda like building up the tension between the two, until it reaches its apex. Let me know if you need further clarification

Btw I find your input to be invaluable, I'd love to hear yours if you can give mine to my latest submission. Thanks

Diederick watching your story evolve has been an absolute joy!! Your art, animation, music and editing have created a really engaging story experience from beginning to end. The sequence with him transforming by the demon was so great and scary!! I love the addition of his son and assistant who had messed up the ritual in the beginning but help him at the end really tied their family bond/camaraderie together, and showed how different their personalities were but how they learned from each other--Gregor's strictness and his son's more laid back nature. The changes you made with him having his son be affected or resistant to Gregor really helped with showing off Gregor's inner problems well..and then his assistant having his back at the end was a great touch! Congratulations on completing Lost Shaman, I would love to see this as an animated short or film, and I can't wait to see where you take this in the future.

Hey Verna,

Wow, thank you so much for your kind comment and compliments on my final story! To be honest, I can't wait to see that transformation in well-drawn animation, haha. That would indeed be satisfying and terrifying at the same time! And I'm so glad to hear that the whole bond / father son connection between Gregor and Bruno became clear to you while watching the short! That's absolutely the best compliment I could get :)

I will for sure finetune the whole animatic soon, by adding more panels to certain sequences (for example, when Gregor is fighting the demon). Besides that, I'm also going to add sound effects to be drawn into the world even more. And I would also really like it if this film was made into an animated short one day. Maybe I'll ask around in the near future for opportunities... I'll keep you posted!

Thanks again for your comment, and my biggest compliments on your superb story reel! You did an amazing job, keep it going!

Congradulations, Diederick, you made it to the end of the program! I've been following this project of yours since like week 2, and I love how it turned out. The content of your story is obviously imbued with references to a certain culture, and you did a fantastic job of illustrating that here. You went above and beyond when it came to the music as well, since you made sure if fit the theme and feel of the story - I really appreciated that attention to detail. Also, regarding your actual artwork, I was quite impressed with some of the shot choices you made, since I think they made the action and pacing of the story really easy to follow and understand. I see a future for you in storyboarding if you keep at it. Nice work!

Hey Brandon,

Great to hear from you, thanks a lot for responding and your compliments. Glad to hear that you've been following my work since week 2 and that you're satisfied with how it turned out! And I got very happy after reading that you really appreciate the shot choices, that was something that I really wanted to push myself into.

Thanks again, and let's hope to keep in touch!

I think I may have missed some of your earlier submissions, but I like your addition of Gregor’s son/apprentice. Having children of my own it is pretty amazing how sometimes they can be that inspiration or influence to fulfill an aspiration and remind your of your self worth. I enjoyed your visuals, from the expressive communication between Gregor and son, and with the action elements. What an amazing final submission, it has been fun seeing your story grow.

Paige

Hey Paige,

Thanks a lot for your kind words! It's really interesting to hear your vision about the story having children yourself. Thanks a lot for sharing that with me, I find it very interesting to hear! Your comment about it almost creates an entirely new moral of the story about fulfilling aspirations and self worth. Fascinating!

Again, I really appreciate your comment, it's been a great ride!

Great job Diederick! I just love the movie and how it all came out!! Great story spine and development, character design, expressions and drawings and compositions, sound effects and all is done very well! Great job the theme reminded me of Disney’s Raya and the last dragon.
Congratulations on the completion of the program and wish you all the best!!!

Hey Habiba,

I'm so glad to hear that you like my final story reel! And I can totally see how it reminds you of Raya and the Last Dragon; not only design wise, but especially with Raya wanting to prove herself to her father (and eventually succeeding as well!). Thanks for sharing that with me, and also for your kind words!

It’s done! Congratulations Deiderick, it looks awesome. I’ve enlisted watching the progress on your story and seeing how it improved every week, especially the beginning where the tribe’s history becomes clearer and establishes a lot of the background.

Very enjoyable watch.

Hey Shelby,

Thanks a lot for taking the time to comment, and for your kind words!
I'm so happy to hear that you've seen my story improve every week, it's been quite the ride with its ups and downs!

Hi Diederick!

First of all congratulations on finishing this amazing work. It has been a pleasure to follow the process of creating and having all the brainstorm sessions together. You can be proud of yourself! The way you improved the intro scene alone is impressive. I love the scene you added where Gregor locks the door, switching to Bruno's face and then showing him a few years later - totally clear!

The use of the totem poles could use some more introduction in showing how they help protecting the village. Even though I knew about the reason behind this it still felt a bit confusing. But maybe that is just me.. 😉

The editing and the amount of frames is AMAZING, also the way you used sound and music. You told me that you were a bit unsure about the sounds, but I think you did a great job in using sound as a tool to make the story more clear instead of just being there for fillers.

During the full animatic I was totally immersed into the world, the characters and the story. Again, you can be really proud man! 💪

Hey Jelle,

Thank you so much for your insightful and motivating comment! I really enjoyed the brainstorm sessions for both of our stories. While some things were confronting to change, it caused us to make great improvements to our stories. And I'm so glad to hear that you like the intro scene! I think the locking door scene really is the final confirmation that Gregor doesn't want to do this anymore.

I think that your comment about the totem poles is totally valid. It could be easily solved by having small demons trying to attack the village, but they get roasted / fired back because of the force field around the totem pole connection. This can also create some nice foreshadowing leading to the actual attack! Thanks for mentioning it!

And thank you so much for your compliments, especially about the music. It's comforting to hear that the music isn't too much and that it fits the story reel.

Greatly appreciate your comment!

I thought it was good to change the secondary character by making him part of the family and the father's problem.
Very good work.

Thank you so much, Bernabe! Much appreciated 🙌🏼

Hi, Diederick! I'm so excited to finally watch this!

I know this is the final submission for the class, but I still want to provide a bit of feedback in case you decide to continue to work on the project beyond this course. Hopefully the notes are helpful, but as always, feel free to ignore any that don't match your vision. And most importantly, congratulations on finishing your storyreel!

Bruno's age feels a little inconsistent in the opening. Sometimes he looks very young and sometimes a bit older. To keep him young, try making his face rounder and his ears and eyes larger in proportion to his face.

It's not totally clear to me what causes the evil magic in the opening. Was that person climbing the totem and knocked a piece off or something similar? It seems like Bruno is playing around with a drum and could have caused it, but we were seeing him being tucked in when it initially happens, right? I quite like the idea that he accidentally caused this first one since that would better motivate Gregor to keep him from practicing shamanism.

Is the music Mongolian throat singing? I absolutely love that stuff and it sounds quite a bit like it. Very cool and unique. The music overall is really well done!

The animation in this final submission is so good! It's incredibly smooth and easy to follow. Really impressive stuff.

I know we've talked about this a bit previously, but I'd love to see the port-wine stain more consistently applied to Bruno.

Love what you've done with the soup when Bruno tries to slip away. It makes it feel much less like he's being constantly watched over but more so just in that moment because of his task.

Also love what you did with Bruno's training session where he's not all that good at using the drum. It's a nice comedic beat.

I like the sequence where the magic gets out of hand, overall, but I wonder if it might be stronger if it was more directly related to Gregor interrupting/mistrusting Bruno. In this version it feels a bit like it was already set in motion before Gregor arrives.

You've done an incredible job with the edit here. It's not only part of why the animations feel so smooth, but the little effects and transitions really punch in the emotions of the scenes. You clearly have an eye for directing!

The sequence where Bruno slides off the roof and Gregor dives to catch him... so awesome!

Obviously, there are a few changes I'd love to see, but this is already incredible, overall. You should be so proud of what you've made here. Now put this in your portfolio and get it out into the world. Amazing work!

Hey Allen,

Thank you so much for taking the time to respond. Let me start with a huge compliment to you; you’ve been so incredibly helpful to me! Not only by providing strong notes on the many variations of the story, but also by giving a lot of usable suggestions that I could to apply in one way or another within the next version of the story. So thank you so much for that, I greatly appreciate it! It really made my story better.

I’m definitely going to improve my animatic, both story wise, in terms of finetuning and adding sound effects to it. So I really appreciate your feedback on this version as well!

Thanks a lot for pointing out the inconsistent age of Bruno in the opening scene, your suggestion is great. I’m definitely going to keep this in mind when adjusting the story reel.

Regarding the cause of the attack in the opening, I honestly didn’t think about it too much. At that moment, I was wondering if showing that would be very important, and still have doubts about it. But I get where you’re coming from! And your suggestion that Bruno might have accidentally caused it, is a great one indeed!

The music is throat singing from the people of Tuva (Siberia)! I’m not sure how much it differs from Mongolian throat singing, but that’s why I wanted to make sure to use Tuvan throat singing, in order to be right culturally (as far as my research went) :)

And as for the port-wine stain, I unfortunately didn’t have time anymore to incorporate it in all frames. I’m definitely going to do that in the fine tuning phase, since it also gives Bruno an unique look that we haven’t seen in animation before a lot (referring to the port wine stain in particular).

Thanks a lot for the various compliments on the animatic, greatly appreciate it!

When you mention the part where the magic gets out of hand, are you referring to the part where Bruno is practicing shamanism secretly, or the sequence where Bruno is on the roof? Would love to know! And I agree that it would be an improvement if it would be more directly related to Bruno (especially in the scene on the roof, maybe after Gregor shouted to Bruno to get down).

Again, thank you so much for your valuable feedback and suggestions, we’ll definitely keep in touch through Discord. It was a pleasure talking to you!

Hey Diederick,

When I was talking about losing control of the magic, I meant when Gregor finds him practicing in secret and we see the "bad" magic begin around 2:48. It seems to me like the magic was going to get out of hand at that point whether Gregor found Bruno or not. But I think it's more interesting if Gregor indirectly causes it by distracting Bruno because it would better relate to the idea that Gregor's overprotective nature is actually partially responsible for Bruno's spell going haywire. It's sort of like how Marlin didn't make Nemo go out to touch the boat, but his overprotective nature indirectly caused Nemo to feel the need to prove himself. Both character's flaws create the problem and then they have to overcome them to solve it. So Bruno's immaturity and lack of respect for consequences plus Gregor's overprotective nature means Bruno is doing a dangerous spell when Gregor distracts him and those two action combine to make the whole situation worse. Then they have to learn to trust each other to overcome their own issues and the external conflict. Does that make sense?

Best,
Allen

Hey Allen,

Thanks a lot for your your explanation about the situation of Bruno and the magic going wrong! I totally get your point and couldn't agree more. Actually, what you just explained is something I really wanted to achieve within the final reel. However, I didn't give myself much time to brainstorm about it and find the best solution, especially with the deadline approaching. I agree that this would make the story even stronger on a character relationship level between Gregor and Bruno. When I'm going to finetune my story reel soon, this is definitely something that I want to change / improve. Would you like to brainstorm with me soon about how to convey this best? We could do that in The Story Pitch server, if you'd like to.

By the way, I just found out that I haven't seen your final submisson yet! I'm going to watch it later today, very curious!

Thanks again, and let's keep in touch!
Diederick

Hey Diederick,

No worries. My final submission isn't all that different from my week 7 piece. Just cleaned it up, made some visual cues more consistent, and added a couple images for clarity.

Happy to discuss your story on Discord, though I don't know exactly what form that would take. I'm still a Discord newbie, so let me know.

- Allen

Good to hear!

Regarding Discord, we could have a conversation through chat, or video call. It also depends what you prefer!
Let's head over to Discord to discuss this, haha.

Thanks!

Hi Diederick! Woww this is amazing! I've seen an earlier submission and am so glad to see your finished story reel! Your story has so much animation. I love the glowing dragons, very strong visuals. Your story is very strong also and characters have so much movement. I would love to see an animation for this story:) i can barely give feedback.. possibly the length could be reduced a bit at almost 8 min but i didnt personally mind it. Great sound effects as well they were perfect. You've done an amazong job with a very unique storyline. Hope to see Gregor again..:)

Hey Gina,

Thank you so much for replying to my final story reel, and for your compliments on it!
I'm very glad to hear that you not only enjoy the visual aspect of it, but that the story is strong as well. Thanks!

I hope that I can eventually make this into a complete animated short with a team of people, I'll try to sort that out in a while.
But before that, I'm going to finetune the story reel even more, by adding extra frames to certain sequences (Gregor's fight with the dragon, for example) and adding sound effects to create an immersive world of sounds.

I really appreciate your comment Gina! All the best and I hope to speak to you again soon.

Sure! Ooo that sounds great!!

Hey Diederick! I’m so glad to see your final submission!

I have followed your story from the beginning and the change is incredible. One of the things that I think makes it more special is that you have incorporated practically all the suggestions that we have been making. It is amazing to see how you take all the feedback so seriously and try to get the best possible version of your story.

There is no doubt that you have great gifts for narration as well as for drawing. Your drawings are impressive, all of them very powerful. It's the first time I see your story with sound effects included. If you already had me hooked before, now with these effects you can't even imagine how I like it!

You've gone from having a wand to having drums, from centering Gregor's rejection of shamanism on the accident his wife had to removing her from the story entirely, you've put in and out of totems in different iterations... I've seen so many versions, each one better than the other, which never ceases to amaze me that you were able to make so many changes and still be able to deliver such an impressive piece of work on time.

Your story introduction is great now. I love being able to witness the accident that changed everything for Gregor. Now I feel much more connected to him as I am able to understand his reluctance to practice shamanism. The fact that you show us how he definitely keeps his shaman stuff under lock makes it completely clear that he wants to keep away from it.
In your previous versions, we suddenly saw Bruno practicing shamanism, but in this new version we see a transition, he was interested in it from the beginning.
I also love the accident scene, when you show us Gregor from above you make him look very small and powerless.

During the program I have seen many stories, and somehow this has been one of the most special for me. I have learned a lot watching the evolution of your work and for that I want to thank you for sharing this whole process with us. I have loved discussing with you the best ways to attack the little confusions that were in the story, sometimes we have even moved our debates to Discord to understand each other better haha
I think you have been the most active member of the community in giving feedback, so in addition to learning from your story I have learned a lot from the comments you have made to me and other people. You notice many details that I would have overlooked.

In short, I think you can be very proud of your work, it is completely impressive and I really hope to see it at the ceremony, you deserve it! Congratulations on finishing the Xperiential program, it has been a pleasure to share this experience with you!

Hey Julieta,

Thank you so much for your amazing comment! I really wanted to make the best version possible within the given timeframe, so all of your feedback was really helpful to make a stronger story. That’s why I also wanted to incorporate as much feedback as possible, since it was all very worthy feedback.

And yes, it has been quite the ride in terms of all the different versions with a lot of elements appearing and disappearing throughout the versions. I’m very impressed that you were still able to look at it with fresh eyes after so many iterations. Thank you for that! I’m really happy that I eventually removed the mother, since I think that the father / son connection is already strong enough to convey the message :)

I’m so glad to hear that you like the introduction! After many helpful comments about the origins and the flashback, I really wanted to make this sequence strong. Not only to have a compelling opening scene, but especially to convey Bruno and Gregor’s motivations, to show why they are who they are in the present time.

I also really enjoyed brainstorming with you, and receiving notes from you! The points were well substantiated and they were also very strong points in their own right. I really hope that we can keep doing this when developing new stories in the future, you’ve been super helpful to me!

Thank you so much Julieta, and we’ll definitely speak again soon!