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Legends of Rhine Act 01 - Documentation

Legends of Rhine is an animated webseries, portraying a modern take on german folklore and the "Nibelungensage" especially. Concepted and created by Keivan Akbari & Fritz D. Thiel for their Master Thesis at Cologne Game Lab, 2024. Read the full documentation of the production of the webseries first entry here!

Legends of Rhine is an animated webseries, portraying a modern take on german folklore and the "Nibelungensage" especially. Concepted and created by Keivan Akbari & Fritz D. Thiel for their Master Thesis at Cologne Game Lab, 2024.
Read the full documentation of the production of the webseries first entry here!

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MASTER THESIS DOCUMENTATION:

Documentation and explanation of

creative decisions and the practical

work in a collaborative thesis project

Pages 01 - 08


00: MASTER THESIS PROJECT DOCUMENTATION:

DOCUMENTATION STRUCTURE

Table of Contents

01. Project Planning

• 01.1:

• 01.2:

• 01.3:

• 01.4:

Initial Idea

Role Distribution

Research & Scope Setup

Storyboard

02. Conception

• 02.1:

• 02.2:

• 02.3:

• 02.4:

Artstyle Definition

Setting Exploration

Character Design

Creature & Asset Design

03. Production

• 03: CREATIVE PROCESS (Individual Scenes)

- Story Relevance

- Purpose in narrative

- Specialities of certain Scene

- Inspiration + Concept

- Initial Idea - Storyboard - Drawing Progress

- Anecdotes

- Execution + Staging

- Detailed Scene Analysis

- additional Panels

- Animation + VFX

- Detailed AE Setup

- Workflow Description

- Sounddesign Description

04. Post Mortem

• 04.1:

• 04.2:

• 04.3:

Workflow Description + Ressource Overview

Pro & Con Revision

Future Plans

P. 03/72


01: PROJECT PLANNING:

01.1: INITIAL IDEA DESCRIPTION

From game to cinematic:

„Legends of Rhine“ was first imagined by us back in 2020, planned to be the first

game project made within our newfound collaboration group of study colleagues.

Initially we aimed to create it as a full low-poly 3D adventure game, a Prince of Persia

inspired experience with shapeshifting abilities on top - a quite ambitious task for

unexperienced developers like us back then. Three years later our study group has

evolved into an approved Indie studio, our first game is a completely different one

and LoR as a game was completely canceled.

Above: CA for LoR 2020. The initial art style was meant to be realized in lowpoly 3D.

Artwork by Fritz Thiel, showing the party entering the mystic isle of Fafnir.

Before abandoning LoR, the project made it into early concept stage, the low-poly

art style was figured out and a story script was written. But even when canceled in

this very early development stage, for us, Keivan Akbari and Fritz Thiel, it always felt

like quite a tragic decision to abandon LoR and its potential. Thus the idea for our

thesis project was born: A revisualization of the old concept and the script into an

animated cutscene - a project where we both can show off our artistic talents and

give the old project the love it deserves! In the following pages, we will describe this

endeavor in detail.

P. 04/72


01: PROJECT PLANNING:

01.2: DISTRIBUTION OF ROLES

Team & Task Distribution

With a team of only two, both sharing the same profession in Game Arts, we had to

be aware of our limited resources and divide the work between us, to use every

day of the thesis period to our advantage. We worked closely together and created

content nearly every day over the period of four months from October 2023 till

February 2024. We shared progress online via Google-Drive folders and worked in a

virtual office environment with Discord. Although we cannot completely divide the

accomplished tasks between both of us, we can separate it by Keivan Akbari working

on the Animation & VFX department in Adobe After Effects and Adobe Premiere,

while Fritz Thiel being responsible for the Asset Creation and Documentation in

Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Indesign.

In general we distributed our tasks 50/50 between the two of us, while checking in

daily to decide about design choices and scene compositions, as also animation and

sound edits. Thanks to this close collaboration workflow, we successfully avoided

frustration and had enough time in February to revisit and polish our earliest scenes.

Keivan Akbari created many of the characters and creatures which

appear in our story and handled the challenging task of Animation

and Effect Editing on the scenes, to bring life and character into

our screenplay.

- Character Design (Franka, Protagonist & Riverraft)

- Monster Design (Catfish, Tatzelwurm & Mermaids)

- Scene Staging including Lineart & Colouring (50%)

- Scene Layering in PSD for Animation Export (50%)

- Animation & Editing (100%)

- Sound Design (100%)

Fritz Thiel took care of the writing and narration of the project

and incorporated his travel experience into the characteristic

portrayal of the Rhineland and its serene beauty. He monitored

the progress and created this documentation.

- Character Design (Captain, Protagonist & Ship)

- Environment Design (Locations, Scene Compositions)

- Scene Staging including Lineart & Colouring (50%)

- Scene Layering in PSD for Animation Export (50%)

- Script Writing & Narration (100%)

- Documentation & Layout (100%)

P. 05/72


01: PROJECT PLANNING:

01.3: RESEARCH & SCOPE SETUP

Strategic Decisions

As already mentioned, our biggest challenge in this project was our resources and

the limited time. Before anything else could be done, we had to sit together to

determine our scope for what the final result should look like. With two artists

being deeply involved in the project from its former iteration, we needed to

streamline our individual visions to something we could accomplish within the given

time. Luckily our beforehand experience from the 3D game days of LoR made it easy

for us to find a compromise between feasibility and a pleasening product.

We wanted to create a project where we both could use our full palette of individual

talents and give a hommage to our beloved franchise, which never saw the light of

day outside of internal conceptions. The existing lore and characters we made back

then, were well-established for us and we felt they deserved to be revisited and

redefined for a new iteration of the idea. Finally we also wanted to publish a loveletter

to the Rhine and its local spirit, an ongoing passion in all the work we do

when collaborating outside of the university. All in all, we can say, that Legends of

Rhine is a passion project.

We knew that we couldn´t realize our vision of a full-motion animated picture within

this thesis scope, so we decided to cut it down. Thus we decided on a roundabout

10 minute cutscene with animations and effect overlays in certain parts of the

individual screens. The narrative is carried by the script and compositions, while

being supported by the subtle use of movement to lead the viewers´ gaze and set

a focus on important aspects of the story in each scene.

Since we both worked together for several years within and outside university

projects, we already had an underlying experience in collaboration. To streamline the

production we decided to do what we are good at and to focus on a satisfying end

result for the viewer. The whole cutscene should breathe atmosphere and directly

lead the player to the shores of the Rhine on a warm summer in 600 AC, a modern

reminiscence of the classic art of Rheinromantik.

P. 06/72


01: PROJECT PLANNING:

01.4: NARRATIVE AND STORYBOARD

Script and Narrative Conception (script included in deliverables)

The initial idea for LoR was born, as a love letter to the serene beauty of the Rheintal

and Siebengebirge, which we both traveled in the past and were left with a lasting

impression by these ancient nature sights. While pondering about an idea, in which

context we may portray these landscapes, we found our second main source of

inspiration in the public library of Cologne: the collection of local west Rhine

folklore tales by H. A. Grueber from 18951.

In his novel, Gruber travels along the Rhine from its source in Switzerland till it´s

final connection at the Northern Sea, while listing and reciting all common folklore

tales when passing their place of origin along the river. The area of Cologne and its

neighboring cities fill a major segment of this book and we were eager to visualize

these stories in a modern reinterpretation and hommage of Gruber´s work.

While studying his source material, we recognized Gruber often reciting parts

of the ancient northern saga of the Nibelungs. We decided to integrate this famous

story as our merging narrative element, by having our cast be on the hunt for the

legendary Rhinegold treasure. While staying faithful to the original storylines, we

focused on single parts and rewrote them into a stage play, currently including the

crew´s first endeavors in finding their leading clue to the treasure location.

Our new plot is separated into three acts, but with the limited resources we have in

our thesis environment, we decided to only visualize the first act - in which our cast

is introduced and set on their journey to find the Rhinegold, a legend they all share

an individual obsession and knowledge about.

While being visually influenced by Richard Wagner´s famous opera play and the

Graphic Novel published by P.C. Russel in 20232, we mixed elements of them with

modern displays from cinema and video games. Since our storyline is mostly told

visually by slightly animated screens, we had to rely a lot on well concepted

compositions and story supporting details in our paintings. To further contextualize

aspects of the script, we integrated lines being read by an off-screen narrator. In this

version Fritz Thiel wrote and acted out this role.

The narrator and the visual representation are both indispensable in helping the

viewer interpreting what is happening on screen, while also providing an engaging

feeling of a mysterious tale being told at a campfire or court.

1: Production, bücher de I. and (n.d.). Legends of the Rhine. [online] bücher.de. Available at: https://www.buecher.de/

shop/historische-romane/legends-of-the-rhine/guerber-h-a-/products_products/detail/prod_id/49213328/#product_description

[Accessed 14 Feb. 2024].

2: www.cross-cult.de. (n.d.). Ring des Nibelungen - Cross Cult - Comics & Romane. [online] Available at: https://www.

cross-cult.de/titel/ring-des-nibelungen.html [Accessed 14 Feb. 2024].

P. 07/72


Storyboard

The storyboard was our first milestone and realized in the software tool

„Storyboarder“. In the final product we ended up with 14 scenes on separate

screens, since we integrated some scenes below into each other by panel overlays.

P. 08/72



02: CONCEPTION:

A hommage to the Rheinromantik

and the Franco-Belgium comic school

in modern media

Pages 09 - 26


02: CONCEPTION:

02.1: ART STYLE DEFINITION

Franco-Belgian comic art in historical setting

To define our art style for this project, we meticulously analyzed existing media from

medieval and modern Europe, to determine a coherent appearance. Our lineart was

majorly influenced by the franco-belgian comic school, with their clear, dark outlines

and flattened, lesser saturated colors. To recreate this handcrafted and print progressed

look in our digital software, we stuck to a brush size of 6 to 9 pixels with

hard edges, to emulate a real-life inkpen. Additionally we mostly abstained from using

strong highlights with shading and gradients in general, to avoid the typical highly

saturated colors apparent in digital illustration.

The second major inspiration was historical wood carving prints from medieval

period Europe, used as printing tools for book illustrations and posters. Both styles

merged create an impression of antiquity, while still allowing us enough modern

aesthetics for our desired designs.

The „antique comic book“ style was enhanced by working with texture brushes to

give the screens the appearance to be printed on old, mottled paper. We are quite

satisfied with the end results grounded aesthetics, which still allows modern

composition tricks like sudden perspective changes and popup-panels

within the scenes.

Paper-Theatre and Shadowplay as animation

To maintain consistency with the old-school handcrafted charme of our art stlye, the

animations needed to be designed in a similar manner. To achieve this, we took a

closer look at European 18th-century paper theatres, a technique where papercut

dolls on strings or attached to sticks are used as actors. In combination with clever

usage of lights and mechanical craftmanship, this ancestry of animation has the exact

look and feel we were searching for.

Our second inspiration was the Asian counterpart, the Chinese Shadow Puppet Play,

where papercut dolls are illuminated from behind a screen and thus throw dramatic

shadows on the surface. The limited but charming movement of these puppets

felt fitting.

As stated before, in our story, animations will be used sparsely but effectively to

enhance the mood and lead the audience focus to certain spots in the frames.

P. 11/72


Above: Luckily the franco-belgian comic school consists of several prominent

examples of rural and medieval European settings, which allowed close inspection.

Our art style supports our ambition with LoR to be a hommage to the Nibelungs,

folktales and Rheinromantik in general. All sources evoke a feeling of PHYSICALITY

AND PRESENCE, which we want to transport into our chosen digital medium.

Below: Chinese Shadow Play and classical papercut theatre are charmingly beautiful

forms of art and provided us with a fitting stylistic appearance to adapt for LoR.

P. 12/72


02: CONCEPTION:

02.2: ART STYLE & UNIVERSE EXPLANATION

The Rhine portrayed in fantastic reality

Our story takes place in late medieval Europe at an undefined location along the

west-german section of the river Rhine. We kept our locations intentionally vague to

leave it up to the viewer to interpret the scenes of action. However we integrated

several landmarks of the real-life area around the Siebengebirge and the Rheinkurve in

Boppard, so an attentive audience might be able to locate some spots.

The general design direction is faithful to historical accuracy, with some creative

freedom here and there influenced by modern fantasy visuals from video games

and comics. A valuable source of inspiration was our books with collections of

drawings by Albrecht Dürer and Peter Bruegel, the Elder3. Their meticulous portrayal

of medieval Europe helped us immensely to design outfits, items and even the landscapes

in general. As an interesting anecdote, we want to visit some less rural areas

of the Rhine later in the story, where surprisingly, in these times, nearly all forests

were cut down for fabrication along the Rhine´s shores.

A fantasy universe needs to be grounded in realism, to allow identification with the

setting. A world where everything is unreal and fantastic loses its fascination, but in

a setting that resembles our real world, any speculative and fantastic element will

stand out and support worldbuilding in its unique details.

For example: In a world where magic is real and everywhere available, there still will

be bakeries. However, the fires in this bakery might be summoned by magic and thus

no fuel is needed to be transported and stored there. A subtle but already intriguing

detail, which makes the fantastic world more interesting and approachable. A great

example of this mixture is the „Dinotopia“ series by James Gurney4.

This approach is resembled in our underlying topic of folklore tales - stories based on

the everyday life of their audience, spiced with mythical legends to explain the unexplainable.

An approach of informative explanation but also a welcomed distraction

from the grim reality.

3: www.zvab.com. (n.d.). ALBRECHT DÜRER. Aquarelle und Zeichnungen von Piel, Friedrich: (1983)

www.abebooks.com. (n.d.). graphic worlds of peter bruegel the elder by h. arthur klein ( peter bruegel )

4: James Gurney. (n.d.). James Gurney - Official Website. [online] Available at: https://jamesgurney.com/.

P. 13/72


Revival of the Rheinromantik

The second major factor defining our setting is the „Rheinromantik“, a cultural

phenomenon from Europe in the turn of the 18th to the 19th century.

Rheinromantik became a common term for the longing and romantical idealization of

the Mittelrhein region in Germany, especially the area between the two major cities

of Mainz and Cologne. This trend created a whole new direction in the arts of

painting and writing and plays a prominent role in German tourism around the Rhein

valley even until today in 2024.

In our digital medium we wanted to revive this period and style in a modernized way,

by mixing it with the aforementioned franco-belgian comic art style, which in many

cases correlate with the Rheinromantik portrayals of nature and vast sceneries. A

major inspiration was the art from Caspar David Friedrich5, who traveled the areas

around the Rhine extensively and portrayed many of its locations in a mystical and

evocative manner.

In the Rheinromantik, the display of nature is mixed with subtle fantastical elements

to evoke the mystical, ancient feeling of a long forgotten romanticized past. The

sceneries are often shrouded in fog or portray ancient, isolated ruins, long recaptured

and overgrown by nature. A reminiscence of times when these lands were still

wild and unexplored and humans coexisted in close harmony with nature.

In LoR we want to evoke the same feelings in our audience. Rheinromantic paintings

or texts focus on the meticulous visualization of the scenery, the viewer feels like

they can step into the pictures frame and enter the scene. For us we went with our

inhouse established rule of 50/50 when we created our screens: 50% information for

the storyline with 50% mood to set the right tone in the stages of the play.

5: Booklooker.de. (2024). Caspar David Friedrich - Epochen - Künstler - Meisterwerke. [online] Available at:

https://www.booklooker.de/B%C3%BCcher/Heinz-Spielmann-Hrsg+Caspar-David-Friedrich-Epochen-

K%C3%BCnstler-Meisterwerke/id/A02yd4QI01ZZC [Accessed 21 Feb. 2024].

P. 14/72


02: CONCEPTION:

02.2: ART STYLE & UNIVERSE EXPLANATION

Moodboard & Inspiration Examples

Several examples of sceneries and European medieval environments by Peter Bruegel,

Albrecht Dürer and Caspar David Friedrich, photographed from the aforementioned

books. Working with these physical resources proved useful and helped us to better

analyze the overall look and feel of LoR, Although the usual online image gallery

search is useful, studying physical prints or even the paintings themselves, reveals

more details and conveys the artist‘s intended mood way more impactful.

P. 15/72


Some further examples of direct inspiration. Bruegel‘s „Big fish ate small fish“ is a

good example of exaggerated fishermen‘s tales about weird beasts spotted in the

open seas, a folktale variant present until today. C.D. Frierichs painting of „Arminius

Gravesite“ down below was a major influence on our mystical island‘s design. The

vast scenery and sense of the island‘s insignificance against the landscape are the

elements, that we wanted to transport into our screenplay.

P. 16/72


02: CONCEPTION:

02.3: CHARACTER DESIGN: PROTAGONIST / JAMAL

Jamal - fortune seeker with bad luck

The protagonist of our story, from here on called „Jamal“ for writing convenience,

is a far traveled opportunist with the ambition, to become a rich man without loosing

his independence. Initially planned as a blank face to allow character customization

in the videogame version of LoR, we had to further flesh out his background

and motivations for our new iteration.

The overall topic of our collaborative thesis project is the union of Middle Eastern

and German folklore. Jamal is the literal embodiment of this combination, he comes

to a foreign nation with his own cultural heritage and meets his German companions.

Both sides have to adapt to each other to survive on their journey, an allegory of

the benefits of integration.

Jamal has an undefined Arabic background and came to Germany on his hunt for

fortune, hoping to explore unknown rich ground to somehow profit from it. He

entered the Rhineland from the Northern Sea and traveled the cities along the

stream until he heard about a rumor of several cargo-loaded ships mysteriously

vanishing. Sensing his opportunity to plunder these lost wares, he took his outdoor

survival skills to use to search the area where these ships were last seen. That‘s when

the viewer first meets our protagonist, on a misty morning along the shore, ready to

set off to investigate the area.

Later in the story he becomes obsessed with the Rhinegold, after the mermaids save

him from drowning and implement a fading vision of the legendary treasure in his

mind, sending him on a mythical quest like in the tales of old. From the hero group,

he will have to face the biggest threats and will overcome his own boundaries and

fears, growing more mature and hardened over it - until the story ends he endures

the classical hero‘s journey. Even though he risks his dear life for his ambitions, he

keeps a clear mind and a positive attitude against his surroundings, making him a

little bit of a medieval version of Indiana Jones.

Jamal wears tattered self-made clothes, arranged in Arabic fashion and adorned with

purple and red dyes. His brighter color palette reflects his positive attitude and urge

to stand out against his surroundings. They also provide a good contrast with the

generally more earthy and grey color palette of the scenes.

His body is athletic but not muscular, Jamal is not a fighter like a classical fantasy hero

would probably be portrayed as. Although traveling the roads and rivers, he styles

himself and wears some expensive amulets and belts, to further emphasize on his

cunning and skittish behavior.

P. 17/72


P. 18/72


02: CONCEPTION:

02.3: CHARACTER DESIGN: FRANKA

Franka - the beauty of the muscle

Franka was initially planned as the cunning love interest of our protagonist. But we

realized her waisted potential of our „male gaze“ and reconceptualized her: being the

single female actor in our play, we wanted her to become the muscle of the group,

while still not just acting as the brave and ruthless warrior girl. A too common

trope to portray female warriors in fantasy media.

For Franka‘s visual appearance we took inspiration from Richard Wagner‘s

„Valkyries“- women of athletic shape in service of the god Odin, capable to overcome

any male warrior they might come across on the battlefield. We also adapted

baroque depictions of valkyries and Nordic goddesses - their bulkier silhouettes were

another welcome change to modern female warrior portrayal, which often tends

towards tender and more filigree body types.

Red hair emphasizes her fiery temperament and her high cheekbones and strong

jawline give her a default stern expression, which still can change her character‘s

impression completely, when smiling. In our script she acts as a force of nature, a

frightening and merciless opponent but also a symbol of maternity and femininity.

Her outfit underlines her practical nature, she wears sturdy and protective leather

gear, together with a warm fur cloak. Both keep her warm and safe when she works

the exhausting and dangerous tasks of a sailor on the deck, while the older and fragile

Captain navigates and plans. She uses tools like a ship‘s axe or lance as weapons, but

is no trained warrior with her own battle gear. While she appears as a classical Viking

soldier at first, all her belongings are rather used for manual labor than battle,

emphasizing that she fills the gap for the Captain‘s missing strength,

rather than being a mere guard.

In the beginning of our story, Franka will be suspicious and openly antagonistic

towards our protagonist (and thus the viewer), while her sly accomplice, the Captain,

will act more welcoming. This Bad-and-Good-Cop situation will change later on, but

is part of Act 1 to further emphasize Jamal‘s situation of having to adapt to a foreign

and hostile world, where it is unclear who is a friend or foe.

However, they both save the protagonist and while being more interested in his

connection to the Rhinemaidens, they still keep him around. In the future of the

narrative they become companions and friends finally, but in the beginning, Franka will

not even allow Jamal to hold a weapon and will constantly keep an eye on him, both

being worried about his true nature and her position within the trio.

P. 19/72


Right:

01: Valkyrie costume by

C.E. Doepler 1876

02: „The Valkyrie by

Hans Makart, 1877

P. 20/72


02: CONCEPTION:

02.3: CHARACTER DESIGN: CAPTAIN

The Captain - old sly fox of the sea

The Captain is designed as our mentoring figure, providing profound knowledge of

local culture and tales. When LoR was still planned a game, he would have been used

as an in-game encyclopedia to provide players with background lore and the real-life

ínformation behind aspects of the setting. In our story now, he acts as the brain and

cohesive force of the group, leading the two younger and more hot-headed

characters with a calm and fatherly hand. However, he is not be underestimated

and has a cunning and selfish character, he knows he needs the crew to fulfill his

goal of grabbing the Rhinemaidens‘ treasure for himself.

Captain is our most ambiguous character in the play. He acts as a guiding hand and

drives the story forward with his input and knowledge about legendary locations and

lore from the Nibelungs and other folktales. His behavior reminds of a humble

mentor, not unlike Gandalf from Lord of the Rings, but on the other hand his actions

also show his manipulative and imperious side. He is dependent on the other

protagonists and thus keeps their bond united, but he sometimes acts solely out of

selfishness. In the later storyline, Cap will be of immense help for the group to

proceed on their quest, but it may appear that they need to be careful around

him, once the deceiving treasure is in sight.

The Captain is the most experienced crewmember and sailed the seas around the

world in his former life. This is not only shown by him owning a full-fledged ship, but

also in the scenes, which take place in his cabin, where the old man hoards a

bountiful treasure of books, maps and forbidden secrets along his collection

of obscure artifacts from his adventures.

His mysterious and inscrutable demeanor is not only portrayed by his personal

surroundings, but also in his looks. We conceived the Captain to resemble a

humanoid heron: A tall and slender figure with a long, pointy nose which he sinks

into ancient books, fishing for any nook and cranny that may house another

tasty secret for his collection. Like his animal counterpart, he stalks the murky

waters of the river on thin and feeble legs, while still maintaining a predatory and

elegant appearance. His outfit consists of a black leather sailor‘s coat paired with

other tattered dark clothes. As an eyecatcher and to support his slender silhouette

we added the red inlay of his coat and his flowing white-red scarf - another hint of

a more ominous side beneath his surface. He has truly adapted to survive along the

murky waters and shoes of the river.

P. 21/72


Right:

The Captain was the most

fleshed-out character from

the videogame iteration of

LoR. We used most of his

former attributes and

visual design and adapted

him into our new style of

semi-realistic European

comic art.

P. 22/72


02: CONCEPTION:

02.4: ASSET DESIGN: JAMALS RAFT

Jamals River Raft - a swimming steed

Jamal‘s boat is not only there to set sail to the mysterious vanishing spot of the lost

ships, but also his homestead for the long time he traveled along the Rhine shores.

His self-made vessel reflects not only his craftmanship talents but rather resembles

his whole lifestyle and personality. The hand-crafted but sturdy raft contains many

hidden stashes, to hold more cargo and belongings than usual, just as Jamal is a

person with many hidden talents and ideas. He and his ship are both experienced

and flexible to adapt to any situation that may fall upon them at these foreign shores.

Visually the raft resembles a historically accurate Egyptian Nile raft, adapted to be

made from European driftwood instead of palms and bamboo. Jamal brought this

knowledge with him from his former travels and built a raft, which is faster and easier

to navigate than its German counterparts from this period. While the squarish

European rafts can hold more cargo and crew, Jamal‘s Catamaran/Canoe mix offers

many advantages for a fast-travelling lone sailor like him.

Like a cowboy‘s trusty steed, Jamal‘s river raft not only carries his belongings, but is

rather a major part of him, not yet rich and well decorated, but fitting for his down

to earth attitude towards life.

P. 23/72


02: CONCEPTION

02.4: ASSET DESIGN: RIVERBARGE

The Crews Barge - home and hub

The Captain‘s ship plays a prominent role in our storyline, as the moving homestead

of our cast it will be the main location for many scenes to come. The ship‘s design is

a mixture of modern and historical European river barges, a type of ship, that was

used to transport goods along rivers and lakes. The flat and slender build allows

navigation through shallow waters and narrow passages, although in open seas

a ship like this would be broken by the stronger tides.

In our context this huge unstoppable construct portrays the Captain as a man of the

rivers, who no longer sails to sea and additionally sets a nice counterpart to Jamal‘s

fast and elegant raft. The crew‘s barge is modified with sails and a luxurious cabin.

These additions again show the Captain‘s cunning character, he is well-educated and

experienced enough to have created his vessel into his own unique invention. His

ship‘s design provides extensive space for his crew and cargo and gives us enough

room to create diverse locations in future acts of LoR, when the cast spends a lot of

time in this wooden hub.

The first iteration of the barge‘s design tended more towards fantasy elements. In the

final visualization we went for a more grounded, realistic look to fit our setting.

P. 24/72


02: CONCEPTION:

02.4: CREATURE DESIGN: RHINEMAIDENS

The Rhinemaidens - keepers of the gold

As a hommage to Richard Wagner‘s portrayal and the classicistic paintings often being

brought into context with his opera play, we designed our three Rhinemaidens after

classical depictions of mermaids. Although our main inspiration was the Lady Loreley

herself, a common folktale from Germany, with her famous cliffs attracting wanderers

to visit the Rhine each year.

In first concepts the mermaids resembled more monstrous water creatures, but for

the above-mentioned reasons, we ended up with beautiful women with elegant fish

bodies, seductive and playful in their character. The original Rhinemaidens were

supposed to all share their golden blonde hair, however we took the creative

freedom, to give them different hair colors, with some more prominent animalistic

features like webbed membranes and dorsal fins.

As beautiful as the maidens are, the viewer is left uncertain about their motivations.

In our story they save Jamal from drowning, but also force the burden to glance upon

the Rhinegold on him, cursing our hero with the neverending obsession to see the

legendary treasure again. They even grant him one of their scales to guide him on his

quest, a constant reminder of his depth to them.

In later acts of LoR the mermaids‘ plan will be revealed, but for now we left them

ambiguous. They clearly follow a plan, luring sailors to their location, where they get

overwhelmed and cursed with the Rhinegold‘s charms. Maybe the maidens seek to

become free of the treasure burden themselves? Our monsters have character and

motivations, finally the viewer will likely feel sympathy for the otherworldy beings.

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02: CONCEPTION

02.4: CREATURE DESIGN: CATFISH

The Catfish - an ancient river monster

The catfish serves as a first introduction to the fantastical elements of our story,

when he suddenly rises from the river‘s depths to crash Jamal‘s precious raft. A true

force of nature, he appears as a humongous, old and scarred gulper, a true legend of

the river!

While our first drafts of this beast were oriented on modern monster designs, we

again toned down his appearance to be more realistic. Inspired by modern German

sailors‘ yarn tales like „Otto the Killerwels“ we thought, that often nature‘s wonders

are even more fascinating than our wildest imaginations. On a second note, these

simple tall tales of fantastic beasts are the modern variant of folklore tales and felt

fitting to be represented in our project.

Like Captain Ahab has to face his famous opponent Moby Dick, Jamal finds his

demise when being attacked by the catfish. In Herman Melville‘s famous legend

animal and man fight a pointless battle. In our story however, we want to give the

monsters a chance to be understood and even redeemed by the audience. Our

catfish is not an evil entity the hero needs to trace down to defeat, it is rather a

simple animal, which acts as one would do when being approached by an intruder.

The intrigued viewer might even recognize the coincidence of the river monster

appearing directly at the side of the Rhinemaidens: Maybe the fish is not a ravaging

monster, but rather acts on behalf of the mermaids and thus the tainted treasure

itself? With any beast that takes part in our tale, we will provide a twist - in most

cases the apparent devils are themselves simple henchmen of a bigger mysterious

force or simply misunderstood.

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03: CREATIVE PROCESS:

Deepdiving into the individual scenes

and the creative decisions behind

their final appearance

Pages 27 - 66


03: CREATIVE PROCESS:

SCENE 01: OPENING

Storyline & Purpose

„Scene 01: Opening“ is our opening shot to establish the setting with a wide view

over the beautiful Rhine panorama. This scene plays relatively long and introduces

the mood and overall feel of Legends of Rhine. Also the narrator and the timeline

are introduced, a fantastical version of Europe medieval period.

It also is our only wide-spanned shot in the project and serves as a first glance on

our detailed art style and design.

Conception & Inspiration

While first being conceptualized as a „zoom-in“ into a screen-filling landscape panel,

we soon realized, that zooming into prerendered outlines creates heavy pixelation,

evenin high-resolution video export. So we changed our strategy from a zoom-in to a

wide spanning nearly 360-degree shot of the Rhine river and its mighty horizon, from

the viewers‘ POV set upon a higher point.

Majorly influenced by our individual travels along the Rhine, we wanted to transport

the feeling of a late summer afternoon, setting its due upon the valleys of the river.

While we already established guidance by the „Rheinromantik (see 02. Conception),

this panel is the first proving ground for our set goals.

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While keeping our ideals of the classic painters like Peter Bruegel, Albrecht Dürer

and William Turner in mind, we also were aware of our guidance by more modern

media like the beforehand mentioned franco-belgian school of comic artistry, helping

us to find a good balance between detail and mood. Our animated equivalent of a

TikTok video opening shot is set up to provide engagement for the following panels.

Artwork Analysis

The first panel of our project already presented a challenge, since we wanted to

provide a long widespan shot across a beautiful landscape, awakening the feelings

present for the rest of the scenes. But with our final render being 16:9 we could not

show the whole entirety of the bountiful shoreline we had set up on paper. Within

development we already settled down to draw two scenes, which play along each

other, but in the final cut we even went further and added a third fullscreen panel

into the middle of the composition, making this opening shot a collaboration of 3

separate screens, merged into one. Flavour was added by putting our beloved

traditional German cryptid, the Tatzelwurm into the first panel and some other

details hidden for the observant audience.

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left: Tryptichon Frankfurter Kirche: Kreuzigung

(~ 1511), Painted Wood, Städel Museum

Above you can see the three scenes we added into

each other, at this point already resembling a

Christian Triptychon, a threefold build paravent,

usually placed behind altars to show stories of saints

from Christian faith. Once we acknowledged this

similarity within the working process, we admitted to

it, by adding a carving valley into the middle frame of the presented shoreline - maybe

the unfolding story will somehow prevail in this location? In a traditional Triptychon,

the middle part was only revealed after the sermons were spoken, will this gap in the

steer valley of the river provide salvation too?

Finally we also wanted to simply show off the beauty of our chosen setting. In the

beginning of the conception we stirred to stay away from the typical shot of the well

known „Rheinkurve“ photographs, but we somehow ended up with a strangely

familair composition.

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Animation & VFX

With our opening shot, we mostly want to provide the viewer with a gentle overview

of the setting. Soothing sounds of nature mixed with a slow pan over the scenery

set the stage for what is to come.

Although we did not miss the chance to add effects within said stage, the first

animation being a turbulence effect along the waterfront Photoshop (PSD) layer,

bringing the river to life by moving its brighter parts in a flowing motion, as if the

sunlight breaks on the crystalline waters.

A general overlay was added with a „Falling Leaves“ particle effect from the Adobe

After Effects (AE) library, tweaked to be rather indistinguishable from floating pollen

or other dusty particles, to enhance the dreamlike afternoon scenery mood.

The second most important addition to every scene is the sound backdrop. For this

scene we mixed together a blend of royalty-free recordings of rustling leaves in a

summer forest with a faint and distant sound of large flowing bodies of water.

On top, we added a concert of birds Fritz recorded in summer 2023 in the Eifel, RLP.

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03: CREATIVE PROCESS:

SCENE 02: RIVERSIDE MORNING

Storyline & Purpose

„Scene 02: Riverside morning“ is the establishment shot for our protagonist, the

nameless adventurer, inhouse dubbed „Jamal“. It shows the concerned but

determined hero sitting on the rhine shore in a nearly dreamlike environment

of peace and tranquility, contemplating his soon to be faced fate. Around him,

the player will see several items that later appear more often in the next scenes,

like Jamal‘s trusty wooden raft and his map, which led to his demise.

Conception & Inspiration

Aside from the focus on Jamal and his equipment (for more context check „Chapter

02: Conception“), the map leading to the shipwreck location needed to be prominent

in this frame. Thus several attempts were made to set up a scene with enough room

for detail and space for the environment.

We ended up with the composition above, since it allows for some environmental

storytelling, further adding to the adventurous character of Jamal. While the other

scenes with him riding the boat or the birds-eye shot are more interesting, they both

didn‘t leave enough room to add the map in. Also, his makeshift shelter adds to

Jamal‘s portrayal as a capable outdoor survivalist and experienced traveler, before we

meet him in this scene.

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The serene morning dust scene at the riverbank was inspired by personal memories

of travels along the actual Rhine Isles and the Spreewald in Brandenburg.

Animation & VFX

This scene did not need for extended animations, since it is already detail-packed and

plays for 20 seconds only. We instead added effects to guide the players eye to the

important spots in the painting. In Adobe AfterEffects we added sun rays in the back

portion of the image, while overlaying the whole scene with a subtle lingering dust

particle effect, breaking the lights. Additionally the water plane was animated to move

in a waving fashion to simulate calm waters.

In the sound editing, we wanted to create a lively scene of nature. We added water

and leaves rustling in a breeze along a concert of frogs and dragonflies buzzing.

Together with the narration overlay added in Adobe Premiere as a last step, this

scene was one of the easier ones to be realized.

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03: CREATIVE PROCESS:

SCENE 03: MAP TRANSITION

Storyline & Purpose

„Scene 03: Map Transition“ serves as a metaphorical loading screen. While in the

second panel, where the protagonist still is at the start of his journey, the following

panel will show him right in the middle of the action. We felt the need to present a

sense of progression in between, thus we took the old trick from Indiana Jones

movies to show his traveling route on a good old map. Storywise this map also

emphasises, that Jamal heard rumors of mysterious shipwrecks at a certain spot in

the further off shores of the Rhine and he somehow got his hands on a crudely

drawn map to follow these tall tales, hoping for a payoff.

Conception & Inspiration

From the beginning, we planned this transition as a simple overlay, a PNG image of

the map projected over the preceded scene. To add some flavor, we wanted the

travel route to be visible by a moving icon, inspired by Tintin comics or the Indiana

Jones movies, where we see the heroes traveling across the globe, visualized in a

similarly simple but effective manner, allowing us to display an easy way to

change locations.

The map‘s drawing style was inspired by medieval maps of European rivers, while

highly simplified. These old maps we found in book collections at the Kölner

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Museum were focused on the city and trading border, but we needed to avoid giving

out exact locations for the sake of the integrity to our semi-fantastic approach

of the setting.

Artwork Analysis

Sometimes the easiest route is the best and here we simply used a flattened and

desaturated image of the preceding scene at the riverbank with a PNG drawing of a

map overlayed. The map‘s art style is slightly different to transport a perception of it

being an item zoomed into. More realistic shading at the edges and a papyrus texture

overlay on the drawing itself were added to make the map look older and worn off.

Animation & VFX

The single object to be animated in this scene were the little arrow icons, displaying

the protagonist‘s journey. These single PNG layer objects were copied several times

and put after another in After Effects, appearing one after another with a slight delay.

The other moving parts work the same and were integtrated as separate layer

objects in PSD.

In the sound department we reused the sound palette of Scene 02 and just toned it

done to be more muffled and less prominent, while the narration sound line kept the

same settings.

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03: CREATIVE PROCESS:

SCENE 04: STORM

Storyline & Purpose

„Scene 04: Storm“ is our first action-packed scene, the viewer is thrown right into

the disparity of being caught within a deadly storm! Also, it is the first scene where

we really went crazy on the animation side of things. The narration fades out and

now we are entering the movie, things are about to change! A change of pace will be

introduced by this scene, in the following screens, we won‘t have the narrator

telling the story, but rather have the screenplay act on its own.

Conception & Inspiration

Our main inspiration for this shot was traditional Asian papercut theatre. We actually

setup the PSD with all waves being single selectable objects to have them move

independently while the ship and actors are separate layers too. The waves are

obviously inspired by the Japanese woodblock print „The Great Wave off Kanagawa“

by Hokusai (~ 1831), for the other design choices see Chapter 02: Conception.

P. 37/72


Artwork Analysis

This scene basically consists of two separate images being projected right after the

other with the fin of the infamous river monster being the driving force leading the

viewers‘ eyes around the already busy scene. We composed the protagonist on his

raft into the right half of the picture to act as a stabilizing pillar of the screen, while

the whole water section and the monster are constantly on the move.

We also wanted to show the raft in its full detail, a good chance to further describe

Jamal as a character. We see his whole belongings pushed inside the smallest parts of

the vessel and the makeshift boat itself shows that he is a capable craftsman and

survivalist. He leans against the powers of the waters with a stoic stance,

at least for now...

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Once the infamous fin

appears, Jamal will change

position into the second

scene, overlaying the first

stage fullscreen in a

smooth fade-in. To further

smooth out the transition,

we added a small close

shot on his frightened

bloodshot eyes to distract

from the scene overlay.


Animation & VFX

The major animation in this panel comes from the gushing waves, fighting against the

raft of our hero. Every wave (the white foam plus its gradient-coloured body) is a

separate layer, allowing us to move them independently in Adobe After Effects. Thus

allowed us to set up the papercut theatre effect, where solid layers move up and

down, creating its characteristic movement and distinct charm.

The second major player in this scene is the monster fin, appearing shortly after the

scene loads, rising in between the separate frontal wave layers and reappearing

behind the raft after a short time, triggering the subtle scene overlay. With the main

characters pose being redrawn to look at the new fin position in the second panel,

we already highlighted this movement, while the suddenly appearing eye-closeup

(added via a simple PNG overlay) also distracts from the scenery fading

into each other.

The final touch was added by the sound design: Roaring waves and blasting winds

blast the viewer into the seat right after the narration voice line stops, shaking them

up in a similar way to our protagonist - pure immersion! Jokes aside, we put effort

into the sounds of this scene being slightly louder than the previous panels, to clarify

the danger of the situation. A light blue lightning effect in AE was added in

post-production, to underline the dramatic impact of the scene by thunderstruck.

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03: CREATIVE PROCESS:

SCENE 05: CATFISH CRASH

Storyline & Purpose

„Scene 05: Catfish Crash“ is our most beloved scene in this whole project. The

intimidating fin, slowly circling Jamal in the previous panel, finally lifts its visage and

shows our hero who is the real ruler of this part of the stream. A devastating impact

is shown in this panel, sending the protagonist straight to his demise. After we built

up tension beforehand, we now release the whole force of destiny all at once.

Conception & Inspiration

This scene is only focussed on impact and the „monster“ itself: the glorious gulper

of the Rhine! We wanted to show off the demise of the now-established hero and

show off our first mythical being within the story. The catfish design is based on the

worldwide phenomenon of „Anglerlatein“, where fishermen like to engage in

discussion about the wildest beasts they saw in open water.

Otto the killer catfish from Bavaria, Germany comes to mind, where in 2006 an

unusually large catfish swallowed a swimming dog and afterward was hunted for

nearly three years until its inevitable demise. Although the dog (and probably

several other unlucky animals) deserve to be mourned upon, both of us felt

sympathy with the monster within this story. If an animal gets this old and big,

it deserves the title of a major predator in their living grounds.

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And here our idea comes into play: What if legendary dragons and all the folklore

beasts can be portrayed by more grounded means? We went back and forth with

this idea and finally decided to give our river monster the rather usual appearance

of an old catfish - these animals are known to grow as long as they live.

Artwork Analysis

While we used the Fibonacci-Curve in the preceding scene in its basic principle to

focus on the protagonist, standing like a human pillar against nature‘s forces, we now

flipped the composition vertically to emphasize Jamal‘s downfall instead.

A dedicated attack animation was way out of scope for our two team resources, so

we went on to display the enemy covering the whole screen. The viewers‘ focus now

shifts from right to left, following our hero falling off the raft, while the foul beast

covers the rest of the scene. The catfish‘s chin crashes the raft, right in the focal

point of the composition - sending the objects beforehand focussed on flying into

the outer realms of the viewers‘ perspective. For us, this final scene came out to be

much more manageable than a whole series of shorter cuts, since sometimes the

most focused solution works best.

P. 41/72


Animation & VFX

While our catfish does not actually jump onto the raft, we still managed to give him

some slight movement by having his sprite emerge into the frame along the orange

line on the left. The actual attack on the vessel is emphasized by adding a „Water-

Splash“ effect layer in AE - a great opportunity to show the monsters wet skin

impact onto the wood, while also providing a veil above potential glitches within

the shattered boat sprites.

For the raft actually getting ripped to shreds, we had to set up the drawn asset

beforehand. Thanks to analyzing which components of a real Egyptian raft were likely

to break first, we already had the asset concepted to be deconstructed, allowing us

the movement of single parts independent from each other - resulting in a satisfying

explosion of the former solid parts. Jamal‘s vessel was established to be sturdy and

weather-hardened. But within a second, the whole certainty of the protagonist fades

with the demise of his trusty steed.

Although additionally maintaining the wave movement and the lightning strikes from

the former scene, the main groundwork in this scene now lies responsible for the

sound design. While in the first frames of the scene the storm is still raging, it even

gets climaxed by the ear crushing impact of breaking wood (adjusted to be safe to

hear with headphones). The devastating aftermath is made clear by fading the overwhelming

sound of the storm into numbness, getting replaced by a looping heartbeat

after impact. Together with the hero, the viewer is taken out of control,

fading into nothingness.

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03: CREATIVE PROCESS:

SCENE 06: SINKING

Storyline & Purpose

„Scene 06: Sinking“marks the undeniable demise of our hero. We see him sinking into

the darkness, unconscious and defeated. After the action-packed sequence on the

water, the next segment will stand in strong contrast, but in appearance and mood,

providing a short and calmer section in between the more busy and narrated scenes.

This scene also shows Jamal‘s progression in the classical hero‘s journey, where the

protagonist first has to fall to rerise to the top, in our case quite literally.

Conception & Inspiration

Since this scene is our first really dark painting, we had to find a way to make the

picture still a pleasure to look at and decided to guide the eye by a spotlight from

the water‘s surface. A reminiscence to theatre stages, where a singer or actor often

is highlighted by a straight bright spotlight on a dark stage, a fitting composition, since

P. 43/72


the Ring of Nibelungs is mostly known for its interpretation as a world-famous opera

play by Richard Wagner. In later scenes we will emphasize this homage more.

Artwork Analysis

The composition is dominated by the

sun spotlight from above the water

surface, illuminating the looming shadow

of the river monster and the rubble of

Jamal‘s former vessel.

We decided to have him float not in a

direct line beneath, but rather compose

a slightly tilted triangle layout, to guide

the viewer‘s eye along his downward

trail of air. The bubbles and his outfit

coming off in the light‘s focus, underlines the gravity of the situation. Overall, we

wanted to give this scene a sense of peace and tranquility, an acceptance of fate.

Animation & VFX

In animation we used two very impactful actors: the twinkling lights and the moving

fish. While Jamal is frozen in his fall, only affected by the fullscreen top-layer overlay

with the established water distortion shader, the lights slightly move and fade in and

out, to create an effect of bright light broken by the moving water surface.

The shadowcast catfish is a separate layer object and rotates around a pivot in the

middle light source, giving him an intimidating circling appearance. To give the scene

more depth, the catfish layer sots behind the bubble trail and is even overlayed by the

less actively moving fish swarm - these three operating layers with their supportive

lighting from behind, makes this simple scene appear like caught from a movie!

After a black screen blends with a loud

splash, all sound becomes immediately

muffled. We can only „hear“ the looming

silence and subtle underwater white

noise, with a really quiet swooshing of

the still raging waves. The sudden change

of audio environment underlines the

serenity in Jamal‘s stagnation while falling

into his despair, unable to fight on.

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03: CREATIVE PROCESS:

SCENE 07: RHINEMAIDENS

Storyline & Purpose

The „Rhinemaidens“ is part two of our calmer underwater section and shows the

appearance of our protagonists Deus Ex Machina: the mystical maidens of the rhine,

commonly portrayed as mermaids, as for example the prominent Westgerman

folktale of the Lorelay proves. Our main goal with this scene is to awaken the viewers

curiosity, if these creatures are Jamal‘s saviors or if they will deliver him the final blow.

Conception & Inspiration

Along the former scenes staging of the darkness being interrupted from the spotlight

above, our main challenge in this scene was the portrayal of the Rhinemaidens,

legendary nymphs, which hoard and seek the Rhinegold in the original saga. Regarding

their visual appearance we took inspiration from Richard Wagner‘s Valkyries and

more classical depictions of mermaids in art from 16th and 18th century Europe.

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But more important was their characterization, without the narrator giving

exposition in these scenes, we had to rely on visuals only. Since we wanted to evoke

curiosity in the viewer, we decided to give this character trait to our maidens too.

They appear from the black depths of the murky Rhine and act nearly in a playful

manner towards the surprising drop from above. However, it is left uncertain if

these beings see a person in need or a meal to toy with beforehand.

Artwork Analysis

Like in the scene before, Jamal is still sinking into the darkness, unconscious

and helpless. The light from above has already become dimmer, emphasising on

his dwindling condition. But from the darkness, a counterpart rises:

The three maidens add some brighter lights in the black lower part of the painting.

Jamal‘s downwards pointing triangle is now mirrored vertically by another triangle

with the nymph, meeting in the middle of the screen, where they will soon lay hands

on him, giving a sense of impactfulness. The maidens‘ poses address their curious and

playful attitude, they circle the body and reach out to it.

Their size in this scene is left ambiguous, although it will be clear soon that they have

human proportions, here it seems they may be way larger than our protagonist,

underlining their otherworldly aura.

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Animation & VFX

Most of the scene was copied and adjusted from the former one. The light source

acts the same, although scaled down around 75%. The existing water shader fullscreen

overlay is the same still, giving the whole screen a slight distortion to simulate

the moving waters. Additionally we added a randomized dancing bubbles shader along

it, to add some details in the dark parts of the screen and to give the light source

from above some more spots to break upon.

The real magic happens with the suddenly appearing mermaids. All three are a

solid layer, appearing on the lower edge of the painting, rising in a constant motion up

to the middle of the composition before the scene ends. While being dark when

spawning in, their brightness is merged to their position and allows the light shader

to affect them too, turning up their colors simultaneously to the height of their

position in the screen.

The unnerving atmosphere is not only produced by the ambiguous lighting and slow

movement of the actors, but also with sound: The underwater ambiance sound from

the scene before is again recycled, but now is interrupted by an ominous female

chorus singing as the scenes transition into each other. This sound effect from a free

asset library continues to play and rise in its pitches, the longer the maidens appear

on screen. The humming melody evokes the feeling of being lured into the arms of

the creatures, while also eerily calming the viewer and the protagonist alike. Again

animation and sound set the final stage to our accomplishment, to keep a sense of

suspense in this scene. Together with Jamal we are frozen in the descent into these

dark waters and await fate‘s hand.

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03: CREATIVE PROCESS:

SCENE 08: RHINEGOLD

Storyline & Purpose

While „Rhinegold“ is a scene with major importance to the overall story of LoR,

this prominent connection of events won‘t be revealed before Act 2, which will be

produced after the delivery date of this paper. For now, we present Jamal‘s first

contact with the legendary treasure, which will in the future be his obsession and

driving factor for his upcoming actions, as a mere ambiguous vision. The viewer may

interpret that the maidens rescue Jamal and lead him up to the guiding sunlight of

the surface. Alternatively, the golden light in the dark could represent the classic

„light at the end of the tunnel“ - a trope for entering the afterlife. We either

witness Jamal‘s death or his last glimpse of his surroundings before losing

consciousness completely and letting it all go.

Conception & Inspiration

Again a major inspiration for this scene was the Nordic Valkyries, as a homage to

the source material and the opera script. Valkyries appear on the battlefield and lead

the fallen warriors to Valhalla, the northern version of the glorious afterlife. They

choose the bravest fighters among the dead and carry them on their winged horses‘

backs or even fly themselves, and always appear as beautiful but also unapproachable

and otherworldly female creatures.

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This pictures the mood we estimated for this scene quite well. We see Jamal‘s POV

for the first time, while one of the nymphs gently drags him along, the other two

swim ahead, seemingly unphased by the whole ordeal. The eyecatcher of the scene is

the golden light they are heading towards, a tranquilizing promise of relief

and final peace.

The allegory of the guiding light into the afterlife was perfect for this scene, the

sunlight from the previously shown screens has fainted and is now replaced by

this mysterious and soothing, but also definitive goal of their journey.

Artwork Analysis

The composition is dominated by the contrast of darkness against the golden

brightness of the light. While the foreground is filled with the actors, they all form

a straight and pointed line towards it, guiding the view along their path. For the first

time we see the scene from the protagonist‘s point of view, allowing the viewer a

more personal experience of the dramatic event - they fade into darkness together

with the hero.

Jamal‘s grip is relaxed, while being held gently but tight by the mermaid. We see he

accepted his fate and completely surrendered to his situation, while the creatures

also don´t act in a manner that would imply immediate danger. A sense of peaceful

awareness and curiosity about what may come after entering the light lingers through

the dark green and golden palette of the scene.

The other maidens next to the light swim in a happy and playful manner, which stands

out against the solemnity of the portrayed scene, making their intentions unclear.

It again implies the question, of whether the light stands for the death or the life

of the protagonist

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Animation & VFX

The animation again uses the water distortion overlay, while mixed with a new

advanced version of the light sparkle effect, now reshaped to radiate in a circular

movement in the middle of the light spot of the painting. The maidens are again a

separate layer and have a subtle movement towards the light, but since this scene is

pretty short the only really recognizable movement stems from the light particle

effect. Aside from the fullscreen overlay from the water shader, we also added the

particle dust effect from Scene 02 at the beach, this time reshaped to resemble algae

or similar undefined underwater particles. Since this effect layer also completely fills

the screen, it is only affected by the light from behind, giving a bit more depth

to the scene.

Finally, we introduced a new blend-out technique at the end of the scene: Before the

screen fades into black, we added 2 black moving blocks with blurred outlines at the

upper and lower end of the canvas. These blocks move towards the center, giving the

impression of the POV eyes closing, a blink into darkness so to speak. This setup be

reused in a later scene of Act 1, tying both events together in a subtle way.

On the sound side of things, the same sound as used in the scene before proceeds

to play, ending at the climax of the nymphs humming, by fading into muffled numbness

as the eyes close and the screen fades to black. With this outro our underwater

section of the screenplay ends and we will soon be reintroduced to the busy

overworld. But is Jamal‘s upcoming resurface, the reality or just his vision in his

personal version of the afterlife from now on?

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03: CREATIVE PROCESS:

SCENE 09: FLOATING

Storyline & Purpose

„Scene 09: Floating“ adds a new change of scenery after Jamal‘s blackout in the

depths. He seems alive and desperately clings to life in the broken remnants of his

belongings. The viewer may question if this scene is reality or still part of his neardeath

experience - how and why should the maidens of Rhine save this unimportant

adventurer? Maybe his fade into light was his end and he just dreams on from now

on? This decision is open for debate.

The second and similar important part of this scene is the first appearance of the

ship, coming to his unforeseeable rescue. This ship will be a most prominent part of

most future scenes, acting as the new hub of operations for the actors.

Will the crew of this ship be the protagonist‘s saviours or the next immediate threat

looming in the distance?

Conception & Inspiration

First of all we wanted to display a sense of uncertainty about the situation in this

scene. We show the river again, but in a less winded up state, displaying the storm

is over and its devastating aftermath for Jamal‘s raft. Scenes like this often act as a

point of no return in adventure media. Tintin is trapped at sea several times and

would be doomed without the writer‘s mercy.

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As an homage we also wanted to incorporate a similar scene and setup to LoR,

since it felt like the perfect setup for the protagonist‘s situation.

Artwork Analysis

The papercut waves from the storm panel reappear, but in a way more gentle and

less prominent way, still keeping the William Turner painting color, but without the

immanent danger of the raging sea. The ship appearing in the background should look

old but trusty and hardened in the river‘s weather, the design loosely based on a

European medieval river ferry (see 02: Conception). The ship works as the second

reference point of the painting, with the shoreline leading the eye towards it.

The calm and cluttered foreground is not too much of a distraction from the more

prominent vessel at the horizon, looming either as a promise of safety or a new

threat over the helpless protagonist. Since the ship will be moving towards the

camera, it also was important to leave enough empty water for the object to be

enlarged without clipping.

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Animation & VFX

As a major story arch and eye-calming shot after the mysterious and dark underwater

scenes, we needed this shot to stand on screen quite long - advanced

moveability needed to be apparent in the file. The basic setup for this is easy: The

more parts of the image are separate layers in Photoshop, the more advanced the

animation can get. In this panel, Jamal and the rubble are separated as one layer, while

every wave in the foreground is a single layer object in itself. The ship and its frontal

wave are also single-layer objects and were drawn fullscreen size to allow rescaling

without loosing details in the outlines.

With this setup, Keivan‘s work in the animation department began. In AE he edited

the boat and character objects to slightly bop up and down, while giving the waves

a gentle flowing movement. Each wave acts slightly time-shifted from the others, so

the impression of lighter wind still rousing the water is given.

The boat coming closer was a more

difficult task. With the object being saved

in the PSD-file as a Smart-Object, resi

zing without loss of details was a given.

So first the ship was scaled down and set

up in its starting point in the upper left

corner of the horizon.

In the first iterations, we just scaled the

ship up in a constant flow until it filled

out the screen. But the movement was too static and looked blutly unnatural, so we added

the same slight bobbing move set of the floating rubble objects to it and separated the

frontal wave into a solitary element. With the ship now being altered by the waves while

moving onward plus the wave being affected by a slight distortion effect from the AE library,

we managed to give the illusion of the ship slowly dragging itself through the still not calmed

down waters.

P. 53/72


In the sound department we finally added a mixture of gentle waves splashing onto a pier

and the sound of distant seagulls. With the ship approaching we also added a faint wood

creaking sound, which can either be interpreted as the ship itself or its sails aking in the

wind. These three elements added enough atmosphere to add the on top.

Additional Panels

On top of the scene and its already quite sophisticated animations we also needed to

present major story elements within the frame. We ended up reusing the overlay

panel idea from the beginning (Map & Storm), with the intention this time being

the portrayal of several things happening shortly in classical comic fashion.

The first of the two panels shows the crew for the first time (read about their design

choices in Chapter 02), with the Captain looking focused into a looking glass, and

Franka standing stoically beside him with a concerned look into the distance. We

know they saw something, but we don´t know their feelings about that.

The second panel shows them looking down the water from their ship‘s railing onto

poor Jamal‘s body. The Captain swings a rope to catch him up, while Franka holds

a boathook to help him out. Both postures can either be read as they immediately

helping them or preparing to do harm to the stranded foreigner, again keeping the

viewer uncertain about these individuals intentions.

While these panels did not need to be animated, we still had to add them within the

animated scene, without breaking the action. The first panel of the crew in the

lookout overlays the approaching boat, concealing its animation. This idea allowed

us to speed its arrival time, without the need of altering the animation itself. Also it

leads the players eye back to Jamal on the left side, making it apparent, that the crew

spotted him through the looking glass and set course to his location.

After the panel vanishes, the boat finishes approaching. The second panel on the

other hand appears right after the ship stops and conceals Jamal and creating the

space for viewer‘s imaginations on what‘s happening next.

P. 54/72


03: CREATIVE PROCESS:

SCENE 10: RESCUE

Storyline & Purpose

„Scene 10: Rescue“ is an immediate follow-up the the scene before, where we ended

with Jamal being fished out of the water by the Captain and Franke. This short scene

shows his POV for the second time after the mermaid rescue, tying them both

together as his vision finally fades and he finds back into reality, by getting grabbed

by two rugged-looking individuals.

Conception & Inspiration

We see the crew menacingly towering above Jamal‘s lying body, reaching for

something in his face. An impactful establishment shot of the two from now on

always present side characters in LoR.

Since this scene is pretty short and rather serves as a transition shot in the overall

script, we decided on a simple fade-over animation of Capt‘s hand positioning and a

fast fade into darkness. It serves as an unnerving shot of intimacy, the strangers

seem to grab out of the viewers‘ screen!

Finally, we both are game developers and thus did not want to miss the opportunity

to add one of in certain games established POV-shots with actors approaching the

camera in a disturbingly close manner.

P. 55/72


Artwork Analysis

The biggest composition challenge in this scene was the positioning of the characters

and their defining features and outfits, they need to be recognizable from now on.

The red inlay of the Captain‘s coat sends the first focus on him, while Franka towers

in the background. Her axe and wrist armor establish her as a rather physical challenge

for Jamal, while the Captain leaves enough vagueness to stay unpredictable.

The ship‘s mast in the background forms

a triangle with the characters, to keep

the focus on them by leading the viewers

eye into the upper middle of the frame.

The seagulls are separate objects for

animation, to bring life into the setup.

P. 56/72


Animation & VFX

The major animation in this scene is the beforehand established „blinking eye fade to

black“ (see Scene 08), with its length adjusted to play faster and only once. The

effect was created by Keivan and after some tests altered in color and duration. It

serves as a connection between both scenes - while also indicating the question, of if

Jamal is still hallucinating or if this rescue scene is real and he finally saved? That´s

up to the audience´s interpretation.

The other animations are

also rather simple: The hand

repositioning of the Captain

is a simple fullscreen fade of

the two previously drawn

screens. Both scenes are

similar, with only the Capt‘s

hand being overpainted in

the second sprite, enabling

a smooth transition. The

rest of the image stays

mostly static. The birds are

another single object plane and are animated with a looping circle animation, making

them move in and out of the frame, adding some fast but soothing movement to

please the eyes and lead the view to the vocal point up at the end of the shipmast.

In the sound department, we added the same wave splashing against wood and the

seagulls from the preceding scene. In the short black transitions from the former

panel we also added the sound of ropes scratching over wood, to indicate the

Captain and Franka pulled Jamal over the railing onto their ship‘s deck.

P. 57/72


03: CREATIVE PROCESS:

SCENE 11: CABIN SCENE

Storyline & Purpose

„Scene 11: Cabin Scene“ was probably the most complicated scene for us to finish.

It supports the so far longest ongoing narration part of the script and thus had to

stay very long on screen, with not much to show except the characters discussing

about Jamal‘s fate and their future plans. Our solution was several fading animations

with the characters repositioning inside the static scene, supported by advanced

overlays, to provide variety within the long runtime of this scene.

Conception & Inspiration

Since the scene takes place inside the ship‘s cabin at night, the lighting was our main

concern. We mixed several cabin interiors from pirate movies and comics with the

color palette of Boettcher‘s „Sommernacht am Rhein“ (1862) to create a warm and

cozy campfire gathering feel for the conspiring group of scoundrels.

P. 58/72


Artwork Analysis

The composition shows clearly a ship‘s master cabin interior with the prominent

windows adding an additional light sources, while leaving enough room for the actors

to change positions. The table plate is also important since it gives a center focus of

the view to be guided towards the mermaid scale in the middle of the composition.

With the composition of the static scene done, we went along to introduce several

different poses of the actors within the shot, to later let them overlay into each other

as a sign of time progressing, in the final cut we decided on three of these variations

to keep the stage alive.

Additionally, we added three light sources, which illuminate the dark cabin to evoke

a feeling of a cozy gathering, rather than a medieval interrogation chamber. At this

point the narrator makes clear, that the sailors are no threat to Jamal and they

conspire a plan to follow the mermaids‘ trail to promising treasures. The warm

orange lights contrast the blue windows, keeping the night out.

P. 59/72


Animation & VFX

For an extensive scene like this one, we made sure to have some interesting technical

treats running in the background. First of all we edited the transitions of the poses as

simple fullscreen scene overlays. They fade into each other long enough to not

interrupt the narrative flow, but still go fast enough to keep the viewer engaged.

Afterward, flicker and glow effects from the sturdy AE library were added to the

light source layers. These were already strong blurred paintbrush layers in PSD and

thus the effects could easily transform them to picture the faint glow of candlelight.

In the light emitting from the window front, some dust particles can also be seen,

dancing within the smokey wooden room of the old ship‘s interior.

While our first plan was to have the light sources change colour and transparency

within the scene to further enact time progression, this effect ended up rather

distracting from the rest of the play and we went along without. In a 3D rendered

environment these dynamic lights would have worked better, but in our 2,5D sprites

they rather looked like a timelapse rather than an engaging night of planning.

As the narration proceeds further to the point explaining the vision of the rhine

maidens, we added the repurposed mermaid layer from the former scene as a semitransparent

sprite projected on top of the window layer section of the scene.

Tweaked with the „overlay“ effect inbuild into AE and some transformation layer

effect, they emanate from the moonlight falling into the room, seemingly a ghostly

appearance from Jamal‘s still startled mind.

P. 60/72


Finally, we added a small but impactful white sparkle effect onto the mermaid scale

object on the table. As a magical item leading the crew to their next destination in

the following chapter, we felt it should immediately catch the eye.

To wrap everything up we added slight camera movement to create the sence of the

ship‘s float and let this animation loop, together with the later added wave sounds

the impression of the ship being in open water is more emphasized.

The sound design work was a bit easier on this one, we mainly added rhythmic and

looping wood creaking, to show the ship being altered by the gentle waves of the

night. A faint and distant sound of waves is also detectable if the viewer pays attenti

on. But the narrator‘s lines definitely are the main string in this section, thus we

didn´t want to interfere too much with them.

P. 61/72


03: CREATIVE PROCESS:

SCENE 12: ISLAND VISION

Storyline & Purpose

The „Island Vision“ serves as another breakup of the narrative-focussed cabin scene

and acts as a major spoiler for what is to come in the following „ACT II“ chapter of

LoR, where the newfound party will eventually enter a dragon‘s lair on the

mysterious isle of Fafnir, located somewhere hidden along the Rhine‘s unclaimed

waters. It will play as another fullscreen overlay with extensive in-scene animation.

Conception & Inspiration

The island should be a hidden place, shrouded in fog and mystery.

The final version was conceptualized as an homage to the painting „Ruine Eldena“ by

Caspar David Friedrich. We wanted to capture a dreamlike appearence, while staying

within semi-realistic borders. Additionally, the actual Loreley helped us to keep it

realistic, while still mixing it with fantastic elements. It will act as our West-German

version of King Arthurs Avalon.

P. 62/72


Artwork Analysis

The biggest problem was the size of the island, we wanted to go for an impressive

silhouette, but ended up with all concepts being too far zoomed out. A mountain

sized island being undiscovered for ages in the middle of the rhine felt wrong.

We went with a formation of huge rocks, with Caspar David Friedrichs „Ruine

Eldena“ and Arnold Böcklins „Die Toteninsel 3“ as a clear inspiration for our

composition. The dead trees of Eldena and the size of Toteninsel mixed together

gave us the prefect panel for our first look on the main stage for Act II, coming

hopefully soon. Waves and fogs in our foreground established europen comic

style were added to act as moveable objects for a slight animation.

In the end we decided to add some wrecked shipwrecks

and rubble for a dramatic impact on the scene. Although this space is

undiscovered, it should show the possible demise of our heroes - there is only one

gap leading into the forlorn rocks to enter. And possible viewers will have to wait on

what they will face within this new environment.

P. 63/72


Animation & VFX

This scene is a simple overlay of the beforehand playing „Cabin Scene“. The two

main effects are playing their role in this scene: a major distortion effect on the

canvas borders of this panel + some subtle movement in the fog layers with sunlight

rays breaking from behind the island‘s rocky peak. An undefined three seconds tune

will play to underline the mysticism in this vision.

While the island itself is a solid layer,

the fog and clouds are all single

objects, easy to manipulate in AE.

We added some distortion and swirl

filter onto the fog sprites and placed

the now enlarged mermaid scale

sparkle effect as a rising sun behind

the lightened-up trees on the islands

top. This guiding light may promise

salvation, like the rose window

behind the altar of a gothic church.

On the sound side, we decided to

add a non-diegetic sound source of

unfamiliar singing, as a resonance to

the golden maidens, leading the hero

to the Rhinegold, four scenes ago.

This acts as a conclusion route to

connect the scenes and lead on to

the endgame of things.

P. 64/72


03: CREATIVE PROCESS:

SCENE 13: OUTRO SCENE

Storyline & Purpose

„Scene 12: Outro“serves as a last showroom for our now established cast.

We wanted to give them some space to act alongside each other. With Jamal getting

a fresh set of clothes from his new accomplices, he also forgoes a progression from

being a stranger in a strange land, adapting to his new future. A fitting character arc,

since he now does not have to rely on his solitude and lone survivor skills anymore,

finding new fulfillment within the crew‘s company.

Conception & Inspiration

Initially planned as a „nice-to-have“, we are glad, the scene made it into the final cut.

Not only does it allow us to show the three actors in a more relaxed and relatable

manner, but also stands long enough to be a background for showing our Legends

of Rhine logo and let the credits roll.

P. 65/72


Artwork Analysis

While this scene is pretty simple on the animation side (Zoom-Out after it starts

playing, freezing once the painting‘s borders are reached), we still used the chance

to have our cast act differently than we saw them before:

First off we see the ship‘s railing forming a solid stage behind the crew, pulling them

together in a sturdy, wooden canvas. We also see a clear power hierarchy, starting by

Franka as the actual leader of the group, getting over to Jamal as a new and promising

prospect of the bunch while ending with the Captain at the end of the food chain.

Although this impression can be deceiving, since he is holding a pair of shears in his

hands, emphasizing his ruling and ruthless character over the bunch.

Franka on the other side also falls out of character, when breaking into laughter

about Jamal and his new still a bit unfitting outfit, while also holding a mirror in a

hand instead of an axe like in her introduction.

Jamal finally is the true source of this surprising shift in the characters‘ behaviour,

stirring up their roster relations. An attentive viewer may recognize his gaze upon

Franka, mesmerized by her surprising outburst of laughter. It seems, that in the near

future, not only mysterious islands and their secluded inhabitants will be challenging

tasks for our freshly founded company of fortune seekers.

But before the credits roll, we have a glimpse at an early morning sun breaking

through the ever-apparent fog of the former scenes. Maybe the rhine maidens

made a good choice for their striders with these adventurers in the end.

P. 66/72



04: POST MORTEM:

Revision of processes and endresult

after finalization and publication

of the thesis project

Pages 67 - 72


04: POST MORTEM:

04.1: DEVELOPMENT OVERVIEW

Overview of development tasks and resources

01: Conceptualization

Research about historical and visual references + development resources. Includes

analysis and termination of possible difficulties in development, like insufficient

technical knowledge and software limitations.

Execution: Online-Research, Excourses to public Museums + Library of Cologne

Challenges: The limited time and resources we hadfor this project required ‚

meticulous befrehand planning, to allow for a satisfying and ploshed project. We

cutted several features to reduce the scope and will include these in

later iterations of the series.

02: Story & Script Writing

Transcript of our imagined storyline with an additional version as a script for the

narrators performance. Includes close revision of source material to match the tone

and details of narration.

Execution: Software: „MS Word“ - TH Cologe Student version, 2023

Challenges: While our storyline is much longer, we decided to separate it into several

chapters, with this project visualizing the first act of our prologue / chapter one.

03: Storyboarding

Distribution of the storyline into segmented scenes. Visualization into individual

screens, with their composition already decided on, though subject of change.

Execution: Software: „Storyboarder“ - V.1.0.0. Win10, Wonder Unit, 2019

04: Concept Art

Visualization of every aspect of the story. Includes artstyle depiction.

Execution: Software: „Adobe Photoshop“ - Win10, Adobe Creative Suite, 2023

Software: „Procreate“ - IOS, Savage Interactive, 2022

Challenges: Some aspects of LoR were already designed when the project was

envisioned as a low-poly 3D videogame. We had to adapt these established designs

into our new art direction, but were even more pleased with the new versions.

In the first iterations we both had to align our individual artstyles into a coherent

appearence. Beforehand practise in the Concept stage and fixed brushes and sizes

helped to eliminate most differences.

P. 69/72


05: Scene Creation

Drawing and composing of the final frames the viewer will be presented with. Started

as mere sketches in the storyboard stage, every single scene was first envisioned in

handdrawn outlines and later coloured and enhanced with texture overlays.

Execution: Software: „Adobe Photoshop“ - Win10, Adobe Creative Suite, 2023

Software: „Procreate“ - IOS, Savage Interactive, 2022

Challenges: Each scene was digitally created and thus we had to keep their export

into the animation software in mind. Moveable objects were drawn on separate layers

and we kept several several copies of each painting to be able to change everything if

needed later in development.

06: Animation

Dissection and arrangement of the moveable parts of each paintings PSD-files.

Creation of subtle movement to guide the viewers attention.

Execution: Software: „After Effetcs“ -Win10, Adobe Creative Suite, 2023

Challenges: Our major difficulty was the decision of software usage for our moving

pictures. While many tools like „Spine“ provide a smoother workflow in 2D

animation, we decided to use the Adobe Creative Suite for its seamless file

distribution between programs.

07: Sound Design & Voice Acting

Searching for sound resourcesto enhance the scenes environmental mood. Editing

and integration into the final project files. Additionally recording and sampling of

voice lines for the off-screen narration.

Execution: Software: „Adobe Premiere“ -Win10, Adobe Creative Suite, 2023

Software: „Sprachmemos“ - IOS, Apple, 2023

Challenges: We mostly used open source files from Youtube fo the basic sound

environment, mixed with several private recordings of birds singing, where our

resources allowed it. Due to our time constraints, we were unable to hire a

professional voice actor, hence we narrated the project on our own. In later

iterations these voicefiles will be replaced.

08: Polishing & Editing

Detection and replacement of unpolished aspects within the scenes.

Finally the creation and assembly of all scenes into a complete movie file.

Execution: Software: „Adobe Premiere“ -Win10, Adobe Creative Suite, 2023

Challenges: Thanks to our beforehand planning and constant collaboration and feedback

loop, we thankfully had not many areas we needed to revisit. While Keivan

adjusted the final refinements, Fritz revisited the development process and

wrote this documentation.

P. 70/72


04: POST MORTEM:

04.2: CONCLUSIVE THOUGHTS

PRO: Skilled by experience

Pre-Production: The pre-production phase, which included art direction, story

boarding, and character design, was executed smoothly. We were able to finalize

the script and storyboard within the first month. This provided a clear vision and

foundation for the production process.

Assets Creation/Preparation: The creation of individual scenes was the next step.

Using the results of our pre-production phase we were able to maintain a smooth

and synchronized creative process. The backgrounds, and characters, accompanied

by visual and sound effects contributed effectively to the overall aesthetic and

emotional impact we were aiming to achieve.

Effective Collaboration: We effectively communicated and collaborated throughout

the production. Regular meetings ensured we were on the same page and helped

to overcome challenges and maintain a positive work environment.

Scope management: The project‘s scope had the tendency to expand during

production as new ideas and possibilities always turn up during the production

period. Luckily, our experience gained during our studies and former collaborations

helped us overcome the scope management processes.

The learning curve: Encountering unpredicted challenges, required troubleshooting

at times. We even invested some time utilizing a new software for storyboarding

during pre-production and pushed our skills in many areas and software to find

solutions or more practical approaches in production.

CON: Room for improvement

Software Experience: Deeper personal experience with the used softwares would

have helped to save time spend to figure out problems and technical issues. Further

expertise will help to smooth out the development process in the future.

Additional research: For later iterations of the project we plan to integrate an

external advisor with a profession area in classic literature and history. This will

help us to avoid inconsistencies with historical lore sources and help to improve

the overall storyline.

P. 71/72


04: POST MORTEM

04.3: FUTURE PLANS

Legends of Rhine - an ongoing web series

The final result of this project is more than satisfying for us and we build a promising

foundation to work upon in the future. But how will this future look? In the following

we will offer a glimpse into our next planned steps for Legends of Rhine.

The first action we gonna take is a general revision of the project to polish it up to a

next quality standard. Without time limitations in our freetime. We plan to replace

the Voice-Over with a more professional version and will likely expand some scenes

with further animation or story details, depending on audience feedback. In the end

we will release this „Directors Cut“ as a standalone version in our private portfolios

and the website of our collaborative studio (https://neptun-interactive.com/).

Following the release of Act 1.1, our plan is to further develop the other acts, which

currently only exist in the storyline transcript. We will continue working in the

established ways we learned within this thesis collaboration, while additionally

documenting our progress on Social Media to gain more traction towards our studio.

Followers might be interested in our continuos updates showing artworks and

animations and may flock around in our studios Discord server, following not only

LoR but also our inhouse productions. The upcoming acts 1.2 and 1.3 will also be

released on the studio webpage and Youtube channel as a free webseries

of animated storytelling.

Once all components of Act 1 are released we will evaluate the general feedback

and interest in the series. Depending on overall positivity we will make plans if and

how we could produce the next parts of the narrative, which currently only exist as

loose bulletpointed ideas. In the best case, Act 1 may become the foundation for a

larger professional production. Depending on public interest in the universe we might

even consider a crowdfunding campaign for a full animated short movie or revisit the

old idea of LoR as a videogame. We cannot estimate yet, how the future of our crew

will look, but we are certain, that this thesis project was not their last time on stage!

P. 72/72


© Keivan Akbari & Fritz David Thiel, 2024

Visit us at www.neptun-interactive.com

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