Clay Thomasson
2D Effects Animator & Compositer
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IN PRODUCTION
"Canned Fish"
2025
A 3D film directed by Lizzie Milat and Paige Chouinard about a fisherman named Keith who embarks on an journey to see the effects his aid in pollution has on the underwater environment.
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On this project my primary role was in 2D FX and Compositing. I also aided in the beginning with storyboards and concept art for the monster in the film.
Compositing
Splash Test:
3D Animation: Sibo Liu
2D Animation: Clay Thomasson
Composite: Clay Thomasson
Proof of Concept:
3D Animation: Lucy Renot
2D Animation: Clay Thomasson
Environment: Paige Chouinard
Lighting: Logan Vanderkin
3D Composite: Logan Vanderkin
2D Composite: Clay Thomasson
Animation/Test
Splash Test
Bubble Test
Surface Ripple Test
3D Animation: Sibo Liu
2D Animation: Clay Thomasson
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Bubble Particle Simulation
Concept
Monster Fish:
For the monster fish we wanted to focus on ways to make a creature that was covered in all the trash and things left behind by humans and their little care for the environment. The monster started off as something like a piranha, but later down the road went to be shaped similar to an alligator gar. We then went to move on in the direction of mixing the gar with an eel in a more hybrid sense. After some review the monster was then turned more into garbage for what we have in the final result shown in the 3D model that was made by Heize Oh.
Modeled By: Heize Oh
Net Designs:
When asked to make nets that our character could use I wanted to create the choice of either like a pool skimmer or a cast net since he is fishing in a freshwater lake either or could work. Logan Vanderkin decided to go with "Net 1" due to the modeling and to not make the viewer not have to lose focus on the object in a distance.
Keith Teeth Design:
When modeling the team realized we need to make a few views on how Keith's teeth would look so our modeler wouldn't have to guess on how they would look while sculpting.
Water Progression Concept:
The idea for this was that throughout the film as the character traverses the water, it would progressively get more gross looking and more dark to build tension and fear for Keith's safety.
Storyboards
Story development began over the Summer of 2024. We (Lizzie, Lucy, and I) began fleshing out from the story beats Lizzie wrote out before our meetings and we began to just play with the ideas of where the story could go. Over that span of time we went through many iterations and even then still made more changes and new plot points which helped build our story further. These are the boards I created during that time before we made the core changes.