Paper Escapers is a short film where a person draws in a notebook and returns to find the character missing from the page.
The single-minute movie was one of few live-action projects I was involved in. The idea was that I wanted to produce something humorous that would also incorporate my drawing abilities.
I really like this one for its simplicity and quirkiness. It was enjoyable to film as well.
Paper Escapers - (By Jacky Nguyen)
The Script
Despite there not being any dialogue, a script was indeed produced for Paper Escapers. This initial draft entitled "Paper Escaper" differs slightly from the final product, but has the same base idea.
Storyboards
Story panels for scene 1 and scene 2 of Paper Escapers. Pretty similar, but still only one dog at the time.
Alternate Takes / Unused Footage
Multiple takes were shot to be used for the movie, most of which became unused. They're mostly the same so I'll just showcase some of them here. The short was also limited to one minute, meaning some footage was edited down.
Drawing the Dog - Scene 1, Take 1
The very first take for the drawing portion of Scene 1. It was 31 seconds long and went unused.
Drawing the Dog - Scene 1, Take 2
Another take on drawing the little doggy. I forgot to close the book on this one.
Opening the Book - Scene 2
Scene 2 begins with the opening of the book. This raw footage had zooming problems.
Escapers Appear - Scene 2
The full version of the shot used in the final film. They dance around for quite a while.
Additional Behind the Scenes Insight
The Paper Creatures were created from the drawings made in Scene 1. There were five dogs in total, and all of them were later used in Scene 2.
The dogs were cut from the paper, with certain features refined and shaded in. Each were given a front and back design along with a piece of white thread attached via Blu Tack.
When it comes to how I made them move around, basically the white threads were attached to a bunch of connector pens (as in those colourful textas you would get back in grade school). The pens were constructed into a long stick that could move the paper creatures like puppets. I attempted a little recreation in the video below.
Final tidbit; the location of filming was in a classroom, particularly a computer lab. There were actually other people in the room when I was filming, so there were witnesses that saw me waving pieces of paper around. They were very quiet though and the overlaying music in the final piece drowns out all the audio anyway.
