So my project is about a kid trying to make dragons. How did it originate? I started thinking about thesis ideas early during my first semester, when all the thesis students were urging us to start thinking now. I've always liked fantasy, and my first and only film I ever made was a fantasy story. My novel in progress, currently over 400 pages long, is a fantasy story I started in high school (unfortunately, school work has hindered my progress, but I come back to it now and again). So fantasy was key.
With that in mind, I dreamt up a cliche video game story about a warrior discovering some treasure guarded by a dragon. In this story, the warrior discovers the treasure, but upon approaching it a dragon materializes out of thin air and fights the warrior. The warrior blocks some dragon fire with his shield, but is unable to cut through its scaly skin. Finally the warrior takes out a spear, throws it, killing the dragon and gaining the treasure.
Obviously, and I knew it at the time, this story was not only too long, and nearly impossible to animate in one semester, but also lacked motivation and character. This was, in essence, a video game animation clip from a cheesy early 90s fantasy adventure. I'll admit that these kind of stories, settings, and characters have had a very strong influence on my artistic leanings.
But I knew I needed a story with a character that was relatively unique, yet had enough personality that an audience could identify with him. I thought about what was attractive to me in the original story. First, I definitely wanted to animate the dragon. Secondly, the special effect of the dragon materializing out of thin air was the money shot I wanted (that and the dragon dying, which would have been another special effect). I thought, if the dragon and the special effect were the only things I really cared for in this story, why not turn it into a dragon-creation story instead of a dragon-destruction story?
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