Crocodile Tears - Narrative - Fall 2021

Members:

• Allen Jay Villena

• Calla Delos Reyes

• Buddy Casiles

• Jess Delgado

Devon: Narrative Co-Lead

For a final project to be a Narrative Lead on, this one was quite an adventure. Being provided the opportunity not only to lead the team with Angelica to create a screenplay and story we could all be proud of, but be able to team up with friends outside of the club to help create music for the film, was incredibly rewarding. Creating the characters and their personalities, fleshing out the story and conflict, and seeing each member’s contributions make their way into the film is an experience I hold dear. I want to thank our Concept Lead, Sunny, for providing us with such a great concept and helping us bring their story to life, Angelica, for being such a great co-lead (best of luck on Ghosted! You’ll do great), and all of the team members, Allen, Calla, Buddy, and Jess for their incredible work. I wish AFPA nothing but the best going forward, and I’m looking forward to seeing what future short films they have in store.

Angelica: Narrative Co-Lead

It was so great to hear the narrative team's opinions on where the Crocodile Tears script should go. We really explored the background of our character Vinny by relating it to our own personal experiences. One of the best things about writing with a team is sharing our individual perspectives to make a script more relatable. It was also fun writing characters to be whatever we wanted; for example, a beefy, overall-wearing wolf (awoo) that plays drums and is a little ditzy. Good stuff.

Crocodile Tears Final Script

.pdf

Download PDF • 32KB

Sunny: Crocodile Tears Concept Lead

Crocodile Tears was kind of wild for me. I barely joined the club the semester before and I was still getting used to how AFPA ran. I was just chilling in the visual development team and I was getting insider info on schedules and organization.

When pitch day came around, I genuinely debated not submitting anything. I thought to myself “There will be someone else who can do it.” I waited and I waited and I waited. I waited until the last possible second before attempting to throw a powerpoint together. And I just sat there trying to think of something, anything, that people would like. I kept trying to please people. But… The idea of a cool crocodile singer in a band called Crocodile Tears sounded so cool to me and my brain just wouldn’t let it go for months. It was something I wanted. Something that hadn’t stopped plaguing my brain simply because I just thought it was cool. And I told myself “Well why the heck not, right? If they don’t like it, then they don’t like it. But I just can’t think of anything else right now and it’s all I’ve got so it’s worth a shot.”

And so I wrote. I wrote and I scribbled out the designs for Vinny, Grant (who was soon to be Beau), and Dom. I kept the naming convention of having the first letter of their names match with the instrument they played for simplicity’s sake. I took from shorts that I had seen that dealt with the topic of family and reconciliation and mashed it with my own experience.

When I put together that first powerpoint, it finally felt like the weird grip Crocodile Tears had on me was finally easing up. When I presented CT and CT got chosen, I was so excited. It felt so big. I know how much work it is to make an animated short even if it’s 3 minutes. It’s a lot of work and time and effort. It’s so much and because my concept got picked, I get to see the idea live out its life to the fullest. It would have just stayed inside my head as something that was just cool and I wasn’t content with that.

Going from being a regular club member to board member and concept lead in the span of 3 days was actually crazy. I just thought a crocodile in a leather jacket was cool and all of a sudden I had a bunch of responsibilities and meetings and questions to answer.

Being a concept lead was rough. It was rough because it was a new position with no set precedent, no examples, no guidance. I didn’t know what I was supposed to be doing or what I was supposed to be saying. But I took it in stride and worked with the Narrative team. I pushed on core ideas, values, and personality traits that were crucial to certain character elements. And once the script was finished, I’d either continue working with the visual development team or I’d pop my head into the other teams to see what they were doing.

People in this club are amazing. They really are because I’d go in to take a peek for a couple of minutes and it was miraculous to see the work they were producing for characters I pitched.

But that’s the thing. I’d see these bits and pieces of the work and I’d work on portions myself, but I never really saw everything put together. At least until I went to the wrap party last semester. We met at the beach to do a last goodbye and at the end of the night, we did a showing of the current progress on all the work everyone has been putting in. As the semester was going on, I had heard clips of the songs that were being independently produced, image sets of final character designs, screenshots of storyboards, and test animations. I had seen everything before, but nothing like this. When the short played, it was nothing like what I imagined when I first pitched Crocodile Tears. I didn’t think that certain scenes in the script would happen at all. I didn’t think that Vinny or Val would appear the way they did. I didn’t know Grant would turn into Beau. I didn’t know we were going to have a collaboration with people who actually make music so that they could produce for us. I didn’t know anything. What I knew for sure though, was that at the end, what I wanted was for Vinny to see his mom make it to his show, shed a tear of relief, play a note, and the credits would roll. And it happened. It happened and when the credits began to roll and I saw the title “Crocodile Tears” and my name just below saying “Sunny Abulon Concept Lead” I just kinda cried a little. Thank god it was dark and no one was looking at me, but for the first time since everything started, Crocodile Tears felt real. For the first time it felt like Crocodile Tears was something I was a part of, something that was made by me, with me, and for me. It embodied so much of what I wanted to convey and I can’t even begin to express how thankful I am to everyone. Crocodile Tears was just a little idea that started because I thought a crocodile singer in a leather jacket in a band named Crocodile Tears would be so cool. It grew to be something so much more and I’m just so grateful. I can design characters, storyboard, do backgrounds, animate, composite, and do sound design. I could do all those things by myself, but I’m not great at all of those things which is why having so many more people who are willing and excited who are much better at all of those things than I am to work on this project is actually nothing short of a miracle to me. So thank you. Thank you for being excited about Crocodile Tears, thank you for working with me, and thank you for seeing my little idea all the way through.