o, as you probably already know by now, we’re currently working on this project for Hat Trick Productions and Channel 4 Education called The Thrill Electric (see Leah’s post from a little while back). So far we’ve written two scripts and are cracking on #3 at the moment. It’s still pretty early days yet but we’re already very, very excited and we thought it would be fun to share some of the stuff we’ve got thus far.
All images below are by either Emma Vieceili (concept and character designs) or Windflower Studio. The script is by Moore & Reppion. We hope it whets your appetite.
The Thrill Electric #1 (3rd draft)
“The Workshop of the World”
Page One.
This is a six panel page, with a big square-ish panel over on the left, two wide panels, one on top of the other on the right, and three smaller panels, all around the same size, across the bottom.
Panel One.
This page starts with the captions appearing on screen as they are beeped out in Morse code. The captions appear, then we hear the noise of the traffic and then lastly the image appears.
This is a big busy exterior shot to start the series with. It might seem a bit much, but an office drama can get a bit talking heads and interiors heavy, so we need to fit all the outside stuff in where we get the chance.
We are on Oxford Street on our way into town with the morning rush hour. (We’re about here) We are approaching the bridge where the railway line crosses Oxford Road, and the road and the railway both cross a canal, so it’s a great demonstration of Manchester’s transport and travel and the whole industry of the place. Also it gives us something interesting to write/draw!
We are in the middle of a sea of traffic of all kinds, looking along the road and under the arch of the railway bridge. Note, however, that 1871 is pre-tram! A big shiny steam train is thundering past from left to right on the bridge, leaving great clouds of steam partially covering the train and bits of the bridge, if you have a look about on the Google street-view, you can see another arch over to the right of the railway bridge where the canal passes under the road, and then if you look under the arches of the bridge on the left of the road, there are some nice old pubs. It’s a nice lumpy interesting bit of terrain, and will really bring the place to life much better than a generic street.
The only problem with this whole location is the big red building with the clock tower up ahead, The Palace Hotel. It is totally iconic and signifies you have reached Manchester, and ideally it would be a lovely landmark to have, but it wasn’t built till the 1890’s, so we have to leave it out I’m afraid, sorry.
Everything is either horse or human powered, as I said no trams yet, only horse drawn double Decker omnibuses. These would have been covered with adverts for everything and anything, Bovril, Lyons Golden Syrup, Tate and Lyle Sugar, Pears soap, Liptons Tea, you name it, it was plastered on the side of a bus, exactly as we have now. Please do go to town with the amount of adverts everywhere, as it was a really big feature of the cities of the age, something people even campaigned against! There are hansom cabs, open carriages, posh ‘coach and six’ type carriages, little wagons pulled by a single mule or horse. There is a brewers dray from Hydes brewery covered in signs advertising their beer, great big beer barrels stacked up, and two big shire horses pulling it.
We can probably see wagons full of produce and wagons of hay on their way in to the many livery stables, it would have been absolute bedlam.
The traffic coming towards us seems to be at near standstill and in the bottom right corner we can see a wagon carrying crates has collided with a carriage and spilt its load. There are crates all over the road, the traffic is piled up behind it, people are stood round gawping and heckling and probably making off with some of the spilt goods. The whole thing is chaos.
The pavements are crowded with people of all kinds, all classes and ages, hurrying to work, or to an appointment or the shops. The scene is about the busiest thing you have ever seen.
Ahead of us we can see the bridge, beyond that we can see chimneys and more chimneys. Above us the sky is a mass of roiling grey clouds of smoke. The sun if we can see it is just a pale disk in one of the clouds. It is raining slightly, and it does not look to be a very promising day.
I would love it if we could animate the smoky sky; just make the clouds move enough to make it oppressive. This probably wants to be pretty subtle though and, as we’ve got another animation suggestion for this page (see panel six) we want to make sure the first page isn’t “over egged”, so your discretion is appreciated. If there is ambient sound we should really layer up the traffic noise. All those wheels and horses would have been really clamorous.
We have a big omnibus in the left foreground heading away from us down Oxford Road, and Emily and Archie are sitting inside it. We can’t see them here, but Emily has two balloons from inside and the three captions which appear at the start and then the scene fades in as we said.
Cap: W. M. to F.R. Collision on Oxford road, all stopped, come in by Hyde Road instead.
Cap: G.W. to O.R. Please meet my wife from the 8:45 train at Oxford Road, I can’t get there on time. Traffic horrific. Much obliged.
Cap: P.F. to B.S. where is our order? You assured next morning delivery and my customer is livid!
Emily: Is it always this bad? I’m amazed anyone even gets to work.
Emily: Archie?
Panel Two.
This is a wide panel, and we are inside the omnibus facing a row of passengers all sat on the same long bench seat. In the middle of the shot we have Archie and Emily, about half figure I’d say. On the left next to Archie we can see an older lady who is glaring because Archie is kind of slouching over onto her slightly. She is very much the old dowager, so think Miss Havisham from Great Expectations and you won’t go far wrong. On the right, next to Emily there is a bewhiskered old gentleman, who is very pleased to be sitting next to Emily. He is giving her a very thorough appraisal, as only pervy old men can! She is trying to act as if she can’t see what he is doing, while trying to attract Archie’s attention at the same time. Archie is plainly asleep on the dowagers shoulder. His clothes are quite rumpled, as if he’s slept in them, and he has a bit of stubble – basically he looks like he’s been out all night and is sleeping off a hangover. Maybe he’s even drooping a bit? That could just be implied in panel four. Above their heads we can maybe make out more adverts above the windows, exactly like modern tube trains. Outside the window we can see the pubs under the railway arch. Emily has one balloon. There is one telegraph caption across Emily which beeps into view like the ones on the big panel.
Emily: Archie!
Cap: Miss Emily Bagley – G.G. (Good Girl)
Panel Three.
This is another wide panel and we can see Emily and Archie in more detail now as she elbows him quite savagely in the ribs to wake him up. He is startling awake with a jolt. He’s dark around the eyes which are bloodshot. He has one balloon, as does Emily. There is one telegraph caption across Archie.
Emily: Archie! Are you listening to me?
Archie: EH?
Cap: Mr. Archibald Bennett – Archie
Panel Four.
This is a smaller panel, and we have Archie’s face in the foreground, as he stares around confusedly, Emily just behind him looking a bit cross, and behind her, the pervy old man who is trying to act casual now, and pretend he wasn’t doing anything at all. Archie might be wiping the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand, as if he’s been dribbling in his sleep. He looks rough – like he’s had a night on the town and barely any sleep. Behind them we can see the grand frontages of the buildings on Portland Street as the omnibus turns right to head down towards what is now Piccadilly gardens. Archie and Emily each have one balloon.
Archie: Oh. Um. You were saying about your father… on the wire this morning. He’s stationed in… Sicily?
Emily: Malta! That was ages ago. You’ve been asleep that long?
Panel Five.
This is another smallish panel. We are outside the omnibus looking in as Archie looks back at us over his shoulder to check where they are and seems surprised. We can maybe see the back of Emily’s head next to him. He has two balloons.
Archie: Sorry Em. Had a late one and I’m not used to early…
Archie: Portland Street? Good job you woke me!
Panel Six.
This is another small panel. We are on the street, with Archie and Emily who have just got off the omnibus. They are half figure. We can see all the shops with their awnings out, and the shoppers and commuters coming and going. Archie is gesturing at it all for Emily’s benefit with one hand while holding his forehead with the other. In addition to all of that, we thought that this might be a nice place to stick in our first animated flock of pigeons taking flight. Obviously they’ll be at some distance here but we thought that if they came towards the “camera” they could act as a wipe too. Archie has two balloons.
Archie: Cottonopolis, “Workshop of the World” and all that. Excited yet?
Archie: God, my head hurts. Maybe the chemist first, then the Mill.
The Thrill Electric #1
“The Workshop of the World”
(15 Pages)
Hello ladies, hope you are all fired up and raring to go on this Victorian techno-romance romp! We are very pleased to be working with you all, and can’t wait to see what you do with our story. If there is anything in the scripts which isn’t clear (there are two of us scripting, so we might word things differently from one page to another), or which you need tweaking to make it work, then just let us know and we’ll help out any way we can. Our scripts are detailed and long, but only because we want to take the guesswork out of it for you, and let you get on with the fun stuff.
It’s a historical story, so as we all know it’s going to be reference heavy, but don’t sweat it too much. Nobody will go over it with a magnifying glass, and it is a work of fiction, so we are allowed a little artistic license! Above all have fun doing it, and that should show in the finished thing!
We will put animation/sound notes in green so that LittleLoud can find them easily (hello LittleLoud).
Right, enough of this dilly dallying, let’s get on with the show!
Page One.
This is a six panel page, with a big square-ish panel over on the left, two wide panels, one on top of the other on the right, and three smaller panels, all around the same size, across the bottom.
Panel One.
This page starts with the captions appearing on screen as they are beeped out in Morse code. The captions appear, then we hear the noise of the traffic and then lastly the image appears.
This is a big busy exterior shot to start the series with. It might seem a bit much, but an office drama can get a bit talking heads and interiors heavy, so we need to fit all the outside stuff in where we get the chance.
We are on Oxford Street on our way into town with the morning rush hour. (We’re about here) We are approaching the bridge where the railway line crosses Oxford Road, and the road and the railway both cross a canal, so it’s a great demonstration of Manchester’s transport and travel and the whole industry of the place. Also it gives us something interesting to write/draw!
We are in the middle of a sea of traffic of all kinds, looking along the road and under the arch of the railway bridge. Note, however, that 1871 is pre-tram! A big shiny steam train is thundering past from left to right on the bridge, leaving great clouds of steam partially covering the train and bits of the bridge, if you have a look about on the Google street-view, you can see another arch over to the right of the railway bridge where the canal passes under the road, and then if you look under the arches of the bridge on the left of the road, there are some nice old pubs. It’s a nice lumpy interesting bit of terrain, and will really bring the place to life much better than a generic street.
The only problem with this whole location is the big red building with the clock tower up ahead, The Palace Hotel. It is totally iconic and signifies you have reached Manchester, and ideally it would be a lovely landmark to have, but it wasn’t built till the 1890’s, so we have to leave it out I’m afraid, sorry.
Everything is either horse or human powered, as I said no trams yet, only horse drawn double Decker omnibuses. These would have been covered with adverts for everything and anything, Bovril, Lyons Golden Syrup, Tate and Lyle Sugar, Pears soap, Liptons Tea, you name it, it was plastered on the side of a bus, exactly as we have now. Please do go to town with the amount of adverts everywhere, as it was a really big feature of the cities of the age, something people even campaigned against! There are hansom cabs, open carriages, posh ‘coach and six’ type carriages, little wagons pulled by a single mule or horse. There is a brewers dray from Hydes brewery covered in signs advertising their beer, great big beer barrels stacked up, and two big shire horses pulling it.
We can probably see wagons full of produce and wagons of hay on their way in to the many livery stables, it would have been absolute bedlam.
The traffic coming towards us seems to be at near standstill and in the bottom right corner we can see a wagon carrying crates has collided with a carriage and spilt its load. There are crates all over the road, the traffic is piled up behind it, people are stood round gawping and heckling and probably making off with some of the spilt goods. The whole thing is chaos.
The pavements are crowded with people of all kinds, all classes and ages, hurrying to work, or to an appointment or the shops. The scene is about the busiest thing you have ever seen.
Ahead of us we can see the bridge, beyond that we can see chimneys and more chimneys. Above us the sky is a mass of roiling grey clouds of smoke. The sun if we can see it is just a pale disk in one of the clouds. It is raining slightly, and it does not look to be a very promising day.
I would love it if we could animate the smoky sky; just make the clouds move enough to make it oppressive. This probably wants to be pretty subtle though and, as we’ve got another animation suggestion for this page (see panel six) we want to make sure the first page isn’t “over egged”, so your discretion is appreciated. If there is ambient sound we should really layer up the traffic noise. All those wheels and horses would have been really clamorous.
We have a big omnibus in the left foreground heading away from us down Oxford Road, and Emily and Archie are sitting inside it. We can’t see them here, but Emily has two balloons from inside and the three captions which appear at the start and then the scene fades in as we said.
Cap: W. M. to F.R. Collision on Oxford road, all stopped, come in by Hyde Road instead.
Cap: G.W. to O.R. Please meet my wife from the 8:45 train at Oxford Road, I can’t get there on time. Traffic horrific. Much obliged.
Cap: P.F. to B.S. where is our order? You assured next morning delivery and my customer is livid!
Emily: Is it always this bad? I’m amazed anyone even gets to work.
Emily: Archie?
Panel Two.
This is a wide panel, and we are inside the omnibus facing a row of passengers all sat on the same long bench seat. In the middle of the shot we have Archie and Emily, about half figure I’d say. On the left next to Archie we can see an older lady who is glaring because Archie is kind of slouching over onto her slightly. She is very much the old dowager, so think Miss Havisham from Great Expectations and you won’t go far wrong. On the right, next to Emily there is a bewhiskered old gentleman, who is very pleased to be sitting next to Emily. He is giving her a very thorough appraisal, as only pervy old men can! She is trying to act as if she can’t see what he is doing, while trying to attract Archie’s attention at the same time. Archie is plainly asleep on the dowagers shoulder. His clothes are quite rumpled, as if he’s slept in them, and he has a bit of stubble – basically he looks like he’s been out all night and is sleeping off a hangover. Maybe he’s even drooping a bit? That could just be implied in panel four. Above their heads we can maybe make out more adverts above the windows, exactly like modern tube trains. Outside the window we can see the pubs under the railway arch. Emily has one balloon. There is one telegraph caption across Emily which beeps into view like the ones on the big panel.
Emily: Archie!
Cap: Miss Emily Bagley – G.G. (Good Girl)
Panel Three.
This is another wide panel and we can see Emily and Archie in more detail now as she elbows him quite savagely in the ribs to wake him up. He is startling awake with a jolt. He’s dark around the eyes which are bloodshot. He has one balloon, as does Emily. There is one telegraph caption across Archie.
Emily: Archie! Are you listening to me?
Archie: EH?
Cap: Mr. Archibald Bennett – Archie
Panel Four.
This is a smaller panel, and we have Archie’s face in the foreground, as he stares around confusedly, Emily just behind him looking a bit cross, and behind her, the pervy old man who is trying to act casual now, and pretend he wasn’t doing anything at all. Archie might be wiping the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand, as if he’s been dribbling in his sleep. He looks rough – like he’s had a night on the town and barely any sleep. Behind them we can see the grand frontages of the buildings on Portland Street as the omnibus turns right to head down towards what is now Piccadilly gardens. Archie and Emily each have one balloon.
Archie: Oh. Um. You were saying about your father… on the wire this morning. He’s stationed in… Sicily?
Emily: Malta! That was ages ago. You’ve been asleep that long?
Panel Five.
This is another smallish panel. We are outside the omnibus looking in as Archie looks back at us over his shoulder to check where they are and seems surprised. We can maybe see the back of Emily’s head next to him. He has two balloons.
Archie: Sorry Em. Had a late one and I’m not used to early…
Archie: Portland Street? Good job you woke me!
Panel Six.
This is another small panel. We are on the street, with Archie and Emily who have just got off the omnibus. They are half figure. We can see all the shops with their awnings out, and the shoppers and commuters coming and going. Archie is gesturing at it all for Emily’s benefit with one hand while holding his forehead with the other. In addition to all of that, we thought that
The Thrill Electric #1
“The Workshop of the World”
(15 Pages)
Hello ladies, hope you are all fired up and raring to go on this Victorian techno-romance romp! We are very pleased to be working with you all, and can’t wait to see what you do with our story. If there is anything in the scripts which isn’t clear (there are two of us scripting, so we might word things differently from one page to another), or which you need tweaking to make it work, then just let us know and we’ll help out any way we can. Our scripts are detailed and long, but only because we want to take the guesswork out of it for you, and let you get on with the fun stuff.
It’s a historical story, so as we all know it’s going to be reference heavy, but don’t sweat it too much. Nobody will go over it with a magnifying glass, and it is a work of fiction, so we are allowed a little artistic license! Above all have fun doing it, and that should show in the finished thing!
We will put animation/sound notes in green so that LittleLoud can find them easily (hello LittleLoud).
Right, enough of this dilly dallying, let’s get on with the show!
Page One.
This is a six panel page, with a big square-ish panel over on the left, two wide panels, one on top of the other on the right, and three smaller panels, all around the same size, across the bottom.
Panel One.
This page starts with the captions appearing on screen as they are beeped out in Morse code. The captions appear, then we hear the noise of the traffic and then lastly the image appears.
This is a big busy exterior shot to start the series with. It might seem a bit much, but an office drama can get a bit talking heads and interiors heavy, so we need to fit all the outside stuff in where we get the chance.
We are on Oxford Street on our way into town with the morning rush hour. (We’re about here) We are approaching the bridge where the railway line crosses Oxford Road, and the road and the railway both cross a canal, so it’s a great demonstration of Manchester’s transport and travel and the whole industry of the place. Also it gives us something interesting to write/draw!
We are in the middle of a sea of traffic of all kinds, looking along the road and under the arch of the railway bridge. Note, however, that 1871 is pre-tram! A big shiny steam train is thundering past from left to right on the bridge, leaving great clouds of steam partially covering the train and bits of the bridge, if you have a look about on the Google street-view, you can see another arch over to the right of the railway bridge where the canal passes under the road, and then if you look under the arches of the bridge on the left of the road, there are some nice old pubs. It’s a nice lumpy interesting bit of terrain, and will really bring the place to life much better than a generic street.
The only problem with this whole location is the big red building with the clock tower up ahead, The Palace Hotel. It is totally iconic and signifies you have reached Manchester, and ideally it would be a lovely landmark to have, but it wasn’t built till the 1890’s, so we have to leave it out I’m afraid, sorry.
Everything is either horse or human powered, as I said no trams yet, only horse drawn double Decker omnibuses. These would have been covered with adverts for everything and anything, Bovril, Lyons Golden Syrup, Tate and Lyle Sugar, Pears soap, Liptons Tea, you name it, it was plastered on the side of a bus, exactly as we have now. Please do go to town with the amount of adverts everywhere, as it was a really big feature of the cities of the age, something people even campaigned against! There are hansom cabs, open carriages, posh ‘coach and six’ type carriages, little wagons pulled by a single mule or horse. There is a brewers dray from Hydes brewery covered in signs advertising their beer, great big beer barrels stacked up, and two big shire horses pulling it.
We can probably see wagons full of produce and wagons of hay on their way in to the many livery stables, it would have been absolute bedlam.
The traffic coming towards us seems to be at near standstill and in the bottom right corner we can see a wagon carrying crates has collided with a carriage and spilt its load. There are crates all over the road, the traffic is piled up behind it, people are stood round gawping and heckling and probably making off with some of the spilt goods. The whole thing is chaos.
The pavements are crowded with people of all kinds, all classes and ages, hurrying to work, or to an appointment or the shops. The scene is about the busiest thing you have ever seen.
Ahead of us we can see the bridge, beyond that we can see chimneys and more chimneys. Above us the sky is a mass of roiling grey clouds of smoke. The sun if we can see it is just a pale disk in one of the clouds. It is raining slightly, and it does not look to be a very promising day.
I would love it if we could animate the smoky sky; just make the clouds move enough to make it oppressive. This probably wants to be pretty subtle though and, as we’ve got another animation suggestion for this page (see panel six) we want to make sure the first page isn’t “over egged”, so your discretion is appreciated. If there is ambient sound we should really layer up the traffic noise. All those wheels and horses would have been really clamorous.
We have a big omnibus in the left foreground heading away from us down Oxford Road, and Emily and Archie are sitting inside it. We can’t see them here, but Emily has two balloons from inside and the three captions which appear at the start and then the scene fades in as we said.
Cap: W. M. to F.R. Collision on Oxford road, all stopped, come in by Hyde Road instead.
Cap: G.W. to O.R. Please meet my wife from the 8:45 train at Oxford Road, I can’t get there on time. Traffic horrific. Much obliged.
Cap: P.F. to B.S. where is our order? You assured next morning delivery and my customer is livid!
Emily: Is it always this bad? I’m amazed anyone even gets to work.
Emily: Archie?
Panel Two.
This is a wide panel, and we are inside the omnibus facing a row of passengers all sat on the same long bench seat. In the middle of the shot we have Archie and Emily, about half figure I’d say. On the left next to Archie we can see an older lady who is glaring because Archie is kind of slouching over onto her slightly. She is very much the old dowager, so think Miss Havisham from Great Expectations and you won’t go far wrong. On the right, next to Emily there is a bewhiskered old gentleman, who is very pleased to be sitting next to Emily. He is giving her a very thorough appraisal, as only pervy old men can! She is trying to act as if she can’t see what he is doing, while trying to attract Archie’s attention at the same time. Archie is plainly asleep on the dowagers shoulder. His clothes are quite rumpled, as if he’s slept in them, and he has a bit of stubble – basically he looks like he’s been out all night and is sleeping off a hangover. Maybe he’s even drooping a bit? That could just be implied in panel four. Above their heads we can maybe make out more adverts above the windows, exactly like modern tube trains. Outside the window we can see the pubs under the railway arch. Emily has one balloon. There is one telegraph caption across Emily which beeps into view like the ones on the big panel.
Emily: Archie!
Cap: Miss Emily Bagley – G.G. (Good Girl)
Panel Three.
This is another wide panel and we can see Emily and Archie in more detail now as she elbows him quite savagely in the ribs to wake him up. He is startling awake with a jolt. He’s dark around the eyes which are bloodshot. He has one balloon, as does Emily. There is one telegraph caption across Archie.
Emily: Archie! Are you listening to me?
Archie: EH?
Cap: Mr. Archibald Bennett – Archie
Panel Four.
This is a smaller panel, and we have Archie’s face in the foreground, as he stares around confusedly, Emily just behind him looking a bit cross, and behind her, the pervy old man who is trying to act casual now, and pretend he wasn’t doing anything at all. Archie might be wiping the corner of his mouth with the back of his hand, as if he’s been dribbling in his sleep. He looks rough – like he’s had a night on the town and barely any sleep. Behind them we can see the grand frontages of the buildings on Portland Street as the omnibus turns right to head down towards what is now Piccadilly gardens. Archie and Emily each have one balloon.
Archie: Oh. Um. You were saying about your father… on the wire this morning. He’s stationed in… Sicily?
Emily: Malta! That was ages ago. You’ve been asleep that long?
Panel Five.
This is another smallish panel. We are outside the omnibus looking in as Archie looks back at us over his shoulder to check where they are and seems surprised. We can maybe see the back of Emily’s head next to him. He has two balloons.
Archie: Sorry Em. Had a late one and I’m not used to early…
Archie: Portland Street? Good job you woke me!
Panel Six.
This is another small panel. We are on the street, with Archie and Emily who have just got off the omnibus. They are half figure. We can see all the shops with their awnings out, and the shoppers and commuters coming and going. Archie is gesturing at it all for Emily’s benefit with one hand while holding his forehead with the other. In addition to all of that, we thought that this might be a nice place to stick in our first animated flock of pigeons taking flight. Obviously they’ll be at some distance here but we thought that if they came towards the “camera” they could act as a wipe too. Archie has two balloons.
Archie: Cottonopolis, “Workshop of the World” and all that. Excited yet?
Archie: God, my head hurts. Maybe the chemist first, then the Mill.
this might be a nice place to stick in our first animated flock of pigeons taking flight. Obviously they’ll be at some distance here but we thought that if they came towards the “camera” they could act as a wipe too. Archie has two balloons.
Archie: Cottonopolis, “Workshop of the World” and all that. Excited yet?
Archie: God, my head hurts. Maybe the chemist first, then the Mill.
One Reply to ““Excited yet?” – The Thrill Electric #1 script and artwork sneak peek”