Project · Layout, Set dressing, Lighting, Rendering, Compositing, Animation · Feature film sequence · 3D, Watercolor

A Monster Calls: Tale 1

A watercolor-style animated tale for A Monster Calls, J. A. Bayona's fantasy drama about a boy coping with his mother's illness.

Dark tree trunks and branches against a pale misty sky, cropped square.
Theatrical poster with a boy beneath a huge tree at sunset above the title A Monster Calls.
Theatrical poster.

Tale 1 is an animated story sequence made at Glassworks Barcelona for J. A. Bayona's 2016 fantasy drama A Monster Calls. Based on Patrick Ness's book, the film follows a boy coping with his mother's illness with the help of a monster who tells him stories. Glassworks animated two of those tales; Adrian Garcia designed and directed Tale 1.

Tale 1: The Tale of the Prince

The sequence tells a fairy tale about a prince and a princess.

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Montage

The montage collects shots I worked on, covering layout, set dressing, lighting, rendering and compositing. The designs and character animation were handled by other artists.

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  • Prince and princess embrace in a glowing forest of tall trees and wildflowers.
01 / 03
  • Monochrome ballroom where the prince and princess dance beneath tall arched windows.
01 / 02
  • A castle on a hill under a red-orange watercolor sky, a hawk flying past.
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Making Of

I joined Javier Verdugo's Glassworks team in Catalunya in 2015 as a 3D generalist, animator and compositor, and worked on Tale 1 through 2016.

The shots were self-contained, often with a single artist covering layout, set dressing, lighting, rendering and compositing. I laid out my shots, worked out their color, then rendered and composited them for final delivery.

A Monster Calls: Tale 1 making of
Open media directly
  • Castle towers in purple tint, repeated and torn by horizontal glitch lines.
  • Skeleton warriors with glowing eyes isolated against black inside a frame.
  • Gray creased paper texture with red-orange watercolor marks forming a castle.
  • Black-and-white matte of a small falling figure and a white panel over a starry sky.
  • Animation software viewport showing a dark face with glowing eyes above scene explorer panels.
  • Dense blue fur strands with green flecks filling the frame.
  • White hair strands streaming around a masked head in a viewport.
  • Gray cut-out of a forest and an embracing couple over a transparency checkerboard.
  • Color-coded shards on a blue background, fanning out from a central point.
  • Rainbow-gradient rectangles scattered at angles on a gray viewport.
  • Thin curved guide lines drawn across a plain gray viewport.

More on the Glassworks project page, the film's official site, and Tale 2 on Vimeo.

Poster styled as an open book, a tree monster rising behind a standing boy, titled A Monster Calls.

Credits

Executive Producers
Xavi Tribó • David Gómez • Ignacio Muñoz
Creative Technical Director
Javier Verdugo
VFX Supervisor
David Gómez
Talent Recruiter
Joan Amat
Producer
Sonia Figuera
VFX Lead
Marco Rossi
3D Animation Lead
Hugo García
3D Artists
Álvaro Gascó • Andrea Giordano • Anthony Vincent • Carlos Cortés • Cat Harris • Daniel Buhigas • David Llopis • Eric Moliner • Ferran Llàcer • Frankie de Leonardis • Gerard Casas • Gerardo del Hierro • Gergely Wootsch • Iván Costarrossa • Jean Vincent Sales • Joan Buhigas • José Luis Estefanía • José Manuel Linares • Kiko Navarro • Kornel Makarowicz • Leire Martín • Llorenç Borràs • Miquel Campos • Salva Borrego • Simon Glas
Digital Compositors
Àlex Blasco • Aurelio Pozas • Carlos de la Sotilla • Daniel López Izquierdo • Edu León • Edu Puertas • Ian Sargent • Pau Minguell • Rubén Llusià
Production
Maria Shovkoplyas • Dani Granado • Clàudia Barbal
IT Manager
Xavi Tribó
IT Support
Washington Neira