Pitch: The Braxton County Monster
Pitch, including concept art, plot and character designs for animation project, 2023.
In 2023 I pitched a short film inspired by the 1950's story of the Flatwoods Monster, a cryptid that was supposedly seen in Flatwoods, Braxton County, West Virginia, as part of a competition. In the end, my pitch was not selected, but I had a lot of fun working on content for it and would like to share some of it here.
The Braxton County Monster is a simplistic story about a young girl who discovers the mythical ‘Flatwoods Monster’ cryptid is actually real, and that it isn’t as fearsome as its reputation might suggest. This was actually my second concept, though worked on concurrently alongside Ohm Sweet Ohm, and it was the concept that I chose for the final pitch. Its theme was Playing With Emotion.
Below: Key beats in the story were outlined by a detailed storyboard. Beneath these illustrations, you'll find story notes which can be read alongside the images.
The plot of the story was outlined as follows, illustrated by the above storyboard:
'First, we see the town of Flatwoods, West Virginia, USA, surrounded by forest, with its sign noting the home of the ‘Green Monster’. In a town square we see on a noticeboard photographs and illustrations of the monster, from the ‘original sighting’ in black and white.
Fade to colour as we cut to Susan, the young girl who is skipping through the woods, oblivious that the night is drawing in. Suddenly the weather changes. The wind rustles through the trees as leaves fall away and the sky turns dark. Suddenly, she feels uneasy.
The trees in the background part as large figure appears in silhouette. Everything falls quiet - she hears a creaking behind her and turns to see the silhouette of the monster illuminated in front of the moon. Then, with a hum of engines, the monster reveals itself. We cut to black as it approaches her...
For a moment, there’s a standoff as neither party breaks their concentration first. The wind blows a branch down from a tree nearby which falls - CRACK! - and knocks the top of the monster - its head falls off! It turns out the machine is actually controlled by a tiny alien.
Realising there is nothing to fear, Susan helps the alien to its feet. After a smooth time jump, we fade from black to see Susan sat by a campfire with the creature - all it wanted was a friend - it isn’t so fearsome after all!'
Below: Sheets from the presentation, including character designs and notes on the aesthetic of the production.
If I learnt one thing from the pitching process, it’s that I love to paint backgrounds, and work in a variety of styles. I also had a blast researching how backgrounds were used on the references for both my project ideas, from the Sunday morning cartoon backgrounds of forests and parks informing the Flatwoods cartoon to the digital painted artwork of Emil Schult which inspired Ohm Sweet Ohm’s rather sombre setting. In particular, I made a conscious attempt to build atmosphere in these backgrounds and concept art by departing from my usual block colour filling style, instead choosing to use a lineless art style on occasion, or go for more subtle colour blending and shading for different visual touches. Perhaps, even if I don’t end up flexing my animation muscles as much as I’d like during this project, I could indulge in some nice backgrounds or concept artwork.
I think that the flatwoods monster story is ripe for an animated short or stop-motion story. I wouldn't be surprised if one turns up over the next few years!
