Anna Davel
Animator - Illustrator - Video Editor
Valkyrie
As a part of UW-Stout’s Honors College program, I had to complete a self-driven project along with the aid of a faculty mentor. For my project, I wanted to investigate storyboarding. I chose to make a series of three storyboards, each one centering around a different topic. The three themes that I decided to explore were worldbuilding, drama, and action. Each of these scenes would focus on a different component of an overall story, all of the scenes taking place at the beginning of a story and leading into one another. For example, the worldbuilding scene focuses on the technology the story centers around, the drama scene highlights the interaction between the two main characters, and the action scene follows the events of a fight. To help me in this adventure, I had two mentors. We met over video chat and in person to discuss the story, designs, and storyboards. I would then make changes based on our critique. Their aid in this journey has been tremendous and I am very grateful to have had their guidance.
Story Synopsis
In a war-torn world, the human population has suffered massive casualties due to the terrible spread of the conflict. To counter this and continue the fight, scientists have developed a way to take the consciousnesses of human soldiers upon death and transfer them into an android host. This process can be repeated many times and is achieved through a transmitter placed inside each android that beams the soul back to the floating fortress known as Valhalla. There, the scientists, strategists, and war experts known as Valkyries tend to the androids and make sure that the process is running smoothly. The opposing side is made up of similar human-turned-android soldiers known as Draugar, but due to an imperfect system, they have very little recollection as to who they are and are driven by a blind, destructive rage. These armies are commanded by Jarls, who are not as consumed by berserk nature as the others and whose host androids are physically larger and stronger. This story centers around an engineer Valkyrie named Mia, and an android soldier named Jude.
