Olivolk is the name of my Youtube channel and voice acting work. It focuses primarily on comedic/informational videos that cover a broad range of topics. The channel features a rigged cartoon character and plenty of photoshops and animated graphics.
Branding
The branding is primarily represented through the main cartoon character, Apex, and a purple tiger pattern, shown here. Art deco elements are then applied, with the Olivolk wordmark.
Outro Screen
An example of the tiger pattern in use, the outro screen features an animated version slowly moving across the screen. The Art Deco elements are again used in opposite corners, with the credits taking the left and a suggested video to the right.
Thumbnails
I use thumbnails both as an introduction to the video and as a sorting method. All main content videos appear similar to this image, purple background, this white line with art deco corners, and halftones. Stream highlights, on the other hand, are more of a light blue with a thick white border on the outside of the frame. Specials are white with a red border.
Character Rig
Ref Sheet
The first order of business was to create a reference sheet for my character, Apex, so I could keep him consistent. Here's the ref sheet I created in full, showing the colors and some minor details so I could also aid others with drawing him. I included a handful of facial expressions both as an exercise and to better understand his facial structure and how it moves.
Room Creation
Creating the room was very important. I wanted an art deco vibe, without being over the top. It needed to feel modern as well. There had to be a large screen present so I could apply visuals, as well as a large portion for the character to sit. Due to all these constraints, I had to create the room myself. I started with the wall/floor, and added pieces from there. Each piece was color, exposure, and shading adjusted to match the surroundings.
Character Art
The character art needed to be flexible, but also easily manipulatable. To assist, I worked with a character artist I sought out. They were given direction by me, but created the linework you see. I decided to use a head with swappable emotions, and several bodies that can be swapped out for proper context. Some of the eyes and mouths that can be applied are pictured here.
Final Product
Here is an example of the character in motion in a video. As you can see, I chose to do an 'animatic' style of animation as opposed to full motion. This approach is not only easier, but also much faster with less possibility for error.
Animated Graphics
For my Chuck E. Cheese Lore video, I used title cards at the beginning of each era. While I used templates for some, shown here is the 'Pizza Time Theater' animated title card that I created from scratch. I wanted a '70s feel on an old TV.
Within the Chuck E Cheese Lore video, a joke regarding a hostile takeover of Chuck E Cheese by Disney is made. I wanted to use the company's characters to visually represent this, taking place in some sort of hellish landscape. In order to best fit the art style, I took an existing image of Chuck E and modified to appear scared and running away. Mickey Mouse was drawn from scratch and made to grab at the fleeing Chuck E. I then animated the scene using gentle sideways movements and a fiery background. To complete the scene, I slightly rotated the hand to add life to the characters.
During Dumb American Folk Creatures, the history of the Loveland Frogman is discussed. In the sequence a scene of a police officer driving is shown. This was an unexpectedly tough scene to create with more moving parts than I originally anticipated. The scene is set in the '70s, so I needed to find an era-accurate side view police car. Then, I added a police officer inside. Lights were then added, and wheels. The car and wheels were kept separate so I could add a bounce to the vehicle. Then, the road was added and looped while moving. A foreground hill and background scene with parallax scrolling were the finishing touches to the scene.
Merch
I am in the process of developing a merch store for my channel.
Here's one of the shirts I created, featuring Apex in a 'comic book' kind of style modeled by yours truly! For a final touch, there's a red and blue offset of the images to give a 3D look.
Full Video