Finally posting something.... I've been reworking most of the parts in the animation. I have included the bug that appears under the salt shaker as i move it. I'm trying to composite it to look as real as possible. But i wanted to add a surreal touch to the bugs, hence the glowing antennas and such.

There's a moment in the kitchen scene where the salt shaker transforms into a butterfly. I changed the butterfly into a make belief bug. Feel it looks better that way.

Only thing left is to make all the components blend well in AE. Also alot of time remapping to do ... was hoping to get that confused feel where certain parts of the movie fast forward with a glitch sfx.

Edited story

I've changed the concept or rather i'm leaving a scene out. Removing the whole "machine operated screens" segment since it doesnt really convey clearly. Instead the focus of the animation will be the character's hallucinations, in this case Bugs.

Starting from the salt shaker, the animation moves on to the toilet scene where the character is attacked by his reflection and swarmed by bugs emitting from the cornor of the wall. When screen fills with bugs the scene cuts to character sitting in an asylum.

below are the low res renders for the bug (swarm) and butterfly (saltshaker)

I'm keeping the beetle lo res so that it wont kill the cpu when i render the swarm. The butterfly will have alot more detail. May be creating a high res beetle in case i wana do close up shots of the bugs crawling up the character's arm

bug renders

Sequence

This new version is just 1 movie instead of the initial 3 short movies idea. here's the sequence.
I'll be using mainly video and layered 3d, keeping the theme dark

New concept

I've rethought my concept based on John's comments about making the concept a personal exploration of the psych rather then within a documentary setting. Decided i'll do something along the same lines of mental disorders, focusing on halucinations/nightmares but the new concept is a ficticious, exagerated hallucinatory experiance. This way I wouldnt have too limit my content to keep it accurate but will have freedom as to how i potray the events.

I've decided to make the theme darker and leaning towards a serial killer kind of story. The movie will be done with video as the datum and layered with 3d animations.

references

http://www.kompostnyc.com/trekant.html

Nice ambient style

http://www.motionographermedia.com/lemontree/thelemontree.mov

the lemon tree vid is the closest i could find of a style I'm hoping to achieve

http://www.pokedstudio.com/pokedesign_illustration_portfolio.html

http://www.nobrain.fr/flims_real/citroen.htm

these r links to vids I gained influence from

Poked studio is a studio focusing on illustrations - good colour grading and hue selection.

colour grading and styles