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Link to my animation ^^ (It takes much quicker to copy and paste this link into your address bar instead of directly clicking it on the site)

My animation was very literally formed around the three intertwining themes of blood, shadows, and desire in Nosferatu. Its main goal was to explain how Count Orlok was consumed by his desire for blood to such an extent that his source of pleasure became his demise. The two images in the foreground of it all were my eye (red because I had an eye infection from sleeping in my contacts, ew) representing blood, and the bonfire symbolizing desire. I thought a fire was the most fitting representation of desire. A fire can grow so large and consume the things it comes across in the way a desire can begin with a thought and suddenly consume a person and those around them. I felt that these really connected in Nosferatu, because Count Orlok’s desire was literally for Lucy (or Nina’s) blood. This passion could not be quenched until the Count drank it up.

Therefore, I placed the fiery desire in a small place at the center of my eye, and reimaged it to grow larger and larger until it consumed the entire center, as if it was literally consuming the blood itself. In the background of this all is the image of a dark, brooding sky, which represented shadows. I felt that this was appropriate, because the whole idea of a passion for somebody’s blood is a bit dark and deviating from the norm. It also is a foreshadowing of what is to come; desire can seem pleasurable, yet it’s consequences here led to Orlok’s disintegration.

To begin the end, I covered the fire slowly with black paint (similar to the tendrils of a fire). The shape the black paint formed for a moment turned into a humanlike image, which represents how Count Orlok actually became his desire; he let it fully take over his thoughts and senses. This was the first step of what led to his destruction in the end, shown by the shapeless black blob, the twisting of the image, and the way the entire animation was reduced to a lifeless black and white outside of the colors of the world.

Here is the fully constructed collage (mid-point), in which the fire has grown to its largest, fullest size. It  was after this point that I began to deconstruct, as mentioned above.