For our project we aimed to recreate a tornado. Our character, a tornado, was created with animated circular and linear movements. We utilized three active stepper motors for the scene; one to rotate a pulley system on a track for the linear motion and two custom built rotating gears for the rotation of the tornado and the pulling of the house towards the tornado.

We studied tornadoes and brought ours to life with a wire framework decorated with fabric and cotton balls. Despite having a small set, the low camera angle exaggerated the size of the tornado along with the small scale of the house. The scene was lit with an ambient blue light and an orange spot light focused on the house. White flashes of light were also utilized to create a lightning effect. Finally, movement of the fur fabric in between frames created the effect of grass blowing in the wind.