A Good Cast is Worth Repeating

See before you the cast of my Native American animation:

 

 What I love about this style is the boldness of the design. The top left character, who looks like Sherlock Holmes, is our lead. The film will follow him through life, which I figured was the best way to cover their lifestyle. Top Right is a horse designed in a Plains Tribe style. It actually reminds me of Yosemite Sam's Dragon in Knighty Knight Bugs.

 
(Image from http://yosemite-sam.net/Sam/Animated-Cartoons/Sam-1958-Knighty-Knight-Bugs.htm)

Bottom left is the Midwife who brings our lead into the world. Her magnificent face was based on a photo I saw of an elderly Native American, who the most extraordinary wrinkles, they were like deep caverns in her skin. I'm sure when she cried it was like a babbling brook!

Then we have, my favourite, the trickster god, Iktomi. This is a spider, who can transform into a human, not the other way round surprisingly. As a human he usually has either red, blue or white paint around his eyes. I decided to go with a big red eye to make him stand out, so that the audience knows he his mischevious. A great concept is that he can use people like puppets. Gotta love mythology.

I have done as much research as possible for this project, because it is important to do as much as possible, not just because you might offend someone (that should be subconcsious), but because it is truth. I'm also including traditional patterns in the animation, such as the sun, below. I made up the colours, bearing in mind what pigments were available.

 Well with the characters designed, it's off to the animation wing. Wish me luck!

The World of Marketing: You'll never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy

Alright people. This is it. It's time to talk about it. DON'T act like you haven't seen it- you know you have. Of course you know that I am talking about the Vodafone commercial featuring -sniff- Yoda. 

Oh Yoda, Yoda, Yoda, Yoda. What happened to you bud? You were once the greatest Jedi in the galaxy, now... 

Actually that brings me onto my next point. This advert shouldn't exist (besides the obvious reasons), as where the hell in Star Wars continuity does this thing take place. It's set in the modern world, yet Yoda died A long time ago... and he wasn't CGI Yoda then either (which makes me wonder, is that the natural growth for his race). 

I mean what was it.

Oh jeez... so how did you get the advert campaign.

I usually don't get so uptight over characters in advertising. I didn't mind when Darth Vader was in the Currys advert, as I have always had my suspicions of Currys, but this was such a weak effort. It was too good a CGI for an advert and I don't get what Yoda has to do with Vodafone- or hairdressers! At least E. T. says phone home, remember those adverts. Clearly the marketing campaigners thought "Doi, they're both cute aliens that can't talk properly- it's essentially the same character", well you know what, they're not. One's a Jedi Knight, the other... can't drive a spaceship!

Maybe I'm thinking too much about this, but I only saw this tonight and I felt like I had to do something. I just have one thing to say to those marketing guys: You'd better watch yourselves. I'm a wanted man. I have the death sentence in 12 systems.

Hey there!

This animation was a test, done to show the curator of Hastings museum what I will more or less be producing for the exhibit.

I will actually be creating the final product in After Effects, but still done in this style (a great example of this is The Invention of Love http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTdzCAGH3lU).

What I love about this is the texture of the background. Trade Secret: it's cream coloured card on a lightbox! Don't you just love movie tricks!

It Belongs in a Museum!!

I have been asked to produce an animation for the Hastings Museum. I thought it would be like 80 years before something of mine ends up in a museum. I am working with filmmaker Nick Pilton, who with a group of students, is tearing down the old Native American exhibit, and  remodelling it- and thank God!

I am creating an animation showing the lifestyle of the Great Plains Tribes, this will range from birth-eating-playing-hunting-medicine. I've done the storyboards for it, so now it's time for the animating. I'll upload the storyboards in a future post.

I found some better photos of our li'l undead friend. 

Here's a better look at the head wound. I really want to know this zombie's back story. 
He is in civilian clothes. He was probably indoors, as he is only wearing a t-shirt and thin hoodie. It's winter he would need more that. Although there is no sign of a forced entry, or an attack, so the danger could have been indoors-- upstairs. He attacked someone, as zombies do not carry around knives with them. Perhaps he was mugged, killed, then reanimated on the streets!

I would like to stress that those are prop teeth!

 

Monster Mash

Last night, I went to my uncle's Fancy Dress 50th Birthday Party. The theme: Anything, which sounds easy, but it was quite hard for some guests to think of something, evident from there lack of costume. They looked like fools!

Unlike us, of course. I knew pretty early on, I wanted to go as the Karloff Frankenstein monster, the make-up was created by Jack Pierce. After a successful test, (which led to the denizens of Rye chasing me down with torchhes and pitchforks) some friends asked me if I could help them with their make-up

...AND HERE THEY ARE: 

 Mine was just a simple face paint and Black hair dye. I had someone trim my hair at the top, to make my forehead look larger. I am pleased with it. I wanted to look as though I had stepped out of a black and white film.

Here we used a latex prosthetic, that covered his eyes. This was perhaps harder, as you had to blend the prosthetic in with the skin.You have to paint over the prosthetic, and outline the wrinkles.  The demonstration video produced a very Miami Beach Vampire, which of course the worst place for a vampire to be. I always prefer a paler vampire, so I gave it a touch of both. You have to make the dead tired,. hence the black round the eyes.

Now for the pièce de résistance. This Happy Chappy had a few prosthetic scars and a knife, all glued down with spirit gum (don't worry, he shaved before!) 

The large head wound was produced by gluing tissue paper down in a ring. 

• When dry, use a palette, or butter knife, to lift the inside ring up. 
• Paint the inside red
• Paint the outside to match your face
• Then just work on the inside to make it more realistic. Real blood is not like Kensington Gore, it has a touch of blue and if you like yellow. Perhaps a touch of green, to make it infected. Then apply some cake blood.
• When you are happy with the colour, comes the fun part!
• Grab yourself some Gel Blood. This is, as the name suggests, very gooey, ergo very fun. Just squeeze it all over the wound. You want it thick and seeping out of the end. 
• I would suggest that you dab the inside with a natural sponge, so that spts of the orignial head comes through. This will give the effect of the skull peering through.

And there you have it. I would like to experiment more with this. I thought it would cool to get some wires inside the wound, like a cyborg costume.

I'll try and get an image of that headwound, but for now use your imagination, for what you don't see is more frightening.

MIDNIGHT IN METROPOLIS

Yesterday I finally finished my animation for the course. It was a paper cut-out animation, in the style of Lotte Reiniger. I produced one last year similar, and now I remember why I vowed not to do another. It takes ages and it is fiddly. Unfortunately I could not get tiny animation pins (I borrowed some for the robot, which looks suitable, as it reminds me of bolts). I tried pins on the girl, but she was too small and the pins would rip right through her (something I would feel very guilty about.)


You will notice that Metropolis (1927) was another influence on the style, mostly in the architecture. I love the design in Metropolis. The tall buildings looming over the action. It just looks marvellous. It also influenced other touches like the little planes flying above.


I wish that I had made the streets busier, to really give that city feel, but apart from that, I am really happy with it. 


In a future post I'll upload my old animation, but until then you can watch it here:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PEGKi8SJaSw