Behind The Scenes: The Pirates!

Immensely looking forward to this new Aardman picture!

The Hunger Artist

Incredible short stop motion film created by Tom Gibbons (animation supervisor at Tippet) based on the short story by Franz Kafka.

Synopsis:

Set in a city both past and present, on a deserted street where only the distant sounds of life blow by. The Hunger Artist stands alone, locked in his cage. Once famous and adored by the crowds, he now performs alone. The Hunger Artist is the story of one man's travel from glory to anonymity and into the greatest performance of his life.
A stop-motion animated film, The Hunger Artist is based on a short story by Franz Kafka. The viewer first sees a lone figure renting out a cage. He goes into the cage, unpacks his bag, and locks himself in. This strange character is the Hunger Artist: a performer whose art consists of denying himself nourishment.

Pilsner Urquell - 'Book of Legends'

More info here.

(notes on) Biology

Under The Oak Tree

"The dream factory, Aardman Studios is situated in an industrial area of Bristol. The production company is world famous for their clay animations, especially for the movies "Wallace & Gromit" and "Chicken run ". There are hundreds of employees dedicated to handicraft in large and small scales.

Everyone has their particular task and special crafting skills. They are handicrafts experts who build models in different sizes, mix clay, sew clothes and paint decors.

In the autumn of 2010, the Swedbank characters were in focus of some 40 full time employees. One second film consists of 25 still images, where the puppets and the environment are adjusted manually. To sync lip movements require great precision. On a successful day two seconds of film were to be completed".

Credits:
Aardman Commercials
Director: Steve Harding-Hill
Client: Swedbank
Agency: Colony/Lowe Brindfors

AT-AT Day Afternoon

Made by Patrick Boivin. A hugely talented stop motion animator.

The Arctic Circle - Graduation Film

The Arctic Circle is a really great example of a graduation film done with stop motion. The style is nice but what I really like are the captions in between the story. It not only helps to lead the story in a very stylistic way, but the choice of words seem appropriate to the context of the film. Great work! Made by Kevin Perry.







Via David Martinez

Connect 4 - Completed Final Version!

It's here, it's done and i'm very pleased with it!
So much so that here is a still:

And the completed final version...

My Diamond Star Car

Project: Stop Motion
Location: Norton Court, Radford + Arboretum
Camera: Olyympus C3000Z
Editing: Final Cut Pro
Time Taken: Over the span of about 1 and a half months, altogether roughly 2 days
Music: Deerhoof - My Diamond Star Car

Finally finished, though hurriedly, to hand it to Simon today.
This was my second attempt at the stop motion technique. I was inspired to make this piece by the continual noise of cars outside my room in my first halls of residence. Since then i've moved to different halls and I thought that move would be a nice simple way to finish it.

Connect Larks Tongue in 4 (Unfinished)

The music works very well, better than the jazz jingle and will be more appropriate when we record the voice-overs.

Connect 4 (Unfinished)

Another stop motion I have been working on. It's a very simple but time consuming piece, though i've enjoyed making it. The music is a song I recorded sometime last year and just called it the jazz jingle.

Narrative Stage 1 (Part 1, 2 and 3)

After a friend who persistently told me to upload these videos I finally budged and here they are, in one short clip.

Part 1 - High Speed Chair Race
I've already posted this video but just to add it was made in the Waverley building, it took about and hour to complete (maybe less) and fades out because just after that scene the movements were far too jittery to pass as a decent stop motion film. The music is in a genre called Math Metal; I think it intensifies the speed and subject of competition between the two racers.

Part 2 - Bin Illusion
I liked the idea behind this film the most because it was very simple and effective. I chose the music Air - Run because by sheer coincidence I was listening to the song at the time I was watching the video. I think it fits very well because the timing is great and it also has no lyrics (or at least that snip), which won't distract the audience from what occurs in the film.

Part 3 - The End
This was a filler scene. We wanted a final piece to end what we had shot so far and The End seemd most appropriate. I also like this because it is again playing around with the idea that stop motion can create many illusions. The music is Gong - Foolefare because I needed a very short song and this worked very well.

With all of these videos I think that we didn't put enough time and effort into our movements; we should've moved much more slowly because it would have made the films a lot more smooth and easier (on the brain) to watch! By the way I hope this all makes sense, i'm tired and I can only be bothered to write this like a beatnik (and I'm not using the word pejoratively).




Can - Halleluwah

Stop Motion Videos (2)

Stop Motion

Lego Mouse

Location: Waterstones, Nottingham
Camera: Olympus C3000Z & Cannon S3 IS
Editing: Photoshop CS3 & Final Cut Pro
Music: Man or Astroman? - A Simple Text File
Time Taken: Just over 7 hours

Lego Mouse Animation...





Answer to the previous blog........... Charlie Chaplin - City Life

Narrative Stage 1 (Part 1)

This has been put together very quickly because I'm not satisfied with the little amount of pictures we took, so I haven't spent that much time editing. But as a first try at this I don't think it's that important; at least I know for the future. The music is by Frederik Thordendal and it's called Dante's Wild Inferno.
High Speed Chair Race...




Update: A suggestion was made today by a friend of mine that I use FX to emphasize the movements of the chair, such as screeches from car wheels etc. This is a great idea and I will do this over the next week and upload it. : 23/10/07

Music: Jethro Tull - Songs For Jeffrey