Adam and Dog

I've been waiting for so long to see this short film by Minkyu Lee and it didn't disappoint!

Set in the garden of Eden, the film follows the story of a dog and his first meeting with Adam.

Kirkplace 5th Anniversary Video

For the fifth anniversary of Kirkplace, the church I've been a part of since last July, I helped create this video to celebrate the milestone. Be sure to set it to 720p.

Sculpture by the Sea 2012

Another great year of Sculpture by the Sea at Bondi Beach in Sydney. If you're in the area in the next couple of weeks be sure to check it out.

Headphones recommended and click through for the HD version


UPDATE 06/11/2012:
Featured as 'Video of the Week' over on The Beast website! The Beast is 'the monthly magazine for Sydney's beaches and bays of the East'.

Rolling Along....

My life has certainly changed since arriving in Sydney.  After coming over for an animation job late last year I suffered a massive burn out as a result of working too many long hours and this was the catalyst for my exit from working full time in the animation industry and heading to Uni to pursue an education/arts double degree to become a high-school teacher (among other things). I'm now in second semester at uni and haven't regretted my decision to change careers for an instant.  The main reason there isn't any regret is that I can now do exactly what I want creatively, when ever I want. So whether that's drawing on the grass while waiting for lectures to start or coming up with ideas for short films, or shooting little tests on my camera, I feel that I'm in a much better place with life now that I can enjoy the creativity I have without having to rely on it for my income.

I'm not completely out of animation though. I'm teaching it as a subject at JMC Academy in Sydney which has been a great way to really push my understanding of the basics of animation in order to teach it proficiently and also because I can put the things I'm learning in my Education degree into practice where appropriate so I'm learning new things on all sides and having a blast.

On the faith front I joined a church called Kirkplace a couple of months ago and in that time met a lot of really awesome people and been really challenge by the lead pastor's sermons.  I've also started shooting video announcements for the Sunday morning service which has been a great little side project each week to stretch my camera and shooting skills.

My debut effort is below. Not after any sort of critic or praise, I'm simply putting it here as a record of what I'm making at the moment so I can look back in a year and see how much I've created.  Having to do one of these a week will definitely speed up my video editing skills.

I'm now wondering what possessed me to use the music track I decided on....



Update 02/09:
Here's the notices video I created for the following week. Much improved from the first one, learned a bunch of new things I hadn't known before about panning and zooming photos within their own frame.

ACTA is on Death Row

The invasive, freedom limiting, corporate self interest, publicly despised, secretly negotiated bill called ACTA was just given a massive punch in the guts by the EU which has voted it be dismissed by a massive majority.

As is usually the case with these kind of freedom limiting, secretive, industry lobbied bills, you kill one and another one is already being drafted in even more secrecy and with even further reaching desires to stifle freedom of the internet and it's users all for the sake of corporate interest and their desire to monopolise creativity, expression and content.

It's called the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), it's super secret and so all we know about it is that's it's designed to make Australia bow to the corporate whims of American businesses in the areas of copyright protection and freedom of expression.

Watch out for it! We have caused a major blow to ACTA which would have been all but signed into law if it hadn't been for all the protests and people ringing their local politicians.  TPP will need the same level of protesting otherwise it'll also just be whisked through without scrutiny.

"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance." - Thomas Jefferson (Maybe he said this, maybe he didn't, you never can tell with the internet, it is however VERY ironic that the world needs to be on the lookout for all the American Corporations trying to push laws on us which limit basic freedoms which we've had for many hundreds of years)

Torrentfreak.net Article

ZNet Article concerning Australia and ACTA

Mechanical Apple

Mechanical Apple is a small studio consisting of Ari Gibson and Jason Pammet.  These two guys are responsible for some of the best animation I've seen come out of Australia in recent time.  Check out their updated website and their new short Winter Fox below.



Winter Fox from mechanical apple on Vimeo.

Genius Party Shorts Online

No idea how long these will last so strike while they're hot!

EDIT: Aaaand they're gone! Lasted longer than I thought they would.

Go buy the Genius Party and Genius Party Beyond short film collections!

Neil Gaiman's Words fo Inspiration

Andrew Stanton on Story

Growing

Here's a really neat time lapse of a girl growing from a baby to age twelve.  Very interesting to see the way we change and develop and when and how our features become more defined.  Great for practice in drawing characters in different stages of their life.

Interactive Online Anime by Koji Morimoto

Check out this trailer and then follow THIS link to take part in a pretty interesting interactive anime experience by Koji Morimoto

#MadeWithPaper

Absolutely loving Paper by the guys at Fifty Three.  Had it for the last three days and been sketching away with it to my hearts content.  It turns the iPad into an effortless creation device rather than a consumer device.  Check it out for free on the iTunes store and if you like the first free tool you get you should definitely purchase the pack for $8 as it's the best $8 you'll spend on an app.



Added 6th April:

Here are a few quick sketches I've done in Paper while at Uni. The best thing about the app is that it forces you to just have fun and enjoy the process of creating and drawing rather than get bogged down in trying to make everything look highly polished.

Keep an eye on my Twitter or Tumblr accounts to follow my sketch diary using Paper or discover other people's creations with the #MadeWithPaper hashtag search on Twitter.

Everything Is A Remix Pt 4

Adam and Dog Trailer

Haven't posted anything here for a while because....well, there's been nothing worth posting about....until this popped up in my twitter feed this morning and single handedly restored my love of animation, something that has been atrophying with the current run of schlock on tv and in cinemas at the moment.

Make sure to check it out in HD!

The Andy Serkis Animation Circus

You may have heard Andy Serkis pounding his chest over his self-elected Oscar worthy animation performance and if you didn't know much about the process of motion capture you'd be forgiven for thinking from his trumpeting that he alone is the sole reason Ceasar was so magnificent to behold up there on the cinema screen.

To be fair, I like what Andy Serkis has brought to motion capture but for him to think that he actually has sole claim over the entire performance and that he deserves an Oscar for it is ridiculous.  He makes a very valuable contribution to the process but is only one part of the process, he certainly wouldn't be considered for an Oscar if he'd dressed up in a chimp or gorilla costume and prosthetics but if he had then he would indeed have more claim to being the sole reason Ceasar was received so well by audiences.

Here's an excert from a blog post by an animator who worked on Andy Serkis' motion capture data over the years, I think he, rather than Andy would have a far better idea of just how much work went into making the character of Ceasar come to life on screen.

For him to break it down to a two part process, then, is a gross over-simplification. Aside from the artistic contribution made from either the performance capture artist or animator, or whatever mix of the two exists, there are the several other creative and technical processes needed in order for that character to be believed as any other performer. Modeling, rigging, texturing, lighting, rendering and compositing are several other crucial steps that, if not executed to the highest degree, would then render anyone’s performance or animation irrelevant because the character wouldn’t be believable.

You can read the rest of the post here