Adventures in Cinema 4D: Part 003

I'm looking into the C4D dynamics now, and having a little play with the materials too.

Adventures in Cinema 4D: Part 002

I found a tutorial to model some tank tracks, but I made these to my own design. I then managed to figure out for myself how to use the Xpresso editor to rig the wheels and track to move together.

Here's another one; a portable communicator of some kind.

And now it's the all-new TX2 handset from BeigeData.

Adventures in Cinema 4D: Part 001

Today I began the 42 day trial period of Cinema 4D Studio from Maxon. The evalution version lets you try out the full Studio option of the software with saving and rendering of projects enabled. The trial-version is limited by having an output resolution restricted to 800x600. I hope to use some of my 'spare' time to get to know this software and generally become more hands-on with 3D, possibly using this for some of my own projects in the future.

Maybe I'll post a few images as I go along. First-up some simple geometry in order to check out the Sketch and Toon cel-shading options here. I've also been able to make these wheels all spin around together using the Xpresso Editor to link all the movements together. Not bad progress for this session.

It's very early days yet, but I'm already finding this interface a lot easier to use and get into than Maya, I'm encouraged to find out more ...

2014 Directing Showreel

I just thought it might be time to put my showreel together again. So I've cut-in a few newer jobs and fixed the broken link to this on my 'REEL' page. These are mostly jobs I've directed whilst at TANDEM, with a couple of extracts from my own short film projects too.

'The Score' film for Mr. Plastimime

This Behind the Scenes film shows the recording session of the musical score for the new film by Daniel Greaves. This is the seventh short video I've shot/edited in the Making Mr. Plastimime series. I shot this footage in the Slovak Radio auditorium a couple of weeks ago during the 5 hour recording session with the Bratislava Symphony Orchestra.

This was certainly one of the most enjoyable days work I've had in a long while. It was really inspirational to be down amongst these incredible musicians and also up in the control room to witness the scoring/recording process first-hand.

The edit for this four and a half minute video took a few days, because I used a separate audio recorded to capture the orchestra sound (for better quality) and had a lot of footage to sync. up in post.

'Cable Car' in Sony Production Awards 2014 Competition

The Sony Production Awards is a competition is open to short films made with any camera. I'm guessing there wont be many other entries shot on Super8 film. My film 'Cable Car' is on there now. If you click on this movie and watch it here, your click and maybe even your vote will be very welcome.

'Hat Trick' film for Mr. Plastimime

Here's the sixth webisode of the Behind The Scenes series I've been shooting/editing at TANDEM in support of Daniel Greaves' Mr. Plastimime project. In this episode, after a discussion with the director, we see how animator Steve Edge creates a scene in stop-motion animation.

Simon Draws: Tabby Cats

Here's another episode in the Simon Draws series of online videos I put together for Simon's Cat Ltd. In this lesson, the inimitable Mr.Simon Tofield shows us how to draw Tabby cats.

Bratislava Bound

Last Friday I had a somewhat interesting day out! I was invited by Daniel Greaves (TANDEM films) to accompany him on a trip to Slovakia to record the score for his new short film Mr. Plastimime.

The Slovak Radio building in Bratislava

The Bratislava Radio building is an immense up-turned pyramid building of early '80s vintage. It's a daring futuristic design and I really love it. Inside, there are miles of gloomy 'widescreen' corridors with concrete panelling everywhere. The auditorium was especially impressive, with an immense pipe organ taking up the entire wall behind the stage.

Composer Mike MacLennan records the piano parts for his score for Mr. Plastimime

Dan was there to supervise the recording of his film's score as composed by Mike MacLennan (Mcasso music). Mike Connaris (composer and MD of Mcasso who wrote the closing song used in the film) also attended the session. The mighty Bratislava Symphony Orchestra was conducted by Musical Director David Hernando Rico.

The Bratislava Symphony Orchestra in full effect.

My role was to document the occasion and make another Behind The Scenes video; the seventh episode in the Making Mr.Plastimime series of videos I've been making over the last year or so.

The incredible musicians of the BSO at the recording session.

I wanted to travel light (Ryan Air cabin luggage only!) and be able to move around stealthily, so I took a small bag with my Canon 600D DSLR camera, 3 lenses (11-16mm wide zoom, 30mm and 50mm) , Rode Video Mic Pro microphone and a Tascam DR-07 mkII audio recorder. I also took a Manfrotto monopod, with a small pan/tilt head and some additional monopod legs too.

I'm editing the orchestra footage this week and I think this is going to be a good episode and quite a bit longer than the previous ones. I hope I will eventually be able to share this new film at a later date , but in the meantime here I'm sharing a few stills from the session. 

Most of the previous videos I've made in this series are now publicly available online on TANDEM's Vimeo page. Here are the first 6 episodes of the Making Mr. Plastimime series.

2014 BAA prize

Every two years, at the British Animation Awards night, the cream of the UK animation 'industry' gather together for one rare night of celebration at the National Film Theatre. I was fortunate enough to be a finalist back in 2010 when my film TXT ISLAND made it into the last three in competition for the 'Best Short Film' award. Although TXT ISLAND wasn't a winner, it was great to have my film up there amongst the finalists. Professionally I can say that's been the high water mark of my career thusfar...

So it was an honour to be invited by Jayne Pilling (who tirelessly puts the whole BAA thing together) to create one of the prizes for this year's 2014 BAA awards. At each ceremony, the prizes are always hand-made artworks created by animators selected by Jayne and her team from previous winners and finalists. On the big night, the prize-winners each receive one of these unique awards rather than the usual plaque or statuette one might expect.

The brief for the design of the prizes is 'create some kind of artwork that alludes to Britishness, animation and ... sheep'. Sheep, because the acronym of British Animation Awards is of course ... BAA.

 

So here is my contribution to the occasion. I've used plastic lettering and pegboard material left-over from the production of TXT ISLAND to make this typographic artwork. I wish good luck to all participants in this year's BAAs, to the prize-winners of course, but especially the runners-up ; )