COMMUTER GLITCH: My First Short with Blue Zoo

Last summer, I worked on my first short with Blue Zoo. Commuter Glitch was a super fun concept. We created a piece of animation with a "pass the pose" mindset, or I believe the technical term for it is ‘Cadavre Exquis’.

(one of my poses from the end of the film)

Animators signed up, and created poses of the lead character, an old man listening to his walkman. We all used the same locked off camera, then took it in turns to animate a few short frames making the character move between a start pose and end pose, and of course, due to the virtue of the whole piece, no one knew what anyone else was doing.

(one of my poses from the end of the film)

It worked kinda like that drawing game, where you draw a head, fold over the paper, and pass it to someone else to draw the body, then pass to someone else to finish off. To add a layer of complexity, each shot created was given to different lighters, to light however they wanted.

I didn't actually animate on the shots, but I created a series of poses with the character, that you can see flicker on screen at the end of the shot.

(one of my poses from the end of the film)

Joe, our director, wanted everyone who worked on the piece to be as creative and out there as we could. 

It was a really fun project to work on, as there was so much freedom to do with the character whatever we wanted. It was also really exciting waiting to see what the finish short was going to look like!



The result, a crazy and surreal animated adventure telling the tale of an old guy on a journey through public transport!

You can find a cool article about the project here!

Cheers
Marc x


P.s. by the way, incase you can't click on the Vimeo link to check out COMMUTER GLITCH, you can watch it here on youtube...but if you can, go to Vimeo as the quality will be much better ;)

Being at BAFTA Guru Live

This weekend was the BAFTA Guru Live event, at BAFTA HQ in Piccadilly, London.  It's a bit like a mini festival featuring masterclasses, panels and keynotes by the leading names in Film, TV and Games.

A few months ago, I applied for a place with BAFTA Guru Pro. There were only 150 places, and it's for industry professionals with 6 months to 2 years experience working across film, TV and games. As there were so few spaces and it was for professionals across all three areas, I didn't hold much hope in getting a spot. However, a few weeks back, I got offered a place.

I was in a bit of a confusion about actually going, there wasn't a very big representation of Animation, or panels and masterclasses that were directly relevant to me, but the appeal was being able to network and meet people from the wider industry. I remember being offered a place on the Aardman Character course, and talking to my tutor Alex, about whether or not it was the right thing to do, and he simply said "take every opportunity that comes your way" (or words to that affect)... so with that in mind, I took the place.

It was a fascinating experience. As a BAFTA Guru Pro, we had access to exclusive talks and panels. We were also given one to one's with industry professionals. I had dedicated time with Grant Orchard, director and creator of Hey Duggee, and Becky Overton, who's a writer on Cbeebies shows such a Justin's House and Thomas and Friends. Both were able to offer insight and thoughts on where I can take my career over the next 5 years. Really useful stuff, and both delightful people.

My favourite talk, was the Film Keynote talk from director, Justin Kurzel. His thoughts on his favourite moments from his favourite films was really fascinating, for instance, in Jaws, he talked about the juxtaposition between the domestic nature of families on a beach, against the terror that lies in the water - although we never see the shark (in the film clip he shared with us), we still felt its presence. It highlighted for me the importance in every element of a picture, and how to structure a scene so everything plays a part in telling your story.

Other interesting panels were hearing from professional execs in My First Three Years in Television, and hearing commissioners and developers talk in Idea, Pitch, Commission. There were a few panels set up too for Guru Pros only (which was kinda cool being in such a small audience), my particular favourite was Delivering the Final Cut, with Film Editor Yan Miles, about his work on Sherlock. Also the Diary of a Series Producer was really interesting, although somewhat irrelevant to me as an Animator, it just affirmed that I never want to be a Series Producer!

It's a shame there weren't more talks directed specifically at animators, or professionals working in Kids TV, but I can't knock it. All in all, it was a great couple days. Of course, the free lunch and unlimited Nespressos helped ease the burden of being inside on a sunny bank holiday weekend, but hey, each time I clocked a BAFTA mask and realised the professionals I was meeting, I realised it was time well spent.

Cheers
Marc :)