It’s always pretty impressive when we come across a piece of work that was pretty much single-handedly done by one artist, and done very well. Case in point is Bill Sneed’s latest music video “Ohio” for the band Outside Royalty. The video follows the journey of a camper truck as it navigates through surreal transforming environments.
Long-term readers are probably familiar with Bill’s work throughout the past few years. He has a knack for quirky characters and a unique sense of humor. He spent some time in London working with Bit State and then returned stateside to Los Angeles not too long ago to freelance. Although, considering Outside Royalty hails from London, it looks like Bill brought some of the UK back with him. We had the pleasure to ask Bill a few questions about the project.
After a year and a half of blood, sweat, tears, and frankly a ‘lil procrastination, YYY / Channel Y is re-launched. With more people experiencing the web on TV and TV on the web, this new iteration of Yes Yes Y’all is right where it needs to be. As one of the first passive experiences online, the site resembles what MTV once represented – a fusion of entertainment and enlightenment.
At a party. Lounging on the couch. Seeking the new. Finding the inspirational. This is how YYY is to be embraced. Music has long been the basis of the site, and as visual artists it’s a natural evolution to have innovative eye-candy creep into the mix. After all, in many, many cases, the beauties of each are not mutually exclusive.
Bumpers have been created by the YYY team and are meant to function as segues into the curated content so keep an eye out for those as you consume the content from the site. If you are interested in working with YYY to create some of these bumpers or unique content that will be featured on the channel, be sure to reach out to them on the site, they’d love to hear from you.
Paint It Black, from Nexus directors, Smith & Foulkes, is refreshingly witty. The color (or shade) black serves as the visual glue that binds the narrative of the piece together and creates a visual dialect that—like much of Smith & Foulkes work—is distinguished by character driven narratives and artful storytelling.
While the piece is entirely 3d, it maintains a graphical uniformity by limiting the palette and rendering each character with a soft finish. Evidently, the directors understand the nuances of great transitions and can intelligently craft a matrix of character subjects into one coherent aesthetic. As well, the ominous voice-over is playfully poetic and harks back to a kind of horror-esuqe delivery from a Boris Karloff or Vincent Price—making the piece filmic while still being commercially proper.
Credits:
Client: Panasonic
Title: Black
Length: 30”
Agency: The Campaign Palace
Creative Team: Nic Buckingham & Hywel James
Agency Producer: Katrina Maw
Production Company: Nexus
Director: Smith & Foulkes
Executive Producers: Julia Parfitt
Producer: Luke Youngman
Project Lead: Michael Greenwood
Illustrator / Designer: Mark Gmehling
Animation: Nexus
Compositing: Hugo Guerra
MmmHmm is a fun visual journey through a mixture of beautifully animated and live action worlds, directed by Special Problems and produced by Warp Films.
The concept driving this piece hits you on the head fairly early, but you can’t help but want to join him on the visual ride he is experiencing, starting with an 8-bit game like world, and getting progressively more organic as he progresses. The animation styles are intricate, intriguing and flat out awesome which leave me wanting more at the end. A seemingly appropriate feeling considering the theme of the video.
The crew over at Blinkink have been one of the few major forces in the UK keeping the spirit of indie music videos alive — one of the leaders of the pack is a young fellow called David Wilson. Named best new music video director last year at the MVA’s last year, he continues to push the envelop with his latest oddity for Skream and his most ambitious narrative to date; the story of Adam and Eve.
Along with a few other London up-and-comers, David is leading the charge with a return to craft and sweat. Raw labor and a love for exhaustive and often archaic techniques, specifically Strata-Cut animation in this piece, produce consistently fresh visuals.
And the making of…
On a side note, this video was actually commissioned by Blink themselves via Tempa — an interesting new take on a self-generative model.
Skream
Listeninʼ To The Records On My Wall (Tempa Records)
Director: David Wilson
Producer: Georgina Filmore
Executive Producer: Bart Yates
Production Manager: Tom Berendsen
Production Company: Blinkink
DoP: Toby Howell & Christophe Leignel
Camera Operator: Chris Nunn
VFX Motion Control: Malcolm Wooldridge & Digna Nigoumi
Art Director: Theo White, David Curtis-Ring & Ceridwen Brown
Srata-Cut Artist & Animator: Joseph Mann
Strata-Cut Assistant: Lydia Smith & Lauren Brown
Material Effects: Niek Pulles
Art Department Assistant: Joshua Stocker, Joe Myers, Iona Davis,
Yasameen Noorian, Daisy Roth, Jonathan Venga, Cornelia
Temple-Richards & Helen Leworthy
Hair/Make up: Lucie Norris
Choreographer: Mark Battershall
Making of: Rob Leonard
Casting Director: Nana Klimek at Headnod Talent Agency
Adam: Benedict Smith
Eve: Harriet Shillito
Editor: Vanessa Wood at Speade
Post Production: The Mill
Producer: Paul Schleicher & Serena Noorani
Colourist: James Bamford
Lead Flame Artist: Gareth Brannan
Assistant Flame Artist: Gareth Parr & Ilia Mokhtareizadeh
Nuke Artist: Donal Nolan, Ben Smith, Georgina Ford, Pete Hodsman, Dave Lee
& Maxime Chaix
Matte Painting: Dave Gibbons
Commissioner: Bart Yates & Sarah Lockhart
I recently watched this film, and while I have mixed feelings about the film itself, the title blew me away. Made by SFAUSTINA Design last year, it’s a typographical feast for the eyes. Some of the type compositions are reminiscent of the golden era of Hollywood in the 1940s (see above, where director’s name, film title, and main actor’s name appear on the same screen). The animation of the type hints at the key visual device that runs throughout the film (lights and reflections), which in turn relates a key element in the story. Catch the full interview with Stephen Faustina and watch the titles in HD, here.
Jacksonkarinja of Rabbit morph an entire city into a living skate park in the 2-minute, live-action trailer “Transform” for Ubisoft’s new Shaun White Skateboarding video game. *Note, this is a Directors cut.
Client: Ubisoft
Title: “Transformation” :120
Airdate: Currently online
Location: Downtown and East Los Angeles
Production Company: Rabbit, Bicoastal
Director/DP: + jacksonkarinja
Line Producer: Gian Colombo
Exec. Producers: Douglas Howell, Joby Barnhart
Advertising Agency: Cutwater, San Francisco
Executive Creative Director: Chuck McBride
Creative Director: Ali Grayeli
Art Director: Marcus Cross
Copywriter: Ray Connolly
Agency Producer: Mai Huynh
Director of Broadcast Content: Jennifer Golub
Editorial Company: Arcade, Los Angeles
Editor: Nathan Petty
Asst. Editor: Aaron Owen
Producer: Ali Reed
VFX Company: Ring of Fire, Santa Monica
Executive Producer: John Myers
VFX Supervisor/Creative Director: Jerry Spivack
VFX Producer: Casey Conroy
Asst. VFX Producer: Candace Niikura
Online Editors: Brian Shneider, Shelly Dutcher
Flame Artists: Brian Shneider, Shelly Dutcher, Trent Shumway, Brian Petras, Tony Graf, Renee Tymn
CG Artists: Andrew McMasters, Leigh Rens, Joe Langmuir
Graphics: Justin Sucara, Marvin Chua
Matchmoving: David Sudd, Paul Hopkins, PvP
Digital Matte Painter: Ron Gress
Colorists: Shelly Dutcher, Brian Shneider
Music/Sound Design: Human, Worldwide
Skaters: Matt Bennett, Greg Crain, Johnny Layton, Jordan Vititow,
Derrick Wilson
The 2010 Emmy Awards for Best Main Title Sequence are as follows in alphabetical order…
Curious Pictures for Bored To Death • HBO
Tom Barham – Director, Marci Ichimura – Compositing/Animation, Dean Haspiel – Illustrator
Imaginary Forces for Human Target • FOX
Karin Fong – Creative Director, Jeremy Cox – Art Director, Cara McKenny – Creative Lead
Imaginary Forces for Nurse Jackie • Showtime Steve Fuller – Creative Director, Mark Gardner – Creative Director, Corey Weisz – Editor, Cara McKenny – Creative Lead
Imaginary Forces for The Pacific • HBO Steve Fuller – Art Director, Ahmet Ahmet – Art Director, Peter Frankfurt – Art Director, Lauren Hartstone – Designer
Shine for Temple Grandin • HBO Films
Creative Director – Michael Riley, Designer/Animator – Zee Nederlander & Dru Nget, Creative Lead – Bob Swensen
A great mixture and execution to show a day in the life of an urban AT-AT. Plus below is a short and sweet behind the scenes video that helps you understand the process that went into making a short that appears to natural and whimsical.
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A. during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
