Ya Gotta Love Them Grecians...

Well, it didn't get snapped up by Depict, but my naked-baby-adventure-romp 'Ground Running' has fared better elsewhere. God bless those Greeks, particularly the ones at the Thermaikos 2Min Film Festival.
Although it was only confirmed today, 'Ground Running' is among the films that will be screened at the event which starts this saturday (Nov 1st). For more info check out their website.
So, if you've always wanted to go to Greece but never had the right excuse, what better than to see a film of mine that runs at about 90 seconds?
Okay, there are many, many better reasons to go to Greece. Culture and architecture and blah-de-f*cking-blah...but, I mean, c'mon, look at how cute the little rascal is...

So am I Huey Lewis or Ray Parker Jr.?

When ‘Ground Running’ was screened for the first time one of the evening’s fellow directors came over to our table to say some nice things, mentioning briefly that my film reminded him of a viral Xbox commercial he had seen. I told him I’d give it a look and, well, I did. Frankly, I’m a little freaked out as the commercial is staggeringly similar to the first few seconds of my film.

A woman in the agonising throes of childbirth shoots the baby out of her v’jay and it smashes through a hospital window. From there the similarities diminish, with the baby aging as it flies through the air and landing in a coffin (I guess somehow representing that…I dunno, ‘Life is short’, so waste it playing Xbox games?). As my film is primarily about being a postgraduate weighing up his options, the bulk of it is, in its own right, original. But watching this commercial is unsettling as it’s like looking at my idea done in live action and with a budget.
Here’s the kicker - they did it first. I am making absolutely no claim of being ripped off as this advert was made years ago (the youtube upload is from 2006) - but at the same time I am absolutely certain that I never saw this commercial. If I had, I probably would’ve sent it to everyone I know as, to be fair, it is pretty cool.
So, it’s a dark night of the creative soul for me. Is it really just a coincidence that my film’s opening is so similar?
I decided the only way to make peace with myself is to dissect the process. Looking back at a previous entry I remembered thinking about other funny birth scenes from film and TV. The ones that stick out in my head include the fantastic intro to Addams Family Values, the pacing of the birth scene being very cartooney in and of itself.

I think other inspiring elements came from Ren & Stimpy…
…As well as a lovely sequence from Big Fish where the baby is popped out and slides along the floor. Given that was a pretty high-profile flick, I’d imagine that said sequence could’ve also been a springboard for the Xbox ad. Elements such as the timing and the ‘bungee umbilical cord’ are unique to my film as far as I know, but as a visual it could easily have been done before.
The real pisser is the baby flying out the window. I can think of a number of sequences from cartoons and movies where things are hurtled out of windows comedically, Looney Tunes, Farrelly Bros. movies, again Ren & Stimpy most likely. Later on in the Addams Family film the baby gets hurled through a skylight...
With all this in mind I’m fairly confident that my idea was the product of my own independent bricolage process. Bricolage being, essentially, the deconstruction of pre-existing ideas and their subsequent reassembly to create something new. To be honest, all creativity could be seen as a type of bricolage, as nobody can really create something new without drawing upon the cultural and societal influences around them. I think it would take a particular brand of arrogance to dispute that.
I’m still not comfortable with it, though. I think it might be worth it to create new footage for ‘Ground Running’, maybe get the runtime up to at least two minutes and change the structure of the opening scene so that it doesn’t share the same similarities. Until then, I think I’ll put further festival submissions on hold.
Now I find myself asking that vital question every young man asks himself at one time or another - ‘how do I get that baby out of the vagina and into the street without accidentally plagiarising an Xbox viral?’
Why, it’s a question as old as time itself.

Squeezing My Duck Dry...

A couple months ago I wrote about the possibility of developing a character from my old webcomic ‘Mitchells In England’ for a graphic novel (or possibly several). This has been incrementally taking shape, but only as far as the writing is concerned. I think it’ll be a funny and interesting story when it comes together, but I’ve been going back and forth as to what kind of visual style I should use.
While my usual ‘Mitchells In England’/’House Guest’ look seems logical, it may be better to approach the artwork in a more contemporary way. I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it, I guess.
In the meantime I’m still eager to produce a graphic novel of some sort, and a friend of mine came up with a pretty nifty idea: adapt ‘House Guest’ into one! In theory it’d be pretty easy - as all the artwork produced for the film could be used, converting it to a comic-book format would just be a matter of laying out the stills and text. I could probably even include segments that were eventually edited out of the film, so it wouldn’t just be a picture-book of material people are already familiar with.
It’s early days (well, early first day) but I think that with some thought it might come together really well. I actually got so enthused last night that I even whipped up a concept for the book cover:How do you like them apples, Spiegelman?

CONE OPENS!!

Today I got my first rejection from a film festival. It’s basically the same type of template letter you get with applying for jobs or schools or whatnot. I’ve known from the off that ‘House Guest’ wasn’t for everyone, and that inevitably I wouldn’t get through to most of the festivals I submitted it to, but it is a little disheartening for the very first reply to be a fob-off.
As the great Les Claypool once sung, ‘lack of persistence is surely a sin’, so I’ve resolved to find two more festivals for every ‘no’ I get. So long as I stick to the ones that don’t charge (or don’t charge all that much) there’s nothing really to lose.
I found out recently that most studios actually have people on staff whose entire job is to scour the listings for festivals and send films off. So a (pretty good) studio film that’s won a couple of awards out of twenty-odd festival screenings was submitted to about two hundred festivals. Them’s shit odds, and for us indie folk who don’t have the staff or the time to send stuff out to that extent it’s a pretty unbalanced playing field.
On a cheerier note, last week I decided to thank Adam Carolla personally for his unknowing contribution to the completion of ‘House Guest’ by calling into his show. If you have any interest in hearing me kiss arse, you can listen to the archived segment here (skip to about 9’30” in).
Carolla brings up a fantastic web animator Michael Narren, who had previously created some short webtoons using snippets of conversation from Carolla’s prior show Loveline. They’re brilliantly executed and work really well as standalone shorts to people who have never heard the show. You should check them out at his website, or take a look at my favourite ‘Grand Theft Submarine’ (and see why the phrase ‘cone opens’ cracks me up).

Baby Boom

Here are some more layouts from my Depict submission-in-progress.I doubt this one'll be too popular with the ladies, but it's helped me get in touch with my feminine side. Plus, giving birth is generally a bit trickier when you keep your legs closed.Here we see the baby's dramatic entrance.Cut to a side-view and the poor little whippersnapper is snagged on the still-attached umbilical cord.
Here are the latter two images in motion:
It's a tiny detail but I really like the way the arms and legs settle into position. It really conveys a sense of tension and balance.This is a similar shot to the first appearance of the baby, although with an acceleration to the speed of the approach to the camera. In the first animation the baby slows down as it gets closer, so with each in-between less distance is covered. In the animation below (combined with last entry's 'skid' shot) the baby speeds up as it falls so each in-between this time covers more distance.
Does that make sense? Does anything I say, for that matter?

Left Holding The Baby

My initial plan to produce my new film 'Ground Running' using a combination of 2D animation and cut-outs/pixellation has been somewhat hampered. This is for a number of reasons, including time, economics and, primarily, my friend who I'd hoped would help with the photography just bought a puppy. On one hand, just having the film limited to 2D animation on its own will doubtless see it less interesting aesthetically. On the other hand -Aaaaw...So cuuuuute...
Actually I think the film will work fine this way. My lament during the production of 'House Guest' was that a lot of the charm in the animation was lost when the rough pencil tests were cleaned-up, inked-in and coloured. It'll be cool and somewhat fitting thematically to have a film be done entirely pencil-on-paper. This way I'm gonna have to make the animation shine through to make it visually impressive, as I won't be able to hide behind any slickness or polish. Here are some layout drawings I've come up with based on the storyboard: For when the baby is skidding along the ground. Although no real harm comes to it, I want there to be a couple Kricfalusian moments where you wince a little bit.On that note, the doctor's glasses are a little homage to John K.I want the facial acting for the woman in labour at the start to be fairly true-to-life. Slightly panicked...and sweaty.The baby graduates! So foolish and full of hope. Poor bastard.

Panel Discussion

I am presently musing on the surprisingly wide-ranging and diverse subject of graphic novels, or bandes dessinées as the Montreal bookstores refer to them. It has previously been a casual interest of mine, although recently I’ve grown to become fascinated by them and developed a pressing urge to do one of my own.My initial interest came as an offshoot of my childhood devotion to the band Faith No More over a decade ago, when I traced the source of one of their album's covers to 'Flood!', a then-obscure graphic novel by Eric Drooker, a New York-based artist, poet and political activist. It was interesting to see the book’s story told without words, as well as seeing the author’s style develop and strengthen as it goes. At the start there’s a cartoonish goofiness to the characters, which evolves into a more disciplined rigidity that takes nothing away from the artwork’s stripped-down charm.
Since then I’ve stumbled across a handful of others that really serve the medium well. Unfortunately I’ve never been able to embrace comic-book culture. 'Batman' and 'Spawn' nearly won me over in my early adolescence, but ultimately I’m just missing that part of a geek’s brain that finds appeal in superhero stories.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m making no pretence of being above it - I’m one of the biggest geeks I know. While most of my friends’ interior decoration comes from IKEA, mine comes from Forbidden Planet. One time I even went to all the way to Birmingham just to meet Pinhead. Y’know, like an infant gets taken to meet Santa Claus at a shopping mall. Here’s the proof:So that digression will doubtless have left no ambiguity - I’m a total fucking dork, and I've finally embraced it. Back to the graphic novels...
Being limited to non-Marvel/DC franchises my tastes are a little less obvious. I guess I generally enjoy the Indy section, veering toward stories with dark humour rather than the indulgent and/or emotional stuff.An exception being Art Spiegelman's ‘Maus’ which, like all good literature, is over-hyped until you read it and find it lives up to every expectation you could have of it. Marjane Satrapi's ‘Persepolis’ is similar in that the strength of the story is its virtue more than the artwork, and it’s ultimately an easier read, being peppered with welcome moments of levity.Jo Hepworth put me on to Roman Dirge’s ‘Lenore’ when I first showed her the concept art for ‘House Guest’, chiefly for its similar aesthetic. The development of its universe and the characters within remind me a great deal of my own, infinitely more obscure webcomic ‘Mitchells In England’. You can tell that the stories mean a lot to Dirge even in their apparent ridiculousness (in the good sense of the word).Doug TenNapel is probably my favourite in terms of artwork. He created ‘Earthworm Jim’, which was a fantastic games franchise (although, ironically, not an especially good cartoon series) and, among other things, writes and illustrates graphic novels that have such visual depth as to rival Bill Watterson. I’d recommend them all, but ‘Creature Tech’ is a great starting point.

Over the years, my cartoon sister and self maintained pretty much the same attitude toward one another.

The aforementioned 'Mitchells In England' had few consistencies - it was a strip that took people I knew and cast them in a series of fictional adventures. As it spanned ten years there were characters based on friends that would alternate in their association with my cartoon self, much as they did in real life. When my friend Ed moved away he eventually stopped being a character in the strip; When my parents got divorced their cartoon versions just disappeared - and so on. The only characters present in every* series (the whole strip was divided into twelve self-contained stories, and with each one I'd consciously develop the style and modify the premise) were myself and my sister, Erica, who was essentially the villain.

Erica threatens the world in series 10.

The in-joke with that scenario was that, bizarrely, the two of us got on in real life far better than any other siblings I've met. Even in the tempestuous furies of adolescence any mudslinging between us was swiftly resolved. Maybe that's just the way I remember it.

But when Erica left for college the arc of her character also changed, and after a period where she was barely a presence in the strip I reintroduced her with a heightened desire for spreading evil and despair. In the strip she forms an all-girl alliance called 'The Emasculators', eventually selling them out so that she can destroy the world and rule what remains. In the penultimate series her character has become so iniquitous that she has physically morphed into an androgynous demon-silhouette.

The decidedly-more 'evil' Erica from series 11.

To return her back to normal, I (well, the Ben in the comic) team up with a lime-green-suited Jesus Christ and follow her into a fugue of non-existence that she has created. At this point I was in college too, I guess I was trying to be deep. In the last series of 'Mitchells In England' the now-human-again Erica has become an actress whose face is repeatedly seen on billboards as a recurring sight gag.
The evil-silhouette Erica is probably my favourite character to draw. Mainly because she has no features, just eyes and proportions that vary on mood. This is the character I'd like to do something else with, perhaps by writing the story of how she originally grew so demented and Machiavellian, which was never explained in the strip. 'Mitchells In England' is definitely something I drew a line under, and I don't fancy doing another comic strip again any time soon, but I think a one-off spin-off (a 'spin-one-off', perhaps? Actually that sounds kinda dirty...) graphic novel might be a good excuse to revisit the character again.
*Actually there was one series in 1996 that I misguidedly set in space, which didn't feature any of the other recurring characters save for the one based on me.

Fun With Babies

In the month that has passed since the degree show I’ve set myself a handful of personal-growth projects that just haven’t been panning out. My endeavours to properly clean my apartment see me re-organising my crap just enough to make the place even more messy before I lose interest altogether. My attempts to lose weight are at odds with an alarmingly renewed fondness for sugary snacks and sitting still. My plan to give my imploded lovelife a shot in the arm is stymied by a sort of asexual indifference when it comes to pretty much every woman I know. Which I’m sure to them comes as something of a tremendous relief.
So, I’m untidy, overweight and single. Time to retreat once again to the world of cartoons!
While I return to the non-riveting world of freelance post-production, I figure it’s best to keep some more fun projects on the boil that will at best see some payoff and at worst keep me occupied.
The first on my list is a short film for the annual competition ‘Depict’, which challenges film-makers and animators to come up with a 90-second story. This is good in terms of labour but tricky in terms of coming up with a concept. Without going into too much detail, mine is essentially a projection of the way I’m feeling about myself, my place in the animation industry and in the world at large. My intention is for it to have a ‘big-sea-little-fish’ relatability to those who are (or have been) in a similar position, life-wise and career-wise.
Here’s some visuals for the main character design:My initial plan is for it to be 2D animation, with a rushed, ‘pencil test’ aesthetic, but if there’s time I’d like to have said animation merge with cutout/stopmotion to give it a bit more depth. Here’s a hurried test animation I threw together as a pitch for my photographer friend Helen Shaw to try and get her on board. As you can probably determine from the footage, I’ll need all the help I can get.

Piracy! Arg!

Well, I’ve got a film done - the question now is what the hell do I do with it?
Any answer I come up with just raises further questions. Do I shepherd it around to festivals? Do I put in online? Do I send it to every animation studio I can think of? Is animation even what I want to do full-time? There were so many other elements of the production that I enjoyed, like storyboarding and composing the music - would it be more valuable to pursue these instead, career-wise? Or, do I carry on doing the post-production and video editing work that kept me afloat after my BA and use the money I make from that to supplement animation as a hobby, as I do with my music?
Lots of options, which I suppose is a good thing as it casts a wider net of possibilities, however one of my main goals in taking this MA was to narrow down my plan of action. That certainly hasn’t panned out.
These days I’m mainly putting together press packages for festivals and sending off DVD screeners. To keep my nose clean, the version I’m sending out there is the shorter, less-sweary, non-copyright-infringing edit I described in the previous entry. When I decide to release it on DVD, this will be the version that goes on it for the same reason. The unedited, 17+ minute original version with that perfect song over the end credits will never get a screening now that the degree show is over. It’s a pity, because at the end of the day that, to me, is the true version of ‘House Guest’, even if the new edit does flow a little smoother. That’s why I’ve decided to bootleg myself!
I can’t in good conscience charge people for a DVD of the original film when I don’t own all the music on the soundtrack, but if I’m just doing the rounds with friends and family there’s no real harm done, right?
The oxymoronically-labelled ‘Official Pirate Version’ is as bare-bones as a DVD can get, containing the cut and uncut versions of the film but nothing else by way of extras. To give it a nice, animationey feel the packaging design is taken from one of the rough layout drawings and printed on clear acetate. The end result is simple but, I think, pretty nifty.
I like to make geeky little ‘special edition’ packages - when I put out the last two Struwwelpeter albums ‘Rapeseed’ (2004) and ‘Agnosticaust’ (2006) I made a batch of home-made versions for friends, family and the first 100 people to order each album online. It’s a nice excuse to create extra album artwork, get creative with the packaging design and include music and video content that would otherwise never see the light of day. In this digital age my generation may very well be the last to take pleasure in the physical representations of movies and music. Sometimes the ingenuity of the packaging can even contextualise the media content. You just don’t get the same vibe from a JPEG in an iTunes ‘album artwork’ window.
I’ve also whipped up a spec design for an eventual ‘official’ release of the film, which won’t happen until it either gets picked up by festivals or I give up trying. Wish me luck, because I’m a nice guy and I’ll treat ya right…

Where Credit's Due

Well, the film is done. While there may be more alternate versions on the horizon, "House Guest" as I had envisioned it is now a fully-formed reality. In some areas it's a little less fancy than I expected, in others it's a little more. Better or worse though, it's finished. For now.
So I'd like to take the time to personally (well, sort of impersonally given it's an entry in a weblog) thank everybody who made a contribution.
First and foremost, my course leader Chris Webster whose advice, support and encouragement got the film started and kept my own interest in it alive.

Of course it goes without saying that Joanna Hepworth was a vital contributor, spending countless hours cleaning up, inking in, colouring, animating and generally making the studio a more pleasant place to be. Without her selflessness I honestly believe I would not have finished on time, if at all.

Two of the most important people to the film's development before production even began were screenwriting students Hanna Merilainen and Verity Ross-Smith. Both of whom went through the original script and helped me filter out the waffle, of which there was plenty. Actually, it was about 70% waffle which would've made the film about 50 minutes long. They were harsh but fair.

My old Cheltenham College paisan Tom Bower did a fantastic job as the voice of the Duck, as did my thespian sister Erica who took on the Prospective Lay. Both of them injected more flavour and personality into the characters than I could have hoped for.
As well as Jo, there were several others who weighed in here and there to do some of the duller stuff, such as colouring and clean-up. Many thanks go to everybody who was able to spare the time:

Vibeke Cleaverly

Cari Merryman

Veronika Broscheid

Rita Sampaio

Annalena Müller

Michael Rokes

Sarah Lawrence

Helen Shaw

There were also a number of altruists and advisors who were valuable to the film's completion. Rachel Robinson from UWE, whose candour was vital during the early months of production when my approach was a distinctly more limited one. Her advice inspired me to strike a fairer balance between economic and full animation.

Mary Murphy, also from UWE and one of its true unsung heroes. Probably the best person for technical support and advice with a truly laudable no-BS policy.

Philippe Vaucher, who left Bristol last year to work in Quebec, selling me my beautiful lightbox Molly. Obviously without her there'd be no film at all. It is a little troubling that I've named my lightbox and decided it's a she, but that's just one little tile in the vast mosaic of my idiosyncrasies.

Special mention has to go to the many baristas of Bristol, especially the ones who worked in Caffè Neros. Over the course of the film's production I managed to see about five generations of staff come and go from one specific branch, including that incredibly hot, tall, bald German one who wore shirt buttons as earrings. Pretty much everyone who had to serve me coffee after coffee after coffee did so affably and having the café to go to as an alternate work environment was a real boone at times.

Finally, the man who got me through the most tedious times during production, although he could not have known it, was radio host Adam Carolla. Happening upon his show by chance back in September, I found him instantly endearing through his natural delivery and outlook on the world and mankind. Whether listening to the current morning show during the week or old episodes of Loveline on the weekend, having a backdrop against which I'd scan, colour and compile ad nauseum made the work immeasurably more bearable. Also thanks to his co-hosts Teresa Strasser, Bryan Bishop and the genius Dr. Drew Pinsky.

One of my larger fears when I began working on the film was that it would wind up being a solitary and lonely experience. In reality it was anything but, and I am deeply grateful to my friends and associates whose names bulk up the credits for making an effort, be it small or large, and for no other reason than 'just because'.
It is a nice feeling.