Bristol Animate Encounters Day 2

Day 2:

Tooth and Claw

This was the third selection of animated screening and as you may be able to guess from the tile most of these animations were animal themed. This screening was an exciting one as this was the screening were former Graduates form my university including Tommy had there film The Money Tree shown, and it was a grate felling to see it on the big screen for them.  My highlights from this screening: The Money Tree, Rising Hope, L’Ere Bête, Ride Of Passage, Ernesto, and The Tortoise

Time Passages

Before this screening I meet up with Katie McQuin who is a community manager at Aardman. I know Katie from posting animations on the Wallace and Gromit site and twitter. I meet here for a little chat last year and it was grate to she hear again and have a good long chat, and she was very happy to get her very own Viv &  Mandy badge. Myself, Katie and Gareth head in to the next screening. This was the fourth set of animated shorts to play and themed about gods, death and the environment. My highlights from this screening were: Zing, A Life Well-Seasoned, Atlas, Seven Minutes in the Warsaw Ghetto and Bendito Machine IV

Setting the scene: Layout workshop

The workshop was held by Fraser Maclean the author of the book setting the Scene, this was an interesting talk were he spoke about his personal jobs within animation, his first job was doing some of the shadow FX work on Who Framed Roger Rabbit. He then went on to talk about the past 100 years of animation layout in a brief history, showing clips for different films and shorts as examples. The full history of layout is in his book that you can check out here! Id highly recommend it for all animators but more so if you are a 3D and 2D animator/ director. As staging can make or break a scene. Also Fraser is a very nice, friendly and easy to talk to chap.

Before this workshop started I spotted that I was sat next Mr Ben Mitchell who is the co-hosts of the brilliant Skwigly Animation pod cast check out there site here! And you can download the pod cast here! or on ITunes. I had been chatting to Ben on and off over the last year over twitter, so It was nice to introduce myself and put a face to the voce and tweets. 

Over in the Art gallery close to the festival they had the pirate ship used in The Pirates! Film on display in the lobby, and boy this ship was massive!! The details on the ship were stunning the mast, sales and rigging alone was over 2 stories high. This made it hard to fit into a single photo but hear it is in all its glory   

Directors UK: Sam Fell

This event was a big one for stop motion Animators, and because of this it meant that most of the online stop motion twitter community were all coming down for it (you know who you all are). We all met up before hand in the watershed bar. I got to chat up with sum of gang that I have met before and some who I was meeting for the first time, a big one for me to meet was stop motion animator Tim Alan who has worked on Corpse Bride Mr Fox and the up-coming Frankenweenie, if you don’t know who he is then check out this sitehere! He has done some brilliant work over the years!

Once we all had a little catch up we all made are way over to the screening of Paranorman (if you have not seen it yet I say you must run and go see it now!!) this will be followed by an interview and Q&A with the films co-director Sam Fell. Even though I had seen the film before the atmosphere of seeing an animated film in a room full of animators and animation lovers was something I have never experienced before and what a buzz it gives you, fingers crossed this will be the first of many like this. Once the film had finished and every one had picked their jaws up off the floor and stopped clapping out came Sam. 

This chat gave a grate inside into what went into making the film. He spoke about the character design, the 3D printing, casting the film, picking the actors, walking the thin line of not making it too scary for kids and the big question on all animator’s lips how did you feel when you heard that Frankenweenie was coming out this year as well. Once the chat was over I got to briefly meet Sam, were I got introduce myself, have a short chat and I gave him my card. He very kindly did me and Gareth a quick singed drawing of Norman etch that I will be getting frame at some point very soon.

After the chat with Sam a big bunch of use all went to that after screening drinks/ get-together on a boat / pub. This was a great chance to meet more people and have a good chat with some animators and directors in a very chilled and relaxed manner. thanks to my idea of tweeting a photo of the badges I was wearing I got spotted and had a very nice chat with managing director of Slurpy studios Aaron Wood check them out here!  Later on in the night myself and Gareth got to have a drink from and more brilliant chit-chat with Tim Alan as well. After the boat party we all made are way to a different pub and carried on with the friendly animation and all things nerdy conversation, before calling it a night.   

Bristol Animate Encounters Day 1

On the 18^th of September I was getting ready for a 4 day trip down to Bristol for the Animated Encounters festival. This was my third year going down to this festival but the first time that I’ll be going down on my own. This gave me the perfect chance to catch up with as many of the online stop motion twitter gang as I could, as well as some old friends who left university my first year. 

I also wanted to make something that I could hand out to people as a gift and so that the people I know online would recognise me and come say hello. I came up with the idea of making some badges 28 to hand out and 2 different designs for me to wear.

Day 1:

After leaving my house at 6am been stuck on the train tracks for over an hour I finally arrived at Bristol for 10am after getting my tickets for the day’s events I had a look around the lobby of the festival and unlike previous years they have models sets and props on display. They also had some live animation going on.

 The creator of Angry Kid Darren Walsh was animating a new Bob episode. Like angry kid this was shot using a real person wearing a helmet were the front face can be replaced with a number of different masks to create lip sync while the actor has to stay very still and get moved like a puppet. This was fascinating to watch and amazing to see it all come to life over the 4 days.

 After I looked around I got to meet up with a stop motion twitter friend and hostel room buddy Gareth Hurst. We got are passes, programs and headed over to the next screening. 

The Trials of Life

This was the second set of animations to be screened at the festival as I missed the first one thanks to the train delays. All the animations in this set were all loosely themed around the everyday lives of people and have some very hart felt emotional shorts. My highlights from this screening were: Head Over Heels, De riz ou d’Armenie, I Am Tom Moody, To the Heart of The Matter and Being Bradford Dillman

Aardman: Early Years Claymation

This was the first of 3 Aardman themed events of the day. This one focused just on the very early Claymation work of the studio. All the shorts shown in the screening are available on the Aardman classic DVD. However it was brilliant to see them on the big screen and see all the small details, With an introduction by Aardman cofounder Peter Lord  My highlights from this screening were: Next, Pib and Pog, My Baby Just Cares for Me, Adam, Loves Me … Loves Me Not, Early Bird and Not Without My Handbag.

Aardman: From Pigs to Pirates

This was the second set of the 3 Aardman events.  Like the last screening this was showing allot of the shorts that can be seen on the Aardman classics DVD. However this time they played the most recent CGI, Stop Motion and 2D shorts. It was brilliant to see a lot of these short on the big screen and there were some that i had not seen yet, as they were made after the Classics DVD. My highlights from this screening were: Stage Fright, Humdrum, Angry Kid, Fly, So You Want to Be A Pirate?, Len’s Lens and Blind Date. 

Aardman: In Conversation 

This was the third Aardman themed event of the day. Unlike the last to this was not a screening but an interview with the 3 company directors Peter Lord, David Sproxton, and the creator of Wallace & Gromit Nick Park. I have meat David and Peter before a number of times and they are very open and friendly chaps but I was most excited to see Nick Park as he hardly dose talks of this size. Although most of the stories they were telling I have heard before from books, interviews and DVD extras there was something about hearing them from the people themselves in-person that was just unbeatable. I could of listen to them tell stories all day but sadly it came to an end. When it did the 3 of them got mobbed by the fans, myself, Tommy and Gareth stood back and waited for them to be less busy.

I first got to speak to peter, were I shook his hand told him thank you for doing the talk and was great to see him again. I gave him my card and he said “I think I seen these before?” then when I gave him a Viv & Mandy badge he said “ah now yes I have seen these two before! I hope you’re doing more?” well as u can guess I felt like I was going to pass out with joy when he said he knew and remembered my work. Peter then did me this little singed drawing of Morph on my festival program, that I will be getting framed very soon. 

I then moved over to Nick Park and got to shake his hand and have a very small chat with him, I was trying not to focus too much on W&G as I did not want to boar him with just how much of a fan I am! I gave him a card and badge told him a little bit about Viv & Mandy and that he may have seem them before as I post them on the Wallace & Gromit creations site. 

He took a good look at card and said “oh thank you I will take a look over your work” he them looked at the badge and said “yes I think I may have seem them before I like their faces…very funny” well once again you can bet that i felt like I was going to freak out when Nick Park says he think Viv & Mandy are funny!  Be for I said anything daft I shook his hand and said a good night and thank you 

Here is a photo of me, Tommy and the man himself Nick Park!!

Me and Gareth when back over to Peter and we evented him to come to the after show drinks with us. To are shock he said yes and we got to have a 30 minuet chat and walk to pub with peter lord, in that time we got to hear some interesting stories and news that I can’t go into on here sadly. When we got to the pub Peter then got in a round of drinks and went to around pub chatting away. Me and Gareth stayed till bar shut and said a hearty good night to Peter and friends and made are way back to the hostel.

What a night I will never forget!!!