Christen Bach’s “Bear Untitled”, An Hommage to David O’Reilley

Berlin-based, Christen Bach, has tapped into the aesthetic and vernacular of David O’Reilly’s smash-hit “Please Say Something” to bring us another dark tale of love and loss between animals.

As Christen puts it in his blog post: “David figured out quite early…that there is something amazing about emotional conversations acted out in ice cold monotone voices. He has been able to get under the skin and display true emotions on very synthetic characters in very synthetic universes.”

Enjoy this fitting tribute and my second attempt to start your Monday with tears.

About the author

Matt Lambert

/ www.dielamb.com
NYC / London

15 Comments

jan

Was that really worth a post?

bencanfield

I would have liked this a lot more if it weren’t for reading the description on the vimeo page.

Jens

Would have been cool as a quickie, as a full on post it is a bit of a let down

billboard_bob

boooooring!

Simon Robson

Yes, please remember that full posts must have all the latest flashy techniques, a crew of at least 30 cg artists and be for a major brand, preferably sportswear or consumer electronics. Quirky and witty bits of amusing story-telling like this have no place here…

ochyming

Would be sad if an artist dismiss that work but not a “consumer”.

This is a good advice for Artists : Steve Jobs’ Advice to Nike: Get Rid of the Crappy Stuff – http://www.fastcompany.com/video/mark-parker-nike-and-steve-jobs-apple

Jens

I agree there should be less commercials and more independant productions on here. However if I see that stuff like this

and this

http://flewterminal.wordpress.com/2009/12/11/146/

get a quicky only I’m surprised this gets a full post. That’s my point. I don’t find the storytelling witty in this one at all, it’s very on the nose, but that might just be me.

Yussef

Exactly how is this quirky or witty? It’s an A->B plot, well executed but nothing groundbreaking or that exciting – and an homage to boot. An homage to a short that is not only quirky and witty but depressing, gut wrenching and profound. I’m sure you can tell the difference Simon, no need to jump to the defense of a contributor in a knee-jerk fashion.

Christen Bach

I just want to say that the film is NOT made as an hommage to David O’reilley. This is taken out of context. I did a entry on my blog where the headline was “Bear Untitled” AND hommage to Mr O’reilley. Which was meant as two seperate things. I just concluded that the sound of the piece had ressemblence to some of Davids sound-aesthetics. And I gave an Hommage to him in my blogpost. I live in Berlin as David does, and I travel the same cirkles, I have the deepest respect for David, and I do by all means not want to leach off his success…

Go read my blogpost for yourselves
http://understandingspace.blogspot.com/2010/04/bear-untitled-hommage-to-mr-oreilley.html

griff

Cranky! You’ve admittedly managed to air frustration at what this site has submitted and largely pomotes, but the issue is more that its simply not very good … i think, at least i’d hope, thats what people take issue with over the priniciple of who its by or for.
The attempt to hitch it to O’Reilly does an already average piece a disservice too.

Simon Robson

Not so much ‘Cranky!’ as ‘having a bit of a joke’…God forbid. Nope, I wasn’t airing ‘frustration at what this site has submitted and largely pomotes’, I was poking fun at the prerequisites that some readers seem to have as to what makes a ‘full-able’ post.

As to it being ‘simply not very good’, that’s entirely subjective. I think Matt out of all the authors takes the most risks with what he posts. His choices aren’t safe and won’t please everyone, but more power to him for it i say.

Hopefully something ‘very good’ will be posted soon enough.

inwinethereistruth

I agree with most of the posts here. Where is the “wow” aspect by which so many are not taken into account? This simply doesn’t have what we’ve been told gives you the honor of a central post. No true innovation, just imitation. Not that I didn’t like it, I did. That is not the point. I thought the work was supposed to stand out and inspire?
I think this begs a larger question we all need to answer for ourselves…where does one draw the line?
I certainly don’t think a lot of the more commercial with big budgets and a huge crew should have more clout than the independent work. That said, the independent work should have some degree of independent thought and good craft.

dlew

quickie at best

hoeveler

Jan said it best the first time.

Christen Bach

Hey you guys. I think it is time I take part in this this witchhunt of a debate. Haha.

First of all. I did not make this piece to be innovative, genious, groundbreaking or nothing of the kind. I simply made it as a small project over the course of 2 days to test GraphicsGale and to see how it works as an animation tool. I think it turned out quite well and I am very happy it got posted – and about all the positive feedback Ive gotten about it. My deepest respect to Matt for finding it amusing and posting it. I dont think things needs to be the brightest and the most groundbreaking to be entertaining. Sometimes its nice to kick back take things for what they are.

If you want to see graphic exellence and groundbreaking techniques you should go check out my pet project the Animation Tag Attack, that is a serious attempt to make something new and interresting:
http://www.animationtagattack.blogspot.com/

Second of all this film is NOT made as an hommage to David O’reilley. This is taken out of context. I did a entry on my blog where the headline was “Bear Untitled” AND hommage to Mr O’reilley. Which was meant as two seperate things. I just concluded that the sound of the piece had ressemblence to some of Davids sound-aesthetics. And I gave an Hommage to him in my blogpost. I live in Berlin as David does, and I travel the same cirkles, I have the deepest respect for David, and I do by all means not want to “hitch it to O’Reilly” as Griff so nicely puts it in a previous post…

Go read my blogpost for yourselves
http://understandingspace.blogspot.com/2010/04/bear-untitled-hommage-to-mr-oreilley.html

Comments are closed.