Machinima + Kinect

What happens when you introduce the Kinect to Machinima? It’s like having a homebrew Avatar rig.

ELASTIC: GAME OF THRONES

Game of Thrones premiered on HBO last month to join a line-up of already stellar shows. What caught our eye was the intricate titles that opened the show up. We had a chance to interview the director behind the titles, Angus Wall of Elastic, who shed some insight on the project.

Continue to read and watch the video.

MPC Opens New York Studio

MPC opens New York studio

Gmunk Returns

I still remember the first time I saw Bradley (GMUNK) Munkowitz’s experimental short, “Finn.” It was in 2002, and I was working as a web designer for the University of Texas, crammed into a dim corner of a room with brown carpeted walls and humming fluorescent lights.

Seeing that film was an important moment in my career. Along with a handful of other groundbreaking works, it sparked an interest in motion design that has sustained me to the current day.

Now, with the (long overdue) relaunch of Gmunk’s site, “Finn” is online, along with 10 years worth of other work. There’s also some great new Tron making-of action in the mix. It’s simultaneously a trip down memory lane and a look into the future.

I should also mention that David Lewandowski mounted a relaunch, too (Quickied). More Tron goodness there, as well as a bucketful of inspiring work.

David Lewandowski Relaunches

David Lewandowski relaunches and shares even more Tron making-of nuggets

F5 RE:PLAY FILMS 03

Another week, another great batch. We have RE:PLAY films from James Copeman & Sam Renwick and Peppermelon with music/sound design from David Kamp. Two wildly different approaches to happiness, but both focusing on singular protagonists who yearn for the understanding of the world around them.

JAMES COPEMAN – “THE TELL TAIL”

“The brief was really open, all it said was “happiness”. It got me thinking about an interview I’d read with actor Christopher Walken a few weeks earlier. In it, he had mentioned his desire to have a tail. ‘It would be so great to have a tail. It would be like.. Look, get back, don’t fuck with Chris today, look at his tail, he looks pissed.’

This got me thinking, I thought how it would be to have a tail that expressed your basic emotions that were subconscious and you couldn’t control it. I pitched this idea to my good friend Sam Renwick, we then sat down and started writing funny scenarios and problems caused by having a tail.The protagonist would struggle with it, and ultimately find happiness in hacking the tail off with some DIY cosmetic surgery. I knew Sam could play the lead character. It was great to get Ed Rutherford on board to shoot it and Caroline Story was really excited about making some prosthetic dog tails. I was concerned about getting the narrative across in under 2mins but somehow it works, and people seem to get it. Sam and I are now working on our next short.”

PEPPERMELON – “fIRST”

FROM PEPPERMELON: “This is PepperMelon’s first approach to classic storytelling, but with the ol’ characteristic pink colors, tweaks and quirks of Garcia’s style…Happiness is to inspire and be inspired; it is the result of connecting with someone else. fIRST represents happiness as something that needs to be shared with someone to actually lift our hearts. True creations, true happiness cannot be achieved while being alone; it is something shared in a crowd, or in twos. Happiness is not about smiling, but about connecting. And, there’s always a first time for all of us to experience this. This is the story…of a fIRST.”

FROM DAVID KAMP: “The piece was a lot of fun to work on, especially since its quite different from my usual musical endeavours. I collaborated with a friend back from my university days. He is a trained Cellist and played the Cello parts on the piece, which i think really brought it to life. I feel like the cello really helps to connect you to the main character and his feelings. An inspiration in that regard was the Cello Theme in Wong Kar-Wai’s great Film “In the mood for Love”. Its been a while that i saw the film, but the melancholic feeling i remembered from that movie was what i wanted to express in my score. The project was a great challenge in the limited amount of time and in between other jobs, but i think the result is a nice little short.”

Lamborghini Aventador: Morph

weareflink adds interprets the Lamborghini Aventador in this morphing wonder.