Labeouf New Film

This is my latest short Labeouf, a stopmotion animation about a goblin called Norman stuck down a hole. The name came from Shia Labeouf as his Just do it green screen video was going around at the time. I wanted subtler name than Just do it so thought this would be a fun name. The puppet is made with a wire armature and painted with latex, the set is made from MDF wood, recycled and found objects. The budget was zero so everything used was either self funded, found or donated. The film was worked on part time for about a year, stopping when other projects were on. 

The story is about a goblin (called Norman) who is stuck down a hole, but he's to distracted to escape. It's also about the endless possibilities available to us all to shape our future, to seize the moment but we're so distracted with social media, boxsets and video games etc that these opportunities are slowly fading with darker more sinister times ahead. 

Social Media is represented by the bucket, through colours, sounds and the idea that we can fill Facebook with our lives. I didn't want to use a blue book as it seemed too obvious. Boxsets are represented via the blue crystals, ie Breaking Bad as everyone seems so obsessed with wasting time watching it. Gaming is represented with the cork painted like a Pikachu. The sky darkening is time running out, in life, for the planet and the human race, through age, pollution, segregation and war. The longer we wait to act the smaller the opportunity we have to affect change in our own lives and on the world around us.

The film began life as a showreel piece but once it had been made I decided to turn it into a short animation. It was a good experience making the short and I learnt a lot, there's lots of things I'd do differently in future but as it is I've finished working on it. Specifically make the puppet larger with a more expressive face, improve the sky animation (oil on glass) and reshoot a couple of shots. I'd rate it at a 2.5 out of 5.

Explainer Video Blades Animation

Here is the new advert for Blades Animation. I am going to produce a making of blog to accompany how the video was made. Though for now I am going to post the video please let me know what you think.

Richard :)

          

300 2

I recently watched the second 300 movie Rise of an Empire. I cant say I have been looking forward to seeing this particularly but there isn't much on at the moment.

Before the showing they previewed a couple of extended scenes to which one audience member ran out of the screening with his hands over his ears to avoid any spoilers (it wasn't me). Captian America 2 looks amazing I'm really excited for this. The first film was good up until he became Captain America then they didnt really seem to know what to do with him and it went a bit rubbish. But this looks great cant wait!

So 300 its okay not great but not bad either. Its set before during and after the first film and follows the larger events of the Persians invasion. Its a bit odd in that one of its messages is that the first film is dumb by regurly referencing the events of the first film and telling you the characters and events are dumb. This is odd because this isnt a particularly clever film and doesnt seem to have a whole lot to say either.

The reason this is elevated to okay rather than bad is Eva Green who is amazing she is by far the best aspect of 300. Her performance is incredible she absolutely blows every other actor off the screen with her portrayal of the villainous Artemisia. It is worth watch 300 just to see Eva Green. The other characters are just buff men holding swords hitting one another. There is very little to the other characters in this they really are only in the film for the fighting. Which is the main reason I imagine people go to see this. From that aspect this is good, the action is entertaining although the CG blood is very poor and definitely takes you out of the experience of enjoying the film.

I really liked that the film was mostly set at Sea as there doesn't seem to be many naval war films around so that was a memorable aspect of the film. The other memorable moment of the film is Themistocles (Sullivan Stapelton the main hero) secret weapon towards the end, this made me laugh as its pretty stupid!

As I've written this I'm going to upgrade my opinion if this film to a very positive okay, still not good. I wouldn't buy the DVD but if it was on Netflix I would add it to my watch list although I'm not sure how quickly it would get watched!

What I'm doing!

Hi so first a couple of quick recommendations go and watch both the Lego movie and Dallas Buyers club, I watched them last week and they are both great. If you can only see one then watch the Lego movie, a great piece of animation! 

This week has been fairly productive I am finally nearly finished with the new advert for my website the only element to complete is the voice over recording. It currently has a scratch track of me reading the script. A process I totally hated even though I was the only person in the studio I still felt very self conscious about recording my voice. Once the voice over has been added I will do a final cut of the advert hopefully shaving about 10 seconds. Then it will be uploaded to the website. The advert is likely to be online March 21st. On the same day the website is due to have a minor facelift. Mostly just an updating of the banner and a few of the other photos in use.

I have additionally began working on a second video for the website that will help explain the price of animation. Its not uncommon for me to be asked how much for some animation like its a packet of crisps. I've regularly been asked how much for some animation a bit like toy story but a couple of minutes long. Unfortunately it is not that easy to give an answer to that. For those wondering things to consider when pricing up an animation I work out how long it will take me to complete, this is affected by how complicated the animation is, materials, how long the finished product will be, style, do I need additional people ie actors, musicians etc. Lots to consider so the more specific someone is when asking the more accurate the quote will be, Its actually better to say how big your budget is then I can work out a project that will fall within it. 

Part of the process of making a piece of animation is scripting, story boarding and sound. Although these have different titles they are all part of the same process. When coming up with an idea I work through a sketch book making notes and thumb nails, from here I'll make a list of things that will happen then go between scripting and story boarding. Normally story boarding before scripting but the process goes back and fourth between these parts. When writing the script I might think of a better idea and will then update the story board, so lots changes at this stage. I story board on post-it notes and then lay them all out on the wall to begin to get an idea of how it will look. At this stage its really easy to change parts around by rearranging the pictures. 

Once I am happy with these parts I record a scratch track of the script. This is me standing with my microphone recording all the voices. As noted earlier this isn't my most favourite part but its essential. During this stage the script is likely to change again. I record every part as written though whats written doesnt always sound as good when spoken so lots of changes will occur at this stage. When recording I can see the script and the story board so have a good idea of what Im doing. 

Once recorded I scan the story board and import all the sound into final cut to edit together an animatic. This is the story board and sound cut together to allow me to see the timings and get a better idea of how the finished short will look with out having to animate. It is the best opportunity to look at it and decide if it is any good and wether or not it is even worth making. 

Yesterday I finished the animatic and felt reasonably happy with it, then when watching it again this morning changed my mind. Today has seen me reworking the whole thing, its been completely re story boarded, the sound that I recored previously is fine though I've trimmed chunks off. The problem was visually it was just flat and slow. Below is the completed storyboard. I plan on animating it in the last couple of weeks of March, aiming to get it online by the middle of April. 

Finally below is a photo said i'd add ages ago of a set and puppet I've made although forgot about. The puppet is complete to how I'd like him though there still some work to do on the set. I'm still a long way off animating this as its not a priority project its just a bit of fun on the side.

Okay thats enough!

Rich

Robocop 14

So it's been ages since I last went to the cinema but on Friday I went to check out the new Robocop film.

It follows officer Alex Murphy who is a tough undercover cop trying to solve a case with his partner Lewis. After a failed attempt to arrest crime boss Antoine Vallon he orders a hit on Marphy as revenge. A minion plants a car bomb on Murphy's car resulting in him being hospitalised with extreme injuries. His Wife agrees to have him turned into to a cyborg police officer named Robocop. 

The film is okay the action scenes are good similar to GI Joe or any number of superhero films where a meta human fights Robot or big Robots. There's a fun shoot out pitting Robocop against an army of drones and a fine fight against a bunch of ED209s. The second attempted arrest of of Vallon is provides a shoutout in the dark lit mostly by gun fire. This is serviceable but nothing special it reminded me of Hit Girls rescue of KickAss from the movie KickAss except it lacked the same emotional impact or the excitement of the underdog overcoming the odds. Vallon was unfortunately very underdeveloped and had little interaction with Murphy or Robocop due to his hands of nature so there was little reason to get emotionally invested in Robos pursuit. 

When I first wrote this I totally forgot to even mention Joel Kinnaman so I guess he turned in a largely forgettable performance. To be fair to him he was fine at pretending to be a robot and his voice was good though not as good as Peter Wellers. 

Other than the action which for an action movie was a bit thin on the ground especially when compared to all the debating and discussion about man versus machine. I really enjoyed Gary Oldman as the scientist/doctor who felt torn over his actions in the creation of Robocop. The rest of the characters were a little bland Micheal Keaten was fine, Jay Burchil provided a couple of smiles as did Micheal K Williams as Lewis. Jackie Earle Hayley was an interesting and enjoyable character who I would have liked to have seen more of. Robocops Wife and Son have a larger role in this film though other than looking good Abbie Cornish did little other than blubber her way from scene to scene. Although there was ample time to allow everyone an opportunity to shine non of the characters really stood out as memorable. 

There were a handful of propagand broadcasts sprinkled throughout hosted by pro robot supporter Sam Jackson. These fell a bit flat for me as they were to similar to actual news broadcasts that can be seen on Fox News US though not as extreme. 

The tone of the film throughout is very serious and pleased with itself for having digs at US foreign policy near the start a couple of stolen lines from the previous Robo film, a dig at Transformers and other various bits of head nodding to the previous film. 

As I stated at the start Robocop 2014 is okay though lacks anything that stands out as new or memorable best just to wait for it to be on Netflix.

If you do have Netflix just watch actual RoboCop as it is miles better than RoboCop 14. The characters are better, the hero is more tragic, the action is far more memorable, there is a very genuine sense of danger for our heroes as the villains are totaly mental, the film is witty, smart and just plain entertaining! There is also an actual point to the existence of RoboCop in this version. Detriot is totally going to help it seems like a genuinely scary place to live and the police clearly cant cope. So they produce RoboCop to try to clean up the streets. In comparison the new film seems to just want to make him for the sake of making him. As theres no sense that crime is out of control or particularly a problem in this films future detroit.

So go watch actual RoboCop!!!

News and Wolf of Wall Street review.

I'm currently working on a bunch of different projects two of which are drawing to a close. The first is an advert for Blades Animation, this has been ongoing since the summer. All the animation sections are now complete and 90% of the live action has been shot? I have began editing the explainer video which currently runs at approximately 1 minute 15 though I'm aiming to have it down to under a minute. The main work left to do is the compositing which I'm starting work on tomorrow so will hopefully have it finished early next week. 

The second project I'm working on is a short film that I'm hoping will come in at under 2 minutes. The puppet was completed today and the set is nearly complete just some touching up on the paint work to do. Photos will be uploaded shortly. The actual animation won't start till some time in February. 

I finally got to see the Wolf of Wall Street this week and it's amazing the best film I have seen in ages. The film sees Leonardo DiCaprio playing Jordan Belfort who starts out trying to make a career on Wall Street as a stockbroker. After a short stint at his first firm he is left unemployed as the business fails. Jordan finds a job selling penny stocks and works his way to starting his own firm.

I was worried that I had hyped it up to much for myself and would be left underwhelmed. Not so the film is fast, frenetic with a great energy that doesn't let up until the final act, when like all great party's over indulgence catches up with the films characters as they deal with the consequences of their actions. There are so many great scenes that are at times hilarious, I had a huge smile on my face from start to finish. I though the film looked fun from the trailer but it was much funnier than I anticipated, I can't recommend this movie enough, go see it!!!

12 years a slave.

Just got back from watching 12 years a slave it's really good but very heavy going. It follows Solomon played by Chiwetel Ejiofor who is kidnaped and sold into slavery.

The film is divided into different sections as Solomon travels from owner to owner, the pace is slow although a huge amount of time is covered in approximately 2 hours. The film doesn't concern itself with dates or amounts of time during Solomon's ordeal. 

The biggest reason to see this film is for Chiwetels performance, he's amazing throughout. A mention needs to go to Lupita Nyong'o who plays Patsey another long suffering captive, who is equally good. The performances by all the cast are great showing the remorseless brutality, suffering and emotion the people endured. 

The events focus on Solomon's journey rather than getting heavily caught up with his relation ships or the politics of his situation. This allows you to see how awful the conditions the prisoners were kept in and how they had to suffer. Leading you to see the choices Solomon is faced with if he is to survive. The conversation with his fellow prisoners on the boat is a good example of this both offering different choices but both leaving little hope.

Visually the film is fantastic, the story is punctuated by beautiful shots of scenery and filled with colour. There are some lovely lingering shots allowing you to absorb the moment rather than cutting off to see what's next. 

A film that should definitely be watched as a great film and to experience, to see the horrors of slavery.

American Hustle

Going in to watching American Hustle I knew very little about the film. I hadn't seen the trailer, though I had seen the poster so I knew that I fancied Jennifer Laurence and Amy Adams and this looked like a film that had been produced to win some awards.

Upon arrival at the cinema I had still not received my Orange Wednesday code which was disappointing, my back up was to use my Odeon card as I thought I had accumulated enough points for a free visit, WRONG :( I was 30 points short due to the price increase. The Birmingham Odeon now costs a disgusting £7.95.

The trailers prior to the film starting were all acting films, heavy on emotion and looks to the camera for an Oscar.

American Hustle see's Christian Bale and Amy Adams play a pair of Con Artists who get caught out by Bradley Coopers FBI agent. Who then forces them to perform a bigger con in an attempt to catch out crooked politicians and Mobsters.

The film is slow to get going and I found myself drifting off a couple of times at the start. Once it did pick up I quite enjoyed the movie. The story is fairly simple and the con is straight forward and easy to follow. The story aside this is a film to check out for the characters and performances. The five main characters are all great to watch, I would have liked to have seen more of Jennifer Laurence as Bales bonkers wife. I liked all the hair styles particularly Bales hair construction scene and Coopers curlers. 

There was a distinct lack of violence resulting in no sense of danger for the characters, at no point did it feel like there was any risk for anyone on screen. Although I really enjoyed watching the characters and the performances I didn't really care about any of them leaving me cold to the films conclusion. Criticisms aside check out this film it's entertaining, with come good humour, although nothing amazing.

New year

During the Christmas period I've seen numerous top film lists being posted on Facebook, Twitter etc and have been asked what my favourites of the last year have been. Unfortunately I've struggled to give very comprehensive lists. Although I've been to the cinema loads over the last year roughly once a week I've forgotten most of them.

In the hopes of remedying this I am going to attempt to review each film I watch at the cinema, so I have a record of the films I've seen and to try to post blogs more regurly. I am also hoping to improve my ability to analyze and to articulate my thoughts on films more clearly. 

I think part of the reason I've struggled to be able to concisely list good and bad film from the last year is in part due to the shear number of similar films that have been released over the last year. I definitely felt like my interest was flagging due to the number of films that were filled with green screen animation. From talking too others they seemed less bothered by this than me. So maybe this is down to my interest in animation so am more aware of it. I mostly enjoy entertainment films but the number of movies I saw with explosions, robots, monsters, spaceships etc just became a bit of a blur. 

I'm tired of watching films where a couple of actors are stood in front of a green screen waving sticks at air only for the locations and extras to be put in later. This Christmas I saw the Hobbit and 47 Ronin. Although the Hobbit is the better film it could definitely learn something from 47 Ronin. Although the green screens of New Zealand are very beautiful it makes a big difference when the sets and locations are real. 47 Ronin did use CG but it also had a lots of fantastic practical sets and the colours were great. Unfortunately the fights were a total mess lots of close ups, poor lighting, choppy editing it would have been great if the camera had pulled back and just enjoyed the movement of the choreography. There were lots of other problems but the point I'm trying I make is the Hobbit coming at the end of a year of loads of "digital stuff" just being thrown unrelentingly at the screen was just to much.

At the moment the films I'm looking forward to the most are the Wolf of Wallstreet and Her. I'm sure I will see lots of Blockbusters again this year but will be approaching with caution. So hopefully this time next year I will have a big list of good and bad films I've seen and a blog with regular updates.

Birmingham Screen Image Network and Networking

This is actually a big answer I gave to some questions regarding the Birmingham Screen Image Network that I attend once a month at Millennium Point. It took me a while to write it but hopefully it will be useful and interesting.

Here are the questions-

What makes a good network?

Why do you go?

And what do you want from a network?

And here is my Answer-

I've attended all sorts of different networking sessions for both creatives and business people, in lots of different venues. I enjoy the BSIN sessions as they are regular, the venue is good and it is easy to find out who is there, what they do and then I can decide who I want to talk to. Rather than the scatter gun approach which occasionally happens at larger sessions.

I think the venue is very important, the worst venues for myself have been bars and pubs. I find the main problem with these is they are to noisy due to loud music and are often being shared with members of the public making them unnecessarily crowded. I found that people end up getting hammered and it just seems pointless talking to some of them as they're totally incoherent.

A venue should have features that provide opportunities for conversation. A drinks station is always good. If I run out of people to talk to and cant see any open groups then I normally get a glass of water and engage the next person to come over to the drinks table. When food is provided finger food works best especially with tall tables that you have to stand at. As you can remain mobile and easily start up a conversation with a new group/table. I think it would be good to put spikes on the walls as it can be to easy for attendees to hide at the side and this would force them into the middle of the room.

Recently I've been attending sessions that have art, interactives, prototypes, puzzles and other assorted conversation props that are great for facilitating networking.

Another style of networking I've enjoyed is speed networking. You all sit in two rows facing one another and have about 60 seconds each to talk, swap cards and move on when the whistle blows. When the speed networking has finished everyone carries on with regular networking but now you know who everyone is and can carry on promising conversations.

Finally the most important thing for me is the people. I preferably want a good mix of creatives, animators, film makers, artists, sound people, writers, photographers, actors etc and preferably some business people, different entrepreneurs who are interested in the skills on offer by the creatives. Most importantly the attendees have to have a good attitude ie polite, friendly and be prepared to try to make conversation.

I go to BSIN each month for a variety of reasons. I enjoy the structure, each person introduces themselves, who they are, then news is shared and interesting debates normally arise. Although the attendances are low there is normally a couple of new faces each month. I have made some useful contacts, I get to hear of news, events and different opportunities coming up.

I think it would be good bring the Screen and Music networks into the same room for the last 20mins to further share news, info, leads etc

When paired with the free dinner and creative networks events after its a really enjoyable and useful way to spend an afternoon.

I also go to support the network and hopefully support the creative scene in Birmingham by attending. Attendances are low which is disappointing, although I wouldn't want the groups to have massive, if it could get up to 15/20 each week that would be great. The only way the group will grow is by people continuing to attend, talking and promoting the meet ups.

Hi

Yesterday I finally finished and uploaded the an animated logo for Blades Animation to stick in front of our films. I intended to finish it much sooner but its been so hot in the studio over the summer that the shoot repeatedly got delayed. Check it out below!

I have already began working on our next project a short explainer video to show off the benefits of using animation and the services we offer.

Richard :)

Update

Hi

This is quick update on what I've been up to.

Most recently I've been updating the Blades Animation showreel, the ancient Cwmbran animation has been added and there is a new piece of animation at both the start and end of the showreel using the Blades Animation Mascot (who is still nameless so if you have any suggestions please leave it in the comments). Please check it out below.

This afternoon I began work on a new armature that I aim to be animating with during July. The puppet is the main character for the multi platform series we have been developing for the last few years. The actual series is still a long way off from being ready but I am keen to experiment with some ideas for the character. I figure it will be a good way to try out some new armature ideas and begin establishing the character and world he inhabits.

Here is something I have been consistently going to since the start of the year its really good. The Birmingham Screen image network is on the last thursday of each month and is normally followed by creative networks all at Millennium point. The first half is a networking event for film makers and sound people. Then there is a free diner and it finishes with some kind of talk of visiting speaker. During the summer months it is just going to be the networking but it is still a must attend for any one out there interested in a career in film or animation.

Here are some things to check out. Number one is this cool scifi/philosophy blog cleverly titled Sci-Phi I've been reading by the talented writer Sarah Brown who you can follow on twitter

Number two is the new project by John-Lynton Bryan the creator of The Collector, a short I animated on a couple of years ago. It is a comic/film called Dream Staite heres the link http://www.dreamstaite-movie.com/.

Thats it for now!

Rich

Lots happening!

Its been a hectic start to the year with lots of news and things going on. First of all the biggest news to report is Blades Animation is relocating. We are currently based in the George Street Chambers in Birmingham. Today I picked up the keys to the new studio located in The Big Peg, I have started moving and hope to be fully moved in by the end of next week. 

The decision to move was made early in January due to a number of issues but the largest being the floor. The current studio has a wooden floor and some of the panels aren't as sturdy as needed. This was causing problems with camera movement while animating, obviously not good. This meant the majority of January was taken up with searching Birmingham for a new studio location. I have looked at numerous places around Birmingham. Here is a list of the places I looked at.

The Custard Factory

The Bond

Venture Way

Faraday Wharf

The Argent Centre

Gun Quarter workshops

It was really difficult to find studios that were appropriate. A lot of time was spent walking around Birmingham looking for different letting agencies or online searching. There's a mountain of office space to let in Birmingham but not so much geared towards creatives. All of the above would be ideal for creatives to varying degrees. In a future blog I will write about each of these locations in greater detail for others who may be looking for their own studio space. 

In between searching for a new home we have focused a lot on networking and making connections with other businesses and film makers around the Midlands. One big problem for Birmingham is theres a huge amount of talented animators and film makers but the scene is very disconnected. There are different  groups but none of them have links to one another and getting to know other film makers has proved to be a slow experience. By different groups I mean things like the Meet up events, animation forum WM, Creative England, Shooters Club etc. The amount of people at the events varies greatly and people aren't always aware of the existence of other groups or film makers etc. Its only through my recent use of Event Bright that I've found lots of new events to attend and have been chatting to others who have told me about some of these groups. They are not all in one easy to find location. ANNOYING!! I would highly recommend the event bright phone app, its really good!

In an effort to keep myself being creative I have hooked up with a number of different writers to initiate some new projects. These are specifically short ideas for the internet. There's no specific deadline but we hope to have something to show later on in the year.

Finally I've been out and about photoing things in an effort to improve my camera and composition skills. So please check out some photos I took from a ceramics workshop located in Sutton College and let me know what you think.

Memorabilia Day two

So here it is the second day report from my recent trip to the LG arena for Birmingham's Memorabilia event.

When booking the tickets I had insisted that we go for both days, though on the second morning I was feeling concerned that there would be nothing to do and we would have wasted our money. Fortunately the second day was even better than the first. 

The Hall was far less busy on Sunday which was nice as it allowed us to look at the stalls with greater ease although there was less atmosphere. We started the day by doing a lap around the arena to see if there was anything we missed the previous day. 

On both days there were lots of people dressed in Sci-fi, cult and movie costumes. The good thing about it being quieter on the Sunday was it allowed more time and room to get photos with the people in costume. I had my photo with some clone troopers and Alan had a photo with Darth Vader.

We decided to fill our day up we would check out the talks on the main stage. The speakers who appealed the most were Michael Biehn, the Starwars crew, David Hasselhoff and Craig Charles. Each speaker was allotted 20 minutes and the format was largely the same for each. The host would introduce them, ask questions and encourage the audience to ask questions. 

The Michael Biehn talk was interesting although he didn't seem to thrilled to be there. He spoke about starting a film production company and how much easier and cheaper it is to now make a film. 

The Starwars crew consisted of Boba Fett, Greedo, the rebel pilot with the black moustache from a New Hope and the Storm Trooper who said the line “these are not the droids we’re looking for”. I was reluctant to see these guys as I didn't think it would be very interesting. As it turned out they were great. Lots of funny stories, very charismatic and entertaining. 

Next up was David Hasselhoff, who was another talker who I wasn't that fussed about seeing. I know that the "Hoff" has a large cult following but even just the nick name puts me off. I was never particularly a fan of either Knight Rider or Baywatch, I only liked Yasmine Bleeth who while a teen consistently made my various celebrity top 10s! We went to see him as there was space and we wanted to see Craig Charles who was on after. David Hasselhoff was meant to start a 1PM though was running late, it turned out he was running about 30 minutes late. The host stalled by dishing out lots of freebies which ranged from tat to some DVD's, I didn't get anything. 

So the Hoff finally turned up at about 2 to a packed audience took the microphone off the host and began talking and didn't stop till about 2.40. The host struggled to get him to wrap up and kept trying to bring the Q&A to an end. The Hoff was fantastic very charismatic, full of energy and just really funny. He was very honest about himself, his career and seemed keen to recapture the glory days of Knight Rider. I still wouldn't pay £25 to shake his hand and to write his name on some of my property but  I would definitely like to attend a similar event with the Hoff.

The last speaker was Craig Charles of Red Dwarf and Coronation Street who was another highlight. He was consistently funny and had allsorts of fun tales about Red Dwarf and Robot Wars. He explained that Robot Wars was cancelled due to the robots becoming to big and powerful which obviously created lots of health and safety problems. It was a shame he didn't have longer to talk as it was all really interesting.  

We finished off the day by checking out the last Robot Wars which was again really entertaining. Then had a final walk around of the stalls. I purchased some comics, clothes and a mug. The next Memorabilia is some time in March and then the big London Comic Con is in May I'm planning on attending both of those after having such a good time at this event. Advice to anyone planning on going to any of these events in future, take a packed lunch as mostly on Saturday there were long queues for food and the prices were vastly over inflated!

Memorabilia Fair Day One!

Memorabilia 2012 Day One

I attended the most recent Memorabilia fair at the LG arena in Birmingham on the 24th and 25th November. It has been years since I've attended an event like this so was looking forward to it. I don't buy comics or toys any more though I still enjoy that culture and the atmosphere. 

I attended with my two friends Pokemon Master Alan Kwan and the film maker Malcolm Kennedy. We had early entry tickets for both days. On the first day Malcolm and I arrived at 9 to be greeted by a disorganised mess of a queue, the attendants sent us form one side of the queue and back again. Once finally in we had a wonder around until Alan joined us (he was travelling from a different location to us). 

Upon entry we were given a free 50th anniversary issue of Spiderman and a program, posters were on offer but we didn't want to carry these around. The stalls were selling a wide variety of merchandise and collectables. It was cool to see a mix of toy dealers and smaller start up businesses selling custom made merchandise rather than the over priced “collectables” as a lot of stands were selling. I appreciate old toys that are mint in box are expensive as they are hard to come by but I find it ridiculous that a Batman figure fresh off the production line can have such a high price tag. 

The smaller custom stands were selling limited edition designed posters, t-shirts, mugs, clothing, console cases etc. It was awesome to see these stands as all of them were being manned by the designers and makers of their products. We got chatting to some of the owners of these stands and its far more satisfying knowing that you are giving the money directly to the products designers. 

One of the stands I bought an ace super hero mug off was Head shot clothing. The lads on the stand were super friendly and had loads of great stuff definitely worth checking out.

In the middle of the arena were all the celebrities asking for £15 to £25 for 30 seconds of their time. They ranged from actors from Starwars, Only Falls and Horses, Michael Biehn and David Hassellhoff to name a few. There were even some glamor models who just about managed to cover their nipples (well done them). 

Dalek made by Robots live and a house robot

As we worked our way to the other side of the arena we found the Robots Live ring. As far as I could tell this was the same as Robot Wars from TV, I assume they had to change the name for licence reasons. We watched one of these events. I was never to fussed about Robot Wars when it was on TV but seeing it live is totally different. Its really good! The first robots out were the smaller light weight Robots that were mostly wedges with flippers on. These were really fast and chucked one another all over the ring. Next there were boxing robots and they did a segment I think was aimed at kids. Then the final part was the heavy weight Robots and were again predominately wedges but these were even more satisfying to see fight. They're all much bigger than I imagined, it was really exciting seeing such powerful robots smash one another up. 

Around midday the arena began to fill up and it became very crowded so we decided to get lunch. Malcolm had brought sandwiches with him so me and Alan began to look for somewhere to eat. There was a Subway straight outside the arena but it had huge queues. We settled on the Weatherspoons but it had a special LG menu that was very expensive, we were going to buy some paninis but they had sold out, it turned out anything under £10 had sold out. So we had sweets and fizzy drinks for lunch. 

In the afternoon we continued looking around the stalls and made a few purchases. I bought some canvas prints, DVDs, postcards, a Megaman keyring and a Pokemon league cap. The event finished for the day at 5PM then we headed home. In a couple of days I’ll post my report on Day Two.

Batman preparing for a poo!

Quick update

Been quite busy this week just got back off holiday, I camped and walked Hadrians wall. It was a good holiday but has left me feeling like I now need a holiday, very tiring.

As a result todays blog is going to be brief and an update of what Im upto. Today Im going to go to Calumet Photographic in Birmingham to buy some new studio lighting which is very exciting. Other new purchases are just before I went on holiday I purchased some new sound recording equiptment. A new condenser microphone, mic stand and pre amp. These were all bought from Fair Deal Music in Birmingham the staff there were very helpful.

I am just putting the finishing touches to a small set to do some new animation with the Blades Animation Mascot. Im going to be producing a couple of short pieces to add to the showreel. These should be ready by the end of the of the month so look out for those.

Well thats it for now.

Rich

Organisation the key to success!

So this new blog is all about Organisation and how its really important! I've even taken lots of photos to demonstrate how I keep myself organised. I've always been into having a diary to keep track of what I'm up to and like to make lists of things to do. Over the years I've expanded and altered how I organise myself. In this blog I'm going to cover how I organise myself, projects, the studio and my work.

I try to always carry my diary with me for a mix of reasons. For keeping notes, collecting numbers reminders and planning my time. Obviously I have a mobile which I know can do all these things. I prefer using a diary as I can see all the days neatly laid out with my notes on, it is also a bit more significant writing something down I'm more likely to remember if I write it down rather than just putting a note on my phone.

Although a diary is very handy my most useful tool is my year long planner. This is great as I can see the whole up coming year and plan my time out well in advance. It helps to keep me motivated as well as I can clearly see whats coming up and get excited about what I'm going to be doing. I use a August to August rather than start till the end of the year chart. This is mostly as I decided to start using a year planner during the summer last year so this was better value for money than a planner I could only use for a few months. I use the coloured dots to mark specific times holidays, days off etc. I write directly on to the planner for things that are going to last for a couple of days i.e. animating. Then if theres a couple of jobs to do I write the notes on a post-it note and attach it to the appropriate day. Before the wall chart I would plan out animation projects in Numbers but have found this to be far more versatile and simply easier to look at.

Next up we have all my to do lists. These relate directly to my wall chart and help me plan the chart and what I do on my days. Each sheet attached to the note board is its own category theres business, marketing, creative, learning and S&S (the series I'm developing). I then list all the things I have to do under the appropriate title. Business covers business things like updating my business plan or sorting receipts. Marketing covers mostly social media reminders, updating the marketing strategy, taking photos of what I'm up to blog ideas etc. Creative days are days set aside for making, animating, painting etc. Then I have learning days for learning different software or maybe reading a book. Im currently learning, Game Stencyl, Motion, Word-press and improving my Final Cut skills. The idea is I can just note down that I want to have a day set aside for one of these lists then pick and choose what I want to do off them. Finally have a priority list of things to do that are particularly pressing and often take priority. As tasks are completed I simply cross them out. 

Just below my notice board on my desk I have this cool desk mat. It has a clear cover on that lifts up to allow me to store all sorts of stuff under. As can been seen on the left I dump all my receipts for organising at the end of the month. Then on the right I've got bills and letters that I need to keep a track of. As well as being a handy place to stick notes it creates a very comfy surface to lean on. 

I have a filing cabinet this is pretty self explanatory so I wont elaborate.

   

                        

Next Im going to cover how I organise projects. Each time I start a new project I have a new sketch book to work in, to make notes, drawings, ideas etc to keep it all together. I label each sketchbook to so its easy to find. These cool label stickers were from WHSmiths and look way better than boring plain white labels.

                        

As well as having a new sketch book for each project I have a storage box to put everything into. This can be a hard copy of a production bible, original story board, sketchbook, receipts, invoices, letters etc. Again this keeps everything together, the same goes for on the computer. I have a designated folder for each project, then back it up on an external hard drive. 

I believe organisation really is very important, from planning out a project, being able to find things and just keeping everything tidy. 

Animation Journey

Hello I've decided that this post will continue the new start to this blog and give some more background about how I was led to a career in animation. I'll cover some of my influences and things that inspired me along the way.

Growing up I was interested in cartoons, sci fi and fantasy. My favourites were cartoons like Transformers, Thundercats and pretty much any other violent action cartoon. Even now I remember seeing both Transformers on Wackaday and Thundercats which Im sure debuted on a Sunday night which is a bit weird. As a child I wanted to be either a barbarian or Optimus Prime briefly after watching Top Gun I wanted to be a Jet. Both the title sequences for these series were so cool, exciting, iconic music and slick animation. Having watched the shows more recently these are the only parts that are any good. If you still think either of these cartoons are very good your mistaken.

As with all cartoons they had all sorts of tie-ins films, toys, cloths, comics etc. I sporadically bought comics of all sorts of stuff Spiderman, Transformers, Zoids (which I recently re-read and its a great read) Thundercats etc I settled on collecting Thundercats Comics which I have most of a run of the first 100. The Zoids comics features excellent art and even early work by the awesome Grant Morrison

check this out its really good apart from the abrupt end

I settled on Comics as my passion and my goal became to be a comic book artist. In the UK during the 80s Marvel UK produced loads of original comics so I could see a direct route to the career. For me Cartoons and Animation was unachievable. I felt quite detached from the production method as it was behind a screen and out of reach, I had no means to reproduce what I saw on TV. Comics I could hold read, draw and create myself.

My big problem with toys was that you never had all the figures, I used to cut out the characters I hadn't got and stick them to card with bases to expand my ranks of Transformers. 2D cardboard Transformers were quite limiting as they were flat and didn't Transform. When I decided that didn't work I began making Transformers out of Plasticine. This worked far better to the point that I just played with Plasticine Transformers instead of the toys. As well as having a complete collection of Transformers I had all the Marvel Heroes and all the Turtles (and blue peter inspired sewerbase) all made from plasticine.

At school I took Art as an option. Then progressed to College continuing with Art though expanding to study Graphics, Jewellery, Printmaking, Ceramics and Media. I never really enjoyed Media as we had to use Macs which I couldn't get my head round plus I just didn't like using computers. For one of the projects we had to book out a digital camera and take photos of letters. I had left it so late that the cameras were all booked out. As I still had to do the work I bought a cheap digital camera with some Argos vouchers I had won from my job at Mcdoanlds. The Camera did the job and it had an animation feature. Rather than exporting the images as individual photos its was possible to export them as a short quicktime. Then you could add effects in paint. This was my first attempt at Animation. Unfortunately I no longer have any of my early attempts at animation though they were probably amazing works of art. The project I bought the camera for also turned out to be my first film project.

The project was a creative presentation of collected and made images of the alphabet. Rather than just handing in a pile of images I filmed all the images. I held a toy rocket on a string and made it fly past the alphabet for a simple narrative (it was very crude). At this stage it still hadn't occurred to me I could be studying film or animation. I imagine based on my work up to now it was probably looked best for me to avoid this route.

While looking for Universities I was planning to continue with Art and do a fine Art course. It wasn't until looking at a prospectus on the journey home from Wolverhampton I even realised you could study animation at University. I changed courses at the last minuet and did Visual Communication at UCE (now BCU). On this course I studied both live action and animation. I had a go at drawn which i found to be soooo painfully boring that I only produced a handful of drawn animations. I think I still have them on a mini DV somewhere, if I ever find them I may put them online for people to laugh at.

I switched to stopmotion as this is the best one and most fun to do. People often say you have to be patient and it takes ages but I find it pretty instantly rewarding. Within a couple of frames you can have a puppet come to life thanks to your work, I find it very quickly gratifying. Then the more you add the cooler it becomes. This is why I dont enjoy creating drawn animation, you have to sit and draw the same thing over and over and its not until you scan or film it that you can properly appreciate what you have done. I have a lot of respect and time for drawn animators and their great work. The other cool thing about stopmotion is your basically playing with toys and plasticine. Its not quite as fast as just playing but you no longer have to imagine your toys coming to life you are actually bringing them to life.

Okay thats the end for now. I'd like to spend more time in the future writing about specific animations and films that I either think are great and worth checking out or things that have really been an influence on me. I think this covers how I got into animation though.

Intro to the All New Blades Animation Blog

Hello so Ive been reading friend of Blades Animation the talented live action director Malcolm Kennedys recently started blog. Below is Malcolm's logo please click on the link to be taken to his website. (don't do it yet till you've read this blog though)

www.malcolmkennedy.co.uk

Malcolm's first entry is an introduction to who he is and what he's about. I thought "umm did I do this?", No I did not. I had a look over my old post to double check as I couldn't really remember but No definitely didn't. So what follows is finally an introduction and welcome to the Blades Animation Blog.

I am actively trying to be more proactive with Blogging, tweeting and facebooking so this entry is all part of this new marketing blitz. Im aiming to blog about once every other week, tweet about once a day and put something on facebook once a week.

When I first started this blog it was just going to be updates of what I was doing, which I guess it had been. I decided that this was in-fact boring so out the window with that and from now on its the all New Blades Animation Blog. I based its boringness on the repetitive titles of the blogs they are all just variants of the word update. My favourite blog post is the networking one, I re-read it the other day and I just thought "THIS IS BLOG GOLD!" Anyway so this made me think from now I'm going to try to put in more useful blogs that are hopefully more interesting. I've got lots of draft blogs I've been compiling for a couple of months now, most of them are just titles with a few notes. I've even got the blogger app so am totally committed to getting these posts done and online.

Right so things Im going to cover going forward are still some updates of projects and what Im up to but less of these. The next puppet I make I intend to document the full process and stick it up on here as a sort of puppet making tutorial. Im planning a day trip to london to buy some studio lights which is going up on here. At the end of September Im going to be walking Hadrian's Wall as research for a project I'm working on which will probably be a mix of smaller posts. I've got lots of creative businesses posts I want to put up, this covers, my work process, marketing advice, scheduling, pricing, how to keep costs low, book reviews, all sorts of stuff and some fun blogs like favourite films etc. If readers have requests then please message me and I can probably do requested blogs or answer questions as well, cos Im nice.

So I think that works as a indication of what this Blog is about from now on. I want to avoid doing any really long blogs and keep them nice and digestible, so I shall stop now. I will try to follow this post up with some history on how I began on my journey into animation, where I started, the routes I took and so on.

Thanks for reading, please like the facebook page to stay up to date on whats going on.

Rich

Inspiring Websites/people/programs

I am well aware I have again failed to keep the blog updated and I haven't produced videos of the studio as I think I said I would last time. Iv'e decided not to make videos incase you see all my cool stuff and come and rob me!

Today I am going to talk about website that I find inspiring that I recomend you check out. I find them inspiring for a number of reasons the people who make them and their content. The following is a list and descriptions so please read on.

Angry Video Game Nerd/James Rolf
I cam across the angry video game nerd while at Uni trying to avoid doing some work. The AVGN is a  web series staring and made by the film maker James Rolf. Theres over a hundred AVGN episodes, he has also worked on other web series and produced his own short films. So if you are trying to procrastinate and want something funny check this out.
James Rolf seems like a cool guy and seeing his work is really motivating. He made a joke game review and uploaded it to youtube and the AVGN took off from there. He's currently working on a feature film of the character. I really like the do it you self culture and use of the internet to self publish work and to find an audience. This is what I am working towards making my own films for the internet.

Nostalgia Critic/Doug Walker
While watching the AVGN nostalgia critic kept coming up on the side on youtube and eventually I checked him out as well. The first episode I watched was his review of He-Man and She-Ra christmas special which is so funny definitely worth a look. I again find him inspiring for similar reasons to AVGN as it is a DIY show that he makes a living off. As well as the Nostalgia Critic he does lots of other shows the other most famous is the 5 second movies.

The Guild/Felicia Day
The Guild was a business model I was advised to look after i had finished pitching my project on the Transform@lab last year. I had watched a couple of episodes before but never really got to fussed about it. When I finally sat down and watched it from the beginning I then proceeded to binge watch all 5 seasons. This series is a comedy and follows a group of gamers who play a warcraft clone called the game. The series is created by Felicia Day who is an actress that wanted to expand the parts she played so created the guild. It was originally meant to be a television series but her producer suggested turning it in to a web series. The first episode were self funded until they ran out of money. They then added a pay pal button for donations and managed to fund the rest of the series. Microsoft came in and said they would begin to sponsor the series and the guild has continue since. It is now transferring to the youtube channel Geek and sundry. Felicia Days channel that also hosts lots of other cool programs.

Zero Punctuation
This is a web series I have only recently discovered. A new episode comes out each week and and they are comedy reviews of computer games. The reviews take the format of a high speed commentary with minimalist animation. I don't really find this so much as inspiring more just really funny and great when Im having a quick break from doing some work.

Zak Ryder
Zak Ryder is a professional wrestler with WWE and from that it may sound like he has already made it in his career choice. He was actually a failing wrestler who no one liked and was barely on television. He started producing a you tube show Long Island Iced Z to try to make a connection with the fans and save his career. As it turned out it worked audiences in attendance at show started chanting his name and demanding he come out. Eventually he started being featured on the TV shows, has a DVD and tons of merchandise. He still does his show though it is now featured on WWE's youtube channel. The episode are mostly comedy based and padded out with lots of catch-phrases but its a great example of some one picking up a camera and using the internet to find an audience. Since Zak Ryder has been so successful the WWE has heavily embraced social media and now you can barely see the wrestling as there are so many images of social media logos on the screen.

Well thats all I can be bothered to do at the moment i might do something like this again in the future. I've some cool stuff Im going to be working on in the coming months for now you will just have to wait probably for another 6 month before I update the blog again.

Rich