Posts Tagged ‘Bent Image Lab’
They Might be Giants, “I’m Impressed” by Bent Image Lab
DIRECTOR Rob Shaw
ANIMATION STUDIO Bent Image Lab bentimagelab.com
MUSIC BY They Might Be GiantsFor this music video, Rob Shaw took his robot minions quite seriously. In an early section of the video you’ll notice soldier robots popping out of paper sheets and folding themselves into three dimensional shapes. This was actually how each robot was made. Rob Shaw created a design with which he could print out paper cut outs of each robot, which would then be folded into the characters.
Known for his character animation, Shaw used an all paper set and cast of characters in a combination of techniques to create this robot-ruled Rome. You’ll notice that many shots were created using 2D techniques, while others utilized 3D paper puppets.
Rob Shaw’s music video for the They Might Be Giants song, “I’m Impressed” won a gold plaque at the Chicago International Film Festival.
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The Machine by Bent Image Lab
An amazingly creative piece of very thought provoking animation.
DIRECTOR Rob Shaw
ANIMATION STUDIO Bent Image Lab“The Machine” is an animated fable following the path of an innocently forged mechanical creature. As his independence and knowledge of the world grows on his journey, as does his desire to conquer all that we encounters, from the pastures of a farmer to the realm of man’s entire world.
The story is in itself a mechanized apparition, the characters and scenery exisiting inside of an early 20th century nickel arcade and being driven forward by the gears of this machine.
The main character, the innocently created, human like mechanism whose power knows no bounds, thinks of himself as invincible, that no man or spirit could ever overpower him. Yet, the irony is that he himself is only a small part of a greater device, and in this case, a mechanized stage for passers by to waste a nickel in.
This film was shot over many hours at Bent Image Lab over the course of several months in 2008-2009. Animated using stop-motion puppets and sets, then composited together in After Effects, the film has a mixed media presence to it that is accentuated by the machine’s own collage like form.
CREDITS:
Film by Rob ShawNarrator
Andrea SchuchVoice recorded by
Angela PoschetAnimators
Rob Shaw
Sarah HulinSound Design
Brian KinkleyMusic
SirrobrobColor Correction
Orland NuttAdditional effects
Fred Ruff
Whale Song for Modest Mouse by Bent Image Lab
View Production Stills on Flickr:
flickr.com/photos/bentimagelab/sets/72157622256680339/
flickr.com/photos/bentimagelab/sets/72157619746721753/-
The indie rock band Modest Mouse is getting the royal treatment from Bent Image Lab’s new director/partner Nando Costa. Just completed, the band’s new music video is a dark and expressive piece of film-making. Heavily rooted in live-action, the impressive six-minute video includes intense moments of stop motion, visual effects, and motion graphics techniques, all brought to life within the studio’s walls.
The visuals follow an artist who enters his personal sanctuary where he is presented with a hand-crafted drawing tool that assists him in materializing his mental impressions. Through drawing circular patterns, the machine discharges an endless web of yarn that guides him through his visual representations of his memories. The story progresses to reveal that he is divided between two worlds, one of dull reality and the second of warped memories. In the process of finding a way out of his consciousness, he is trapped between the two competing spaces, which eventually inflict lethal damage, acting as metaphors to self-destruction.
This lyrical and moving piece was conceived by Nando Costa working closely with lead singer/guitarist Isaac Brock to polish some of the film’s intricacies. Featuring a seamless combination of live-action and stop motion that alternates between stage shots of Modest Mouse and a spiraling dream-like world of ever-shifting landscapes, Whale Song is a stunning representation of the combined capabilities of Nando and Bent. The variety and execution of the VFX portions of the video – from yarn reeling into complex patterns to a guitar that plays with no musician attached – strongly evoke the confused and surreal patterns of one’s warped memories. Additional creative touches such as animated and intricate photographic collages and giant CG snails sliding across the band’s stage – add variety and depth to the surreal world.
“This new video is the perfect showcase for the benefits of the collaboration between myself and Bent,” noted Costa. “I typically wouldn’t have created a film with this much live-action or stop motion, and Bent also wouldn’t normally approach a project with such a strong motion graphics influence, which is what I have long specialized in. With such well integrated in-house teams, I can’t imagine that there’s a project out there that we couldn’t pull off.”
One of the challenges in Whale Song was to recreate the contours of an ever changing, disorienting and intriguing series of landscapes. Costa shot the majority of the piece with Bent’s RED One cameras, which came in handy for their 4K capabilities when adding camera movement in post. In order to create the feeling that lead singer/guitarist Isaac Brock was being split up between two competing scenarios of pure reality and his imagination, for example, Costa mounted two of the RED cameras side by side on a custom plate, each with identical lenses set at an angle to simulate a stereoscopic effect.
In another instance, band members that appeared to be standing on the ground were actually hoisted aloft and secured to a fake ground plane, which meant that the stage floor was perpendicular to the ground. This situation intentionally restrained their flexibility and shifted the gravity, adding oddness to their movements.
Costa used a variety of frame rates, ranging from time-lapses at 6 frames per second, to 1000 fps shots from a Phantom camera to give the feeling of variety of speed in the character’s memories. Blue screen stages were used extensively to place Isaac against the varying landscapes of mountains, dense forest valleys, and deserts. Bent’s CG department was also responsible for creating significant portions of the video’s landscapes and scenic elements.
During production, Nando and his team relied solely on a very detailed script containing technical and creative notes, live-action and animation guidelines, with specifications for composting and stop motion, which were all previously defined and polished by the director. “From what I’ve learned, producing a project at Bent is a wonderfully self-contained experience,” noted Costa. “From building intricate props to figuring out complex CG shots, Bent has specialists in all fields. I’ll walk over to the stage for live-action, then back to compositing, load the footage and work from there. It makes the whole process immeasurably easier, and creatively freeing.”
“Seeing this video makes me feel good about what we’ve done here at Bent”, stated Bent EP Ray Di Carlo”. We set out to establish a creative clubhouse atmosphere where talented people like Nando could come to work. I’ve always admired directors who can hold a project’s final vision in their minds eye and are able to let the talents around them do their respective jobs for a projects whose creative whole becomes more than the sum of it’s parts, and that defines Nando. Seeing Nando come in, suddenly doing things that he wasn’t used to doing, and still delivering at a high creative and technical level, means that David, Chel and I were able to create a place where everyone learns others’ disciplines. That’s rare. It’s what we set out to do – what we originally wanted — but when you see it work, it’s amazing.”
Concept:
After entering his personal sanctuary, an artist is presented with a hand-crafted drawing tool that assists him in materializing his mental impressions. The machine discharges his thoughts as an endless web of yarn that guides him through his physical thoughts. The story progresses to reveal that he is divided between two worlds, one of dull reality and the second of warped memories. In the process of finding a way out of his consciousness, he is trapped between the two competing spaces, which eventually inflict lethal damage, acting as metaphors to self-destruction.Credit List:
Music: Modest Mouse
Animation Studio: Bent Image Lab
Director: Nando Costa
Executive Producer: Ray Di Carlo
Senior Producer: Tsui Ling Toomer
Producer: Kara Place
Production Coordinator: Ryan Shanholtzer
Director of Photography: Bryce Fortner
Motion Control Operator: Jim Birkett
Gaffer: Adam Burr, Jim Birkett
Phantom HD Technician: Benji Brucker
Production Assistants: Andrew Ellmaker, Charlie James, Esa Di Carlo, Morgan Hobart, Samuel Moyle
Kinetic Sculptor: Ben Hopson
Set Designers: Nando Costa, Solomon Burbridge
Set & Prop Fabricators: Daniel Miller, Eric Urban, Greg Fosmire, Jamie Hanson, Jen Prokopowicz, Justin Warner, Kimi Kaplowitz, Marty Easterday, Sarah Hoopes, Solomon Burbridge,
Art Department Coordinator: Evan Stewart
Art Department Intern: Jessie Weitzel
Carpenter: Drew Lytle
Graphic Designer: Nando Costa
3D Lead: Fred Ruff
3D Artists: Eric Durante, Shirak Agresta
2D Animation & Compositing: Brian Kinkley, Brian Merrel, Jay Twenge, McKay Marshall, Nando Costa, Orland Nutt, Randy Wakerlin
Rotoscoping: Ben Blankenship, Randy Wakerlin
Compositing Intern: Dustin Dybevik
Stop-Motion Animation: Jen Prokopowicz, Marty Easterday
Still Photography: Jared Tarbell, Nando Costa
Processing: Barbarian Group
Behind The Scenes Photographer: Ben Blankenship
Special Thanks to: Isaac Brock, Darrin Wiener, Linn OlofsdotterLinks:
Band’s Website: modestmousemusic.com
Band’s Blog: modestmouse.com
Band’s MySpace Page: myspace.com/modestmouse
Animation Studio: bentimagelab.com
Record Label: epicrecords.comContact Info:
Animation Studio: (503) 228-6206
EP: rayd@bentimagelab.com
Director: nandoc@bentimagelab.comPress:
- Showcased at Seattle International Film Festival during “Bumbershoot”
- Premiered on Pitchfork.com
- Featured in Stash 61
Thom Yorke Harrowdown Hill by Bent Image Lab
DIRECTOR Chel White
STUDIO Bent Image Lab – bentimagelab.com
MUSIC BY Thom YorkeRadiohead frontman Thom Yorke describes this song as his most political work. “Harrowdown Hill,” is part of Yorke’s solo album, “The Eraser,” which released in August 2006. After seeing the short films of Chel White, Yorke sought him out to direct his next music video.
White, who is co-founder of Bent Image Lab in Portland, OR, chose to incorporate an innovative technique that he and the rest of the Bent artists had been researching previous to this project. Dubbed Smallgantics, the technique takes footage of large objects (rivers, factories, city skylines) and makes them appear as though they are actually miniatures. In “Harrowdown Hill,” Chel used aerial footage from the pacific north west to be miniaturized using Smallgantics.
Smallgantics, inspired by tilt-shift photography, took the principles inherent with using tilt-shift lenses (Lenses that sit at an angle in comparison to the film plane, creating a sloped focal plane which can at times simulate short depth of field and can distort the apparent size of subjects), and pushed them to a new level. Instead of the apparent blurriness of the subject matter being dependent on its vertical alignment in the picture, Bent broke the image up into its apparent planes of depth. So, just like in actual shallow depth of field, it is the subject’s proximity to the lens that determines its sharpness.
The process involves splitting the footage up into several vertical planes that move back over the perceived z-axis, or into the image along its perceived depth. These planes are then affected with varying degrees of blur to simulate a shallow depth of field. If done right, the amount of blur increases smoothly as it moves along the planes of the image. Next, these levels of blur are animated to simulate a change in focus or to compensate for the forward movement of the camera.
Chel White’s video for Thom Yorke’s, “Harrowdown Hill,” won Best Music Video at South by Southwest (SXSW) 2007, ResFest 10, and The Worldwide Short Film Festival. It was nominated for Best Music Video and Best Special Effects at MVPA and FutureShorts.
LINKS:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tilt_shift
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chel_White
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