Talk about low budget, but this had to be very time consuming. The song is 'Again and Again' by The Bird and the Bee. I'm not sure if this is the official video, but it's
very clever. Mac geeks will totally appreciate it (and the rest of you geeks as well).



via Signal vs. Noise

Labels: Experimental, Music Video

This was posted to the AE List by Eugene Pak. Richard's description "An abstract HD film animated in After Effects. The soundtrack, 'The Beautiful Blue Sky', is a realtime electronic synthesizer improvisation for Buchla 200e and Haken Continuum." It's purdy.


LUX from Richard Lainhart on Vimeo.

Labels: Experimental

The Red Giant/MyToolfarm NAB Contest submission was officially over earlier this week and we had several terrific entries. Because of a problem we had with our uploader, the entries were also collected via another method, so this is not every entry unfortunately. This will give you a good cross-section of what was entered and if the winning entry is not in this bunch, we will put it online. There were about 24 entries in total. There are some super talented designers and motion graphics artists out there. I was blown away by some of the entries.

For a video to qualify, they must use Trapcode Form or Magic Bullet Looks. The first place winner will receive a trip to NAB and present their project at the Red Giant Booth. The first and second runners up will receive software.

The official winners will be announced next week. The list below is in the order they were submitted from newest to oldest and is no indication of the winners.

I should also note that the star ratings are not accurate if you view at MyToolfarm, so please ignore them. I think they work fine, but I wonder if someone has come through and given them all low marks just to be funny. All of these videos deserve higher ratings than they've received. I'm going to look into this.

Symantec NetBackup Product Launch

Submitted by Mark Jeschke

Veritas Backup Exec 10 Event Opener

Submitted by Mark Jeschke

Tori Amos Greenscreen Contest Submission 2007

Submitted by Mark Jeschke

Freedom Fall (Clip)

Submitted by Erik Candiani

Ryan Wheat Motion Graphics Demo

Submitted by Ryan Wheat

Penny and Ashtray

Submitted by Axel Roessler

The Field Scene

Submitted by Pericles Lewnes

Mumbai Central

Submitted by Alexander Snelling

Besuch der Holztiere

Submitted by Axel Roessler

Labels: 2D, 3D, Demo Reel, Experimental, Film Short, Music Video, MyToolfarm, Student Work

Check out "Myriad Harbour" by Directors Johanne St-Marie and Mark Lomond of Fluorescent Hill. Here's an excerpt from an interview at FEED's site:

"Because we had so little time in that shoot, we couldn’t afford the time to have them act out anything. So I shot Jo as the body double for Neko and Kathryn in the band, and shot my friend Richard as the body double for all six guys.

Then I redrew all the bodies in different sizes and clothes, and attached all of the heads I drew. The mouths are stop motion photographs of my mouth and Jo’s, then drawn and in-betweened and composited into the mix. We went completely paperless for the whole process, and drew everything in Photoshop.

I kept the colour to a minimum and played with three or four combination. I had gone further with the colour combos, but it made the faces unreadable in the really short scenes."

You can view more of Fluorescent Hill's portfolio at: www.fluorescenthill.com

Labels: 2D, Experimental, Film Short, Music Video

Designed and directed by Dave McKean, Mirrormask is stunning and chock-full of visual effects. Dave McKean is one of my favorite artists, and I was excited to see the film retained much of the look and feel of his work.

Labels: 2D, 3D, Bizarre, Character Animation, Experimental, Movie Trailer

In case you missed it, here's a few of the highlights from "Best of Stash 2007" at MGFest08.




Microsoft Zune Ad by Fulltank.



Music Video: Faithless-Music Matters by Micros Image.



Coca-Cola Happiness Factory- The Movie by Psyop.

Labels: Character Animation, Commercial, Experimental, Film Short, MGFest, Music Video, Television

Here's an interesting site, with some of the more freakish films that messed me up in my college art history and film courses- all in one convenient location!

The List Universe- Top 10 Most Bizarre Videos

Some of the "classics" from the likes of David Lynch and Jorodowsky are here!

One case in point:



Thanks to Kevin Lang for the link.

Labels: 2D, Bizarre, Experimental, Film Short

Cyriak sounds like the name of a magician to me, and he is.... a magician with Photoshop and After Effects! Cyriak is a freelance animator in Brighton, UK. His website bio is very funny:" Hello, I am Cyriak from 100 years into the future, where I have been exhumed and sent backwards in time via cyberspace in order to welcome you to the unabridged contents of my brain-damaged imagination." He's unbelivably creative. Jim G. passed his stuff on to me. Jim is in the know.

Check out two of his amazing animations.

Moo!

The cow DNA is mindblowing! A screen shot just doesn't do it justice.

Beggin' - Frankie Valli video re-mix

This is just cleverl The mutant head in the vortex.... wow. This is just disturbing and oh, so fun to watch.

I never thought Frankie Valli sounded like the guy from Maroon 5 until now.

Labels: 2D, Bizarre, Experimental, Humor, Music Video

Beautiful.

Labels: 2D, Experimental, Film Short

San Base is a contemporary artist originally from Russia who now lives in Canada. He has perfected a program to generate algorythms that move elements in a painting fluidly to come up with a dynamic picture. I could look at it all day. Read more about the technology behind Dynamic painting. Wouldn't that be nice at your next soiree.

Labels: Experimental

The rescaling and removal tools are mindblowing. I wonder if Adobe will buy this technology and incorporate it into future versions of Photoshop? One can wish.

Labels: Documentary, Experimental

They say that this is easy but it looks a bit complex to me! It's a new node-based interactive system for cutting out objects in the foreground of video, being developed at the University of Washington.

Labels: Experimental

HBO Voyeur Project is about a twisted and interconnected stories in an apartment building. More fun than drag queen puppet bingo.

Labels: Experimental, Television

Stash Media Stash 33 trailer came out earlier this month. Man, this is some seriously cool work. I'm too lazy to re-write the description:

Fun, in all its shades and guises, is the operative word for Stash 33.

For instance: we open the main program with complete bunny-mad chaos from Pleix and MacGuff for Groove Armada, and then trample on through Psyop’s hip-rebel-comedy for Fanta, HSI’s deadpan take on Reyka Vodka, manic pirate/bovine/bicyclist stop motion for Cravendale from Nexus, crazed MTV Asia work from JL Design in Taiwan, Wilfrid Brimo going berserk for V Energy drink, Han Huggebrooge’s unhinged vignettes for Dutch TV, Make’s extremely flammable chipmunks, very curious characters from Curious Pictures for Crunch and we cap it all with a surreal and utterly original bit of action-lunacy about courage, show business and inter-media love created at Supinfocom by Corentin Laplatte, Samuel Deroubaix and Jerome Dernoncourt,,, you get the idea – check below for the full list of contributors.

Labels: 2D, 3D, Bizarre, Demo Reel, Experimental, Film Short, Stop Motion

Now this is the kind of stuff I'd like to post more often! The information is all in French, but the Babel Fish Translation tells me: Original creation for the "Book of the designer" on After Effects (ED Eyrolles). Workshop 06 based on the expressions. The tutorial is in the book. Very cool effect!

Labels: Experimental

A cool effect made in Adobe After Effects. I wish the lighting were a bit better, but I really like the effect. So, how do you think he did it?

Labels: Experimental

Up Against the Wall is one of the stranger videos I've seen. Watch a guy getting food thrown at him over and over, then see it mirrored as the edit is repeated. Then, see it with other men get food Cap'n Crunch thrown at them. Then, confetti. Are these men Peter, Bjorn & John?

Anyway, the video credits Martin Arnold's technique.

Labels: Experimental, Music Video

By reading this blog, one might think that the only thing I ever watch are music videos. In the 80s, that was entirely true, with a break once in a while to watch Silver Spoons or Family Ties! Here's a blast from the past from one of my favorite bands from the 1980's, Missing Persons.

Surrender Your Heart was done by Peter Max with a PaintBox. I used to use a PaintBox back in the day. Sadly, I never did anything this cool... mostly just worked with corporate logos. Yay. Well, ya have to start somewhere.

Labels: Experimental, Music Video

This music video, Montreal for Seattle electronic artist KJ Sawka, is beautiful and creative and is the absolute definition of eye candy. Director/animator/designer/editor: Clay Lipsky. There's an interview with Lipsky about the making of the video at ShotsRingOut.com.

I got a kick out of Lipsky's equation for music videos:

final cut + photoshop + illustrator + 3D (cinema 4d or MAYA) + After Effects - sleep + coffee = video

(Via BoardsMag)

Labels: Experimental, Music Video

Floris: Metalosis Maligna, which came out last year, is a scary documentary slash short film about medical implants gone crazy. There's lots of cool 3D and some stellar compositing and tracking work. The man with the metalosis maligna, with his body being replaced by "metal tissue" and the stop motion portions are really impressive. Wow. I'm blown away.

The Dutch duo called Microbia, Floris Kaayk and Sil van der Woerd, produced this amazing piece.

Labels: 3D, Documentary, Experimental, Film Short, Stop Motion

Tyger, a film short by Brazillian Cuilherme Marcondes, is based on William Blake's poem, Tyger. It is one of the most amazing pieces I've ever seen. The tyger is a puppet that maneuvers through Sao Paolo, Brazil, with the puppeteers in black still visable. It's a mix of live action, photographs and 2D and 3D. Gorgeous.

It has the feel of Circque du Soliel for me, beautiful, etherial and with a rockin' soundtrack.

Labels: 2D, 3D, Experimental, Film Short

The Awesome X-Ray Plate Video - I happened upon this interesting effect-filled video by Teasider, aka Eran Solomon, an Israeli motion graphics artist who seems to be master of many programs. He uses After Effects, Premiere and Poser to create this great showcase of special effects. This guy is really talented. Check out his other work.

Labels: 2D, 3D, Experimental

We're looking for a few good animators, editors, students or even just fans of visual effects to contribute to this blog. Not HTML skills necessary, but a good eye for the most ground-breaking and rule-breaking techniques and styles out there. We want eye candy! Yes, we do.

Interested? Drop me an email and tell me why you should be considered. You would be expected to make one post per week, but you can post more, as long as they're quality videos. You're welcome to add your thoughts and opinions about the video, too.

Labels: 2D, 3D, Bizarre, Commercial, Demo Reel, Documentary, Experimental, Film Short, Interview, Movie Trailer, Music Video, Podcast, Stop Motion, Student Work, Television, Titles

Labels: Bizarre, Experimental, Music Video

This gorgeous video link was sent to me by one of my students, Paul, asking about how they created the effect. I tried to dig up more information on the video, but unfortunately, I don't know where the link came from. It was posted to a forum.

So, dear readers, any help would be appreciated. I'd love to know who did it, how, and what sort of software was used. It's so interesting.

Labels: 2D, Experimental

The Animation Show is a travelling animation festival that features some unbelievably cool animations from traditional cell to computer animated. The one pictured to the left is Rabbit by Run Wrake. It's creative, although very violent. Collision by Max Hattler is kalidescopic and trippy Islamic patterns and American quilts mix with the colors and geometry of flags. Collision is an abstract field of reflection. City Paradise by Gaëlle Denis is a breathtaking mix of live action and 2D/3D. (Tomoko arrives to London from Japan and accidentally discovers a mysterious, secret city underground, inhabited by friendly little aliens and a beautiful blossom. After she's found it, everything changes… )

Clip from City Paradise:

Labels: 2D, 3D, Bizarre, Experimental, Film Short, Student Work

YEAR OF THE FISH is an animated independent feature film written and directed by David Kaplan, shot entirely on location in New York City’s Chinatown. A modern-day adaptation of Cinderella based on an old Chinese version of the story, it was shot on inexpensive live-action video that was used as a guide for digital painting in post-production." It's also an official selection at the Sundance Film Festival.

"Once the shooting and live-action editing were completed, the animation of YEAR OF THE FISH began. Following in the footsteps of Richard Linklater's "Waking Life" and "Scanner Darkly", the production was shot and edited on miniDV and then rotoscoped in post production to create a high-definition animated feature film."

There are no clips of the film, but there are several screen shots and very interesting production notes and details about the animation process. They used Synthetik Studio Artist to acheive the unique look.

Labels: 2D, Experimental

Lobo Skank One Song is an amazing and beautiful conceptual piece from the Ebeling Group. Now that is some serious tracking (Boujou, maybe?) There are playful 3D elements sprouting throughout the environment and a sweet piano soundtrack. Those must be some extraordinary headphones.

Labels: 3D, Commercial, Experimental

Some fun and bizarre Christmas wishes. This is an interesting combination of 2D and 3D with lots of textures. Read more and see it in Quicktime, Real Video and other choices here.

Labels: 2D, 3D, Experimental

Justin Cone at Motionographer posted this hillarious and violent video of the Battle of Famous Album Covers. The spot was created for Fluid Battle of the AdBands in NYC. I can't imagine how much time this must've taken!

Labels: 2D, Experimental, Music Video

Onesize is a production studio in Delft, The Netherlands and I gotta say, this one blew me away. It's the Onesize 2006 Demo Reel. They're taking styles and techniques that have been done before and put a new interesting twist on them. The result is mindblowing! Seriously cool stuff.

They've done work for MTV, KFC, Nike, Vans, Mitsubishi and others.

(Note: This file link says temp, so please tell me if it gets moved and you get a broken link. That happens sometimes, to my dismay.)

Labels: 3D, Demo Reel, Experimental

I like to get some variety up here by featuring projects from big post houses, cool student work and some interesting techniques and styles that I've never seen before. This one came via Charlie Forbes, one of our Toolfarm Forum Experts.

Nicholas C. Raftis III, a fellow Michigan artist, is a video/audio artists create inherently fused synaesthetic animations and music, via programming generative systems in Max/Msp/Jitter by Cycling 74. I have no idea what that means, but the result is really interesting and fun. His work deals with abstractions of space and reality.

He has performed live music and video under the pseudonym "OOO" at numerous large scale electronic music shows, alongside notable artists such as Juan Atkins, Wu-Tang Clan, Jimmy Edgar, Richard Devine and more. He has done interactive audio/visual installations, published albums of music on many record labels, and screened films in festivals worldwide.

This is Nicholas' Demo Reel. I would like to point out the twisting effect on the city scape and the cool graffiti effects. Very cool, indeed.

Labels: Demo Reel, Experimental

Matthew Frederick Davis Hemming created this beautiful experimental video, Organica Islam, (15MB, pops) after watching a documentary about Islamic tapestries. The colors are beautiful and harmonious and it gives you the feeling of falling through 3D space. The Middle Eastern music is a perfect fit. The piece is called "Blue"; the band is Syntax Error and the vocalist is Astra Ozols. I don't know what the Islamic version of Zen is called, but this is pretty close.

Matthew says, "It's one 6 second loop of a simple animated mask reiterated many, many times applied as tinted difference layers, moving through 3D space while the camera wobbles around." He made a step-by-step tutorial explaining the process. He used Trapcode's Starglow to enhance the end.

Check out Matthew's website, MFDH.ca.

Labels: 3D, Experimental, Music Video

Liquid Liquid, a legendary NYC band from the early 80s, was part of the 'No Wave' movement (minimalist disco). In 1983, Grand Master Flash and Melle Mel sampled the funky bass line and melody for the hit song, White Lines (Don't Do It). White Lines was also covered by Duran Duran.

This psychedelic video was directed by Liquid Liquid's bass player, Richard McGuire and first aired in December 1997. McGuire has also done work for the Sea and Cake. The animation is highly inspired by a 1927 film called Seelische Konstruktionen (Spiritual Constructions) by German filmmaker and painter Oskar Fischinger.

Labels: Experimental, Music Video

This fresh piece called The Seed of Change was inspired by the music and by the conflict of man vs. nature. The theme of using technology in harmonious ways with nature was the goal of the piece.

Animators, Martin Thoburn and Aaron Mustamaa were responsible for the compositing. Traditional animator Mike Bielenda created the flash-based character animation, including the dramatic exploded robo-hand midway through the video.

The video was composited in After Effects 6.5, combining heavily-manipulated digital photos with graphic elements from Photoshop and Illustrator. The growing florae were created using a unique masking technique to achieve their organic and fluid motion. Textures such as wood, watercolor paper, and dirt were used throughout, as well as a strict color palette to establish the overall visual style.

The team's main inspiration, however, came from the music track: Hoarse by electronic artist, Cepia. The video was completed at the College for Creative Studies in Detroit, Michigan.

Labels: 2D, Experimental

Gnarls Barkley's "Crazy" is Rorschach test-inspired video and so well executed. How did they do this? My friend Dru Nget has experimented with ink and he said this is very difficult.

The video was directed by HSI's Robert Hales. The animation and visual effects were done by BL:ND (Blind) in Santa Monica, CA.

Gorgeous.

Labels: Experimental, Music Video

Re:Vision Media is a company run by Brandon Hirzel, a new media artist from Detroit (props for Michigan!), now living in San Diego, California. He works as a freelance motion graphics, cinematography, music video, VJ...

I saw his eye-popping reel on Brandon's MySpace URL. What really delights me about this reel is the effect where the video freezes, an outline is drawn around the character and the person becomes a bit posterized. As this is happening, textures, graffiti, lines and other elements draw on behind him. Okay, this effect is all-over right now, but I haven't seen it this superbly. There's so much detail. A definite 10 on the cool factor.

The reel is vivid, energetic, tight, fun to watch and everything a reel should be. Well played, Brandon. Well played.

Labels: Demo Reel, Experimental