Making of The Piper Teaser Trailer

I know its a later then i pland but here is the making of The Piper Teaser Trailer. way back in summer I got the idea of doing a retelling of the pied piper, with my twist. As soon as I got that Idea I started sketching quick designs for the piper and the playground itself. As I was not doing a straight retelling I wanted to have hints to the original story buy having rocking horses that look like rats in the park.

I had a very lose idea for how I wanted the piper to look , so I did several pages of just random face designs. To help me come up with different ideas I looked into as many of the different retellings of the original story as I could find.

After doing the quick concept sketches I wanted to see if the design I liked would work well in 3D. As I was sculpting I felt that the design of the hair did not look right as a 3D sculpt . I tried out a number of different hair styles till I got a look that I liked

 

After plenty of research and feedback I sculpted The final Ppiper

Happy with the sculpt I removed the head and got it ready to cast up to make the silicon mould from it. To make it castelbel I had to remove the hair and make holes in the head to show where they will go. Once the silicone mould was made and the clay head was taken out I got to cast the head up by using a two part fast cast resin.

As this was a teaser trialer i wanted to keep the look of the piper a secret till the final film. So i strated off by making an all black test head that I will use for the trailer. To make his hair I made foam cone shapes that I glued around some wire and placed into the pre made dents in the head. Then the long process started were I had to glue each hair on to the foam to give the look and texture of hair that I wanted. 

 

The next step for me was to make the ball and socket armature that the piper will have, so he can do the graceful movements required in the final film. this was kindly supplied by Animation Toolkit to check out all the awesome goods on the site click here!!  

 Once the armature was made I then glued the foam over it. When dry I cut the foam down into the required body shape. to make the pipers outfit i got a pattern from a producer mate that im not aloud to say the name of just yet . With some slight adjustments to the shape it fit the piper grate.

 The Piper on set

The making of the roundabout, its amazing what several coats of paint on a old chopping board with a cardboard tube and some drinking straws glued on to it can do. 

These images show the making of the: park gates, rocking rats and the swings. The Ground on the swings set was done the same way as the main park set, using chunks of ripped up cardboard glued to a wooden board then painted over with several cotes. 

 I am right now in the middle of the full productionon on the final Piper film. Now that the trialer has been out for 2 mouths i have been amazed by the grate feedback i have got back from it. I would like to take this chances to say a big thankyou to all who has seen and comented on the video it meens a lot! 

The Piper Teaser Trailer 2012 from Daniel James on Vimeo.

The Piper Teaser Trailer

I’m very excited to show you the teaser trailer for what will be my final graduation film The Piper , I hope this has you excited to see the final film coming in 2013!

There will be a making of blog post very soon but for now enjoy the trailer!!
and as always your comments and feedback are very welcome!

Viv & Mandy to have a second outing to the Flip Animation Festival!

Exiting news everyone, you may remember that last October Viv & Mandy in the Big Clean up Part 1 was screened as part of the Flip International Animation Festival? Well I’m very happy to say that Viv & Mandy in the Big Clean up Part 2 will be getting screened at this year’s Flip animation festival on the 2^nd of November!

I’m very excited by this news and really looking forward to seeing Part 2 on the big screen in a room full of animation lovers who may even remember seeing Part 1 last year. I’m very grateful to the people at Flip for once again give this me and Viv & Mandy this opportunity, thank you very much!

This year’s Flip is going to be very cool as we have 5 different short films from graduates from my university also been screened, so a big congratulations to all of them as well!! For more information about the Flip International Animation look at http://www.flipfestival.co.uk/ to book tickets and see what great things they have going on there this year.

And for anyone who is going to flip come say hi or let me know as I want to meet as many of my online animation mates face to face, and you can even have your very own Viv & Mandy badge :D

Bristol Animate Encounters Day 3 & 4:

Networking Breakfast

After the joy of last night Myself, Tommy and Gareth got up nice and early and went over to a filmmaker’s breakfast networking event. We sat down at a table and many different people went around the room and came over to talk to use. We got to the meet and chat to some very interesting people, some were fellow animation students, resent university graduates and the film and animation advisers from the British Council. I learnt a lot from these people and found out some interesting ways to help you get finding for animation and short film ideas. These are something I will most defiantly be keeping in mind for when I leve university next year. 

The Lighter side

This is the last of the short animation screenings, and this one felt much more like a bigger mix of short and longer studio animated shorts. I had seen some of these shorts screened on TV over last year and it was fantastic to see them on the big screen were every detail looked amazing. My highlights from this screening were: Much Better Now, Phone Home, Pythagasaurus, Stopover, A Different Perspective, Chop Chop and The Gruffalo’s Child.

Nexus Studio Focus

Nexus Productions are an independent production company and animation studio based in London check them out here! This one was grate a mix of a show and tell presentation with the screenings, 4 people from the studio sat there speaking about the company; they would show a short then talk about the making of that short. This was a very different way to screen the shorts and I have to say I really enjoyed it, this is exactly how in my eyes the 2 Aardman screening should have been like. My highlights from this screening were: Back to the Start, Invade all of the Humans!!!, The Chase, Speed of Light and This Way Up. But if I was to pick one it would have to be Invade all of the Humans!! Hands down! 

Trip to the Aardman Lobby

After the last screening Tommy and myself decided to go for a little walk around Bristol and hopefully find The Aardman animations Studio. To cut the tale short we ended up finding the studio, and after about 5 minutes standing outside saying should we or should we not ring the bell, we rang bell. 

 The very nice chap behind the desk let us in and very kindly let us have a look around the amazing props, Puppets, sets and life size Wallace they have on display in the Lobby. To say that this was an amazing and very overwhelming felling to be standing in the middle of Aardman is a big understatement. One day it would be fantastic to get any form of Work experience there, or even the full on tour would keep me happy, but until then I have got theses pitchers to remind me of just how amazing it was.

Late Lounge

Still buzzing from are trip to Aardman we then mad are way over the Late Lounge. This screening was a mix of live action and animated shorts that are a little to adult themed to show in the day screenings. There were some that were very funny and some that were a tad disturbing, but the quality of shorts was fantastic. My highlights from this screening were: Tram, The Bob shorts, Curiosity Kills and Umshini Wam (Bring Me My Machine Gum)

Day 4:

Aardman Kids Animation Workshop

This was my last day in Bristol and a brilliant way to end it was to go to a build your own Gromit work shop with the very awesome Aardman model maker Jim Parkyn. Although me and Tommy were some of the oldest in the room this was a cracking work shop that lasted just over an hour. Using a sheet of basic shapes we used these to build are very own Gromit, and I have to say I was very happy with the way mine came out. And thank you Jim for letting me keep the modelling tool with the Aardman logo on it I will use it with pride!  

Once the workshop was over we stayed back and had a very nice chat with Jim about most things animation, I then handed him one of my cards and a Viv & Mandy badges. Once out of the workshop Tommy and I said a jolly good bye, parted ways and i got the train back to Sunny Stoke. 

Now I am back into the full swing of university life I can say that all in all this festival has been one hell of an amazing experience and I’d like to say a massive thank you to all the truly amazing people that I got to meet, chat to and spend time with. I very much hope that I can make it over to the festival again next year, so until then buy buy Bristol!