Impactist – Last Heist EP
Impactist – Last Heist EP is a new album from the Portland duo. They created four uniquely genuine short animations for each of the tracks, that fit the musical aesthetic perfectly.
Upgraded from a quickie, we felt that everyone should see how self-initiated projects like this can extend your portfolio and flex your creative muscles without the restraint of a client or online contests rules and boundaries.
Spheremetrical (Here With You)
The Magical Number Seven
Micrhomage (Community)
Looking For You
We asked Impactist to contribute a little bit about their thought process…
Like everyone, our brains are always running. We haven’t found the off switch. So, in between other projects and life itself, we’re developing and making projects that we want to make. This is just what we enjoy doing and feel compelled to do. We don’t need a prompt like spec projects or contests for us to create. We’re just not into those exercises. Painters paint, photographers expose, and musicians compose. We personally enjoy all those mediums and more and are well aware that we are extremely fortunate to live in a time where technology permits it and the actual social community condones it. These are really special times.
Last Heist is one such collection of those ideas we’ve acted on. A small, simple album of tunes we enjoyed making and promos that were made in response to the tracks themselves. We think small is good. Get in and get out, try not to waste time, and hopefully make something that is at minimum engaging for ourselves, and at best also relatable or of interest to an anonymous audience that brings their own tastes and opinions to the projects.
These are just fun projects that are initiated without any sort of pressing agenda. The album title comes from the the idea that characters in film and television often cite their “last heist”, but it most often never actually is their last. Much like this isn’t a last anything for us either.
We’re not tied to any one technique and we work in many spaces. The music is a combination of real and synthetic instruments and field recordings. The visuals include live action and still photography, film and video, paper sculpture, wooden models, practical fire and smoke effects, and other optical and graphic techniques developed specifically for the set.
VIEW conference
MAAC 24FPS Awards
The Art of God of War 3
Director/Designer Colin Day goes freelancing
Director/Designer Colin Day, ex-Digital Kitchen, releases a cool new site and goes freelancing
Xfrog 5 for Maya
Animation Mentor Student Showcase 2010
Cinema 4D R12
Today, Maxon releases Cinema 4D R12 boasting improved rendering, enhanced dynamics, new deformers and advanced character animation control. See some of the new dynamics controls here.
Steven Spielberg - Part Two
London International Animation Festival
London International Animation Festival (LIAF) has kicked off and is now in full swing across London.
Now in its seventh year, this animated festival is showing 250 films from 30 countries. Lots of high profile stuff and lots and lots of obscure but no less wonderful animation is screening all over town.
LIAF runs from Aug 27-Sep 5
www.liaf.org.uk for more info
CINEMA 4D R12 released
GDC Online
Krakatoa 1.6
Two Erotic Shorts from RSA
Two abstract, erotic shorts from RSA: Vernie Yeung’s ‘Quatre’ for Wallpaper & Johan Renck’s ‘Brand Film’ for Agent Provocateur (slightly NSFW)
Sophie Gateau & Paranoid US: “White” for LG and LIGHTS
Simple is beautiful. In Lights, Paranoid US and new SF-based agency, DOJO, keeps it simple and retells the classic story of boy meets girl. With director Sophie Gateau at the helm, the piece dually functions as an advert for LG and a music video —similarly named— for electropop artist, LIGHTS.
At the heart of it, the piece is a canny take on an old story —fancying a straightforward approach to create something elaborate, yet deceptively simple. Technically, the piece is exquisitely executed —so well that, on multiple viewings— the animated images appear to be the result of practical effects. The kicker is that it wasn’t. In a most spectacular display of CG stagecraft, Gateau, with a background in CG and motion graphics, utilized her skillset to the utmost degree. To sum it up:
“Utilizing motion control to shoot the available 45 pre-production models , Sophie shot twenty passes–moving the phones along in each pass. The Paranoid Design Studio team then assembled the passes, tracked animated characters and environmental drawings, and composited them into the scenes.”
