paganomation

Patreon refresh! 😅💦

Hi Patrons! 

So far, 2019 has been a year of rest, reflection, and rebuilding. The Unofficial Hiatus™ that we began in January continued longer than I intended—but just as long as I needed. 

We've had a few bits of content trickle in here and there, but now we're ready to get back on track. As with many online content creators, the goal of all of this was to find ways to keep making things without totally burning out. (A minor detail.)

Anyway! With that said, there's never been a better time to become one of our Patrons. We've revised our tiers so that there are only two: the $1 "PaganoPatron" (where you can get a look at whatever we're working on, and see some stuff public stuff early) and $5 "PaganoPatronXL" (where we'll put your name in the credits and give you some extra content.) And everything on the whole is more affordable—both for you receiving the content and for us producing it.

Hopefully, this will allow us to give everyone more exclusive stuff to see more often. If you're already a Patron and the tier you had before is no longer here, feel free to revise your support to one of these two options. As always, we appreciate it!

- David

Countdown to LGIS - 10 days remaining

(This type of post would normally be exclusive to patrons. But any LGIS posts that are public on our Kickstarter page will be posted here publicly as well.) 

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I have been nothing but "Little Guys!" for months and months now (see above image), and we are just over a week away from the release of this film! 

Valerie designs a pixelated logo mosaic for the in-universe military. 


I like how green my tracking document is becoming.

- David

Countdown to LGIS - 20 days remaining

(This type of post would normally be exclusive to patrons. But any LGIS posts that are public on our Kickstarter page will be posted here publicly as well.) 

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Closing in on the final stretch of "Little Guys... In Space!" From here, there's only sound design, a few still photos, and digital effects to do. Here's some photos from the last of the stop-motion:

The government agents scene had one of the highest detail-to-shortness ratios. Here, their props have both been transformed into Little Guys!

All of the shots in the mission control room were animated in one day. 

I ran out of time to build a complex background for these scenes, so I added these greeblies to a wall made entirely of colored baseplates. Having just read a book about the costumes of Star Wars, I was perfectly primed to create things that look spacey but don't necessarily have any specific purpose.

The final scene

The final shot called for a camera move down a reaaaaaaally long table, so I built this platform out of wood to serve as the tabletop structure. 

I then covered the top with 15" baseplates.

We used minifigures to plan out the final scene, getting an idea of their arrangement, color schemes, and general look. 

Starting to stage the final scene with some reuse stand-ins for scale reference.

I built this extremely makeshift camera cradle to tilt the camera up at an angle.

We added grey plates to act as a channel for the camera to slide along.

One member of the final scene's Alien Council. 

Jeff stages the completed characters for the final scene.

These numbered "bars" are used to change the angle of the characters' necks. More characters means more bars. 

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Almost there! 😅

- David

Countdown to LGIS - 30 days remaining

(This type of post would normally be exclusive to patrons. But any LGIS posts that are public on our Kickstarter page will be posted here publicly as well.) 

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Technically, there are 28 days remaining. But it's been a busy week. 

Suffice to say, principal photography on the film is complete! And now we're at BrickFair VA. We'll be back with more substantial updates next week. 

Let this image (from the longest, most complicated shot I've ever attempted) set the tone. 

- David 

Countdown to LGIS - 40 days remaining

(This type of post would normally be exclusive to patrons. But any LGIS posts that are public on our Kickstarter page will be posted here publicly as well.) 

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Continuing on with the marathon towards August 31st! 

Reusing a suit-and-tie torso design to create the general's military uniform.

I pulled out a variety of decorated tiles to use as military ribbons on the uniform.

There are still one or two left to build, but design on all of the backer caricatures is complete! 

My flight home from Bricks by the Bay was delayed by 2+ hours, so I did some design work at the airport. This is a Photoshop template I use to draft basically all of the face designs. It's especially useful for those that are based on real people.  

I'm also now realizing that I should have taken a wider photo, because the context for this being taken at the airport is lost. It's the airport, trust me.

I built this mini dropship for the "Future War" scene so that there could be something flying in the background. We'll see whether I have enough time to actually composite it into the shot. 

I also re-purposed a PaganoPuppet (more reuse!) for background of the scene with the government agents. It felt a little weird to build a modern-day weapon (particularly given The LEGO Group's stance on present-day war toys), but I wanted it to be the exact rifle used by the government agents in the film "E.T." so that the joke would work. 

What is the joke, you ask? You'll see in 40 days.

- David

Countdown to LGIS - 50 days remaining

(This type of post would normally be exclusive to patrons. But any LGIS posts that are public on our Kickstarter page will be posted here publicly as well.) 

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We're marathoning our way towards the August 31st release date! There's been a LOT going on for a variety of scenes in the film. Here's the latest:

Aliens

These alien characters are co-workers in an office. They love "Little Guys!"

Some of the mouth shapes for the green alien, as well as her "blink" eyelids and a thumb.

The backdrop of this scene is built studs-out on baseplates that are clamped to a wooden backdrop. The tan 2x2 bricks were my way of figuring out the bulletin board size and position before I built it. Despite being large-scale, I've been trying to keep the backgrounds simple. This cuts down on production time, and also keeps your eye focused on the point of the scene (the characters).

Robot

A robot (seen here from behind) collects "Little Guys!" and puts them on a shelf. In the upper right corner is reference video I shot to get an idea of how the robot would move. The wires coming out of the robot's head are from Brickstuff lights which were built into the eyes and mouth.

The backdrop in this scene was built using a similar studs-out technique to the aliens' office. The shelves are all trans-clear 1 x 6 x 5 panels so that the lights can shine through and illuminate the robot's "Little Guys!" collection.

I realized while setting up this shot that I didn't have enough LGIS figures to fill the shelves, so I built two more.

Future War

A soldier in a familiar-looking future war fights enemy robots and talks about why she likes "Little Guys!"

The future war scene features lots of practical explosions (i.e. bursts of light from off screen). This was my rough X-sheet for how bright one of those light bursts should be.

This render screen of the future war shot gives you an idea of what the final lighting looks like.

Without lighting, the future war set is revealed for what it is: a lot of BURPs and stock models we've made for past videos. Reuse, reuse, reuse.

Miscellaneous

This government agent was loosely based on Dana Scully.

The agent's walkie-talkie, modeled after one I remember from my childhood.

This military general fills the role of "older person who doesn't understand what 'Little Guys!' are."

The original version of the general's mustache was more articulated, but so complicated that I thought it looked out of place with the rest of his head.

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More to come!

- David

HAWAT #003 - Behind-the-scenes images

(This type of post would normally be exclusive to patrons.)

As with everything else I've already mentioned, this episode also benefited from having two people on hand to snap some behind-the-scenes pictures. 

At the start, I jotted down these notes on the order in which the actions in the scene would take place. Originally, I thought we might do three different shots, but as Christopher and I discussed it, we came around to instead doing one shot with all three actions, including an in-camera zoom-out lens animation. 

The only action I was really sold on coming in was having that kind of "arm flailing" action that Godzilla and other rubber-suit kaiju monsters tend to have when they get hit or otherwise lose their balance. I dunno why; it just always stuck with me watching these movies as a kid. 

Again, the buildings were all reuse from either "The Magic Picnic" or actual LEGO products from our "Adventures of Max" episodes. We tried to populate the background of the shot so that it was busy but not too busy, keeping some buildings attached to baseplates while others were simply stuck to the tabletop with blue tack. 

Godzilla's walk benefited from not being bound to a LEGO grid, so we kept the entrance area baseplate-free. Here you can see a bunch of blue tack stuck to some very not-on-model monster feet. This is from the moment right after the "building swipe" occurs. You also can see the disassembled upper floor on the table in the foreground—rather than digging around for dark red LEGO pieces, Christopher just took apart the existing upper floor and used those parts to make progressively tinier models. 

I forgot to call out this "atomic breath" build, which was also provided by BRICK 101. We rotated this little model inside Godzilla's mouth every frame, giving the flames a kind of boil. 

This pose happened by accident when we were cleaning up afterwards, and was a good visual representation of my energy level after animating all day.

- David

BRICK 101 LEGO Godzilla | How About We Animate That

(This type of post would normally be exclusive to patrons.)

When deciding on the subject for HAWAT episode #003, I had to consider the following:

- Dave Pickett was nice enough to send us the Godzilla model (the only copy in existence) but needed it back by 6/12. 

- Christopher Gearhart was in town and interested in collaborating on an animation. 

- A few folks on YouTube were asking us to "animate LEGO". 

These turned out to be the perfect circumstances under which to create a HAWAT episode. 

Like I said in the wrap-up, this turned out to be a long animation clip—mostly because, together, Christopher and I had so many ideas for what could happen. Things like the police officer being inside the building after the top floor is knocked off, the distance 'star' after the building recedes into the distance (looks like Team Rocket is blasting off again), the officer throwing the ladder off the side of the building... all of these things were concocted on-the-fly. 

The ladder solution took the most time to develop, as I wanted to go with an option that didn't make it look like the police officer had died. Other possibilities included: 

• the officer jumps from building to building and escapes off screen
• the officer jumps off the building and has a parachute
• the officer gets burned up by Godzilla's breath and becomes a solid black 'charred' microfig (which moves, indicating that the officer is cartoonily still alive)

Multiple people (including Christopher) had made the suggestion to have Godzilla's spine 'light up' by changing the colors of the slope bricks used, so that was getting included no matter what. This is a common occurrence at Paganomation: we'll be animating an episode of something or other (typically on a tight deadline), and someone on the crew will make a suggestion that is too cool not to do, despite whatever extra work it may require. I typically respond by saying, "well, now we HAVE to do that." 😄

Even though Dave Pickett built the Ginza Wako building to go along with the Godzilla model (as seen here), he didn't send that to us. The buildings used in this episode were all reuse—most you'll probably recognize from The Magic Picnic, while others are actual LEGO products we used to stick in the background of "Adventures of Max" episodes and the like. 

Again, this isn't the kind of shot I'd have animated solo, but with the two of us together, it became less about "how can I keep this simple enough to make sure this episode is released on time" and more about "let's have fun hanging out and animating some wacky monster antics." 

The episode itself actually didn't go live until early Saturday morning. This was made during a particularly busy week (~75 days left until LGIS), and the final render didn't come together until about 4am Saturday morning. I accept that this may happen sometimes; but ideally, not too often. 😴

I'll have some behind-the-scenes photos from this episode coming later.

- David

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Support Godzilla on LEGO Ideas: https://ideas.lego.com/projects/d65caaf7-5ca2-4fbe-b0c5-5af830d09754 

In this episode, David and guest animator Christopher Gearhart (of Bricks Brought to Life) animate the BRICK 101 Godzilla model designed by Mark Larson and Dave Pickett.

Brickworld 2007 Animation Demos | From the Archives

(This type of post would normally be exclusive to patrons. This is an early release for Patreon only; the video will go public on our YouTube channel on 6/15.)

Since Brickworld Chicago is this week, I figured it was a good time to revisit the animation demos from the very first Brickworld back in 2007. My first LEGO fan event, I spent the majority of the time teaching exhibitors and attendees how to animate minifigures using stop-motion. 

A lot of the demos are from folks trying animation for the very first time—you'll see some rough walks and other moves, and also a bicycle that pops up pretty frequently. When introducing stop-motion to beginners, I often use minifigs on bikes and skateboards to get some solid motion going without the added complexity of a walk cycle.

(Some animation of my own also pops in from time to time—I animated the red-haired kid from "Little Guys!" during the lulls where no one was stopping by the table.)

Sadly, I won't be at this years event, but my capable cohort Dave Pickett will be in attendance to oversee all things brickfilmish. Have fun, y'all!

- David

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David tethered together all of the stop-motion tests visitors did at the Brickworld 2007 LEGO fan event. 

"From the Archives" is a series where David Pagano shows old videos he created back before Paganomation even existed.

HAWAT #002 - Behind-the-scenes images

(This type of post would normally be exclusive to patrons.) 

I had fewer behind-the-scenes images that I remembered; mostly because I wasn't planning to launch this Patreon until I was about halfway through shooting this episode. I'm also using this post as a way to teach myself how photo posts on Patreon actually work. 😄

Speaking of which, one thing I learned during the production of this episode was a neat trick for invisibly attaching a lav mic. The first HAWAT episode had a really complicated boom mic setup, and I wanted to find something simpler. I found this inexpensive lapel mic on Amazon, but it really stood out against the yellow shirt I wore in this episode, and I couldn't figure out how to clip it to the collar in a way that didn't look sloppy.

Thanks to this YouTube tutorial from Carl Kwan, I ended up adhering the mic to my chest with a bit of gaffers tape. You can see the black wire a bit in some shots, but I managed to hide the majority of the mic/tape setup behind Titus. The mic ran into a portable SD card recorder in my back pocket, and syncing the audio in post production was a cinch.

The explanation of what the heck I was doing in this episode turned out to be more complicated than I expected. I figured it out over the course of a couple of takes, but still had to write it all down and stick it right beneath the camera lens so that I could prompt myself. 

There are often one or two sticky notes attached to the tripod during any given recording session.

- David

IKEA SPÖKA Night Light | How About We Animate That

(This type of post would normally be exclusive to patrons.)

Production on the second HAWAT episode went much more smoothly now that I have a better idea of what this show actually is. 😄 

While I had production assistants on episode #001, this second episode was produced entirely by myself, including all phases of production. It also helped that I could re-use a lot of the assets from episode #001. All told, it took about 3 days of work. I'm curious to see if I can get these done even faster in the future, again with help from other folks. 

Of course, what I'm animating in any given episode will affect that, too. This night light was very straightforward and simple, whereas other things I try to animate in the future might be more complex. Regardless, this is one big experiment, and as long as I'm having fun with it, I think it'll work out okay. 

I've got a couple of behind-the-scenes shots from this episode, too, which I'll be posting later today as an example of the "Pics or it Didn't Happen" reward tier. 

- David

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David makes a spirited attempt to animate the SPÖKA night light from IKEA. Like guardian angels, it's always near.  

Buy (a slightly different) SPÖKA on Amazon: https://amzn.to/2GTH1k7

Livestream 6/2/2018 @ 12pm ET

We're doing a #livestream tomorrow! David will be hanging out with #animator / #designer / #puppeteer / #fabricator / #composer Matt Witham to discuss the many hats they've worn in their film & TV careers.  They'll also be building something or other. 

Join in at 12pm eastern at youtube.com/paganomation 

AnimatorDV Commercial | From the Archives

(This type of post would normally be exclusive to patrons.)

The goal for non-HAWAT fridays is to have a variety of other types content to post. One of these will be "From the Archives".

I've been making weird films and videos for decades. There's a lot of this stuff on various tapes and CD-ROMs that rarely sees the light of day.

While HAWAT shows my process in terms of how I approach stop-motion animation, something like "From the Archives" is more about the process of how I got to where I am as a filmmaker.

Spoiler alert: by making tons of sometimes terrible, often bizarre, occasionally surprisingly decent films. 😂

- David

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Overcome your limitations in this ad created for an AnimatorDV-sponsored contest, which I believe ran on Brickfilms.com back in 2005. 

"From the Archives" is a series where David Pagano shows old videos he created back before Paganomation even existed.

Mega Construx TMNT Mutations | How About We Animate That

(This type of post would normally be exclusive to patrons.)

"How About We Animate That" is the main series of our new YouTube initiative, with a new episode coming out every other Friday. I've got seven episodes scheduled at the moment, with about a dozen other ideas for future episodes. All of this isn't even including suggestions from our viewers, so I'm not at all worried about running out of interesting subjects to animate. 

Completed episode uploads like this one will always be public on our YouTube channel—the episodes themselves aren't one of the reward tiers, but our behind-the-scenes commentary and discussion of the episodes is. 

I do have a LOT of cut footage from this first episode, as I had very little idea of what the show would be when we shot it. (It was kind of nice to be loose and experimental for a change.) It was only during the editing process that I figured out the main focus of the show and solidified the structure.

So, maybe a future patron-exclusive behind-the-scenes video can show off some of that stuff. 😄

- David

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In the premiere episode, David Pagano tries his hand at animating some retro Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles figures from MEGA Brands.

Buy Rocksteady: https://amzn.to/2wK4owD  

Buy Baxter Stockman: https://amzn.to/2jZMgpy

ALL posts public until 6/23

Hi, supporters! As we develop our presence here on Patreon, we've decided to keep ALL of our posts public for the first month. 

This way, new folks can see what we're all about and be able to better gauge what level of support membership they're interested in.

Tell your friends.

Welcome to Paganomation on Patreon

If you're here, you probably already know what we're all about—and we're thrilled to have your support! 

This train has been moving along at a steady clip, and even though we've switched lines over to "releasing original content more often", I feel confident with where we're going. 

The train analogy is very vague, so why don't I stop talking and just get back to work on the next "How About We Animate That" episode. We're making more stuff!

Again, welcome.

- David