Hello! I needed to design a bunch of kites for the film, and ended up doing a faux-replacement-animation with their silhouettes.
In the actual film these will change in time with the music, so they won't go by quite this fast or be evenly spaced. I just thought I'd speed it up here so you can see the animation within the animation a bit clearer!
Looking at it in this context, I'm kinda tempted to add heaps more in-between kites so it's really smooth, but then the picture would be changi...
2021-05-27 23:51:34 +0000 UTC
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Everything is about as spherical as expected.
2021-05-12 06:54:51 +0000 UTC
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This new film has a lot of string in it (attached to kites), and I'm quickly realising that a string blowing in the wind is quite a lot of precise drawing for what, in the end, is a featureless squiggly line. A line is one step removed from nothing at all, it's about the least thing you can draw. And in film, a string is traditionally something you're meant to pretend you don't see, that a little cardboard spaceship is dangling from.
So it seems a little silly to say "hey check it out here...
2021-05-10 02:35:29 +0000 UTC
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Watch out little apple, here comes that rascal Apple Getter!
This WAS one of the Pen Pal ink drawings from April, but then I scanned it and coloured it in on the computer and now it's this instead. The original linework for this, along with everyone else's lines, will be sent off in the next day or so.
This is not my first time drawing the Apple Getter- they've appeared in at least one Pen Pal drawing before, and several times in sketchbooks before that. I don't know anything about ...
2021-05-05 23:51:33 +0000 UTC
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Hello! This method of animating a sheep is turning out to be less practical than I anticipated. Hopefully it's fun to look at though! This, as you might have guessed, is for that film I said I'm making. There will be more soon, but for now please enjoy these orbs with an animal inside them. Bye!
2021-04-27 07:36:37 +0000 UTC
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Ding ding ding! A NEW FILM project has COMMENCED!!! And here is how the film itself will commence: presenting the completed first 5 seconds!
This was a little too soft and subtle to squash into a gif so this Vimeo embed is MEANT to loop. But you could be seeing this in an app or an email or the website on a myriad of devices, so if it happens to not work with your particular combination, let me know and I'll explore some other ways of posting short clips.
So WHAT IS THIS FILM???...
2021-04-13 02:00:06 +0000 UTC
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Hello! Following up my last plasticine experiment, I started this follow-up plasticine experiment! An experiment is whatever it is, however it comes out, but I would be lying if I wasn't hoping this one would be a little longer, and be something I could even use as an extension of the last plasticine thing and make a mini film.
BUT, it has been sadly abandoned in this current state. While it's not ...
2021-04-07 03:14:43 +0000 UTC
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Hi! Remember all these paper animations I did last year? I originally posted them as gifs, which is fine but a little lossy squishy squashy. It's not the clearest way to see them- that would of course be a video. So here is one, in 4k! Videos can also make sounds, so I put sounds in it too. Not sounds of me drawing on paper, but other sounds, like music and footsteps.
I will probably pop this up on YouTube in a week or so, but here it is for you to look at now!
2021-04-06 00:01:59 +0000 UTC
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Hello hello, patrons old and new! As always, a big THANKS for all your support and for joining me here this month, which is April.
To Pen Pal patrons, your ink drawings will be shipped off in the next day or two. Here is ONE of the drawings being sent, which I have digitally coloured. It's a dinosaur evolving into a bird! This is what it looked like, on the day when the dinosaurs all decided to do that. Pretty bold move, I wonder if they knew what they were getting into!
2021-04-04 23:01:47 +0000 UTC
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Hello! Maybe you saw a gif I posted here a few days ago of a plasticine flower. Here it is again, but in a video, with music and sound and a background and compositing and stuff.
This isn't a shot for a film project, but after making that flower as a test, I wanted to see what it might look like if I DID make a plasticine film. And I suppose it would look something like this!
During Throat Notes, I knew that whatever I made next, I wanted to incorporate more mediums, be it stop ...
2021-03-22 07:32:27 +0000 UTC
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Hello internet family!!! I've been experimenting with some good old plasticine..
Having a top-down camera already set up to shoot paper animation, I've been excited to use it for this particular style of stop-motion, where everything is flat on a table so nothing actually needs to support it's own weight. Some of my absolute favourite animations are made this way but I've never had a chance to try it myself, and it took a few very disastrous attempts before arriving at this cheeky flow...
2021-03-17 09:34:53 +0000 UTC
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Hello all! Thank you for joining me here this month, be it again or for the first time!
The Pen Pal drawings for this month have been shipped off to their respective new homes.
Part way through last year, I started using these Pen Pal drawings to do little paper animations.
But now THROAT NOTES is over, I've been looking to expand my skill set and have been e...
2021-03-09 01:50:44 +0000 UTC
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Hey! Here is a clown!!!!!
You may remember me mentioning a SHED a while ago, and making things in it using physical mediums. Here's one such thing I've been making, with my life/animation partner Zoë!
This clown is a technical experiment, featuring a felt puppet made by Zoë, and manipulated by me using a mix of practical and digital techniques. The process was pretty clunky and could use some r...
2021-02-28 07:30:24 +0000 UTC
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Hi! So!
I don't leave a whole lot of evidence when I make a film. There are no formal storyboards or animatics, no rough versions of anything- I usually keep working each shot, from conception to completed animation, inside the one digital file where any figuring-out is drawn directly over or deleted as I go.
BUT, scattered throughout my sketchbooks, there's a kind of fractured version of the film running alongside.
Before a film, and in the early stages of it, I might do so...
2021-02-16 09:30:29 +0000 UTC
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well HELLO! Here is me and there are you!
So last time we spoke, I just made a film, and then I went to lie down for a little bit.
Since then, I have gotten back up, and my partner and I turned our shed into a STUDIO TYPE THING!
During my adult life, my workspace has mostly been limited to what I can fit on top of a desk. Shortly before starting this Patreon however, our spatial considerations changed, and we moved into a slightly larger rental in order to fit a desk AND a baby i...
2021-02-10 08:30:31 +0000 UTC
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Hello everyone!!!!
It’s been a pretty overwhelming couple of days since THROAT NOTES dropped- and whether you’re one of the patrons who supported me through making it, or a new patron here to help me make whatever the next thing is- THANK YOU SO MUCH!!!!!!
I started this Patreon in 2019 with the specific purpose of funding THIS film, so now that it’s over we’re in uncharted territory! I’ve got a bunch of ideas for things to make and ways to share them with ...
2020-12-31 09:22:39 +0000 UTC
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Well, THROAT NOTES is now on YouTube for the world to see! Now you can share it with friends and see it again without the pesky watermarks.
IN ADDITION, you can also download the film here!
vvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvvv
THROAT NOTES THROAT NOTES THROAT NOTES
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^...
2020-12-27 22:23:37 +0000 UTC
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This is the film! This video right here!!!! You can watch it right now, if you like!!!!!!!!!
First of all: THANK YOU!!!!!!!! There is no way this film could have been made if it wasn't for your financial support.
This film started with a gif 3 Decembers ago, the same year Double King came out! Around freelance work I hardly had the time to open it again, let alone make all of this. I'...
2020-12-16 06:52:06 +0000 UTC
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I don't know what this is! A witch? Some sort of magical madam hopping towards you in any case- or floating! Not sure if her feet are reaching the ground but those trees look a long way down.
Anyway, THIS is the monthly paper animation, and the original frames will be sent to Pen Pal supporters in the coming days.
As for the other, much longer animation- it is nearly DONE!!!! One-and-a-half shots left to animate, in fact. The animating is NOT the last step, there are a bunch o...
2020-12-03 23:17:38 +0000 UTC
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3!!! SHOTS!!! LEFT!!! 3!!! SHOTS!!! LEFT!!!
Here is a normal human face, making some sort of normal human facial expression to clearly communicate a familiar and relatable human emotion. I'm sure we all understand and no further explanation is necessary!
2020-12-01 05:52:16 +0000 UTC
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Remember that wobbling frog from a couple of days ago? Now it looks like THIS! No it's not transforming into anything, it's just the same old wobbling from the last shot but now seen from a distance, so I had to draw it smaller and simpler and it got a bit weird! I've included a second gif of just the face animation without any additional wobbling, to help make sense of what you're looking at.
2020-11-23 03:44:01 +0000 UTC
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I've been kind of avoiding doing too much complicated redrawn animation of these frogs that are throughout the film, with their fiddly spotty confusing character designs, and then right near the end one of them just DECIDED to start wriggling around!!! Keep still you fool!!!!!!
2020-11-19 22:19:41 +0000 UTC
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Hello disregard that last post, I realised I published it to the wrong tier!!! It was regarding the names in credits benefit, but it was meant to be directed to the Secret Council and Pen Pal tiers and I accidentally sent it to everyone. I'm really really sorry for any confusion or disappointment!!!!
What you DO need to know is that the film is VERY close to being finished, and you will all be seeing it VERY SOON!!! Here is one of the final backgrounds- final in the sense that it's at...
2020-11-18 23:21:22 +0000 UTC
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Just a background! A background for the film, to go behind things. Here it is without things in front of it!
2020-11-05 22:13:53 +0000 UTC
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Happy- Halloween!!! Here's the paper animation I made during October, which I hope has a certain Halloweenish quality to it. I think I'm starting to get the hang of this new-fangled """"paper"""".
The original frames will be sent off to Pen Pal patrons in the coming days 📬
2020-11-02 00:29:32 +0000 UTC
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Making cat kill bird (in the film, not in real life). Yes I know there's way too much animal death in everything I make I'm SORRY.
This particular variety of parrot is also very endangered, which made this an extra weird thing to draw and I'm sorry for that also.
2020-10-30 06:40:21 +0000 UTC
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I've been working on a shot that involves a large crowd of animals. In the film, they're all on screen at once, not for all that long, and each one is quite small- so you won't get the best look at them. It seems like a shame but the film is NOT ABOUT THEM. This gif is though! Here they all are bigger, with their own screen-time they don't have to share. Please excuse any scribbly line-art or bad colouring-in. As I said, they're all a lot smaller in the film.
All critters are real worl...
2020-10-22 00:57:54 +0000 UTC
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Hello here are a lot of pictures! There is context! I will tell it to you!
As you probably know, the top tier of this Patreon is one where I send you a physical drawing each month! It has finite spaces because I can obviously only do a finite number of drawings, but over time that limited number still adds up to quite a lot of drawing.
Lately, each drawing has doubled as a frame in a monthly paper animation (which I hope has made them even more special to recipients!...
2020-10-15 04:49:21 +0000 UTC
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This little brushtail is the closest this film has to a main character, but I don't think she has many appearances left! I thought I'd take the chance to show a quick breakdown of how I've been animating her, for most of her shots.
I start with her extremities like hands, feet and head using cut-out animation, then I fill in the middle with her blobby redrawn torso and tail.
Brushtail possum fur has a stippled, salt and peppery look, and there's colour variation but no clear divisio...
2020-10-06 08:15:44 +0000 UTC
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Hello all, and welcome to October! I have another little paper animation for you, from the World of Worms! (Wormld?)
The frames of this animation are also the ink drawings for my Pen Pal patrons this month! I'll be sending you your worms in the next day or so.
Now back to work on the non-paper, non-worm animation (actually that also has some worms in it, but what doesn't?)
2020-10-01 23:56:35 +0000 UTC
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