The Illusionist

Some pictures have been finally released by Pathe from the film I worked on in Scotland that had the working title "The illusionist". It is a film directed by Sylvain Chomet and is his second feature film after first making the Triplets of Belleville. Thats a must see by the way if you haven't already seen it. I have no idea though when the film is due to be finally released , so I am curious like a lot of other people as to when we get to see it in the flesh, on the big screen.



The image above is from a scene I actually worked on: I animated and cleaned-up the Shepherd and Tati and Olivier Malric did the sheep and effects and Jean-Pierre Bouchet did the compositing. I cant remember who actually did the layout and background, but as you can see it was done really well and has a great atmosphere.

There is another blog entry on the film as well as some other atmospheric stills. Its not a lot, but it gives you a good taste of how the film will look. In the mean time we must wait and see when it will come, but I will certainly blog it once I know.

Later.

Rudolf

Well its been a while between drinks and since my last blog I have been working on a new TV series called Rudolf. Its a real contrast to the stuff I worked on in Scotland, going from realistic to a completley cartoony style. The character Rudolf basically goes from door to door selling something different each time ( episode that is) to an unsuspecting customer or should I say its more unsuspecting for Rudolf. Either way it ends up being a chain reaction of funny gags that have a cause and effect that liken it to Ren and Stimpy somewhat, just not as subversive and caters more for kids and adults alike.
Its produced by JEP animation and they have set it up in a way that each animator animates a whole episode which are approximatley 3 minutes long.This includes most effects as well as all characters. Which is great as you basically or almost have the episode to your name from a raw animation point of you and of course you dont need to worry about how scenes hook up as you are more or less dealing with yourself with regards to this. So far I have 3 episodes under my belt with a couple more to come and it has been really quite a fun experience and a refreshing change from the more traditional stuff I have worked on.
The director is a Belgian chap named Rudi Mertens who also does all the storyboards . For him its all about good laughs, so as long as you produce a chuckle he's a happy man. A good philosophy you'd have to say. I think it will be a really good to watch , its the kind of humour we all need when you have had a crap day at work and need a good laugh to calm the nerves. You can check out the trailer that was animated by Rudi at the link above at JEP animation and just go to" productions" and there it is "Rudolf".
I 'm not sure exactly when it comes out but it will be at least another six months I guess, but I will announce it as soon as it does and put some rough animation from the episodes I worked on online.

Fishing

This is one of a handful of illustrations I have been working on with querky fishing scenarios. There are a couple other new ones on my illustration page.

Perkler Animation (not final sync!)

This is a freelance project I did recently for an online portal called Perkler.

I made the film using Flash combined with traditional 2D animation techniques. My work involved concept, layout, storyboarding, character design and animation of course. It's an intro film on their landing page which describes in short how to use their website but with a little bit of flare. It started off with three illustrations that I did for their website. Then they really liked the little perkler-man so they asked me to turn it into an animation and here is the finished result.

The Perkler guys have created a handy website that allows you to manage all of your loyalty programs in one place and connect with other Perk lovers. Check out their website at www.perkler.com - besides my film on their homepage - there are some additional promotional videos that give you a good taste of what they're all about.

Sound was done by Heiner d`Alquen from picturemusic in Cologne who have excellent experience and great ideas.