Horsies

Just a quick montage of scans from this little animation project I’m working on, which involves some horses galloping, which can’t help but reference Eadweard Muybridge. I still remember how excited I got when I spun the zeotrope at the Science Center when I was a kid and saw the horse running through the slots. Remember that?

Anyway, I need to refine them a bit, but they actually already animate quite nicely in the inky washy way that I like.

Gooseplay

The illustrations for Gooseplay are now finished and the book will be self-published in the coming months. Here’s the final cover image and a few more colour illustrations. Learn and see more on my website.

Love to Patti

I recently finished reading Just Kids, Patti Smith’s memoir about her and famed photographer Robert Mapplethorpe’s early years in New York City. I’m sure you’ve all read it by now. It’s a beautifully written and inspiring story despite the sad ending. GOOD Magazine editor Ann Friedman sums it up well in her review for This Recording, “…it’s also “our story”—Patti and us. Patti and every woman who has felt within her a desire to create.” So true.

click images to enlarge

Ladies

The one new year’s resolution or whatever you want to call it that I seem to be coming through on is to draw more people. Drawn from photos I’ve been collecting in my “Ladies” folder, with ink on crappy paper with pleasing results. A couple are stars… Recognize anyone?

It’s Super 8 time.

I haven’t made a Super 8 film in about five years (woah), and the reason these two lovely ladies are on my desk is that I’ll be using them for a new short animation project I’m about to start work on very soon.

Digging them out got me all excited. I used to be a regular participant in the Montreal Super 8 Film Festival, where I made this film amongst others. Super 8 film cartridges are three minutes long and festival rules meant all editing was done in-camera, ie. figure out your shit, shoot it and screen it no matter what. Once I got in a bike accident while shooting but that’s another story…

For this project I’ll be filming backgrounds for my animation. I look forward to the touch of “real film” aesthetic it will give my piece. Speaking of which, is it ironic to take a photo of Super 8 cameras with a cell phone set on fake “old” photo mode? If so it wasn’t intentional, but appreciated in hindsight.