There are some gems in the treasure chest of work at Barcelona-based Actop created for both print and motion.
Here is their bio information from their site:
“Actop is a studio based in Barcelona and London operating as an open structure. We work on a wide range of media: Print, animation, motion graphics, live visuals and new approaches to the moving image. We feel comfortable in any discipline of communication: Festivals and events, commercials, music videos, magazines and of course our own projects.”
Brazillian Motion Agency Molho does the kind of work that melts your brain. Recently they conceived a two minute free-from motion piece for Maxhaus. Maxhaus is a Brazillian brand that specializes in modular custom lofts.
Molho studio is based in Sao Paulo and led b creative director Marcelo Garcia. The studio aims to conceptualize and produce ideas across all mediums and in very possible format.
Have a gander at their work for Maxhaus and be patient because they will soon have a full and proper website where you can review the rest of their work.
The super talented Chris Hewitt who goes by the name Dstrukt has just wrapped an impressive project for the Sci-Fi channel. The spot is very much in keeping with Hewitt’s kinetic style. The spot is a 60 second ident sequence for Sci-Fi Movies. Hewitt used an array of techniques ranging from live action, CGI and traditional animation. The project involved a wild 2 day live action shoot at Jason Tozer studio in East London where everything from exploding mirrors to burning orchids was filmed.
Art magazine ROJO, now has their own place on the web aptly named Rojo TV where you can both watch and submit your experimental motion graphics or videos. There is already some interesting content there. My only problem with the site is that you can’t embed the video. If you have a little time to kill and you need a little creative inspiration, there is some interesting content there to get you recharged.
London-based Up the Resolution have crafted some amazing creative in the form of commercials, music videos, and virals for clients both large and small. There is some really amazing work on their reel and there is also some great behind the scenes footage on their site.
Wow, crazy audiovisuals at Club Transmediale 2008 by Rishaug & Watz concert at Generator.x 2.0. It’s like my favorite classic 70’s graphic design come to life and set to music.
I saw Iron Man over the weekend and it was fantastic. It really was a great movie. Pure entertainment.
Something that jumped out at me was the closing credits. They were spectacularly designed and invoked memories of Tron from my youth. It was a testament to the amount of work put into the movie that they didn’t even stop at the credits.
The sequence was designed by Motionographer Danny Yount working for the really amazing motion firm Prologue. It’s a great sequence that makes you think future but calls on inspiration for the past. The combination of the two is what makes it classic.
Full Credits
Title designer: Danny Yount
Design & Animation: Ilya Abulhanov, Danny Yount, Alex Hansen, DongHo Lee, Dave Rinder
Compositing & Finishing: Anthony Mabin
Post Supervisor : Seth Kleinberg
Producer : Ellen Stafford
Executive Producer : Kyle Cooper
The amazing and talented group known as National Television launch their new site. They’ve always had a knack for creating flash sites that aren’t annoying.
1st Ave Machine is an NYC based CGI VFX/Animation studio and production company specializing in advertising, music videos, broadcast and feature film. They are known for their hyper-realistic organic animation. The studio was founded by animation and live action director Arvind Palep and executive producer Serge Patzak.
The stills above are from a recent AT&T commercial. The realism of the graphics have to be seen to be believed. They are absolutely stunning. Amazing work.
I saw this a while back and forgot to post it. The wildly-talented Wyld Stallyons recently teamed up with doodler-extraordinaire, Jon Burgerman. They created an animation utilizing Jon’s unique characters to promote the release of his new book. It’s interesting to see his characters animated. We contracted Burgerman at Cactus, to cover the Own Your C ride vehicle with his characters. He was very easy to work with and is a really talented guy. Check out the animation and look into picking up a copy of his book.
Shilo launched a new site this morning that appears to be their blog. It offers up an RSS feed of their latest work. The site is titled, ‘We Make It Good‘, which isn’t off the mark if you are familiar with Shilo’s work. Shilo is led by directors Jose Gomez and Andre Stringer.
They have been riding the bleeding edge of motion design for several years now and Jose is a very down to Earth all around nice guy. You can’t go wrong working with them from what I have heard from industry insiders. They are an Emmy award winning studio with offices now in New York, New York, and Del Mar, California.
Psyop has finished a follow up spot to their ground breaking Happiness Factory commercial from more than a year back. The original spot won almost every industry award imaginable. How they could even attempt to follow such an impactful spot with another that is equal in quality really warrants merit. The new spot is every bit as good as the first and is really incredible when considering how much work must have gone into it’s creation. I can’t think of many other television commercials that have been responsible for creating such a rich 3d environment.
I had never heard of The Inspiration Room but it’s definitely worthy of a bookmark. If you’re looking for inspiration in the world of motion graphics, graphic design, photography or commercials, this is the site for you. The site has a great user interface, and you can even submit your own work.
But inspiration of the name of the game, and I found some great work from Drew Flaherty. There’s not much info on Drew, except for the fact that he’s out of Australia. And his work is a smorgasbord different styles and types of work, everything from magazine covers to motion graphics. The picture above might be the least impressive of his work, but it’s definitely one that caught my eye.
The new Bjork video that one of our other Editors, Celeste wrote about earlier last week premiered today. The video was directed by the maddeningly creative minds at Encyclopedia Pictura. It really is an amazing video but then again so is pretty much every single video that has ever been produced for Bjork. She is a crazy little woman and that is why I love her so much.
You can now view the video in higher resolution via Motionographer here. There is also a nice ‘making of’ video available here at YouTube.
Here is some of John Whitney’s 1961 showreel entitled “Catalog.” John worked on films of numerous categories and collaborated with some pivotal players in the film & design industry, including Saul Bass on Hitchcock’s “Vertigo” title sequence. It might not look like much to us now, but 40 & 50 years back this was a pretty big step in the direction of what most of us refer to as motion graphics or oscilloscopy. John had a pretty unique sense of creativity, not only in his output, but in his production techniques as well. He used a mechanical analogue computer that he invented to do most of these animations. It’s kind of amazing to really see where these sort of things start up and gain their momentum. I constantly try to remind myself of the importance of somethings original meaning and how people can come together because of it. These combined endeavors can affect, not only each person’s ambition, but the industry’s as a whole. These rare collaborations between artists and designer go unseen and nearly unrewarded for most. When I find little pieces of history like this, it makes me feel like the world is a giant place and there is truly no limit to information and creativity.
Dvein has been making some design headlines as of late and now they have a website online. Dvein is a motion and interactive studio based out of a city I am dreaming of one day residing in, Barcelona. They provide art direction, design and animation for cinema, broadcast and music videos. They are also capable of storyboarding and co-developing at the conceptual phase. They consider themselves an open minded studio in an open minded city and are down to get in on at the proposal level as well. There work shows some amazing talent and their website is also very intuitively designed.
I noticed over the weekend that the all-powerful Buck had updated their website. They have also put together their reel for 2008 and it is absolutely marvelous. I put Buck down in a top 3 list of motion graphic agencies that we should consider using last year for our Own Your C campaign at Cactus. Unfortunately I didn’t get to work with them personally, but they ended up being selected by our other Art Director and actually agreed to work with a fairly low budget because they believed in the campaign. They showed a kind of integrity that is a rare thing in business. They really got behind the message that was driving the concept and gave it all they had. The end result was absolutely spectacular and everyone who had the chance to work with them thought they were far and away some of the nicest people they had ever had the opportunity to work with. Our office is still littered with the stickers and postcards they sent, and the spot they produced is arguably the best spot Cactus has ever been a part of.
They really stand firm behind good design and from what I have gathered, and took their name from one of my favorite people of all time, Buckminster Fuller (AKA Little Bucky). If you haven’t yet experienced their work, spend a little time at their site because it is impossible not to come away inspired. If you haven’t noticed, I am a fan.
Atop my “wants” list sits Uncredited, a book about title design in movies and the evolution of the process.
Uncredited is the first book to offer a general and historic insight into the role played by graphic design in films, from the dawn of cinema to the present day. It presents a critical analysis of the opening title sequences, thus throwing a light on the typographic work and composition of anonymous designers or of those rarely accredited. This book includes over 1,000 films and over 300 sequences of opening titles, from more than 150 creators. An analysis which, as well as revisiting the most well known artists such as Saul Bass, Pablo Ferro, Maurice Binder or Kyle Cooper; it uncovers the incursion of prestigious designers into this specialty such as Tibor Kalman, Milton Glaser, David Hillman, Juan Gatti or Simon Taylor.
The book is nearly a foot square and is about 350 pages, so it’s a pretty hefty book. But not only do you get to see a breakdown of various title designs on paper, but each book comes with a DVD (in Quicktime format) so you can watch the titles on a screen near you.
Originally written in Castilian, the book has been translated. And although Uncredited came out last summer, copies fly off the shelves so get yours while you still can. You can pick up your copy online at YouWorkForThem ($44.95), or if you want the Castilian version, you can find at Index Book (55€).
While on the subject of titles, imagine what the Star Wars opening credits would’ve looked like if Saul Bass did it. Need a visual? Click here.
And if you need even more credit design reading, check out this interview with Susan Bradley who’s done a ton of titles for Pixar movies as well as the graphic design for Ratatouille.
05/14 EDWARDS BACKS OBAMA A pleasant surprise for the Obama campaign today came in the shape of an endorsement from John Edwards. Do I smell a new VP on the Obama ticket?
05/12 EARTHQUAKE KILLS 9000 A terrible earthquake measuring 7.9 on the richter scale rocked Chengdu, China yesterday. Authorities are claiming it is the worst in decades and the death toll may now be close to 9000.
05/10 100,000 DEAD I am sure by now you have heard all about this but the scale of human tragedy is just shattering. As many as 100,000 may now be dead in the wake of the Myanmar cyclone. Please Myanmar, let foreign aid workers help you.
05/06 SDSU DRUG BUST Nearly 100 people, most of them students at San Diego State University have been arrested as part of a drug investigation. I am sure there will be plenty of room for them in the California Penal System. I think they are running short on inmates the last time I checked.
05/02 HEPARIN TAMPERING This case of what is now being called ‘deliberate’ tampering with the drug Heparin in order to substitute a cheap alternative and save money is deplorable. We have to hold the FDA to higher standards.
