A Little Film About... Thomas Burden

A Little Film About... Thomas Burden is an inventive and inspiring look into the method and little madness of the film's titular 3D illustrator. In three minutes, Burden takes us through a day in his creative life, exploring the humble origins of his subject matter and style ( 60-70's National Geographic meets Argyll Story Catalog), the temperament of his quiet village home of Chichester, his home-life, and the intentions and motivations behind his work.

His pieces capture a vibe of child-like abandon and Clokey-like aestheticism. Burden is a meticulous illustrator and an adventurous tinkerer, smashing shapes together to create oddball creatures and miniature worlds of wonder. Check out more of his awesome work at his personal website, and give the guys and gals at Handsome Frank a nod too for making such a gorgeously Wes Anderson-esque video.

Making Of An Image - "Astrogirl" By Pac23

(Via)

Awesome Miami based illustrator Francisco Perez (Aka Pac23) just recently shared a really cool process piece for his stylish Astrogirl piece, in itself a really cool hybrid style illustration. The choice of mixing graphic elements with painterly elements gives the piece a semblance of a self contained narrative - The organic nature of the femme versus the rigid, industrialized suit that contains her, the idea of her imagination and wonderment at what she's witnessing being reflected off her visor..Quite a few possible ideas come to mind.

You can check out the step by step making of after the break, and don't forget that Pac also contributed his talents to one of the shirts in our store!

"Super Science Friends" - Making Of An Intro Animatic

If you've ever wanted to watch a show be developed from the ground up, you're in luck! We just stumbled into the development log of Super Science Friends, a show being developed in Toronto at Tinman Creative Studios. It seems like the show is relatively early in development yet, with this first sneak peek offering us a look into some of the potential opening sequences for this campy looking, Adult Swim-esque show. If you're interested in following the progress, give their Facebook page a like and you'll be there at ground floor as they work towards a pilot. Starring Winston Churchill, Nicola Tesla, Darwin, Freud, Tapputti and a young boy (Of course), that's one hell of a cast.

A team of super scientists travel through time fighting Nazis. They are the Super Science Friends! These are initial concept animatics for the show's intro.

The Art Of Ricochet188 - Birth Of A World

(Via)

One of the coolest things to stumble into in a growing artists gallery is the beginning of a core idea or narrative development driving illustrations. Catching these types of developments early on give us the joy of following an artist as he builds a world, which could at a later point become part of something much bigger. Ricochet188 is one of these artists currently embarking on that journey, with a series of illustrations following an ancient machine waking up for a dormant slumber and embarking on a journey in a dystopian future.

While the narrative is still in flux, with bits and pieces of narrative coming in here and there, pieces being reworked over and over again, the recurrence of certain characters solidifies the fact that certain ideas have taken hold. From what I've understood along the way this mysterious entity, comprised of a strange oily substance encounters a dying female cyborg whom ultimately joins him as part of his journey to discover what happened to the human race that crafted them.

The Turkish illustrator is onto something here, and I'd recommend heading over to his Deviantart page to read up on all his notes and bits of lore regarding this illustration series to get some insight into his thought process. Who knows, if he keeps going this could be the premise of a scifi feature in a matter of years or decades. I kind of wish more artists would take the initiative of trying to create their own worlds, although I do acknowledge that the fear of being derivative and the process of formulating a world is no overnight process. Check out more of Ricochet188's original, and as of  yet unnamed scifi project after the break.

The Gap - Overcoming Creative Obstacles

This piece directed by German director Frohlocke carries an excellent message, especially for any of our readers getting started in the creative industry. Getting started in this field is a major uphill battle, and getting your skills to where you want them to be takes a lot of time and blood, sweat and tears. Once you accept the fact that it'll never be easy, you'll be at peace and continue your growth..The key is to never give up. Just keep making stuff and try and improve with every piece, it tends to pay off.

Presented using a fun series of vignettes to illustrate the key words narrated by David Shiyang Lius, it's a healthy reminder that persistence ultimately pays off. From a personal standpoint, after 6 years of working in the game industry I think this message rings absolutely true.

"Life After Pi" - An Intimate Look Into The Troubled VFX Industry

Life After Pi is a documentary born out of a deep sense of frustration over a completely broken system in Hollywood, one that's adversely affected over 21 US VFX Studios in the last ten years or so. In an article that we wrote last year, we noted how foreign subsidies were driving VFX studios to bankruptcy by stretching them extremely thin and forcing them to bid lower and lower for movie projects: Ryhtm and Hues was just one of the companies to fall victims to this trend at a most inopportune time back in 2013, going into bankruptcy while winning Oscars for Life of Pi simultaneously. At the time it seemed baffling that such a thing could happen, but troubling rumors started to pop up while last years Oscars were ongoing.

The event that caused a large stir in the VFX industry came about when director Ang Lee and the Cinematographer completely failed to acknowledge the hundreds of (Now jobless) people that poured their life into making their CG heavy movie a success. This unified artists from many different fields to share their disdain for the current state of the movie industry, which has paid no regard to fostering the home grown studios that made dozens of their movies into visually stunning box office hits. Life After Pi goes into what happened at the studio during and after this period, and the type of broken system in Hollywood that has been driving many studios into bankruptcy.

Considering that we've seen little to no acknowledgement of this problem from studios, we'd encourage you as a reader to share this documentary wherever you can to educate people on this issue. Especially with the Oscars around the corner, it wouldn't hurt to see actors or directors acknowledge the hundreds of people working long, unpaid hours in the VFX trenches out of love for their craft. The same could be said about many other creative industries, where figureheads get all the credit for the work of hundreds. There needs to be a change.

Jeff Gabor's "Epic" Animation Reel

Animator Jeff Gabor just released this truly fascinating reel showcasing his process for cinematic animation on Blue Sky's 2013 feature, Epic in all it's different stages. I think it's awesome to get a behind the scenes glimpse as to how animators bring different scenes to life. In Gabor's world he plays the role of everyone and really gets into it to deliver the best performance possible. To some companies, it's just as important to see the process of the artist as the final product before hiring, keep that in mind.

On a side note, Blue Sky's Epic was a truly fascinating example of the type of damage that kneejerk media coverage can cause to a movie's reputation. When the movie came out and had a slow opening weekend, every single news outlet, movie forum and person I knew was quick to label it as a 'bomb,' dismissing it without even giving the movie a chance. After doing some research I learned it had actually grossed over $260 million worldwide on a budget of $93 million. After watching it it's actually not half bad, just a good case of misleading word of mouth and overshadowing by other features.

Everything Is A Remix - The Iphone Case Study

We've featured Kirby Ferguson time and time again for his Everything is a Remix series- a compelling look at how everything is inspired by something at some point. Over time he's done some truly fascinating studies on movies, music and beyond, and his latest installment turns the magnifying glass over at Apple's iPhone, a product that could not have existed without the innovations pioneered by many other companies. Time and time again we've been shown that some of the best inventions were simply created by remixing existing technologies or concepts.

From a website standpoint, two examples come to mind: A)Facebook, which pretty much killed Myspace by taking the idea of a social platform and streamlining it and B)Reddit, which was created to fill a void created by the disastrous Digg V4 implementation, which stripped power from the users. And honestly this mentality applies to just about any creative field. Every creation is inspired by something that came before it.

Musical Laser Forest and Company Is All Kinds of Awesome

Lasers are cool and if you disagree than I'm not really sure what's wrong with you. This video gives an in-depth look at the creative process for three of the coolest interactive displays I've seen to date. While the Musical Laser Forest acts as a giant instrument for visitors, the tech behind real-time projection mapping is absolutely mind-blowing.

We've showcased the work of Marshmellow Laser Feast in the past, but being able to see what drives the crew is an experience in itself.