Clumsy Claus (2001)

Back in December 2001 I made this short film to share with family and friends at Christmas. I was in grade 12, I had been editing on the computer with very limited skills for about a year, and because of a communication technology class most of my productions from 2001 had been stop motion.

For the last 5 years I assumed I had lost this project for good. I had no record of the footage or the location of the finished film, and I didn't get too hung up about it because I assumed the project was just a waste anyway. Then just recently on a nostalgia kick I found an old CD and on it was an .mpeg of Clumsy Claus.

It's funny because the CD was clearly from 2001, and despite all the work that went into the project at the time, this little 40mb file was all I had to show for that entire memory. I hadn't seen the project in years, and suddenly after seeing it again I realized it wasn't nearly as awful as I thought it was. In fact, I found myself so excited to see it again that I felt it was worthy of a bit of restoration.

The movie itself is essentially the same, I just tightened up what I could and improved the quality of the credits; both of which I had little control of on my basic editing software back then. We didn't even have a DVD drive yet to back things up.

The memory of making the project is a flashback to a different mindset. I made it before I went to university, before YouTube existed and when downloadable music and home editing was just starting to thrive. The idea of having a blog or uploading my videos to the Internet seemed incredibly complicated and expensive, and I made projects knowing full well that maybe only 10 to 20 people would see them.

In the case of Clumsy Claus, I was 17 and I wanted to make a Christmas movie. I'm just happy that after all these years, a bit of new technology, and the fact that I'm still interested in making movies, I'm able to share this project in a way that seemed so far off when it was originally created.

Awesome Editing in 'The Pez Song'

I've always had a soft spot for stop motion, and with Halloween just around the corner some Pez candy seemed quite fitting also. This video was made by a fellow you-tuber who I've been subscribed to for some time. 'The Pez Song' was made months ago, but it's proven to be his most popular edit and one of my personal favourites. For the record, the music is original.

Amazing Editing in 'Junket Animation'

This video is an excellent example of the ingenuity possible with limited resources. I've always been a big believer that it's about the concept, not the equipment, that really dictates the success of a project. Here's more evidence to support it. A couple of university students made this stop motion film and cut it to a song by Sabrepulse. Simple and clear concept + top notch editing and animation = really fun to watch.

Lost Animation

Back in 2004 I took an animation class where for my final project I ended up making a claymation project called Over at Grandpa's. The premise was simple: an old man goes to change a light bulb, shocks himself, and gets the energy to dance the day away. The project was completed, but I've only got a rough copy of it on film. I can't even transfer it because the film is so rough. It's kind of a shame, but I was thinking about all of this because last night I was going through some old picture CDs and actually found the scanned images of the backgrounds I had drawn. To clarify, the old man was plasticine and he pretty much just ran through these various scenes on his dancing escapade - it was a stop motion test really. Here's the proof the project even existed.

Update - You can view the film strip from this project here.

Lost Claymation

I found this picture today by accident on one of my picture CDs. It was from a claymation project that I had planned on making in the summer of 2005 that never happened. It was actually based on one of my first stop motion projects, One Banana (2001). 

In that movie a tribesman makes numerous attempts to get a banana from a tree.  This film was pretty much going to be a remake (Two Banana) but with better animation. For as many claymation projects as I've done, about half of them never got passed the making characters stage. No lie, some of the ones that did get done are pretty painful to watch; clearly experiments. At least the characters always looked cool. I probably still have the materials for Two Banana stored away back home, maybe I'll pick it up again one of these days.