New York: Falling Into Gravity With Ron Cole

I’ve been out in New York for the past couple of days, clearing my head and doing some early development and pre-viz for my next Tertiary Animation project. It’s been a great and much needed change of scene for my creative mind.



One of the highlights of my trip so far was getting to visit the Mysterious Ron Cole in his Long Island studio. In the last year or so, Ron Cole has risen out of obscurity to some sort of underground stop-motion animation god. All based on a 1 minute trailer for his upcoming short film “In The Fall Of Gravity” that he posted on the internet. The 12 minute short is a revolutionary experiment involving animatronic stop-motion. This new technology that Ron is developing could very well change the way stop-motion animation is done in the future, as well as improve the quality beyond cartoons.



When I got to his basement studio, I was EXTREMELY excited, as I have been a fan of his trailer since it first surfaced on the web almost a year ago. Nothing could prepare me for what I was going to see. We journeyed through the various set areas and he introduced me to Isomer and Trevor, the stars of the film. What blew me away was how giant these puppets were, I couldn’t believe it. Moving them around was a dream, they had wonderful ball and socket armatures, and then Ron started to play with their robotics, moving the mouths and eyebrows around, seeing them come to life was truly magical. The type of facial features and movements they make are like nothing I have ever seen in this industry.





The sets were beautiful, hand panted, leaves and vines crawling up the rails. I just wanted to touch it all. What surprised me was that all the backgrounds were hand painted and right there, no blue screen. The painstaking detail apparent in each one was mind-boggling.



The real treat, though, was getting to be the first person (other than the composer) to watch the finished “In The Fall Of Gravity” film. And let me tell you, all you stop-mo fans that have been salivating over his trailer for the last year; it is well worth the wait. The final film is stunningly beautiful, and I watched the entire time with my jaw on the floor. The trailer doesn’t show anything compared to what the film has in store for you. The animation is top notch; the visuals are beautiful and fun. I’m pretty sure the deep, philosophical story was compelling too, but I was so captivated by what I was watching, not much else got through. It is a sensory overload and demands multiple viewings to truly take it all in and get the full affect.



We spent the rest of the afternoon talking about animation and technology, I showed him my Fox & Calf shorts, and I got to know his really cool family. He shared with me how he did all the low-tech effects in the film and my head almost exploded. It’s funny that even I assume everybody does everything digitally. And his tricks were brilliant. So brilliant, in fact, that I feel as if giving them away on this blog would be the same as me telling you how his film ends. Hopefully he will do a “making-of” featurette on his DVD and give us all a glimpse at how his brilliant mind works, and still defies the computers.

I had an amazing experience with Ron and his family, and his puppets, and left feeling very inspired. How often does that happen? I cannot wait until everyone else can see what he’s done and feel the same!

Took Baby Steps Today

Due to a fairly busy schedual today doing a million things other than clay-animation, I only got a few things accomplished today, but some of it's pretty cool. First off I've been painting the cocker spaniel's dress (it's taking a lot of layers for the acrylic to become opaque), also I painted the calf's horns yellow (also you can see the beginning of the fox's half-body armature being built in the back).But in VERY COOL NEWS I've begun sculpting the hippo character. This is my first hippo, and I think he'll be really great. I personally mixed his color.Let's hope there's a bunch more to show tomorrow!

Still Been Workin' Some More

Sorry I'm not explaining any of my progress, but at this point I feel it's pretty self explanitory. These two characters have half-armatures, meaning they won't walk, but will be great for above the waist shots.

Still Been Workin'

Armatures!!!!!

I’ve been keepin’ myself busy over at Tertiary, having fun making these great characters. Unlike Frog Family and Critter Song, the characters in this production are having armatures built for them, which will allow them to do a great deal more things than the non-armature characters, mainly walk.
The first step to building an armature (The way I do it at least), is to twist two pieces of wire together with an electric drill on one end and some pliers at the other end. Then I take some plumber’s epoxy putty and put it on the wire. You want to cover all the wire with a thin bit of putty. The putty represents the “bones” of the characters, so leave exposed wire where you want the joints to be.
Above you can see the armatures with the heads so you can get a better idea about the characters’ proportions.
My initial sculpt of the fox was way to large and would have been problematic so I had to scale him down. Here you can see the difference in sizes. The lighter the head, the more capable he’ll be at various movements.
Before I can start sculpting the clay onto the armatures, I first have to melt some on to bond with the armature, this will keep the clay sticking to it much better, and keep the armature from busting out of the character’s flesh like some cheap 80’s horror flick. I used a double boiler (I pan within a pan of boiling water) to melt the clay and then applied it to the armatures.
WARNING: If you plan on doing this, make sure you are in a very well ventilated space, with lots of windows open, etc. The clay fumes can get nasty. Also remember to not cook the clay directly on a stove top pan, use the double-boiler, because it keeps the fumes to a minimum, and keeps the clay from burning.
This is a very brisk description of how this is all done, maybe in the future I’ll go into a lot more detail for those who are interested. Until then, I should probably get back to work. Ciao!

Brown Character Looks Upward

Here’s a little fella I’ve been working on. There’s toothpicks in his ears, also, I used brown clay for his body.

Anatomy Of A Frog-Thing

Hey, I’m in between shots right now so I’m in the process of cleaning up the characters. The clay tends to get messy and dirty and ugly after it’s been manhandled over and over, frame by frame. So sometimes when I’m going to change camera angles, I take the chance to remove the characters from the set to repair them. This usually consists of tearing them apart and rebuilding them, and also smoothing out the clay. Sometimes the clay gets spots on it from other colored clay or bits of styrofoam. Sometimes there are just nicks in it from my fingers or tools. Here you’ll see Daddy Frog with his legs removed. They were getting a bit torn apart so wanted to make them sturdy again, you can also see the toothpicks I use for support. While not the best armatures in the world, toothpicks are great for characters who don’t do too much movement (It saves you a lot of time not having to build an unnecessary armature).

Here is Baby Frog without his eyes, I really needed to clean up his face, and smooth out his clay.

Lastly, here’s Baby Frog’s replacement mouths, made from baked clay. So Exciting!

Big Bulky Characters

When I'm building big, bulky characters like the Frog Family who have very limited movement and don't have to walk on legs or carry things, I usually don't use armatures. Armatures are skeletons that help support the character, and I usually build them out of wire and epoxy putty. If there is no major limb-movement, but I still want to have a little support for the various appendages, I'll use toothpicks. Most of my characters have tons of toothpicks in them, I love to use them. I also build up most of the body mass with dirty clay and cover it with clean clay of the right color for the exterior. This is a great way to recycle used clay, and save time when you have to mix your own color (which can be tough and time-consuming) by only making enough to cover the outside.