Reel of the Month Club (Dec. 2024): Coat of Arms
December 21, 2024
Ringling College students Michael Bidinger and Michelle Kwon hit every beat perfectly in their graduation film, a four-minute romantic comedy called “Jinxy Jenkins, Lucky Lou.”
The refined character design, animation subtleties and clever story arc (combined with the breezy original core by Mason Self and sound design by Nick Ainsworth) make it easy to forget you’re watching a student film and not the trailer for a new Disney feature. [Watch]
The Method Design team in New York twist classical Middle Eastern architecture into a hyper-detailed and carefully lit 3D broadcast promo toolkit designed by Danny Yount and Prodigal Pictures for FX Network’s new drama “Tyrant.”
According to Method: “The abstract frames will allow for the addition of text elements and a set of transitional elements were also provided. The artists paid particular attention to creating a detailed version of the logo treatment which is revealed front and center. The Method crew’s toolkit included Maya, V-Ray and Nuke.” [Watch]
The four members of new French directing collective Brutus (Thibaud Clergue, Aurélien Duhayon, Sébastien Iglesias and Camille Perrin) all graduated from the animation program at the Arles campus of Supinfocom in 2012 and just dropped us their first short film: a grindhouse-flavored concoction of speed and death called “Horde.”
“We tried to find an original look for this film so we mixed different kinds of renders. We also mixed different kinds of animation like a pose to pose in 12 fps for the characters, and a more fluid animation for clothes and props. We mainly used 3ds Max with V-Ray, Mari, Flash, Photoshop and After Effects.” [Watch]
No doubt time-lapse films are everywhere these days and some say the time for time-lapse has lapsed. But director Timothy Melville and cinematographer Nathan Kaso are out the convince you otherwise with this sweeping branded film for Australian car maker Holden, shot over seven nights across the wilderness of Tasmania.
“We travelled over 2,000km through the barren hills of Queenstown, to the vibrant streets of Hobart and finished on the dolerite plateau of Ben Lomond National Park. We captured nearly 20,000 still images, shooting from dusk until dawn and averaged just four hours sleep per day.” [Watch]
LOL and NSFW, The Onion nails it with this behind the scenes “Sneak Peek At Ninja Turtles’ Hyper-Realistic CGI Genitals.” Laugh (and cry) here. [Watch]
All is not what it seems in the aptly named “Scale,” a lovingly rendered 3D short directed by Annie Hua, Arthur Graff, Kevin Monnier and Ouirich Bounthavy in pursuit of their Master’s degree at ATI in Paris. Music by Alexandre Chaigneau. [Watch]
French directing duo Quentin Baillieux and Raphaëlle Tinland (aka Parallel) strike an artful and atmospheric balance of 2D and 3D techniques in this online brand film animated by Ann lou Erambert for Italian watch makers Anonimo who carve (rather than cast) the cases for their timepieces out of solid brass. [Watch]
Paris directing collective PLANKTOON (aka Sun, Alban, Fabrice, Alexandre and Sebastien) step outside their usual realm of fun/colorful 3D character work for this powerful monochrome fundraising appeal created for French AIDS charity Sidaction thru Passion Paris and Leo Burnett. If you have kids of any age, it’s hard not to get caught up in the drama of the vignettes. [Watch]
TBWA\Media Arts Lab references everything from The Simpsons and Pac-Man to the Cookie Monster, Hello Kitty and the Beats logo in this highly likable ode to the love users have for their MacBook Airs. Lovers of Separated at Birth (like myself) will enjoy pointing out the similarities to a certain Google Play spot produced by The Mill earlier this year…
Zeitguised, Berlin’s grand masters of cool weirdness, help launch Odiseo Magazine No.4 with this clip called “sim | stim” which they describe as “a cargo cult of sensual nano-alchemy.”
Commissioned by independent Spanish CD Carlota Santamaría, and creative directed by Santamaría and Albert Folch for Odiseo, the film “celebrates temporary mummification of the body by engaging in an erotic relationship with shape changing clouds of synthetic material.” [Watch]
London branding powerhouse DixonBaxi just launched their new site with a slew of new work including this punchy broadcast redesign for Sony TV across Latin-America anchored by clean typography, flat graphics and sleek CG. [Watch]
Glassworks Amsterdam director/animator Daniel Hope takes liberties with the natural order of predator-prey releationships in these two CG-masquerading-as-stop-motion clips for the bi-annual ad-scene networking events in Amsterdam called X-Pollination. [Watch]
Gary Basemen launched a Kickstarter film project today inspired by the heroics of his father Ben Baseman who escaped death at the hands of the Nazi’s twice and then fought against them as a partizan for four years.
Baseman and director David Charles need the cash to travel to the Ukraine “to uncover the Holocaust experiences of Baseman’s parents, and re-imagine their heroic stories through an inspiring, fantastical, heart-wrenching odyssey.”
A worthy cause made all the more appealing with very collectable pledge perks and prizes including this limited edition Partizan poster co-designed by Baseman and Shepard Fairey based on an old photograph of Baseman’s father.
A warm, dreamlike tale of reverse evolution from director Rok Predin and producer Richard Barnett at Trunk in London, this new CG short called “One of a Kind” features 70 characters bound together by a quietly commanding VO from actor Jim Carter (“Shakespeare in Love,” “Downtown Abbey”) and music by [Watch]
