2021 here we come!

A belated but very heartfelt happy new year to each and every one of you.

2021 has some VERY exciting plans in the works for us, and that means we can really help you in more areas of animation, rigging and all those lovely little areas around it. We’ve been heavily experimenting with natural media effects in Toon Boom, so look out for more on that this year too (as you can see a taste of in the animation below!)

I hope your year has started well and that the news isn’t getting you down. If it is, I have a 3 step plan which I can guarantee works 99% of the time (it’s free too).

1) Place all the items you receive news on in a room together
2) Shut the door on the room. Avoid at all costs
3) Have a nice drink and stare out the window at the wonders of nature

😀

Adam

N.B: That little joke there isn’t meant to be insensitive, just my nod to the mental war we’re all waging on the disasters on our screens right now. It’s exhausting, I know! There is light though, so keep the faith 🙂

New animation training

A little update from the world of animation training. As you may know, I’ve been running the side project turned mega beast Toon Boom Trainer. I say mega beast as at times it takes over my life! But it IS fun and I get a huge kick from running the courses and seeing people come on with their learning.

What’s this new name about?

Toon Boom Trainer has been going for 3 years now (time flies!) and it’s now time for a change. So from the end of May, Toon Boom Trainer will become….

Adam's Animation Academy

The new logo

To start with I’ll be running the same courses, but the idea is to allow for easier expansion and training over a much broader area of animation. It’s exciting! I’m really proud of the site that’s been created as the student experience is very friendly and easy to track progress in. I’ve also go a blog set up and plans for plenty of free content, so DO sign up for the email updates when you head over 🙂

You said new course, right?

Our newest course, Advanced Animation in Toon Boom Harmony opens for sign ups as of today! Sign up via the image link below. It’s going to be a fantastic ride through the world of character animation, resulting in a showreel-worthy piece of performance. Read more on the new site, but I think you’ll love it!

Advanced Animation in Toon Boom

Lots of great exercises and tips to get your character animation SINGING!

Happy Easter!

Last Sunday I found myself in the unusual situation of enforced lockdown on a sunny day. We’d taken our dog, Wilson out for his walk already and had done the jobs that needed to be done, so it was a free afternoon. The sun was streaming in the living room window and the music was forming a comfy background to settle into. Alas, hand drawn animation became a THING for the day! I haven’t done hand drawn animation for FUN for many years, and it was ACE to come back to my animation gateway drug 🙂 It did make me realise how loooooong hand drawn stuff takes, but it was very relaxing and enjoyable to make anywho. Cheesy music courtesy of Apple iMovie. Animation made in Rough Animator for the iPad.

MAF update

So far so good at #MAF2019 (or Manchester Animation Festival 2019…to the non initiated!) Great making of talk with Aardman (@aardmananimations) and brilliant to finally see Swallows of Kabul in the evening. As a quick reminder, I’m talking from 10.30am tomorrow (Thursday 14th November 2019) in the event space about animation work and the greatness of Toon Boom. If you have a festival pass, come along! It will be a great introduction to the software, perfect for those curious about what it can do and how best to use it.

MAF 2019 swag

MAF 2019 swag including notable additions of chocolate bee emblem and lovely pin badges. 10 out of 10!

Manchester animation festival talk

I’ll be talking about all things animation and Toon Boom next week at Manchester’s very own animation festival. It’s pretty impressive these days with loads of great events and screenings, so I’d encourage you to go. You can read the whats on guide here.

Here’s the info for my talk. If you’re around, please do come say hello!

Annecy Animation Festival 2019

It’s been a few weeks now but I’ve finally got a bit of time to sort my post-Annecy notes and sketches. I haven’t been for a while, this being my fourth trip. It never fails to inspire you and re-ignite your love for animation! You come away wanting to DRAW haha!

The ticketing system is a bit more high tech than when I last went…all QR code scanning and app booking. It took me a few days to get the hang of this as I seemed to have missed booking ANYTHING. Luckily I bagged an additional screening of ‘I lost my body’ (j’ai purdu mon corps) which was being produced at the last studio I worked at (Pipangai) on Réunion Island.

This film was EPIC. Exactly the kind of animation and storytelling I love to see in a feature at the moment, as it felt very fresh and engaging. It was a bit of a downer of a film. I mean, it’s French so of course it’s moody 😉 But it is beautiful in the way it was executed and blows the socks off anything else in the independent circuit right now. The first 5 minutes are sooo cool. It’s not the sort of shot choices you see in a 2D animated film (probably because of the directors background and the combining of 3D and 2D tools). Here’s a trailer:

I got my head around the ticketing eventually and saw a load of great short films (for me, these are the best bit of festivals). The range of styles and forms the storytelling takes is the big THING that inspires me. I wrote a bunch of notes along side sketches, hence why the long decode time as I’m often writing in the dark..! I met many lovely people there including old friends, which is always a big highlight. I got to chat away to many folks at Toon Boom whom I’ve never met in person, but I’ve recently completed some promo work for as part of their 25th anniversary. You can watch that below:

There’s a whole section of the Annecy festival called Mifa, which is sort of the business area. You can have meetings here, go check out companies who make software, studios who are recruiting, and so on. You’ll often get some freebies too! I did a fair amount of chatting here, so the week was quite busy all in all. I DID manage to squeeze some sketching in though. I’ve also got a collection of sketches from my half day in Geneva before I headed home, which I’ll aim to post soon. I’d like to add some colour to more of these, as the scenery was so bright and often I didn’t get time to paint on location. The storms rolled in for a few days, which meant there was a real contrast! Could’ve just spent a week there sketching and painting, never mind all the films! Here’s a gallery of sketches and many more photos (iPhone is just a bit too easy). I took a disposable black and white camera that I bought in the airport on a whim. When I get those developed, I’ll post a few! I met one of my heroes, Ronnie Del Carmen there. He as a lovely chap and I’ve been a fan of his work and comics for years. We have a lo-fi selfie, so I’ll be sure to post him one when the roll is finished 🙂

Nexus film fest and Nottingham’s scene

I’ve been entering the (free) festivals with my little film ‘Who Moved My Penguin?’ since it was finished in February this year. I’ve been lucky enough to get in a few too, which is very nice! I love watching things on the big screen, and one of those was in my hometown of Nottingham. The festival was called Nexus and took place at the swanky new arts venue, Metronome (new to me anyway…think it’s been there a few years now).

My film was in a session of animation, music videos, documentaries and comedy. It was a brilliant display of variety and talent, and I came home very inspired! Some of the highlights for me included a short film about ghosts from their perspective and some great music videos for local bands.

The film is also showing in the USA, Russia and of course lovely old England. It was the first time I’d seen it on the big screen though, so a brilliant milestone. Now I’m looking forward to making the next short, and of course working on this comic / graphic novel that is taking form. More to post in a few weeks, if I get chance before my brother’s wedding..! Best man speech to write and all… 😉

Nexus film festival

A true to life capture of myself trying to find the front door to Metronome in Notts.

Penguin film alliance!

Boggle Sox alliance

I have some exciting news: as of last week, my recent short animated film, Who moved my Penguin? is screening exclusively through Adastra’s channel, BoggleSox. The channel also screens such properties (fancy word for stuff, tangible or not) as Grandpa in my Pocket, Bounty Hamster and Spider! Funnily enough, you can see my fiancee, Josie (as of Feb 14th!) in the show Ha Ha Hairies on there, too!

It’s really great to get the film seen by such a large audience (50 million channel views and counting!) with the bonus of being around the brilliant shows mentioned above. I’d LOVE to create more of these little films but it’s all down to funds to do so. They’re not expensive (I can actually make them quickly, in animation terms) but I still need money to live 😉 If you are looking to fund some new short animated series work, LET’S TALK! 😀 I’d love to hear from you.

Here’s the film again, updated to it’s new place on the web. As of last week it became inactive on my Vimeo and YouTube accounts, ready for this launch. At that time, it had amassed over 40,000 views. I’m chuffed with that! My last proper short film was during university and with the internet not being the beast it is now, it garnered nowhere near as much eyeballing. Festival submissions and DVD posting ruled back then! Ahhh sweet 2007…

 

Sepia life drawings

sepia life drawings

Time for another life drawing post! This outing onto the paper was great as I actually felt I captured more of what I was going for in each image. The model had brilliant figure and structure for drawing, with the outside orange street lighting casting an unusual fringe glow. I was using a slightly sepia paper already, so started sketching in a burnt umber/dark sepia charcoal stick pastel thing…I’m not exactly sure what it was! It definitely helped me loosen up though and focus on what I was drawing a bit better. I try out different styles when I’m doing it, mainly to have fun and experiment, but also sometimes it gives me these happy accidents 🙂

Who moved my Penguin?

Who moved my Penguin

Here it is! The short film I made about basically being kind to one another, no matter where in the world you come from. It’s around 2 minutes long and you can watch below (note: this video is now playing from BoggleSox’s channel due to a streaming partnership with them).

Where does the story come from?

The story came about from watching all this news on refugees trying desperately to get away from their homeland, and the very mixed reception that people gave them. I didn’t want to make a film that was preachy or too political, as I feel like there’s enough depressing things out there already! My aim was to tell a lighter version which can be viewed by all, with a core message of kindness and empathy.

The picture pin board sequence works around the idea that circumstances affecting the movement of people are often out of their control. This is shown through the easy life of a young Westerner, with details of their affluent life scattered around the photos. The actual pictures are representative of the exotic holidays that rich tourists ‘take and tick off’ on their individual road to self affirmation. the only interaction with the world outside their bubble being a throw away, filtered photo or an ‘awareness’ post on social media. These are just fleeting moments to them, like the worldwide, disaster news they scroll through online everyday.

But I believe people are still fundamentally good! And so this is the end to the story. So be kind to one another people 🙂

Original sketch for the film

One of the first sketches for the film

How was the film made?

The film was made in Toon Boom Harmony using Adobe Premier, After Effects, Audition & Photoshop for certain parts. I started the film as an exercise for rigging demos (a hand drawn character that is rigged up like a skeleton) but it evolved past that, probably because it took so long to finish! I actually believed that the Syrian refugee crisis would be ‘over’ by the time I finished and no longer in the news, but alas… The film was started in 2016 but often was put off due to work commitments and other projects. I finally came to the realisation that I needed to be brave and just finish it towards the end of 2018, when my girlfriend and I were robbed in Mauritius and I was also reading The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron…but that is story for a different post!

There’s an original score by Richard Hunter (it was great to work with him too..thanks Richard!) and assisting direction from Josie Cerise…saving me from moments of madness 😉

Who moved my Penguin promo image

If you have any questions about the film or the process, just send them over from the contact page. I hope you enjoy it!

Copyright © Adam Oliver 2024.