dirty hands blog

Whew. So long since a fresh new Animation Hotline video. It felt...

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 11:11:05 -0500

Whew. So long since a fresh new Animation Hotline video. It felt so good to do whatever I wanted to do and not have to try to make sure it looked good or looked right and could experiment and make mistakes and just have fun.

I have a chance to go to Cannes this year with the Animation Hotline, so I’ve got two things. First, I need people to leave messages about ‘The Other’. See the website for a more detailed description of what I’m looking for. But if I choose your message it will be played and premiered at Cannes in May 2012. The second thing is that I’m looking for help to fund me attending a networking workshop at the festival (Cannes) so if you know anyone who wants to help with that, again, information on the website.

animationhotline.org

I’ve been watching a bunch of Queen videos on youtube...

Wed, 14 Dec 2011 11:11:06 -0500

I’ve been watching a bunch of Queen videos on youtube lately and I told my friend about it. Today when he came over he said, “Did you just draw Freddie Mercury?” Um, wow, yeah, I guess I did.

Animation Hotline is a series of daily animations where I use messages left on my voicemail for content. When you get a chance please leave me a message, and honestly it’s best if you leave more than one because sometimes what you think is the perfect message might simply be impossible for me to animate in one day. This project is only as good as the messages that you leave me, so if you feel so inspired, call!

animationhotline.org

To leave a message call…
inside US: +1 212-683-2490
international (skype): animationhotline

Animation Hotline is a series of daily animations where I use...

Tue, 13 Dec 2011 11:12:05 -0500

I used some new techniques with this one. The last scene has...

Mon, 12 Dec 2011 11:12:06 -0500

I used some new techniques with this one. The last scene has three layers, the image, a mask of the person walking and a still image of another painting. I haven’t really used a lot of post-production in the past, but it was nice to try different things and layer the images.

A little light on the color, but sometimes I feel like I rely...

Fri, 09 Dec 2011 11:12:05 -0500

A little light on the color, but sometimes I feel like I rely too heavily on color and sometimes I need to just make something with a simple line and little or no color.

Electric Literature had me do one of the Single Sentence...

Thu, 08 Dec 2011 11:14:05 -0500

Electric Literature had me do one of the Single Sentence Animations for them. They give you a sentence from one of their stories and then let you do what you want with it. The sound is a high school show choir singing a rendition of Surfing USA, it’ll make more sense if you read the story.

Classic Pat and Vannah, on Vannah’s first day at the...

Wed, 07 Dec 2011 11:15:05 -0500

Classic Pat and Vannah, on Vannah’s first day at the office. Does Pat say something greasy?

I know this isn’t so much using the chalkboard, but...

Thu, 03 Nov 2011 11:11:05 -0400

I know this isn’t so much using the chalkboard, but sometimes it’s fun to switch it up a little bit and try something different.

I was thinking I should edit this down but after listening to...

Wed, 26 Oct 2011 11:11:06 -0400

I was thinking I should edit this down but after listening to the message a few times I really couldn’t cut out any of the message. She is so sincere and so excited and thought that to edit anything would be taking away from the beauty of the message.

I believe the ethnologist and engineer Raine Borg said it best...

Tue, 25 Oct 2011 11:11:00 -0400

I believe the ethnologist and engineer Raine Borg said it best with his statement, “A key is a symbol of all forces that open and close, bind and release. It stands for liberation and incarceration.”

I didn’t stick to the narrative on this one and instead...

Mon, 24 Oct 2011 11:11:05 -0400

I didn’t stick to the narrative on this one and instead just drew images of a traditional holiday meal. I forgot the pumpkin pie though.

This is the fifth of the HSI animations. I finished it a few...

Thu, 20 Oct 2011 11:11:06 -0400

This is the fifth of the HSI animations. I finished it a few days ago but then I wasn’t happy with the scale and the rotate at the same time, but then I went back and tweaked it a little bit and now I think it looks better. I don’t do a lot of movement in post, I try to do it all in camera, but I thought this one would work. Maybe it is like trying on a new pair of pants that you know look good, but just don’t fit right yet.

My parents had a light blue VW bug for the first five or six or...

Wed, 12 Oct 2011 11:15:05 -0400

My parents had a light blue VW bug for the first five or six or seven years of my life. I remember climbing in the very back, that little spot behind the back seats and under the rear window.

This is the third in the series of HSI animations. I was trying...

Wed, 28 Sep 2011 12:11:06 -0400

This is the third in the series of HSI animations. I was trying to think of what a comfy coat would look like and there was this one coat I used to wear fifteen years ago that was similar to this one. It was the warmest, most comfortable winter coat I’ve ever worn.

This is the second of the HSI animations. I used some old...

Tue, 27 Sep 2011 11:15:06 -0400

This is the second of the HSI animations. I used some old footage off of archive.org for the people standing in line. It was actually an old PSA produced in 1945 by the Office of War to promote how the United States peacefully elected a new leader, Franklin D. Roosevelt.

This is the first in a series of twenty animations I’m...

Mon, 26 Sep 2011 11:11:05 -0400

This is the first in a series of twenty animations I’m doing for Housing & Services Inc. to be screened at a fundraiser in December. They will be celebrating twenty-four years of housing and management programs for lower income households and New Yorkers with special needs. Their mission statement reads, “We believe everyone needs a home.” They are being totally awesome and letting me have the freedom to do just about anything I want. I’m going to keep it really similar to what I’ve done with the Animation Hotline and have the clients and staff call and leave messages.

I just installed a new sheet of slate in my studio yesterday, so tomorrow will be my first animation on the new slate. It has a few scratches in it, so I don’t know if I’m going to try to clean them up or if they are going to just fill in with chalk naturally.

This is another of the ‘hint fiction’ stories....

Tue, 23 Aug 2011 11:11:00 -0400

This is another of the ‘hint fiction’ stories. I’ve gotten about twenty of them so I am going to try to do as many as will work. I’m not going to post a comment about not posting but I will post a blog about posting comments about not posting…

sorry.coryarcangel.com/

Hint Fiction: An Anthology of Stories in 25 Words or Fewer, published by W. W. Norton and available wherever books are sold.

robertswartwood.com/

Animation Hotline is a series of daily animations where I use messages left on my voicemail for content. When you get a chance please leave me a message, and honestly it’s best if you leave more than one because sometimes what you think is the perfect message might simply be impossible for me to animate in one day. This project is only as good as the messages that you leave me, so if you feel so inspired, call!

animationhotline.org

To leave a message call…
inside US: +1 212-683-2490
international (skype): animationhotline

I’ve started working on the ‘Hint Fiction’...

Fri, 05 Aug 2011 11:12:05 -0400

I’ve started working on the ‘Hint Fiction’ anthology animations. I decided to use Robert Swartwood’s story first because he put the anthology together, but also because I thought this one was hirarirous. I was going to draw an old senile toothfairy bumping into the walls, but then about half way through the animation I decided to give the narrator dementia instead. I think that is why I am so excited about this series. Hint Fiction is defined as a story of 25 words or fewer that suggests a larger, more complex story. There seems to be an almost endless amount of ways I can tell the story because there are so many options.

I was at a birthday party in Brooklyn and I told someone what I was doing and she said that I should look up these 25 word stories. I emailed Robert Swartwood and he emailed his tribe of writers and had them leave emails. So for the next two weeks we’ll be doing stories from the anthology, read by the writers.

Hint Fiction: An Anthology of Stories in 25 Words or Fewer, published by W. W. Norton and available wherever books are sold. Contributors include:
Jenn Alandy, Nick Arvin, Samuel Baldwin, Max Barry, Kirsten Beachy, L. R. Bonehill, Ryan W. Bradley, Gary A. Braunbeck, William Brazill, Yvonne Brockwell, Jeremy D. Brooks, Randall Brown, Ken Bruen, Stace Budzko, James Burt, Frank Byrns, Ron Carlson, Jonathan Carroll, John Cashman, Adam-Troy Castro, Douglas Clegg, Danielle Combs, Chris Compson, John Connors, Hannah Craig, Brian Crawford, Blake Crouch, Kirk Curnutt, Tara Deal, Gay Degani, Nicky Drayden, Stephen Dunn, Stuart Dybek, David Erlewine, Camille Esses, Merrilee Faber, Nada Faris, Jamie Felton, James Frey, Janet E. Gardner, Roxane Gay, Shanna Germain, Tess Gerritsen, Bill Graffius, Charles Gramlich,Val Gryphin, Jennifer Haddock, Jane Hammons, Ann Harleman, Bruce Harris, Donora Hillard, David Hirsch, Robin Hollis, Kevin Hosey, Eric Hsu, Gregg Hurwitz, Ben Jahn, Ha Jin, Jason Jordan, David Joseph, Michael Kelly, Jack Ketchum, Jack Kilborn, J. A. Konrath, Christina Kopp, Minter Krotzer, Joe Lansdale, Don Lee, Min Jin Lee, Rachel Lopez, Sarah Lyons, K. J. Maas, Nick Mamatas, Lewis Manalo, Marshall Ryan Maresca, Michael Martone, Natalie McNabb, David Miller, Sarah P. Miller, Ty Miller, John Minichillo, Gwendolyn Joyce Mintz, Christoffer Molnar, Madeline Mora-Summonte, Rose Rappoport Moss, Barry Napier, Joyce Carol Oates, Brendan O’Brien, Daniel A. Olivas, Will Panzo, Edith Pearlman, Benjamin Percy, Sophie Playle, Jason Rice, Samuel Rippey , Katrina Robinson, Jenifer Rosenberg, Jess Row, Robin Rozanski, Kathleen A. Ryan, Marcus Sakey, Joe Schreiber, Jessa Slade, Noel Sloboda, Andrea Slye, Kelly Spitzer, Agnieszka Stachura, J. J. Steinfeld, Peter Straub, Jake Thomas, Bob Thurber, Jade Walker, Ben White, Amber Whitley, Sue Williams, F. Paul Wilson, Robley Wilson, Mercedes M. Yardley, Mabel Yu, J. Matthew Zoss
robertswartwood.com/

Animation Hotline is a series of daily animations where I use messages left on my voicemail for content. When you get a chance please leave me a message, and honestly it’s best if you leave more than one because sometimes what you think is the perfect message might simply be impossible for me to animate in one day. This project is only as good as the messages that you leave me, so if you feel so inspired, call!

animationhotline.org

To leave a message call…
inside US: +1 212-683-2490
international (skype): animationhotline

Animation for Longshot Magazine. They called at about 3PM...

Fri, 29 Jul 2011 17:59:19 -0400

Animation for Longshot Magazine. They called at about 3PM yesterday asking if I could get them an animation ready for 3PM today. I told him he was crazy, then I told him yes. The topic was easy for me because I have an intimate relationship with debt.

Longshot is a 48 hour magazine, where they sent out the theme this afternoon, then they get all the stories in tomorrow by 3PM, then they edit it overnight and have the whole thing ready to go out by 3PM on Sunday. I’m interested to see what they come up with.

We did the audio for the animation in the same style as the Animation Hotline, where they called in and left a bunch of different messages then I edited what I could use and drew on top of it.

If you don’t know, the Animation Hotline is a series of daily animations where I use messages left on my voicemail for content. If you have a short message, story, ridiculoti, give me a call!

http://www.animationhotline.org

To leave a message call…
inside US: +1 212-683-2490
international (skype): animationhotline

Finally the rains came and the heat subsided. My studio...

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 11:32:00 -0400

Finally the rains came and the heat subsided. My studio isn’t air conditioned so it was really difficult. I kept having to take baths to cool down. Jeff Roth left me this message. It’s a lot longer than this, but the frame by frame rotoscoping takes a really long time, so I edited some out of it. I’m going to add a Muybridge horse to the middle of it, but this is what I’ve got for now.

Animation Hotline is a series of daily animations where I use messages left on my voicemail for content. When you get a chance please leave me a message, and honestly it’s best if you leave more than one because sometimes what you think is the perfect message might simply be impossible for me to animate in one day. This project is only as good as the messages that you leave me, so if you feel so inspired, call!

animationhotline.org

To leave a message call…
inside US: +1 212-683-2490
international (skype): animationhotline