Master Model Maker!

My old pal Cundo had a nice article written about the concept models he built over at Dreamworks for the latest "Shrek" installment. I worked with Cundo in the puppet fabrication department on "The Nightmare Before Christmas" and he was building models on my first job as an animator on "Bump in the Night". Cundo's skills have obviously continued to grow since then! Click below to check out the article:

Set your TIVO's

The episode of Moral Orel I directed is on this Sunday (er...Monday morning I guess) on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim- Please check it out! It is titled "Geniusis" and everyone did a really great job on it.

Notes from the Box?

Some of you out there in stopmo-land may remember a very inspirational blog that vanished from the web a year or so ago. Yes I am speaking of course about "Notes from the Box" which was the passionately keyed stopmo ramblings of animator Misha Klein. Well- for anyone out there that might be wondering, the blog may be gone but Misha's project (previous known as "Bad Bullets") is in full production. What started in his little one room studio in San Francisco years back is now nearing completion in another cramped box here in Los Angeles. I've seen some of the most recent shots and all I can tell you is that fans of stop-motion are in for a treat. Misha is crossing over into some juicy acting zones- and really putting it all into the performance. For those of you who are unfamiliar with Mish- check out the teaser scene for his film. Visit Misha's Web Site

This is an old picture Misha sent me when he was working in his San Francisco studio. The reading has paid off- he is definately following "The Way of the Actor". Keep rockin' it Mish!

Behind the Scenes Video!

I'm going to try and start adding small behind the scenes videos of the puppet fabrication techniques being used on my characters. Here is the first installment showing Mike Murnane finishing the sculpt for "Brawl Magnet".

Negative Character

A few weeks back Paula finished the mold for Brawl Magnet! It came out beautifully, and is a piece of sculptural art in itself. Thanks again Paula for lending your mold-mastery to my project!

Here is the finished six piece mold- complete with a little plug that fits into the mouth:



And here is an in progress picture laying up the wet clay around the sculpt:

Board yet?

Hello out there in stopmotion blog-land. Yes- there has been another big gap in time since my last post. My wife Cindy and I recently moved which is always a big time drain, so I haven't really made any solid steps forward on the film for a few weeks. The other bummer about the move is that I no longer have a garage to use as a studio space. Angry Puppet Films is now based in a 6' x 8' garden shed in my backyard! Just enough space to hold my tools and a workbench- so I will be counting on the universe to provide me with a shooting space once I am ready to go again. In the meantime I am trying to get some things finished that can no longer be put off. One of them is storyboards. There is stil a significant chunk of the film to board, and it is the hardest thing for me to do since I am not the best wth a pencil. I really admire the abiilty of a good storyboard artist to communicate the key information about a shot without spending too much time on each panel. I am trying to losen up and just get through these scenes, without worrying about the quality of the actual drawings or whether the angles are true perspective. Check back soon for a Brawl Magnet update!