fantastical adventures in black and white

Posted on June 8, 2022 Tagged Aera, Animation, Creatures, fantasy, film, horrorLeave a comment

I haven’t written about Aera in a bit, and I really should get better at talking about my work, so.

Episode 6 is up, and I’m pretty happy with it. I’m not sure whether or not it works as the miniature horror movie I’d intended, but it looks cool and that’s ninety percent of what I aspire to.

There’s a lot I want to say about the larger story and where it’s going, but I’m hesitant to get into that yet. When I was first thinking about this series I was really into the idea of the viewer discovering the shape of the story as it emerges (which is one of my favorite experiences with fiction), and I don’t want to undermine that by tipping my hand too early. Which is maybe a pompous thing to say about such a shoestring project. Have I really earned the right to be that coy? I don’t know.

So anyway, check out Aera if you want. Tell your friends, like & subscribe, blah blah blah. I would love to have an audience for this thing. Here’s a still from Episode 7, currently in progress:

Posted on January 28, 2022 Tagged Aera, Animation, Creatures, film, serialLeave a comment

Now seems as good a time as any to mention that the animated serial I’ve been working on for the better part of a year is well underway, and the first four episodes will go online tomorrow (January 29th), here and on my YouTube channel.

Aera is an ongoing story, best described as:
-a meditation on interspecies communication in a fantasy context, or
-a Moebius-inspired retelling of Homeward Bound, or
-a swords-and-sorcery epic containing neither swords nor sorcery*

If any of that piques your interest, check it out! The episodes are really very short; attention span strictly optional.

*or in any case only minimal, ambient sorcery

work very much in progress

Posted on May 1, 2021 Tagged Animation, concept art, film, work in progressLeave a comment

As I mentioned before, I’m early in the process of my next long-term animation project: an ongoing series of shorts, sort of a spiritual continuation of the inhabited world, but with an actual story this time.

There are some pretty big narrative questions I still need to answer. In the mean time I’ve been working on some rough backgrounds/concept art in an effort to work out the look of the thing, and in the process learning just how out of practice I am at still images. Here are a few of the least embarrassing:

…much more to come, probably slowly.

Fully Inhabited

Posted on March 27, 2021 Tagged Animation, fantasy, film, Ten Second Films, The Inhabited WorldLeave a comment

I just finished the tenth (and probably final) installment of The Inhabited World; check it out:

These were extremely fun to do, and I think I’ve learned a lot in the the process. Moreover, a lot of these shorts’ DNA is going to carry over into my next project, which is looking to be raaaather more ambitious… more on that later.

Posted on March 13, 2021 Tagged Animation, film, Ten Second Films, The Inhabited World, things with wingsLeave a comment

increasingly inhabited.

Posted on February 27, 2021February 26, 2021 Tagged Animation, fantasy, film, landscape, Ten Second Films, The Inhabited WorldLeave a comment

I just finished the latest Inhabited World short and I think it’s my favorite so far- check it out:

Catchup Blog- Winter 2020

Posted on December 19, 2020 Tagged Animation, film, Meteor, Playing Catchup, The Inhabited WorldLeave a comment

Well, it’s been exactly two years since I wrote a post here… is blogging still a thing that people do? In my defense the world’s been a bit weird, no?

The film that I was just starting to tease in my last posts is now complete! It’s called Meteor, and I’m currently working on getting it seen. With that finished, I’m in the very early stages of my next long-term animation project. I suspect it’ll ultimately take the form of a video installation with a strong narrative component; more on that once I have something to show for it.

In the mean time, for fun/practice/keeping-my-sanity-over-the-winter-months, I’m making a series of ten-second(ish) fantasy films called The Inhabited World. I’ll be posting new ones here and on my YouTube channel as I finish them- probably every other week.