Finally managed to blog about our 2 week Motion Graphics projects for all Level 1 Graphics Arts Students we run just before the Holidays. For this project it was a chance to introduce the idea of time based communication. Students where split into groups of 4 or 5 and each group had to select from a some pre chosen songs.

  • Scott Walker – Farmer In The City
  • Bowie – Baal’s Hymn
  • Public Service Broadcasting – Inform – Educate – Entertain
  • Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds – Fifteen Feet Of Pure White Snow
  • THE ACORN – Flood Pt. 2
  • The Flaming Lips – Waitin’ For Superman
  • David Byrne & Brian Eno – Life is Long

The brief launch was a good excuse to play some Scott Walker and using an extract from Lewis Williams (2006, p160) we de-constructed the song and talked about how this may lead onto further reference and visual research. Richard Williams (2012) provided a more few extracts from his rather awesome Animator’s Survival kit to help kick start the process. I showed a few selective short films and set each group off researching. Each group then returned to the studio that day and was challenged to distil their initial research into 4 key themes/subjects to drive the research forward for that week.

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During week 1 all students gained a basic introduction to some time based media software, including Premier and Dragon Stop Motion whilst attending group tutorials.

To finish up week one, staff curated an hour long screening of a number of exciting and innovative short film and animations to inspire the groups as week 2 was all about producing a piece of time based media to communicate the ethos and feel of said song to be screened to all students at the end of week 2.

The screening was an exciting session spanned over 2 days in our Lecture Theatre and given the time frame, new software skills, research and team work what was produced was impressive considering they all had completed products within the short time frame.

Here is a small selection from the screening.

All of the films can be viewed on this youtube playlist and for those students that have elected to continue with motion graphics, keep an eye on that channel.

– Lewis Williams, 2006. Scott Walker: The Rhymes of Goodbye. Edition. Plexus Publishing.

– Richard Williams, 2012. The Animator’s Survival Kit–Revised Edition: A Manual of Methods, Principles and Formulas for Classical, Computer, Games, Stop Motion and Interne. Second Edition Edition. Faber & Faber.