Hey Hey Everyone! Well, in honor of Fox & Calf finally going up online, I figured over the next few weeks I would do some posts about certain aspects of the production. For the first one, Robert Litton has graciously offered some insight on the scoring process. Without the right music, films can really have a hard time delivering an emotional impact on the audience. That's why Robert's job is so important, because he heightens every feeling the film tries to get accross, making them clear, and sometimes adding some unexpected style of his own. It's so fun to just listen to his music in each episode, from his playful sci-fi jazz riffs in The Walk to his gorgeous, Satie-inspired intro to Painting The Unpaintable, each moment has it's own character. Hopefully reading his thoughts and accounts on the process will inspire other budding animators and filmmakers to take a more thoughtful look at the music in their pieces and see what a funand rewarding process it can be.
-ryAn
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When Ryan first sent me the hand drawn sketches for the four Fox and Calf films I realized instantly that, because of the shortness of each film and the importance of the dialogue, I was going to need to write a very simple, concise, memorable theme that would allow me to maximize the little time music would have to "comment" on the character's situations/emotions and would allow me to dress it up/disguise it through out the films. Getting as much mileage out of one simple tune would allow me to subconsciously bind the four films together and create an instant sense of familiarity as we traveled from scene to scene, film to film. The trick of course is writing such a theme!

While watching "Painting the Unpaintable" I was struck by how laid back the buddies were about setting things on fire. To me this was total "Ryan McCulloch" humor and I set out to compose a "Buddy Theme" that was cool, laid back, easy going, and (hopefully) instantly memorable. The fact that the buddies were so "La-di-da" or "Doot-de-doot-de-doo" (a la Homer Simpson) after lighting a girl on fire got me thinking that they probably whistle a lot as they go about their quirky lives. For a composer it's these little clues that can unlock an entire score...and it did!

The "Buddy Theme" features a cool, laid back whistler walking down the street groov'n with a small jazz rhythm section. Crucial to the spirit of the films was that the whistler not sound "too" good and it was very brave of our professional musician to come into to the studio and intentionally whistle like an amateur. As always I worked with live, REAL musicians and was very lucky to get a small group of some of the LA studio world's finest to help bring Ryan's fantastic character's off of the screen and into the hearts of the viewers. All of the music for the 4 films is derived from this main theme appearing in various disguises such as a classical guitar waltz in "Painting the Unpaintable" or as a Nordstroms clothing store improvised piano solo in the "Blind Date".



"The Walk" provided me with a wonderful chance to tip my hat to the video game tunes of the late 80's. In an instance such as this my job as a composer was much less about finding the right notes/pitches or writing a great melody but rather just finding the right sounds. A combination of 80's keyboard sounds mixed in with an EWI (Electronic Wind Instrument - kind of like a saxophone that plugs into a computer) provided us with the perfect palette to conjure up the sonic world of those classic Nintendo video games. The icing on the cake were the off-beat sand paper blocks and, of course, the hand claps.

By far, hands down the most challenging task in scoring the Fox and Calf films was the 4th film "The Fridge". It is very difficult and time consuming to tackle all of the math associated with scoring a scene. Figuring out how fast the music should be, where to start, where to stop, how to line up a note or chord with a cut or moment of action in the film all takes an enormous amount of planning and mathematical calculations. It then takes cleverness and creativity to compose the score so that it fits all the "hits" of the scene yet still sounds and feels musical and not awkward or mechanical. Naturally I had a small heart attack when I first saw "The Fridge" and one of the characters is strumming a guitar on and off throughout the scene! Stylistically it was very easy to score...have a guitar play the main buddy theme in a very bluesy, "kick'n back on the porch with your pals" feel. Technically it was very, VERY difficult to compose the music in such a way that it made sense musically yet caught every pick and strum the Fox performed on the guitar. In fact, it was such a headache that when Ryan asked after the scoring session how it all turned out I said two words...and the second word was "YOU".

For a composer Ryan is a dream to work with. He has a vast knowledge of music and knows what he wants music to do for his films yet gives me his complete and total trust to follow my instincts to deliver a score that meets his wishes, the needs of the film, and my needs as an artist. His films/characters inspire vivid musical thoughts and ideas and watching the final films with the score mixed in is a very deep, truly rewarding experience. With 2 projects under our belts I eagerly look forward to our next collaboration...especially if he goes to film school and starts making less sucky films.

Here's what I'm currently working on, an exterior of the Furryvale Movie Theater, where my next short, Monogamy, takes place. For the extras I'm pulling out some old characters from The Noc Turtle Bar scene from Rhonda and some that have already appeared in some Fuuryvale shorts (along with the debut of Bre's Pink Mouse). For now I have some place holder posters on the wall, but I'll work on getting them properly framed tomorrow.

Here's a concept sketch I did for my next skit, "Monogamy," which takes place in front of a movie theater. And since it takes place there I'm having some fun making some movie posters to go on the wall. This first one I did is a parody of "The Spirit" Posters. I figured by the time this animation comes out (fall/winter) it'll be a topical.

Here's me and a goat character I'm working on, right now he looks like a sheep, but when his horns are done (which will be baked clay), he'll look much more like a goat.

Here's a character I've been working on today for a skit I'm hoping to produce in our upcoming Furryvale series. He was pretty quick to make considering I recycled Spencer The Fox's clubbing outfit and just sculpted a new head, hands and feet. Nice not having to make a new armature or body.

.....yet!

Hey All! As you may know, my wife Bre likes to help out by making characters to populate the backgrounds of my group/crowd scenes. Well, she's recently completed her latest character who is a cute pink mouse! It's fun to have Bre involved in the process and exciting to see how far she's come since her first character.  Her mouse doesn't have a name yet, but I'm sure she'll come up with something soon.

You heard right! The First episode of Fox & Calf, "Blind Date," is available to watch online at the SXSW Click Online Festival. This 2 minute episode, which is kind of calf-less, was nominated as one of the 3 finalists in the animation category. If you're inclined, feel free to register and vote for it (you can once a day), if not, just ENJOY! I'm really happy to at least have one of these episodes out, though the image has been squashed into a 4x3 apect ratio, but it's not too bad. It'll do til we get the entire series up online. Make sure to watch one of the high-res versions.

Alright, GO HERE TO WATCH BLIND DATE, let me know what you think.

Also, check out my acting debut as the butt-hole waiter in Tertiary's live action short THE DATE, which is an episode of their upcoming Control Freak series and a finalist in their live action category. (Thats me on the left.)

I'm SO CLOSE to wrapping animation, I will literally be finished by the time I eat lunch tomorrow, but unfortunately I didn't finish it all tonight like I hoped. 2 hours behind. Oh well, tomorrow I can celebrate I guess.
 

Here's 2 shots I did today and also a behind the scenes shot, so you can see how I got Martha Stewarthog's hand to look like it was pointing at the portrait. I love those floating limbs!

Hey hey! Today I got to make little pies for the Martha Stewarthog sketch. It was a pretty cool experience to make them. I haven't made little accessories like this in a while so it was fun, my mom would be proud. It's soft clay with texture added and some paint for the various colors.

These two have been really fun to make. I just want them to be really sweet and cute and happy. And it looks like they are turning out to be just that! I hand mixed (with the help of Bre and Candace) the pink for the hippo and the orange for the sweater, I like making colors that aren't available to buy, it makes the character that much more unique.

Hey! So I'm working on my THIRD short now, with the working title "Pie." I'm excited about this one. Should be fun. Here's a head I'm working on and a new portrait for the wall, you all know how I love to paint these little portraits.

Hey Hey! So yesterday I FINISHED animating this short! It feels good to wrap it up. Today I'll digitally remove the stick from the pony frames, and make a logo, and then tomorrow I'm onto my THIRD short!

Anyway, I thought I'd share something with you... One of my favorite things to do is paint miniature paintings and portraits to go into the little scenes. You can add a lot of character to the room, and say a lot about the people who live there. It's a lot of fun.



This one was inspired by this beautiful "old" frame, and I liked the idea of doing a really old style portrait, maybe it was painted of a grandma when she was younger.



Next I have another portrait, but this one was inspired by those glamoure photos every woman and her mom was having taken in the 90's, where they pose with there hands and maybe a boa, with the big hair and the light shining off it.



Lastly, there's the boring family group portrait. Everyone standing kind of rigidly. It's kind of creepy actually. Unfortunatley this one doesn't really get any screen time.

Hope you enjoyed, and feel inspired to inhabit your little sets with these personal touches too!

Happy Friday Everyone! Yesterday I was able to start animating my newest short, and I got 2 shots in the can. This morning I've already gotten 2 more shots animated and some foley sound fx added to them. I'm hoping that by the end of the day I'll have most, if not all of this thing animated. I think I might be able to get into this whole short-short thing. As soon as I start, I'm almost finished.

Here's a little guy I made for this next skit. I actually made him last week but thought I would share him today. I spent a good portion of the day finishing up building the set which I'll show you tomorrow. Hopefully by the end of tomorrow I'll be animating. Here's hoping!

So I thought I'd share this shot of Pigg Angel on set so you could see how simply it was done. He's just standing on the table (with his place markers) in front of a blown up photo from Kinkos (non-glossy on foam board). When cropped, it looks pretty good I think. I debated having the homeless cat in the shots at all, but decided at the end that the over the shoulder angle worked best for giving the illusion that they are interacting, considering they both act on completely different sets. Tomorrow I'll show you the character I've been working on today.

Well, I'm happy to report that today, on the One Year Anniversary of my time here at Tertiary, I completed animation on "Pigg Angel: Swine Freak." I shot all 5 of Pigg's shots today in front of a parking lot back drop. It was fun and the shots look pretty good, if I do say so myself. This experiment has proven that I can get from pre-production through production (40 animated seconds) in 10 working days, tomorrow I'll see if I can do it again!

Hey Everyone! Hope you all had a nice Memorial Day weekend. Bre and I took a trip out to Michigan to visit my grandparents for a few days. But before that, on Friday, I was able to shoot the first three shots of Pig Angel: Swine Freak, and I think it's going to go really smoothly. If all goes according to plan, I should have this short-short completed animating by Thursday (2 more days!). So wish me luck as I go at it again today.

Hey Everyone! Sorry for the lack of posts the last 2 weeks. It has been pretty busy around here. We made an unscheduled trip out to California for a week to be with family. Then when we got back, Rob Broadhurst, voice of Spencer The Fox and writer of the Fox and Calf theme song, came out for a few days to do some creative consulting on the upcoming MOLI KIDS projects.



Over the last 3 days I've been able to work on my newest character, Pigg Angel, a caricature of a popular T.V. illusionist.



He was a really fun one to do, and my first sculpted-animal-caricature. I created the denim jeans by doing a poor mixing job of 3 colors, and got that great look. I'm really happy with it. Hoping to start the set today!

Here's the first character I've started building for my new series. I can't say anything about it yet, but I thought I'd share this little guy with you. I've been doing so many characters with replacement mouthes lately, it'll be nice to animate a character with a good ol' movable mouth.

I’ve been out in New York for the past couple of days, clearing my head and doing some early development and pre-viz for my next Tertiary Animation project. It’s been a great and much needed change of scene for my creative mind.



One of the highlights of my trip so far was getting to visit the Mysterious Ron Cole in his Long Island studio. In the last year or so, Ron Cole has risen out of obscurity to some sort of underground stop-motion animation god. All based on a 1 minute trailer for his upcoming short film “In The Fall Of Gravity†that he posted on the internet. The 12 minute short is a revolutionary experiment involving animatronic stop-motion. This new technology that Ron is developing could very well change the way stop-motion animation is done in the future, as well as improve the quality beyond cartoons.



When I got to his basement studio, I was EXTREMELY excited, as I have been a fan of his trailer since it first surfaced on the web almost a year ago. Nothing could prepare me for what I was going to see. We journeyed through the various set areas and he introduced me to Isomer and Trevor, the stars of the film. What blew me away was how giant these puppets were, I couldn’t believe it. Moving them around was a dream, they had wonderful ball and socket armatures, and then Ron started to play with their robotics, moving the mouths and eyebrows around, seeing them come to life was truly magical. The type of facial features and movements they make are like nothing I have ever seen in this industry.






The sets were beautiful, hand panted, leaves and vines crawling up the rails. I just wanted to touch it all. What surprised me was that all the backgrounds were hand painted and right there, no blue screen. The painstaking detail apparent in each one was mind-boggling.



The real treat, though, was getting to be the first person (other than the composer) to watch the finished “In The Fall Of Gravity†film. And let me tell you, all you stop-mo fans that have been salivating over his trailer for the last year; it is well worth the wait. The final film is stunningly beautiful, and I watched the entire time with my jaw on the floor. The trailer doesn’t show anything compared to what the film has in store for you. The animation is top notch; the visuals are beautiful and fun. I’m pretty sure the deep, philosophical story was compelling too, but I was so captivated by what I was watching, not much else got through. It is a sensory overload and demands multiple viewings to truly take it all in and get the full affect.



We spent the rest of the afternoon talking about animation and technology, I showed him my Fox & Calf shorts, and I got to know his really cool family. He shared with me how he did all the low-tech effects in the film and my head almost exploded. It’s funny that even I assume everybody does everything digitally. And his tricks were brilliant. So brilliant, in fact, that I feel as if giving them away on this blog would be the same as me telling you how his film ends. Hopefully he will do a “making-of†featurette on his DVD and give us all a glimpse at how his brilliant mind works, and still defies the computers.

I had an amazing experience with Ron and his family, and his puppets, and left feeling very inspired. How often does that happen? I cannot wait until everyone else can see what he’s done and feel the same!

Well, today was an exciting and emotional day. I shot the final two shots of Rhonda, meaning that I am done animating Rhonda, and for now, done animating Fox & Calf. Anyone who's animated characters over a long period of time knows that the emotion connection the animator feels for his creations is surprisingly high. And having worked with Spencer The Fox and Wally Calf for the better part of a year, I feel particularly attached to them. Usually after a long time spent on a project, I cannot wait to get as far away from it as possible. But this time, I will truly miss these weird little people, and I am really proud of the 6 shorts they have starred in. Some of my most personal pieces yet. Anyway, I am super stoked about my next project, and looking forward to when I can bring these guys back for more adventures someday.

Here's some concept art I did when trying to come up with the bartender a couple months ago. I think he's a cool character, but glad I went with the burly puffin.

Still been animating, "Rhonda" is coming along great! I should finish the animation by next Tuesday.

Hey Guys, Hope you all had a great weekend. Heres a few shots I did on Friday. I think I'm at about 28 seconds of animation now, that's almost halfway through (although I'm just now getting into the lip-sync, so that'll take a little longer. Gonna shoot a bit more today. My hope is for 5-10 seconds.

You heard right, yesterday I shot the first shot of Rhonda, the establishing shot of the bar. It's four seconds long and more or less includes 9 moving characters (or parts of them). I'm really happy with how the lighting turned out, and I know that this shoot is going to look really beautiful. Due to the gels dimming the lights a bit, the lamps have to be quite a bit closer to the characters, meaning they are getting more heat than usual (and my little animating space is hotter for me the animator too, making it a tad miserable). Oh well, it's a short shoot. And the first shot is always the hardest to accomplish, once you've jumped that hurdle, the rest is easy (as easy as clay animating can be, of course).

Hey hey all! Well, today was more or less the same as yesterday, just getting some boring things out of the way so I can animate tomorrow. A big project was rearranging the studio space to animate in which took a while. Above is Rhonda with her new eyeballs! I also finished Spencer's new green shirt, and painted the sexy bunny's dress. I also sculpted Spencer's new replacement mouths, his old ones were just too dirty and he needed some new ones. I also gave Rhonda's body double and the puffin some hands. I did a billion other things today, but non of them worth mentioning. So Tomoorw I should start animating, cross your fingers, see you then.

So I had a very fun, very exciting week working on the nightclub that Wally and Spencer are going to, to scam on chicks. Pretty much the whole thing takes place at the bar. I decided to go with a blue theme because none of the other sets I've done for the series so far have had that color scheme and I like each episode to have a totally unique look and style. I've never been much of a set guy, I've always been better at creating the characters, but I feel like I'm finally starting to get the hang of it, and even having a little fun too.

The bar was pretty fun to do, it's just painted wood and styrafoam. I bought a few of the miniature bottles, but decided that I needed so many that it just wasn't in my budget to buy them all so I made a bunch more myself using baking clay and paint. The bottles that I wanted to look clear got painted the same color as the background. They don't look fantastic up close, but they won't really be in focus in the actual film, so it's all cool.



Once the puffin got his body and a more furrowed brow, he looked much more like I hoped, so I was pretty happy with how he turned out. As for the other characters hanging around, I just placed them in the shot to make it more interesting, that won't be where each character will be, besides, that's only about half the background characters.

Anyway, I should start animating on Wednesday, and with the right camera angles and lighting, I think this is going to be really great.

So here's a question for you all, what should I name the nightclub?

Hey hey! So I've started piecing together the bar at the nightclub for "Rhonda," and I think it's gonna be really cool! Anyway, here it is at it's bare minimum, and you can see Spencer & Wally have some sharp new outfits for their night out. Pretty cool.

Hey, hey everyone! I've been busy on a few projects right now, and in my free time I have been working on the new "Rhonda" short for Fox and Calf. I've been enjoying making the many background chaarcters who will inhabit the nightclub.



Here's a pink bunny chick I'm working on, I still have to paint her dress color onto her. Usually if a girl character is wearing a skin-tight dress, I will just paint it onto her.



Here's a dog character which my fellow Tertiary crew members pointed out to me is Lakers colored. Not intentional, but cool.



The blue shrew above is using Steve the Gecko's body. A good way to save time doing this kind of stuff is recycling old characters. And speaking of recycling.........



This pig used to be the girl calf from Painting The Unpaintable. With only a 15 minute face-lift, I had a completely new character. Awesome!

Alright, I've been working hard on the title character, Rhonda, and maybe will have some pictures of her for you soon. Take care!!!

I have been busy as a beaver lately (Wow, that is a term I will never use again), and I thought I'd share a glimpse of what I've been up to. It's all over the map, so I'll call it something fancy and deliberate, Pot Puri:



This is a really silly shot that I like, below you can see the actual set up for this shot, very simple.



next is a cool shot I like......



wonder what the story is behind this....



Ouch! Hazards of the job I guess. Luckily there's no clay character union, or I'd never be able to move their eyes.

Well, I did four more shots today which I'm really happy with. Now, hopefully, I'll get to relax a little for the weekend before I pick it all up again on Monday (even though I'm losing an hour). Have a great weekend Everybody!

Been animating quite a bit more today. Here's a glimpse at what I've been up to.....





So what the hell is that thing Wally Calf is playing around with, and why is that slug on Spencer's nose? It's hard to say....... I would like to point out that the red chair behind Spencer had a broken arm, so I strategically placed a plant in front of it so you wouldn't see. Maybe I shouldn't have told you.

You heard right! In 2 weeks, I will officially begin pre-production on the as yet un-named fifth episode of Fox & Calf, based on a story by Rob Broadhurst and I. The episode will most likely premiere a week or two after the other episodes do. More information to come soon!

Here's a shot I did on Friday of Wally scolding a fish. Is he being TOO harsh? Should he have given the fish the benefit of the doubt? It's hard to say. Below you can see the little fake arm contraption I put together so I wouldn't have to bother with worrying if he could support the weight of the fish or not, this kept things sturdy and gave me the greatest ease when animating. You can see his little replacement mouthes littering the floor.

.....Spencer wears short shorts! Whoa, is that the first time I've said the fox's name on the blog? Well there you go, Spencer The Fox, maybe some other time I'll tell you the Calf's name.

Sorry for the sporatic postings, I've been very busy on a non-Fox & Calf project that has now ended and I can officially finish all of Fox & Calf's loose ends, which means lots of fun posts for the next 2-3 weeks that won't make any sense but should have some pretty pictures.

Today was a great day, among the many other things I had to do, I got to create this wonderful little jogging outfit for Spencer, this is the kind of thing I love to do. I'm not into costume design, etc, but sometimes this can be really fun. Below you'll see that Spencer is actually in front of a backdrop.

Rob Broadhurst, the voice of the Fox, wrote and performed this amazingly fun theme song for the Fox & Calf Series. Listen to it below, I hope you all enjoy it it.
Robert Litton has begun scoring the series, so it will be very exciting to see how that turns out in the next few weeks. Can't wait.