Ah! Stop motion! You brilliant fusion of reality and fantasy! Of design and of manifestation!
Ore No Doriru wa – 2022
I have been a stop motion animator for more than 15 years now. Yikes, you’d really think my work would be better than it is by now. I used to animate crap like transformers, clay, knives, toys. Alot of my earlier work has been deleted forever from the world in multiple fits of self criticism. Sometimes Nostalgia leads to regret, but perhaps it’s better off already extinct.
Now my work has grown to be more legitimate and I make my own models, or moreso these days work with replacement-frame style concepts formed by Nature. Maybe because natural forms cannot be fabricated, and their reality cannot be questioned. Ive never been a 100% no CG or chroma key purist, but yea, forget CG. Nope.
Some of my films have won cash-money prizes at film festivals. I have also been paid big bucks to teach classes on it to west-coast children, too. I have even been approached by Laika and asked to apply/send in my portfolio etc. But I likely won’t hire myself out as an animator. It means too much to me. Not unless the offer was holistic, centered, and felt right. I was approached by youtube a half decade ago wanting me to monetize stupid videos of action figures slaying eachother that was getting a lot of views. I declined and then they put ads on it anyway. Below is a sampling of writing work on the philosophy and mechanics of Stop Motion. It was interesting enough that the ideas were plagiarized by the organizer of stop motion magazine! I’ll post more about that later when I care enough to take offense.
| What is Animation? |
This essay was also published in my book, Syntheses & Analytics Volume 2.
So I have enjoyed most flavors of success as a stop motionist to at least a mild degree. For many years my mountaineering off-grid lifestyle prohibited the development of proper infrastructure to adequately animate as I would’ve like. I adapted in small ways, but longed for the day I can get back seriously into it. The interim served as a good photography development period.
Some works from that time included submissions Stopmotionanimation.com’s StopmoJam
Here’s a film of mine that’s a little more interesting.
Something of an abstract ballet in celebration of the physical laws of motion and the evolution of life as the pinnacle dance the cosmos.
Behind the scenes to the above film… very informationally dense.
Eastern mysticism flavored meditation animation
A few years back, this one is probably my most meaningful work of art as a human because of the immense truth it contains.
After moving deep into the mountain fastness, I hadn’t been able to animate with anything resembling a studio. So this is an improv compromise.
I have more animation videos on my childhood Youtube, but you’ll have to find those on your own if you care enough to.
Since acquiring the NRPRI urban property, I have set up an animation studio there. By visiting that web page, you can view some of those animations. I wish I had more time to animate, or was a higher-tier time mage than I am such that I could pull off more work like this. It is truly heights for me, it is very difficult to pull off but always worth when I can.