It’s my Short of the Week rotation again and this time I fess up to my obsession with beauty in the moving image through Igor Zimmermann’s experimental piece Daylight.

Have a read and watch.

• SotW: I Love Sarah Jane
• SotW: En Tus Brazos
• Short of the Week Piece
• _grau - Robert Seidel
• Virtuosi - Marcelo Garcia

Sometimes when I get really lucky, a director whose work we’ve featured will stick around once the interview dust has settled and become a firm friend who I can have extended film discussions with and tap up for viewing suggestions. Thankfully since his first appearance on DN 028 Kurtis Hough has fallen into that category, so it’s pleasure to welcome him back for an extra special episode kicking off our 100th consecutive week of podcasting to discuss his latest project Storm.

To watch Storm visit Kurt’s site and select the fourth thumbnail.

Showlinks
KH Studios
Stumble Then Rise on Some Awkward Morning
Godspeed You! Black Emperor
Baraka
Microcosmos
Galapagos
The Blue Planet
Winged Migration
Godfrey Reggio
Koyaanisqatsi
Philip Glass
Grave of the Fireflies

• DN Ep 028: Stumble Then Rise on Some Awkward Morning - Kurtis Hough
• DN Special: Joy Division - Grant Gee
• Time Piece - Kat Mansoor
• Stumble Then Rise on Some Awkward Morning - Kurtis Hough
• Miss D 2007 Top Ten

It’s with complete unashamedness that I admit we discovered this week’s guest Dan Schneidkraut from our well mined source of the Filmstock Film Festival when El Vez spotted Daddy’s Time, Part two of Dan’s Seeking Wellness: Suffering Through Four Movements quadrilogy of films. My interest in the films only grew when all four parts arrived and I discovered that it was going to take some work on my part to fully engage with their themes. Dan joins us to discuss challenging cinema, the strengths of video and a lifetime ban from the 48hr Film Challenge.

Seeking Wellness: Suffering Through Four Movements Materials
Production Stills
Cup of Friendship, Shrine of Scars Treatment
Daddy’s Time Shooting Schedule
Final Project Shooting Schedule
Malignant Love Shooting Schedule

Showlinks
Seeking Wellness: Our Suffering In Four Movements
Water Passing Through Weeds
Filmstock
Stan Brakhage
Yasujiro Ozu
Chris Mars
Earth
Sunn O)))
Pachelbel’s Canon
Lasse Marhaug

• Seeking Wellness - Dan Schneidkraut
• Filmstock #8
• DN EP 094: Das Dores - Gabriel Tupinamba
• DN EP 069: Somewhere, Anywhere - Chris Dundon
• DN EP 067: Four Eyed Monsters - Arin Crumley & Susan Buice

Seeking Wellness: Suffering Through Four Movements (2007)
A series of conceptual video projects exploring ideas relating to victimization, recovery and empathy.

Part One: Cup of Friendship, Shrine of Scars
Part Two: Daddy’s Time
Part Three: Malignant Love
Part Four: Final Project

• DN EP 098: Seeking Wellness - Dan Schneidkraut
• Now You See Me, Now You Don’t - Attila Szasz
• Four Eyed Monsters - Arin Crumley & Susan Buice
• Dead Bird - Brek Taylor & Clare Tinsley
• And the Colors Are Like Summer & Das Dores - Gabriel Tupinamba

Sometimes I go after a director for one film and they’ll come back at me with another that completely trumps my already high appreciation of their work. This week is such a case with director Gabriel Tupinamba and his lyrical study on repetition Das Dores.

Das Dores Materials
Stills
Script
Storyboard, Shotlist & Lighting Plan

Showlinks
Nonada Filmes
Das Dores
Festivus Film Festival
Met Film School
Cannes Film Festival
Groundhog Day
Magic Realism
Sony HDW F900
Sofia Coppola
Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design

• And the Colors Are Like Summer & Das Dores - Gabriel Tupinamba
• DN EP 098: Seeking Wellness - Dan Schneidkraut
• DN EP 078: Garage - Lenny Abrahamson
• DN EP 069: Somewhere, Anywhere - Chris Dundon
• DN EP 067: Four Eyed Monsters - Arin Crumley & Susan Buice

And the Colors Are Like Summer (2006)
And the Colors Are Like Summer is a short film that deals with the passage from hate to love and with the place that violence and aggression have in the sexual and love discourse, specially when taken to its limits.

Das Dores (2008)
Das Dores tells the story of two teenagers that end up trapped in an abandoned petrol station while trying to run away from home. Their car ran out of fuel and they are looking for a way out of there. While they get a chance to reconsiderate if running away together is such a good idea, strange noises and events enwrapped them and it becomes apparent that beyond their actions lies another - always repeating - pattern.

• DN EP 094: Das Dores - Gabriel Tupinamba
• Seeking Wellness - Dan Schneidkraut
• Four Eyed Monsters - Arin Crumley & Susan Buice
• Dead Bird - Brek Taylor & Clare Tinsley
• _grau - Robert Seidel

It’s not often a director gets to come up with his own type of animation, but after experimenting with the Strata-cut method Javan Ivey combined his love of working with paper and developed a technique dubbed as Stratastencil on his experimental piece My Paper Mind.

Showlinks
Javan Ivey
Indie Mogul interview
Pratt Institute
X-Acto
Strata-cut animation
Tunnel Kids
Replacement Animation
The Principles of Animation
Adobe After Effects
Adobe Photoshop
The Nightmare Before Christmas
The Corpse Bride
Persistence of Vision
Taking the Sea
Eliza Jayne

• My Paper Mind - Javan Ivey
• DN EP 060: Drift - Carl Burton
• DN EP 043: Mind Games - Peter Bunzl
• DN Ep 023 reposted: Virtuosi - Marcelo Garcia
• DN EP 076: Duelity - Boca & Ryan Uhrich

My Paper Mind (2007)
An experimental animation exploring the “Stratastencil” technique devised by director Javan Ivey. Inspired by the Stratacut technique, Stratastencil is an additive process. Stratacut removes material to reveal another layer, while this technique adds another layer while still showing the layer before it.

• DN EP 081: My Paper Mind - Javan Ivey
• _grau - Robert Seidel
• Virtuosi - Marcelo Garcia
• To Shoot a Rurf - Shane & Paula Sheils
• Stumble Then Rise on Some Awkward Morning - Kurtis Hough

Something has happened to PBS favorite Charlie Rose. The erudite conversations and sober intellectualism have been replaced by an absurd world where illogic, inane dialogues, and open hostility rule. The one-on-one interview between Charlie and his guest begins as usual but quickly goes awry, so much so that Charlie is warned that, somewhere, a man named ‘Steve’ is not happy. But who is ‘Steve’ and why is he angry? And why does the mere mention of his name stop Charlie cold? Using appropriated footage from a single episode of Charlie Rose, filmmaker Andrew Filippone Jr. creates something both disturbing and farcical in “Charlie Rose” by Samuel Beckett.

• Happy Monday - Andrew Filippone Jr
• DN EP 066: Happy Monday - Andrew Filippone Jr
• Time Piece - Kat Mansoor
• Kitchen Diaries
• Four Eyed Monsters - Arin Crumley & Susan Buice

Squint/Opera are well known for their work operating in the space between the film industry and architectural practice, realising commissions as hybrid visualisation/motion graphics pieces for their clients. Co-founder Jules Cocke joins us to discuss the company’s award winning piece for the 2006 Gardens by the Bay Master Plan Design Competition in Singapore.

Showlinks
Squint/Opera
Gardens By The Bay II
Will Alsop
Apple Final Cut Pro
Adobe After Effects
Design Event ‘07
3ds Max
Houdini
Autodesk Maya
Olympic Stadium
Fonejacker
Cloud City

• Gardens by the Bay - Squint/Opera
• DN EP 076: Duelity - Boca & Ryan Uhrich
• The Scent of Seth - Anita Shukla
• DN EP 065: _grau - Robert Seidel
• DN EP 060: Drift - Carl Burton

Gardens by the Bay (2006)
A film showing the development of the design ideas behind the winning entry to the landscape architecture competition in Singapore.

• DN EP 080: Gardens By the Bay - Squint/Opera
• Trusted Computing - Benjamin Stephan & Lutz Vogel
• To Shoot a Rurf - Shane & Paula Sheils
• Stumble Then Rise on Some Awkward Morning - Kurtis Hough
• Mr CityMen - Eric Lerner

Chances are that if you’re into music, but have had your fill of the sanctioned, glitzy, over produced pop promo you’ve at some point stumbled over the work of director Vincent Moon co-creator of The Take-Away Shows (Concerts A Emporter). Beginning back in his photography work and now in video, Vincent has re-define the approach to capturing live music, mutating it into a new form that’s best described as a performance documentary of the moment, in which multiple takes and planned setups are unwelcomed conceits. He joins us this week to discuss his work.

Showlinks
Vincent Moon
La Blogotheque
The Take-Away Shows
William Klein
Michael Ackerman
Antoine D’Agata
The National
Chryde
Arcade Fire
Banksy
Marla Hansen
Sony HVR-Z1E
Sony HVR-A1U
Scout Niblett
R.E.M.
Supernatural Superserious
Step Across the Border
Gimme Shelter
Dont Look Back
Beirut - The Flying Club Cup

• The Take-Away Shows - Vincent Moon
• Taxi!!
• DN EP 097: Inside the Circle - Marcy Garriott
• Routes Hits a Cinema Near You
• Routes - Alex Reuben

The Take-Away Shows: #83.3 - Sidi Toure - Part 3 & #78.3 - Scout Niblett - Nevada
You meet a band. You take them outside, in the streets, and ask them to play there, shoot the movie in one unique shot, whatever happens. Those are the Take-Away Shows, the weekly Video podcast from french weblog La Blogotheque.

Watch more episodes at The Take-Away Shows

• DN EP 077: The Take-Away Shows - Vincent Moon
• Taxi!!
• Trusted Computing - Benjamin Stephan & Lutz Vogel
• Tovarisch I Am Not Dead - Stuart Urban
• Tokyo Cowboys - Daneeta Loretta Saft & Patrick Jackson

Directors Boca & Ryan Uhrich describe their creative relationship as an ongoing tennis match in which each of them pushes the other to create the best work possible. Their animation Duelity presents the two main arguments for the origins of man as separate films which come together in a third split-screen piece to debate the issues.

Duelity Materials
Proof of Concept Films
Script
Moodboards/Lookframes
Storyboards

Showlinks
Duelity
BOCAMOTION
ryan.borys.tv
Vancouver Film School
Typographics
Google Analytics
Adobe Illustrator
Royksopp - Remind Me
Envisioning Information - Edward Tufte
Nova - Origins
Adobe Photoshop
Adobe After Effects
3ds Max
Illustrate!
Adobe Flash
PopVox Awards
Webcuts
The Elans
Thank You - Motion Graphics
Normal Design

• DN Ep 029: Trusted Computing - Benjamin Stephan & Lutz Vogel
• DN EP 080: Gardens By the Bay - Squint/Opera
• DN Ep 023 reposted: Virtuosi - Marcelo Garcia
• DN Ep 020: Abigail - Tony Comley
• The Scent of Seth - Anita Shukla

Duelity (2007)
According to the records of the General Organization of Development labs (GOD) it took a mere six days to manufacture a fully-operational universe, complete with day, night, flora and fauna, and installing Adam as its manager to oversee daily functions on Earth. That’s one story.

If thou shalt believe the Book of Darwin, t’is five billion years after The Big Bang that we behold what the cosmos hath begat: the magma, the terra firma, the creeping beasts, and mankind, whose dolorous and chaotic evolution begat the gift of consciousness.

Duelity is a split-screen animation that tells both sides of the story of Earth’s origins in a dizzying and provocative journey through the history and language that marks human thought.

Watch CREATIONISM [left-side] & EVOLUTION [right-side] at www.duelity.net

Via Cool Hunting

• DN EP 076: Duelity - Boca & Ryan Uhrich
• _grau - Robert Seidel
• Vote for Duelity!
• Virtuosi - Marcelo Garcia
• To Shoot a Rurf - Shane & Paula Sheils

Past guest Robert Seidel (DN065) puts his experimental approach to animation to work on a canvas worthy of his talent. In his own words: “processes: living paintings” is a 35 by 16 meter full facade projection with a corresponding light choreography, ambient music and synced sound effects shown on the 2/2/2008 in Jena, Germany.

Not satisfied with a continuous repeated loop, Seidel created a 17 minute ambient soundtrack that shifted constantly to create singular experiences with each viewing. Clever stuff!

The stills and videos look great, but do make me feel a pang of jealousy at not being able to stand out front and experience the piece first hand.

• _grau - Robert Seidel
• DN EP 065: _grau - Robert Seidel
• Vote Yes to Mind Games
• Virtuosi - Marcelo Garcia
• To Shoot a Rurf - Shane & Paula Sheils

A tip off from past guest Robert Seidel led me to the work of animator Max Hattler, who has been described by Dazed and Confused as one of “three of the world’s most exciting young animators”, next to PES and Model Robot. He joins us this week to discuss his experimental piece Drift.

Showlinks
Max Hattler
Goldsmiths College
Dazed and Confused
Goodbye Lenin
Royal College of Art
Camberwell Composers Collective
Bermuda Shorts

• DN Ep 020: Abigail - Tony Comley
• Drift - Max Hattler
• DN EP 065: _grau - Robert Seidel
• DN EP 060: Drift - Carl Burton
• DN Ep 025: Sweet Salt - Katerina Athanasopoulou

Drift (2007)
A blue planet and some ‘air.

• Drift - Carl Burton
• _grau - Robert Seidel
• Virtuosi - Marcelo Garcia
• To Shoot a Rurf - Shane & Paula Sheils
• Stumble Then Rise on Some Awkward Morning - Kurtis Hough

I first discovered the work of director and artist Jesse Ewles last year when I stumbled across the video he created for Grizzly Bear track Central and Remote. He joins me this week to discuss some of his pieces along with his approach to building a sustainable, creative career based on mutually beneficial collaborations and personal progression as an artist.

Central and Remote & On My Side Materials
Stills

Showlinks
Jesse Ewles
Cameron Tomsett
Todd Julie
Rasterform
Dean Tzenos
Grizzly Bear
Autodesk Maya
Michel Gondry
Jonathan Glazer
Spike Jonze
Orson Wells
Etsy
Lowbrow / Pop Surrealism
Marcel Dzama
The Clayton Brothers
2001: A Space Odyssey
Ten Kens
Michael Zapruder’s Rain of Frogs
Of Montreal

• Moros Eros: On My Side - Jesse Ewles
• DN EP 072: 8 - Benjamin Ducroz
• DN EP 067: Four Eyed Monsters - Arin Crumley & Susan Buice
• DN Ep 025: Sweet Salt - Katerina Athanasopoulou
• 8 - Benjamin Ducroz

Moros Eros: On My Side (2007)
An urban hunter works their way through the city’s back alleys pouching balloon versions of endangered species.

• DN EP 073: Moros Eros: On My Side - Jesse Ewles
• 8 - Benjamin Ducroz
• DN EP 072: 8 - Benjamin Ducroz
• Auto Pilot, Distortion, Ping Pong & Biker Mike - Mike Chan
• _grau - Robert Seidel

Artist and director Benjamin Ducroz has in the past associated his work with media bondage and saturation, he joins us this week to discuss his improvised approach to tactile stop frame animation along with the balance between passion projects and paying commissions.

8 Materials
Stills

Showlinks
ducroz.com
Videodrome

Via No Fat Clips

• 8 - Benjamin Ducroz
• DN EP 073: Moros Eros: On My Side - Jesse Ewles
• Moros Eros: On My Side - Jesse Ewles
• DN EP 067: Four Eyed Monsters - Arin Crumley & Susan Buice
• DN Ep 025: Sweet Salt - Katerina Athanasopoulou

8 (2007)
The shape that moves in space, through time changes its form and returns to its original state and place.

The shape that represents measurement statistics and swiss cheese.

Nothing practical, nothing didactical, just another formal experiment.

No political, environmental, commercial or social motive, just another pointless animation by Benjamin Ducroz.

• DN EP 072: 8 - Benjamin Ducroz
• Moros Eros: On My Side - Jesse Ewles
• DN EP 073: Moros Eros: On My Side - Jesse Ewles
• _grau - Robert Seidel
• Virtuosi - Marcelo Garcia

Along with the great selection of films you’d expect to see, the Times BFI 51st London Film Festival, presented Power to the Pixel - The Digital Distribution Forum for Independents. Festival Director Sandra Hebron, introduced lead advocates and practitioners of digital distribution, along with filmmakers currently making digital distribution work for them. Perhaps the most well known example of a film utilising the possibilities afforded by the digital revolution on all fronts is Four Eyed Monsters, I dragged the film’s creators Arin and Susan away from the post conference party for a Directors Notes’ interview.

Showlinks
Four Eyed Monsters
Four Eyed Monsters YouTube
Four Eyed Monsters MySpace
Spout.com/foureyedmonsters
London Film Festival
Power to the Pixel
Panasonic AG-DVX100
Apple Final Cut Pro
Workbook Project

• Four Eyed Monsters - Arin Crumley & Susan Buice
• Filmstock #8
• DN EP 099: The Super Noble Brothers - Mark Escribano
• DN EP 086: Extraordinary Rendition - Jim Threapleton
• DN EP 073: Moros Eros: On My Side - Jesse Ewles

Four Eyed Monsters (2005)
Four glittering eyes, two pink mouths, and eight limbs wrapped around itself taking up two seats on the subway.

• DN EP 067: Four Eyed Monsters - Arin Crumley & Susan Buice
• Tokyo Cowboys - Daneeta Loretta Saft & Patrick Jackson
• The Super Noble Brothers - Mark Escribano
• Sugarhouse - Gary Love
• Seeking Wellness - Dan Schneidkraut

If you’re of the view that after just over 100 years of existence the form of film is a locked down certainty, my guest Andrew Filippone Jr’s piece Happy Monday, a documentary film object, suggests otherwise in its depiction of the death of the short film Happy Monday Mr. Krebs whose motionless 16mm reels form the core of the piece.

Happy Monday Materials
Stills

Showlinks
Telling Story
Commute Still
Spoiler Alert Radio Interview
Lost in La Mancha
Nagra
Stefan Girardet
Shaun Roberts
11th Rhode Island International Festival
Hot Springs Documentary Film Festival
The International Experimental Cinema Exposition

• “Charlie Rose” by Samuel Beckett via Andrew Filippone Jr.
• Happy Monday - Andrew Filippone Jr
• DN EP 067: Four Eyed Monsters - Arin Crumley & Susan Buice
• Filmstock #8
• DN EP 073: Moros Eros: On My Side - Jesse Ewles

Happy Monday (2006)
In Happy Monday documentarian Andrew Filippone Jr. tells a simple story through a radically new formal language for non-fiction film, where story and subject are externalized and made tangible. Looking anew at his first film project - a failed and unfinished decade-old narrative short - Filippone recasts the unused 16mm negative into a vague and lifeless human shape that audiences linger over and read, the frozen moments entombed in its frames a moving expression of naive ambition and undisguised failure.

• “Charlie Rose” by Samuel Beckett via Andrew Filippone Jr.
• DN EP 066: Happy Monday - Andrew Filippone Jr
• Four Eyed Monsters - Arin Crumley & Susan Buice
• _grau - Robert Seidel
• Virtuosi - Marcelo Garcia