video

Tyrannosaurus sex

Posted by hil

This is a snippet of the sizzling action in Philip Millar’s Puppetvison show Tyrannosaurous Sex sex which is on at the Northcote Fringe Festival until 13 October, as part of the Melbourne Fringe Festival. I’ve seen this – its terrific! Puppetvision is also presenting Tadpole and Pure Puppet Palava, which means you have a good chance of seeing that blokey beer-swilling koala with attitude, Ken Koala:

(Philip Miller’s Ken Koala MCs the puppet cabaret at the 2006 National Puppetry Summit. Photo credit: Laura Purcell. From Terrapin Puppet Theatre’s Summit gallery.)

There are other puppetry offerings at Northcote, but only a day or two left to catch them.

Green things

Posted by hil

Earth2tech

I’m taken with this lovely leaf logo which belongs to a new green blog Earth2Tech (a new part of the GigaOm blog network) which will focus on the business side of green and clean technology.

And check out the cool Power of Wind ad produced by Nordpol+ Hamburg for EPURON, a renewable energy company based in Germany.

(via Laughing Squid)

Dragon

Posted by hil

Dragonz

Dragon is a beautiful animation ad made for United Airlines. It’s made using paper cut-out stop-motion puppets, and you can see the process and team, lead by director, Jamie Caliri, in The Making of Dragon. Caliri also directed the ending animation for Lemony Snicket.

(via Lines and Colours)

Search for a Scapegoat

Posted by hil

Notsorry

I’ve written previously about Shan Jayaweera’s John Howard puppetry satires. Now with an election looming later in the year, ‘Australian Prime Minister John Howard needs to find something
new to blame and scare the voters into voting for him’. Follow his efforts in a welcome new series, John Howard – Search for a Scapegoat:

  • Episode 1: Howard looks at former grand Mufti Sheik Taj el din al Hilali.
  • Episode 2: John Howard goes into the music world to find two potential scapegoats to help him win the next election. There is also an advertisement for the latest Liberal Party
    Reception centre.

Darth Vader balloon!

Posted by hil

How cool is the Darth Vader hot air balloon!

The burner jet sound would be absolutely perfect – maybe they should have a loud recording of ‘Luke… I am your faaather’ to go with it. Hope it comes to Canberra sometime; the Van Gough balloon came here, so it’s reasonably likely.

John Cox: How to make a monster

Posted by hil

Gillmanx

John Cox‘s exhibition How to Make a Monster has been travelling around Australia for some time now, and at present it’s at the Scienceworks Museum in Melbourne until mid July. John’s work became known with his making of the animal cast in Babe, but he has since been involved in many movies, including Crocodile Dundee in LA, George of the Jungle 2, Peter Pan, and Inspector Gadget 2. Often exhibitions only hint at how things are made, but How to Make a Monster looks as if it goes into the making process in detail. I feel there is often a hunger for this kind of information, perhaps especially among children. The willingness to share such detail both here and on his website is a generosity I respect and appreciate.

How to make a monster: the art and technology of animatronics is a great review, talking through many of the facets of the exhibition, while Ghoul School ‘explores the workshop of Australia’s pre-eminent monster-maker’.

I’m interested Cox uses computer technology linked with a router for some sculpting.

The 9-metre crocodile made for Peter Pan is amazing. Check out the video studio for footage of the crocodile being tested…

Jcox

It took 4 months to make and is a favourite of Cox’s, and of the puppeteer, Richard Mueck:

‘RICHARDMUECK (SCULPTOR/PUPPETEER): This was an absolute joy to perform. This was possibly the most powerful, impressive puppet I’ve ever had my hands on, and I was like a little kid in a toy shop who just got the coolest Christmas present. — ABC 7.30 Report

Unfortunately, due to financial pressures, the director had to cut its use to a cameo role: “You see it open one eye and move its head about 30 centimetres,” Cox says. “We could have done that with a head on a stick.”

Experience has taught him not to be too precious about his creations. Making them is the real buzz; what happens after that is often beyond his control. “We got to build this amazing, big thing and it worked,” he says. “It makes for an interesting story and there are no bad feelings.” – SMH

This rings absolutely true. As do Cox’s practical hints for students.

The Tale of How

Posted by hil

How

The Tale of How is a beautiful and intreguing animation, a labour of love by three friends calling themselves the Blackheart Gang, who hail from Cape Town, South Africa. It’s the second part of a larger story they envisage, A Dodo Trilogy. Their ‘making of’ video introduces the makers and explains how they went about it.

(via She Dreams in Digital)

Update: Siouxfire has a cool Concise Overview of “The Household”, a series of interviews, production
images, and information on the two follow-ups completing the Dodo
trilogy as well as the following trilogy (the Bear Histories) at Siouxwire. Thanks, Siouxfire!