Metronomy "A Thing For Me"

88 turned me onto this video earlier today, it's SICK.


A Thing For Me from Metronomy on Vimeo.

(sick in the good way, not the AIDS-y way)

More Motionographer Love...

One of my best friends and lovers Mark Theriault got his very own shout-out on Motionographer.com today. If you haven't checked out his site Partially Frozen yet, check it out here or better yet check out his Computer Beach Party VFX reel here.* You'll be so engulfed in particle-sex that you'll need to see a doctor and a lawyer.

*note: Mark Theriault's CBP reel has made members of Locksley cry. No joke, right Sam?

Lifelong Friendship Society (We Go Hard)

Own Your C, a project I worked on with Lifelong Friendship Society got some love on Motionographer.com today! Not only did I get a chance to animate and help out on set, but I fulfilled my day-long dream of dressing up as an underground elephant king and dancing on a television set.

... and apparently I work for a company with " lo-fi hipster aesthetics." If only that applied to Burger King spots as well.

ALSO: The music video All Over Again that I directed last year made it into the finals for "Best Music Video" at this year's Midwest Independent Film Festival! Hopefully that works out. If I had known about it sooner I would've tried to rally everyone into an online voting frenzy but alas I was unaware. Check out the trailer for this year's nominees here.

UPDATE: Alas, we didn't win... but there's always next time.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving!

I've been tying up all the loose ends with boarding out new projects these past couple of days so I can have my first real vacation in half a year. This particular animator is heading back to Chicago 'til next week, and is going soak up all the love and nostalgia that his social sponge can absorb!

... but maybe more so in a way that sounds less gross.


Nacho pie here I come.

Public Service Announcement

(click on image to enlarge)

I had some free time and doodled this up in Flash. I'm a sucker for its vector paint tool.

88-Keys "True Feelings" is online!

Yes, it is available for viewing on my site as well but clicking on the link above will give the Computer Beach Party site a little more love! Hope you guys like it.

Coming Soon. Very Soon.

Well it's been awhile since I've updated this blog and I apologize to all four of you who read it. However, my absence from the bloggurobble doesn't mean I've been unproductive by any means. After weeks of no days off and late nights at the office, I can finally say that the music video for 88-Keys' mixtape song "True Feelings" is in the final stages of completion. In the next few days we'll have it posted on both Marked Animation and Computer Beach Party so be sure to check back at your leisure! Until then, here are a couple more screenshots of the beast:



This project was a lot more texture-heavy than other things I've worked on. Graduating from the School of Stealing Images Off of Google Image Search, I instead went around Williamsburg taking a series of close-up snapshots of the gritty & grainy for this video to dirty things up a bit. There's a lot of high school, neighborhood bodega and traffic signs plastered all over 88. I can only assume that's why he got into this business.

Special thanks to Lifelong Friendship Society, Anna Maltezos, and Ben Myers for lending a varietal of hands on this project.

First Screenshots from 88-Keys' "True Feelings"

Sup fam!

Here's a couple of very vague & ambiguous screenshots from the upcoming music video for 88-Keys that we're working on. The video should be done in less than a couple of weeks (shit!) so be sure to check back soon for the finished product!

"Landing Gear" in stores today!

A friend of both the Computer Beach Party family and hip-hop lovers everywhere, Devin the Dude's latest album Landing Gear hits stores today! One of the funnier rappers out there, longtime fans will be able to rest-assured that he mentions shampooing his testicles within the first 2 minutes of hitting the play button.


Here's a song off of his previous album, Waitin' to Inhale...

Casualities of Animation Part 1 - Gastritis

I know I can speak for the majority of animators & graphic artists when I say that we all sacrifice a lil' somethin-somethin for our careers. Some of the more common consequences involve moderate to severe weight gain, a little too much hair in and around the keyboard & eating ramen noodles well after graduating college. These are things that we all must deal with in order to convincingly render a sack of flour feeling sad on screen.

In other words, we as animators do some of the most important work in the world.

In the day following another late night at work, I had a sudden loss of appetite & some mild stomach pain which quickly escalated into a fever & what felt like performing sepuku from the inside out by nightfall. Days passed and things only got uglier... things that I'm not quite willing to share in a blog on the internet (yet). Incapacitated by the end of the weekend, I finally went to the hospital to get things checked out. What I initially thought was food poisoning turned out to be something called gastritis. According to the handy lil' fact sheet that the doctor provided me, gastritis is caused by ingesting too much spicy food, medications, consumption of alcohol, drinking too much caffeine and "emotional distress." It's not quite an ulcer, but probably worse than taking part in the Hollywood Diet.

Well... at least I wasn't on any medications?

It didn't help that listing the causes of gastritis was basically like reading a summary of my day-to-day routine, and since I've found it easier to work without burning kidneys... I have since modified what goes into me on a regular basis. Gone are the days of red bull and coffee, my friends. I've had a few cups of tea when things get rough, but for the most part I have actively avoided caffeine.

As for the spicy food, stress and beer... maybe next year?