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Sir John Lubbock’s Pet Wasp – a micro-short film

Posted by lauriehill at 2:32, November 14th, 2018

Director:
Laurie Hill

A bit of news! I’ve just co-directed a new micro-short called Sir John Lubbock’s Pet Wasp.

It’s a collaboration with the excellent Osbert Parker.

We were very fortunate in finding a team of wonderful and talented people to help us bring it about.

The 2 minute version is here:

https://https://vimeo.com/297121305//

There’s also a 1 minute cutdown version on Instagram:

https://www.instagram.com/p/BqH4Ne-lkOw/

Details below:

Sir John has a problem with his pet wasp stinging him. Can he overcome its base urges through a tailored education programme and application of sweet treats? This documentary-fantasy chews over the thorny question with a delightful blend of cut out and stop frame animation styles.

Inspired by the life and writings of Sir John Lubbock (1834-1913) and the unnamed wasp.

An Anim18 and Animate Projects commission, supported by Lottery funds from Arts Council England, British Film Institute and British Council.

Directors: Laurie Hill and Osbert Parker
Producer: Abigail Addison at Animate Projects 
Co-Producer: Osbert Parker 
Animators: Laurie Hill, Osbert Parker and Ollie Griffiths
Animation Assistant: Thrishali Sumanasekera
Compositors: Laurie Hill and Michael Zauner
Editor: Julian Tranquille
Composer: Terence Dunn
Sound Designer: Rob Szeliga 


I have a few film stills too!





Laurie Hill behind the scenes on Vigorsol Air Action Xtreme Mission

Posted by lauriehill at 23:22, May 18th, 2016

Director:
Laurie Hill

And how about this for quality content? An exciting production still from my recent Vigorsol Air Action Xtreme Mission film!

Laurie Hill directs Vigorsol Air Action Xtreme Mission

Posted by lauriehill at 23:34, October 10th, 2015

Director:
Laurie Hill

Here’s some news!

I’ve directed a tasty animated project with Annex Films. It’s an online film for Vigorsol Air Action Xtreme gum, BBH the agency behind it.

This was a little while gestating but it finally got the go ahead and we dived in, plunged into a world of lemmings and snow.

It’s a collage-style project using manipulated photographic and footage source material from a variety of places. As such it required some heavy-duty picture research from the outset and there were some interesting challenges along the way!

I gotta say, I was working with a very very wonderful, creative and crazily talented animation team for this. Thank you Bill Porter and thank you Michael Zauner. You’re both amazing! Animation was by the three of us.

Here’s a link to my Director’s cut.
http://www.annexfilms.co.uk/portfolio/vigorsol

Here’s a link to the Italian language version.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIbwNvYq98M

Blurb on the Annex website about the project.
http://www.annexfilms.co.uk/news/laurie-hills-vigorsol-air-action-xtreme-mission/

I’ll pop a few stills in too. Here we go:







Laurie Hill interview with BeyondChron

Posted by lauriehill at 19:12, September 29th, 2010

Director:
Laurie Hill

Hey – more content to offer – a new interview! This one’s with BeyondChron ‘San Francisco’s Alternative Online Daily’.

http://www.beyondchron.org/news/index.php?itemid=8519#more

This ties in with Photograph Of Jesus showing at NY-SF International Children’s Film Festival.

Laurie Hill on apengine

Posted by lauriehill at 1:30, October 12th, 2009

Ok ok – so here’s a little interview that was taped by apengine –
I’m blethering away merrily there – apologies!

https://vimeo.com/6665165

Laurie Hill Q&A on Britfilms.com

Posted by lauriehill at 15:54, August 16th, 2009

Director:
Laurie Hill

There’s a fun little Q&A I was asked to complete up on the British Council website.

Here’s the link:
http://film.britishcouncil.org/comment/spotlight/2009/laurie-hill

Photograph Of Jesus

Posted by lauriehill at 13:05, November 25th, 2008

Director:
Laurie Hill

LaurieHill poj 08 smllLaurieHill poj 09 smllLaurieHill poj 02 smll
images courtesy of Getty Images

Film title:
Photograph Of Jesus

Running time:
6 mins 40 secs

Description:
Looking for photographs of Jesus, yetis and Hitler in 1948?
Help is at hand with this documentary-fantasy based on true stories of requests for impossible images. Real-life archives become the stage where fact and fiction collide, belief runs amok and unruly images have a life of their own.

Aspect ratio:
16:9

Language of dialogue:
English

    LaurieHill photogofjesus 06

    La La Song

    Posted by lauriehill at 13:04, November 25th, 2008

    Director:
    Laurie Hill

    LaLa applewide smLaLa appleyuk smLaLa flybut sm

    Film title:
    La La Song

    Band:
    The Kissaway Trail

    Track title:
    La La Song

    Record Label:
    Bella Union

    Running time:
    3 mins 5 secs

    Description:
    Beneath an innocent exterior, this promo for The Kissaway Trail reveals a darker, maggot-ridden heart. Made on a tiny budget, Laurie Hill directs, animates and stars as the cutout runaway in a tale of near-misses, frustration, escape and its repercussions. A stray rocket out of the blue brings disaster, the heavens offer encouragement from afar and a deluge of cockroaches, maggots, dinosaurs and butterflies makes satisfaction an elusive goal. A digital/stop frame collision with plenty of blu-tack.

    Extra info:
    The idea was to create a surface-level innocent story of escape but then reveal a darker flip side and its repercussions.

    Pure cgi can get a bit sterile – and I was really trying to avoid that. I wanted to try a hybrid approach combining computer animation with traditional stop-motion techniques.

    I created my main puppet using cutout photographs and wire – I’m sure you can still see some of the blue tack and glue if you look closely enough! But it’s those hand-made touches and glitches that give it vitality and character. I stop-frame animated this and the other found objects against a bluescreen, shooting with a digital stills camera. These were then placed within computer-generated 3d environments made with elements by illustrator Tekura Maeva.

    Aspect ratio:
    16:9

    My First Taste Of Death

    Posted by lauriehill at 13:03, November 25th, 2008

    Director:
    Laurie Hill

    MFTOD2

    Film title:
    My First Taste of Death

    Running time:
    9 mins 30 secs

    Description:
    Another special collaboration crossing the barriers of time.

    A kind of angsty and tormented take on Hollywood actioner full of surreal detail and humour. Me and the boss discover Dodo island, I face a deadly struggle with my nemesis the demented sea scorpion and the whole adventure can only end in tears.

    Miniaturised King Kong but without the ape?

    Extra information:
    As with My Life At 40, the script is a genuine document written when I was 12 and left unedited.

    BAFTA award-winner Ian W. Gouldstone provides the voiceover.

    About the music: ‘I wanted a powerful original score to be a key feature of my film and was keen to have a close collaboration with the composer, Andrew Lomatschinsky, from a very early stage in the development of the film. Visual and musical ideas were to develop together and proceed through close dialogue right through to the final dubbing session. Jacquelyn McKay provided the soprano vocal performance.’

    Andrew Lomatschinsky comments on the score: ‘All the music is original and written for this film. As a point of interest, the text used for the soprano is formed from extracts of writings from Hildegard von Bingen (c.1175 AD).’

    Aspect ratio:
    16:9

    Language of dialogue:
    English

    My Life At 40

    Posted by lauriehill at 13:02, November 25th, 2008

    Director:
    Laurie Hill

    LaurieHill mylifeat40 01 1

    Film title:
    My Life At 40

    Running time:
    7 mins 40 secs

    Description:
    I’m not 40 yet but I’m forward-thinking. A special collaboration between the director, aged 12 years, and his 34 year old self, both looking forward to a glorious future as a 40 year old conservation hero and Lamborghini owner. Made with six years to go!

    Note on technique:
    This film uses a variety of techniques: real and computer animated cutouts, drawing, photography and time lapse. No moving image cameras were used – just digital stills cameras.

    Extra info:
    My Life At 40 is billed as a collaboration between versions of myself at different ages struggling to articulate and realise their dreams. In doing so, a negotiation between idealism and pragmatism occurs. The script is a genuine document written when I was 12, rediscovered many years later.

    Directly after completing My Life At 40, I worked on a project for BAFTA-nominated director Osbert Parker – a promo film for the World Wildlife Fund, ‘WWF Living Planet’, featuring lots of great cutout animation.
    ‘My Life At 40′ describes my desire to become a conservation hero by the age of 40 and so this felt like it was a step in the right direction!

    Generally speaking, the drama of Control Vs. Unruly Forces is usually bubbling away at the heart of my work and this can fly off in any number of directions. There is also a tension between the desire to create narrative and another to dissolve it. A healthy dose of (dark) humour and a sense of absurdity are also crucial ingredients in the mix. If I can make myself laugh I know I’m on the right track!

    Aspect ratio:
    16:9

    Language of dialogue:
    English

    Weather Report

    Posted by lauriehill at 12:59, November 25th, 2008

    Weather Report is a collage of footage home recorded over an entire year on one UK channel – weather reports. The supposedly banal is transformed into cultural gold!

    LaurieHill WR 01

    Director:
    Laurie Hill

    Project title:
    Weather Report

    Individual work titles:
    1. Weather Report
    2. Chrissie, Sian, Martyn, Robin, and Becky
    3. Chrissie
    4. Sian
    5. Martyn
    6. Robin
    7. Becky

    Running time:
    approx. 45 secs each
    all together 6 mins

    Description:
    Composites formed from instances of appropriated TV footage: national and London weather reports recorded over an entire year 2004-2005 on one UK channel.
    These home-recorded reports have been cropped to a single video ‘line’ each and spliced together to form new hybrids.
    Together the hundreds of linear fragments play back simultaneously, as do the vocal commentaries.

    Chrissie, Sian, Martyn, Robin, and Becky is an amalgam of multiple presenters, charting the frequency of their appearances.

    Aspect ratio:
    4:3

    Language of dialogue:
    English

    Laurie Hill finalist in Jerwood Moving Image Awards

    Posted by lauriehill at 17:04, February 24th, 2008

    Director:
    Laurie Hill

    Another nice piece of Jerwood news here:

    My Life At 40 is one of the eight finalist works up for the Jerwood Moving Image Awards 2008.

    There’s a complete streaming version now available online at
    www.jerwoodmovingimage.com

    There’s also an exhibition of the eight finalist works on at the Jerwood Space in London at the moment, details below

    Jerwood Space: 20 February – 20 March 2008

    Jerwood Space
    171 Union Street
    London
    SE1 0LN

    Jerwood Space opening times:
    Monday – Friday : 10.00 – 17.00
    Saturday – Sunday : 10.00 ? 15.00
    Entry: Free

    Another Excerpt from John and John

    Posted by Will at 19:20, January 31st, 2007

    Hello. Due to popular demand in my imagination, here is another extract from ‘The Adventures of John and John’.
    This time it is the Exciting Police Drama out of John’s Brain…
    2.2MB of Exciting Police Drama

    for wills personal site see
    www.wrongboy.com

    Wrongboy.com

    Exerpt from John and John

    Posted by Will at 12:34, January 27th, 2007

    click here for quicktime of an excerpt of ‘The Adventures of John and John

    Aojaj sm
    The Adventures of John and John is the graduation film of Will Bishop Stephens
    Dur. 7mins 11sec
    2006.
    www.wrongboy.com

    There it is. An excerpt at last. I don’t think festivals mind excerpts.
    bon.

    for wills personal site see
    www.wrongboy.com

    Wrongboy.com

    My First Taste of Death: more great images!

    Posted by lauriehill at 2:43, July 3rd, 2006

    LHill MFTOD 02LHill MFTOD 03LHill MFTOD 04LHill MFTOD 06LHill MFTOD 07LHill MFTOD 08LHill MFTOD 09LHill MFTOD 10

    My Life At 40: images

    Posted by lauriehill at 5:21, February 26th, 2006

    LaurieHill mylifeat40 01 1LaurieHill mylifeat40 02LaurieHill mylifeat40 03LaurieHill mylifeat40 04

    Laurie Hill: old news item archive

    Posted by lauriehill at 16:14, February 24th, 2006

    For some reason items of news keep on dropping off the bottom of these pages so I’m going to try to bring them back somehow!

    April / May 2006

    East End Film Festival, London, UK

    13th Stuttgart International Festival of Animated Film, Germany

    February 2006

    Finalist & awarded Runner Up in Experimental Animation – Animex Student Animation Awards, Middlesbrough, UK

    January 2006

    Eat Our Shorts, National Film Theatre, London, UK

    Halloween Short Film Festival, Institute of Contemporary Arts / Curzon Soho, London, UK

    Squawking Heads

    Posted by ianmackinnon at 0:09, September 23rd, 2005

    canaries

    Canaries 1Mb 3Mb
    Catflap 1Mb 3Mb

    Here are two films that Meg and I made for MTV this summer. They were begun in June in a cloud of infectious naïveté, and finished in August on a tube train between Embankment and Westminster.

    Will kindly came on board for Canaries, delivering his début acting role. I do not exaggerate when I say that it is his most moving performance to date. We shot ninety percent of the film in one continuous, relentless 20-hour camera marathon, stole a few hours sleep, and then canned the remaining shots in another 4 hours.

    The technique required holding one’s pose for hours on end while your stick-on facial features were roughly tampered with by a colleague. After some practice we developed such expertise at this task that it was possible to grab forty winks between frames without moving a muscle. Covent Garden beckons.

    Copy

    Posted by ianmackinnon at 0:00, June 17th, 2005

    Copy 3Mb 8Mb

    Winner of several international awards, including Least Continuity and Most Visible Passers By, Copy premiered at the RCA ArtBar in Summer 2005. Based on an original concept by Julie Aveline (Nominated: Worst Walk Cycle in a European Picture) and directed by Ian Mackinnon (Winner: Least Artistic Integrity 2002, 2004), it was commissioned to accompany the launch of a magazine by RCA History of Design students.

    Credits:
    Direction/Animation: Ian Mackinnon
    Concept/Animation: Julie Aveline
    Cameraman: Martin
    Assistance: Sarah & Miguel

    Middle dog gets angry

    Posted by georgegendi at 20:09, March 17th, 2005

    middle dog gets angry 04 2
    5.21Mb
    Hello everyone. Here is Middle dog gets angry. It’s very small but you can just about see.

    Aspects of Identity

    Posted by ianmackinnon at 20:00, March 17th, 2005

    MichelThaoEmma

    Michel 0.7Mb 2Mb, Thao 0.7Mb 2Mb, Emma 0.7Mb 2Mb

    A series of time-lapse animations based on interviews with children about their identities. The animator and animation process are exposed to the camera along with each pixilated protagonist, a mark of the film-maker’s interpretation of the interviewees’ personalities, and a stamp of his own identity upon the films.

    All films were made in one take and took between two and four hours each.

    Art

    Posted by ianmackinnon at 0:00, November 30th, 2004

    artArt 0.7Mb 2Mb

    This is my favourite animation of all the films I’ve worked on. As part of a technical project involving lip-synch, André Ruivo and I made this experimental piece of time-lapse character animation that went on to inspire most of my animation work for the next six months.

    The two protagonists discuss how difficult it is being an artist while André and I buzz around them, furiously animating their faces. It took four hours of continuous drawing and erasing to make the film and we were awarded a fine collection of blisters each for our troubles.

    A Drawing of a Person

    Posted by Will at 10:08, May 13th, 2004

    A Drawing of a Person 0.2Mb 0.3Mb
    digitalexcellence
    (this is not an image from the film, but it is near enough)

    for wills personal site see
    www.wrongboy.com

    Wrongboy.com

    Bee Control in City Parks

    Posted by Will at 20:26, March 29th, 2004

    beecontrol2Bee Control in City Parks 7.9Mb

    A Municipal information film (about bee’s controlling city parks)

    for wills personal site see
    www.wrongboy.com

    Wrongboy.com

    Klak

    Posted by ianmackinnon at 0:00, January 16th, 2004

    ianmackinnon klakKlak 3Mb 8Mb

    Before starting the animation MA at the Royal College of Art, I had a few final spasms of computer animation to shake out of my system; klak was one of them. It was made in four weeks, little by little each night between gettting home from work and falling asleep at the keyboard. I’d like to believe that it would very different and much better if I’d done it in the daytime, but I can’t be entirely sure.

    The protagonist’s body is a 3D CGI rig, but his head is a complex system of 2D lines that deform based on the position of the camera and several user controls to give the illusion of a solid object.

    Running time: 01:56

    Pooky the Giant Shrew

    Posted by Will at 19:58, December 29th, 2003

    Pooky the Giant Shrew 3.6 MB 7.9 Mb pooky

    for wills personal site see
    www.wrongboy.com

    Wrongboy.com

    Un Amour Mobile

    Posted by ianmackinnon at 0:00, May 5th, 2002

    ianmackinnon unamourmobileUn Amour Mobile 3.5Mb 8.5Mb

    This is my Batchelor’s Degree graduation film, produced at the National Center for Computer Animation at Bournemouth University.

    It was intended as a platform to explore and combine some of the conventions of 2D and 3D animation. It attempts to challenge the audience to question the tangibility of the characters and their environment. Each element is designed to appear at once three dimensional and flat. It is also an experiment in using abstract spaces to facilitate elements of a narrative.

    The look of the film was intended to emulate a style of 1920’s french illustration that used cut-out coloured paper and bold, thick brush stroke edges.

    Credits:
    Animation, Software and Music: Ian Mackinnon
    Handwriting: Kristin Ross

    Charon’s Delivery

    Posted by ianmackinnon at 0:00, March 7th, 2002

    ianmackinnon charonsdeliveryCharons Delivery 3.6Mb 9Mb

    This film was an excercise in blending hand-drawn cel animation with stylised vector-rendered CGI. Alex Kanaris Sotiriou provided the hand-drawn elements and I wrote a bespoke computer program to render the scribbly CGI. Character animation, cinematography and editing were shared between us and the music was provided by Supra.

    Running time: 02:34

    Credits:
    Animation: Alex Kanaris-Sotiriou & Ian Mackinnon
    Rendering software: Ian Mackinnon
    Music: Supra