Art Director

Brin Frost

Celebrity Deathmatch meets Groundhog Day in Chris Ullens' terrific and cheerfully gory video for UK teen pop singer Gayle's team-up with singer-songwriter Blackbear - featuring the pair as toys in toytown suburbia, with homicidal tendencies.In this stop-motion epic of nextdoor neighbour hostility, Gayle takes the form of a figure the size of a toy soldier, leaving her house (after guzzling down a real-size frankfurter) to wage war on Blackbear, who lives next door. As he is mowing the lawn to make a rude sign, she feeds him and his friends to the mower. And that just starts the begins the increasingly extravagant&nbsp;ways in which they dispatch each other on a daily basis.&nbsp;[imgtoken data:1]Ullens is the king of stop-motion animation who has given us some wonderful videos for the likes of Fergie, Rex Orange County and Lee Ann Womack, all from his&nbsp;tabletop studio. This one falls into the category of toy-related gore that he pioneered with Two Fingers' Vengeance Rhythm, a real stomach-churning splatterfest&nbsp;involving a psychopathic teddybear.&nbsp;This is rather more playful - as the animation was created with a series of non-moving&nbsp;plastic figurines. Ullens also only had a four-week turnaround to create his dark comedy - and he still manages to engineer something of a Happy Ever After...&nbsp;

Chris Ullens

Jade Bogue

Friends Electric

Trevor Joseph Newton

Jamie Durand

Matthew James Day

Atlantic Records

Gayle ft Blackbear 'fmk' by Chris Ullens

Gayle-(with-Blackbear)-'Fmk'-by-Chris-Ullens

Following his previous work for BRONSON, Bastille and the BBC's coverage of last year's Winter Olympics, Balázs Simon now pushes the boundaries in animation further with his remarkable work&nbsp;for US electronica duo Odesza.The video for Light Of Day - a track with plaintive vocals by&nbsp;Ólafur Arnalds - introduces us to a hunched figure, emerging from a cave: he is a very old man, robed in furs, who surveys&nbsp;the remote, hostile, freezing mountainous world around him.&nbsp;On a distant peak a golden light is visible. And the old man begins to set off, on the impossible&nbsp;journey to reach that&nbsp;light. - an unfeasible task, due to the hostility of the terrain.&nbsp;[imgtoken data:1]This magical tale, a life-affirming parable of the benefit of fortitude and on the cyclical nature of Life itself, is given great depth by its hugely impressive and innovative execution. It takes the form of an animated painting, where the 2D nature of the image is continually developing, and the old man's progress is expressed through the application of painterly digital brushstrokes. This is an aesthetic style that really works as the underlying movement of the figure is essentially realistic.<blockquote>I wanted to harness the immersive qualities of 3D animation, but also make it more painterly.</blockquote>Simon achieved this very distinctive and poignant visual piece through a combination of&nbsp;live action, motion capture, 2D and 3D animation.&nbsp;To create an immersive world, the environments were crafted in 3D with painterly 2D brushstrokes applied. The character’s movement was recorded via motion capture and real life elements were shot to complement the 3D environment, heightening the sense of realism.&nbsp;[imgtoken data:2]"I was fascinated by the idea of this very old character who gets rejuvenated in a sense during his struggle to experience something magical," says&nbsp;Balazs Simon. &nbsp;"This film is about focussing on the values of life, and not giving in to the pressures we face each day. I wanted to harness the immersive qualities of 3D animation, but also make it more painterly than usual. The result is a mixture of hand-painted backgrounds, in-camera effects, motion capture - and tens of thousands of algorithmic brush strokes in each frame!"&nbsp;Like the old man's journey to the top of the mountain, it is a brilliant achievement - and rather magical too.

United States

Beattie Hartley

Bea Egyed

György Fábos

Barcsay Marcell

Dániel Szabó

Balázs Simon

Sunnyside Animation

Máté Barbalics

Blinkink

Max Halstead

Josef Byrne

Alex Halley

Szilard Totszegi

Róbert Erdélyi

Gyar

András Piroska

Electronica

Odesza ft Ólafur Arnalds 'Light Of Day' by Balázs Simon

Odesza-'Light-Of-Day'-by-Balazs-Simon

Animation maestro Chris Ullens reunites with Rex Orange County, with their first collaboration since Loving Is Easy back in 2017, to create a sweetly romantic tale for Amazing.In contrast to <a href="https://www.promonews.tv/videos/2017/11/09/rex-orange-county-ft-benny-sings-loving-easy-chris-ullens/50382" target="_blank">Loving Is Easy</a>, where he employed stop motion to animate Rex's bedroom performance with Benny Sings, Ullens opted to use hand puppets to handcraft his story about Mr Hand - a milkman of an alpine town, who milks Cow each morning before going on his delivery round.But his happy regular routine is disturbed when he meets&nbsp;a young lady (hand), falling head-over-thumbs in love..."It's really cool that [Rex] came back to us for a second one!" says Chris Ullens. "He said it was the sister song to the first one we did a video for, and that he wanted us to be back on it for that. But the schedule was mad -&nbsp;so instead of stop-motion we suggested puppeteering and he loved the idea. The schedule was still mad though, as we took four and a half weeks to deliver. But really pleased with the result!"

United Kingdom

Jack McGinity

Alt-Pop

Rex Orange County 'Amazing' by Chris Ullens

Rex-Orange-County-'Amazing'-by-Chris-Ullens

Blink Art illustrators and now directing duo Essy May and Stevie Gee release their directorial debut for heavy metal behemoths Mastodon&#39;s latest single Steambreather.Directing the live action and 2D animation May and Gee&nbsp;have created a promo that tells the story of two Mastodon fans in bland English suburbia,&nbsp;who stumble across a &#39;Deep Nasal Enlightenment&#39; breathing workshop. Things gradually start to get weird as the &#39;Breath of Life&#39; class begins to spell &#39;Death&#39; for the unsuspecting audience. And then things get very trippy indeed.

Brin Frost

Art Director

Videos featuring Brin Frost

2022 (3)

2017 (1)

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