And the (intentionally bad-looking) cake on the poster, along with all of its stunt-cakes, were baked and decorated by the beautiful and talented Jen Hoche of Uhu Baking. (Full disclosure: she also pays half the rent and often cooks dinner at Pete Levin Films HQ. Also, I probably shouldn't refer to our place as Pete Levin Films HQ.)
The film stars Laura Prepon, Dreama Walker, Bryan Greenberg, Tate Ellington, and Matt Bush. It's got music by a lot of popular bands that the kids know and like, such as "fun." and "Architecture in Helsinki". It's a lot of fun and you should see it twice.
Eagle-eyed viewers of the film may be able to see a glimpse of my facial hair, making it's feature film debut on my blurry face in the background. (I'm in the scene that takes place in the kitchen.)
This last Saturday's issue of the LA Times had a great article about Stoopid Buddy Stoodios, the place where I've been working the better part of the last year and the home of Robot Chicken, Spy vs. Spy, and Dinosaur Office. I can't say enough good things about everyone at the studio and I'm happy to see the Buddies are getting the recognition they deserve!
If you still read your paper the old-fashioned way, you might have seen this bearded animator while you were drinking your morning coffee.
Check out the little Spy puppet I'm holding!
While the Baltimore Ravens occupy the top space in the football part of my heart (how about that Superbowl two Sundays ago?!), my dad was from Detroit and an avid sports fan, so I've always had a fondness for his team, the Detroit Lions.
John Sumner (a born-and-raised Michigander) and I had previously collaborated on the Baltimore Orioles animation, so when I saw that the Detroit Lions were having a video contest, I knew I had to mention it to him. I sent John a text when I was parking my car to see a movie and by the time I was out of the theater, he'd not only agreed to do the contest, but had already sent me full-color storyboards.
We had two weeks for him to build the puppets and for me to light and animate them. We were working on Spy vs. Spy segments for season 4 of Mad during the days, so nights and weekends were spent with John fabricating and painting and I was in the garage, composing shots and pushing puppets.
With it being due on Monday, January 14th, we worked until the late hours of Sunday the 13th. We brought in Alan Franzenburg to do some post production touch ups and edit and we used some music from the band Brian Von Jawa and the Takedowns, fronted by Brian Perez, one of John's old friends. John ended up directing the spot and I did the animation.
We used a fun technique of full-body replacement puppets done as cardboard cutouts. Each individual character cutout had animatable elements like the throwing arm or detachable football. It's kind of great how much movement you can imply with just a few simple poses.
You can see the fruits of our labor here by clicking here.
Oh, did I mention we won first place in our category?
Here's a Robot Chicken Thundercats sketch I did some animation on. As a kid, I actually had the Lion-O figure this puppet was based off of.
And as a bonus, here's the aforementioned Power Rangers sketch:
In Sunday's episode of Robot Chicken, I return as an animator for the first time since 2006! Good to be back.
(Previously, I'd worked on the first two seasons of Robot Chicken, starting in 2004 when it was still Untitled Seth Green Project. I started as an assistant animator and got to animate -- as well as act as coordinator -- more in the second season.)
In the above scene, I worked on a bunch of the shots of Zordon's head.
After finishing up on last year's Spy vs. Spy and Dinosaur Office, I was brought on to Robot Chicken for a couple of episodes at the end of the season. Getting to play with animate some of the toys I remember from my childhood was really great.
All aboard the Friend Ship!
Here's another project I animated on recently. This one is really fun and charming. It's part of Ruby's Studio, a series of videos produced by The Mother Company that's about the emotional education of kids.
The animation is downshooter animation with dimensional puppets shot on flat glass. I really like the look of it. Melissa Bloom and Maria Sequeira did an excellent job with puppet fabrication. My buddy Musa Brooker directed. The talented Jay Kim also animated.
While the animation I worked on is just a small part of the video, I'm happy to have been part of a project with such a positive message.
Cut ahead to the 1:03 mark in the video to see a quick glimpse of the stuff I worked on!
I'm a Los Angeles based animator, writer, and director. Between jobs for larger studios, I work out of my own stop motion animation studio in my garage, producing advertisments, music videos, and short films.
