ODONIS ODONIS | Busted Lip

Odonis Odonis | Busted Lip Listen Here

Rejected by Much Fact 04/13/2012

Concept

Dark imagery projected on a stretching latex screen.

Mood & Art Direction

Dark 90’s feel. Seamless blend of sex and horror and humour.

Approach

Step 1: We will create a montage of 90’s inspired images. These will include plates of the band under gloomy daylight, running through a dead forest. Portraits of people with Hypertrichosis (werewolf syndrome). Images of women’s mouths chewing.

Step2: We will construct a large latex screen. The montage footage will be projected onto the screen. 

Step 3. A nude actor will be placed behind the latex screen. The actor will stretch the latex to the beat of the song distorting the projections in time to the music. Periodically, a light behind the screen will illuminate the actor, revealing their form to the camera.

Technical Treatment

Camera: 7D Canon DSLR + Canon EF 24-105mm zoom lenses.

Screen: The screen will be constructed from .45mm thick white latex rubber sheet.

PORTABLE.TV Interview

Portable.tv Interview (unabridged)

This week I did an interview with Portable.tv regarding my video for Of Montreal. I decided to publish the unedited article here —You can view the original by clicking “Portable.tv” above, in case that’s unclear. :)

So Spiteful Intervention is a very mixed media, did you create the artwork as well? How did they come together like they have?

Yes, I painted the majority of the work. My good friends Lee Stringle and Cameron Tomsett came in to help with the final push so we would hit the deadline. Our approach was to take hand-painted characters and animate them by mapping them to a 3D meshes in Autodesk Maya. 

The imagery or idea behind it seems a little dark, what general mood/feeling did you want to generate with it?

Originally I had wanted to do a 3D video in a similar style to artist Jeff Koons collages. That idea was rejected. Treatment one was too pop-arty for track. The first few times I listened to the song, I was focusing on the poppy rhythm of the piano and the change at 1:39. Both reminded me of the Beatles White Album for some reason… anyways, I completely missed how dark the lyrics actually were. The song’s all about self-loathing and battling dark thoughts, so I felt having Kevin’s head morph into various creatures would be the simplest, and most fun way to illustrate that idea. I think the colours, the loose painting and the bounciness of the images, combined with how sad all of the drawings look, matched the song pretty well.

You’ve done quite a few film clips, how do you approach each one with a different mindset and originality?

I’m  curious. I like taking things apart and rebuilding them in different ways. 
In art school we were always encouraged to find one distinctive way of working, and to put all projects through that filter. There’s the Alex McLeod filter, and the Martin Wittfooth  filter, the Jessica Rae Gordon filter. They each build little worlds, with their own sets of rules. It’s a great approach for business as Milton Glaser would say. The main thing I took away from illustration was the mechanics of world building.

I think my filter is influenced by the internet I think. My work is filled with the mutts that are created when when the world’s culture begins to have sex with itself and spawn mutants. My videos are experiments, never intended for mass production. If I was writing this for an council grant, I’d say it’s about metamorphosis and the images that live in the crossover between the analog and digital world. 

What general process do you go through when coming up for an idea for something like this and how do you develop it?

I like to use the music as a seed, and imagine a world growing out of it. This leads to experimentation by necessity. I’ll listen to a track and think, this song reminds me of a Saturday morning cartoons, or this song reminds me of Voyager Space probe, or troll under a bridge… the songs take you a lot of different places. Especially if you have a mind that’s so full of rubbish absorbed from the internet.

For Spiteful Intervention, I knew I wanted to make images that were dark and creepy, to match the lyrics, but also had a pretty silliness to them, to match the song. I started to think of various images that had that vibe, I could use as influences. Black velvet clowns, the 16th century paintings of fruit arranged to look like faces by Giuseppe Arcimboldo. I also riffed off artist William Blake’s images from the Divine Comedy.

You work with a lot of different media and mediums, do you have one thing you like more than all the others?

My favourite aspect of making videos is that they can be experimentations in storytelling. I chose to make videos in the first place as an alternative to film school, so trying new things and learning the best approaches for setting a certain mood is the whole point. Moving forward, I’d like to work towards becoming a good multimedia storyteller. So for me, it’s not so much about doing more animation, or more live action, but instead developing a long form style where each of those worlds coexist. Not in a Roger Rabbit kind of way. More like how fantasy and naturalistic ideas coexist in our imaginations. For feature film, I’d like to direct meta stories like Slaughterhouse Five (the book, not the crappy movie) or Alan Moore’s  the League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (the comic, not the crappy movie) or the scifi book Snow Crash. Stories that leave room for absurd cartoons amidst violent and pornographic worlds. :)

OF MONTREAL | SPITEFUL INTERVENTION (VERSION 1)

Jeff Koons

Of Montreal | Spiteful Intervention (version 1)

Rejected 01/15/2012 What we made instead... 

Concept

A 3D, morphing, animated collage. The images will be similar to the work of artist Jeff Koons, combined with more realistic versions of characters from the Of Montreal album art. The collaged images will be converted into 3D using the post-3D technique popular in IMAX films.

Step 1

We will construct animated collages featuring kitsch images (toys, candy), paint blobs and magazine collage featuring sexy lips, fingers with colourful nail polish and photos of wild animals. 

The lip-stick mouths featured in the animation will sing along to the track as they float through the compositions. The singing mouths will be similar to the giant mouth at the beginning of Rock Horror Picture Show. 

Step 2

The photo collaged images will be imported into the 3D suite Maya and converted into CG.

Step 3

We will paint a nude model all in white with white body make-up. We will paint the model’s hair white with spray-on hair colour. We will project the collage animation from step 1 on the model’s body. The model will be seated against a black velvet curtain to absorb the projectors reflected light.

Technical

The collage elements will be shot and scanned at 4K and animated in After Effects and Maya 3D. 

The final video will be delivered as a 1080p .mov quicktime.

Sum 41 | What am I to Say (version III)

Photo posted by Uwe the Artisan

Sum 41 | What am I to Say (treatment #3) Listen Here

Rejected 05/13/2011

Premise

 The last guest at a formal party smashes up the place in slow motion.

Look 

Warm, hazy lighting, similar to Kubrick’s Eyes Wide Shut. The camera will move around the scene on a track shooting at 120 fps.

Synopsis

We see a garden at night, set up for a formal party. The area is deserted. Overhead is a canopy of glass light bulbs. There are two long banquet tables with a 15 foot stretch of grass in between. A ceramic lawn jockey in the shape of a dog stands beside two water bowls. At one end of the party is a “guest of honour table” with a cake and presents. It has a giant portrait of a young woman hanging above it, similar to the giant portrait of the Queen that used to hang in the Winnipeg Jets arena. 

Beside the table is a coat rack, overflowing with coats. Some of the coats are piled on the ground. It seems the guests left in a hurry. At the other end of the party is a small bandstand with a microphone, a couple of amps, and some stools. 

Deryck slouches in a beat up armchair, on the lawn in the centre party. He looks out of place. He seems to have dragged the chair there. He is wearing a soiled black suit with his tie undone. It looks as if he was punched in the jaw. He is not wearing any shoes or socks.

In slow motion we begin a long track shot as Deryck stands up and begins touring the scene. 

Empty seats, glassware, and plates of unfinished food pass in the foreground as Deryck walks. Deryck passes an open air grill looking bored and passive aggressive.

Deryck passes a large pile of unopened presents. He shakes one of the boxes at his ear and throws it over his shoulder. He scoops up the rest of the presents and tosses them into the air. Deryck picks up a piece of cake off a plate and eats with his bare hands as he walks. 

Deryck passes by the coat rack. He shoves the rest of the cake in mouth to free up his hands.  Deryck begins turning the pockets of the coats inside out looking for change. He finds none. Disappointed, his mouth still full of cake, Deryck gathers the coats in his arms and falls forward. The coat rack collapses under him.

Deryck stands up, munching on cake. He wipes his mouth with one of the jackets. 

Deryck walks back towards the banquet table closest to the camera. Deryck climbs up on top of the table and begins strolling across it. We see Deryck from the waist down as he moves. He kicks glasses onto the grass. He steps on a large cake. At the end of the table 

Deryck pulls up the tablecloth and steps onto the bare plastic of the banquet table. Deryck pulls the end of the table cloth around his shoulders, as if it were a cape. Glasses, plates, and food fall everywhere. Deryck jumps of the table like Batman. The tablecloth and everything on it is dragged to the ground.

Deryck heads to the bandstand. He picks up the microphone stand and begins to attack the other equipment. Sparks fly. Deryck heads into the courtyard where the ceramic dog sits. Deryck shatters the dog statue with mic stand. 

Deryck pulls up the layer of sod. He throws the heap of grass and soil at the over-sized portrait.

Deryck pauses a moment, surveying the scene for other areas to attack. Our camera trucks left until the gasoline for the open air barbecue comes into the foreground. Deryck rushes for the can. Merrily, he spins with the can slinging gas all over the tables and chairs. 

Deryck climbs up on the far table. He reaches up and pulls down one of the strings of lights hanging above the area. He gathers the light string up into a ball. Deryck swings the ball of lights and crashes them down on the table. They explode in slow motion. Deryck climbs up and grabs a second string. He repeats the same action, but this time as the lights break, the gasoline on the table sets fire. 

We close with a shot of the fire spreading across the long banquet table. Deryck returns to the centre of the area.  He collapses back into his easy chair to watch the fire.

J

Technical treatment

We will use practical lighting. The party area will be sprayed lightly with a fog machine to add atmosphere. 

We will shoot at 2k, 120 fps. The camera will be on a track.

OF MONTREAL | Sex Karma

Image by R. Crumb​

Of Montreal | Sex Karma Listen here...

Rejected 10/05/2010

Approach

Mixed Media Freak-out 70’s Animation

Concept

We will make a bizarre, loose, 70’s, underground comic, psychedelic montage. The animations will be inspired by the art of R. Crumb. The colour work on the piece will be highly saturated and feature Of Montreal-esque decoration and colour pallets such as sparkles, feathers, loose paint and metallic textiles and saturated colours. The video will be a mix of claymation, cgi and photography. The video will contain nudity and adult subject matter. It will not be suitable for MTV (without blurring) but will have good viral potential on the Internet.

Sequences

Hump sequence: Amorous men and woman ride on buxom, strong-thighed woman.In the background, 70’s rainbow bursts and colour bars whiz around. Girls being ridden include: Fire girl, roller girl, ski girl and ski dive girl. I’m also open to other suggestions… The R. Crumb drawings will be the starting point, but the characters will take on an original flare once converted to claymation.

Make-out sequence: A looping animation of various animated heads, tongue kissing with one another. Some of the heads will be earnest. Some will be weird. Some surreal. Make out couples include catman + catgirl (Fritz the Cat), a mariachi in a sombrero + a tourist lady in a sun hat, an old Lady + a lemon meringue pie-face, two sea urchins kissing, a black crow pimp + a pig police officer, a nerd + his 8 bit computer screen girlfriend, a man with alopecia + a lady sasquatch with big tits, two horses, a skull head + a pile of worms and two perfectly round twins.

Breast sequence: A montage of breasts from different female creatures [white breasts, black breasts, freckled breasts, old breasts, hairy breasts, spiked breasts, lizard breasts, skeleton non-breasts] As the chests appear on the screen, they are embellished with glitter and sequins.

Eye Sequence: Close-ups of giant cartoon dilating eyes, insinuating orgasm.

CHORUS

Other weird image loops appear during the songs choruses. A dominatrix steps on the crotch of a masochistic bald man. The man digs in his pockets for money to keep the woman torturing him. He pulls out wades of lint, dry clean tags and corroded coins.

Two homeless men spoon on subway grate while being sprinkled with Christmas snow. 

A girl rides a seesaw with a boy lying underneath it. The girl kicks herself up into the air and crashing the seesaw down between the boys legs repeatedly, crushing his junk. He loves it.

Approximate Production time: 8 weeks

SUM 41 ~ Baby You Don’t Wanna Know (version 1)

SUM 41 ~ Baby You Don’t Wanna Know (version 1)

Rejected 05/28/ 2011  What they made instead...
 
Concept

We would like create a music video, with the feel of a behind the scenes rock documentary, cataloging a tour of Toronto’s night life, but with a surreal twist… The band will be followed by a furry black beast everywhere they go.  
 
Tone

 Serious, with silly undertones. Like a Coen brothers movie or a Herzog doc. 
 
Technical Treatment

We will use hand-held camera work and the footage will have a raw, grainy, 16 millimeter look, with a vignette. The furry black beast will be a man in a fur suit, similar to the way Chewbacca was handled in the Star Wars films or Barkley from Sesame Street.  It’s mouth parts will be puppeteered.  

 
Synopsis
 
Inside a cheap hotel room, Deryck awakes from a nap and heads to the bathroom to wash his face.  He notices Steve, hunched over the bath-tub covered in soap bubbles.  Steve moves to the side and reveals he’s washing a huge furry black creature, with glowing multicolored eyes.  Deryck doesn’t react as he’s used to seeing the furry black beast every day.
 
Deryck exits the bathroom.  The door to hotel room opens and a female press agent enters pushing a room service cart, loaded with Tacos and Jarritos Soda Pop. Jason enters behind the agent carrying a large bundle wrapped in brown paper.  Deryck sits down and eats some taccos.  Steve and the furry black beast exit the bathroom and join Deryck for the meal.  The furry black beast is toweling off.  He wraps the towel around his head like a turban.  
 
Jason hands the paper bundle to the dog. The furry black beast opens it. Inside is an exotic looking fish. The furry black beast pulls the fish apart and eats it politely.  
 
Jump cut to a ride in a van-cab.  Deryck, Steve, Jason and the furry black beast stop to pick up Tom from the street corner. Tom looks pleased until he opens the van’s sliding door and sees the furry black beast. Tom looks suspiciously at the furry black beast as if he’s resentful. The furry black beast just pants peacefully. 
 
Jump cut to the studio. The furry black beast is playing guitar, shredding fast and hard. Jason, Deryck and Steve are blown away by his talent. Tom looks on jealously. Angry, Tom leaves the studio.
 
Cut to a shot of the band playing a small live show. The furry black beast is on stage playing lead guitar.  A small gathering of bar flies move to the beat, various old women shower attention on the furry black beast. Tom looks on from the shadows jealously.
 
Later, the band and the furry black beast visit the rock bar Bovine Sex Club. Deryck and the gang chat with the owner. He looks distraught. The owner leads the band and the dog to a small hidden room behind the bar. Inside, hunched in a chair, sits a middle aged woman holding a bag of ice to her eye. She’s weeping. She reveals a black eye. Someone has attacked her. She points to her office wall.  On the wall is wooden sword wrack with a missing sword. A dusty silhouette of a sword is all that remains. Deryck, Steve and Jason look to the furry black beast. The furry black beast approaches the bruised woman. The dog’s eyes begin to glow brighter than before…  In a flash, the woman’s bruises disappear. Steven, Deryck and Jason look on with awe.
 
Suddenly the sound of broken glass startles everyone in the office.  The 3 guys and the furry black beast head back into the bar and find Tom is there with medieval sword. Tom looks upset.  He’s swigging the sword and smashing beer bottles with it.  As the song concludes, the dog monster approaches Tom. Tom flinches. He considers attacking the dog creature… until their eyes meet.  om and the furry black beasts are drawn together as if their about to kiss. Before they touch, the screen cuts to black.
 
Cut to black

Sum 41 ~ What am I to Say (version 2)

Sum 41 ~ What am I to Say (version 2)

Rejected 06/01 2011
 
Premise

Band footage inter-cut with steam-punk robot imagery, shot in black and white. Similar vibe to Fritz Lang’s Metropolis.
 
Tone

Moody, surprising.
 
Shot list
 
Band footage
Sum 41 will be shot in black and white sitting in an industrial-looking room filled with scrap metal. Members of the band will be shot in various ways interacting with the machine parts they’re surround by. 
 
Inserts
We see an unusual grave in a field of tall grasses. The footage is black and white and grainy, like Fritz Lang’s Metropolis. The grave is a pile of white stones overgrown by weeds. The grave marker is a small tree made out of twisted wire. The tree has corroded metal leaves and strange fruit growing on it. The fruit looks like glass light bulbs. The entire tree looks to be covered in some kind of dark grease.

One of the bulbs falls from the tree and is immediately swallowed by the soil. The soil on the grave begins to seethe and expand. Tangled weeds on the grave recede and the white stones roll away. The soil parts. The body of a mummified woman is revealed. Her face is shrunken with age and she has two large moth cocoons attached to her eyes. Lying across the woman’s chest is a small robotic dog. The dog looks amateurish, cobbled together, and rusted. In time lapse we see the woman’s face restored. The woman jolts up, gasping for breath. The eye cocoons split and two large moths fly out from them. 
 
The woman climbs out from the grave. As she does, she notices the robotic dog. The dog has a hole in its back where one would expect to screw in a light bulb. The woman picks up the machine. 
 
Cut to the woman walking along the side of a gravel road in the middle of nowhere. She’s dragging the robotic dog behind her on a leash. The machine is bouncing off the gravel like a tin can being dragged behind a wedding limo.
 
The woman finds a weathered looking barn. She enters, still dragging the dog behind her. The interior of the barn looks to be the same place where Sum 41’s footage was shot. The woman finds one of the grave tree’s bulbs lying on a work bench. She screws the bulb into the dog’s back. The bulb illuminates and the dog robot begins to mechanically shuffle across the bench.
Further on in the space the woman spots what looks to be a humanoid robot. The woman picks up the illuminated dog robot, to cast light on the discovery. The humanoid robot is a mass of twisted wires, gears, and steel, some eight feet tall. The woman is startled by something touching her back. She drops the robot dog, and its bulb explodes. It lies motionless. 
The woman turns around and feels the arm of the humanoid robot. Its long skeleton-like arms are reaching out lifelessly from the darkness. 
 
We notice that, in the dimness, the woman’s blouse is glowing. 
 
The woman backs away from the arm right into the torso of the humanoid robot. As soon as she makes contact with it, a row of metal latches spring shut around her body. The woman struggles. The large robot begins to move. Its monstrous head tilts into the frame. The robot eyes its new power source. With a skeletal robotic finger it opens the woman’s blouse a few inches. Her chest is pulsating with a mysterious while light.
 
The large robot moves out of the barn into the daylight, the struggling woman bonded to it. The two characters move through the field at increasing speed. 
 
The woman’s fear turns to exhilaration. As the track finishes the robot and the woman fire past the open grave at great speed.

Cut to black.

BRANSON BUCKS

RICHARD BRANSON MONEY

Branson Bucks. Branson Bucks imagine a present where Richard Branson is king of the world, and we finally get the moon base and space elevator adventures humanity has been promised for a century. I left these notes around town with my email address scribbled on them, but no one replied. I still have a bunch. If anyone wants a souvenir, email me here jesse@jesseyules.com

Kathrn Calder ~ Turn a Light On

Kathrn Calder ~ Turn a Light On

Rejected 11/05/2011 Another director closer to Vancouver was chosen to shoot a similar concept.

Director: Jesse Ewles & Cameron Tomsett 

Concept:  Kathryn Calder sings as she walks through a dark, winter forest illuminated with giant paper balloon lanterns.

Art direction / mood: Warm and cool lighting. Dreamlike feel. The balloon lanterns will be shaped like owls.

Synopsis

a) Kathryn Calder walks though a snow covered forest at night.

b) The forest is illuminated by dozens of large paper balloon lanterns tethered to the base of the trees. 

c) Above, the stars in the sky are hidden by the glare from the lanterns. 

d) Kathryn sings as she walks through the forest. 

e) Kathryn visits each of the large lanterns. She blows out their candles. The darkened lanterns float to the ground.

f) As the light from the lanterns are extinguished, the stars above become more and more visible. By the time the last lantern goes dark, the stars are glowing as bright as fireworks. 

g) Kathryn walks towards a teepee. She lies down on a bed of pine branches and covers herself with a fur blanket. The stars in the sky are glowing brightly.

h) As Kathryn begins to dream, we see tiny colourful clouds of light swirling in her head.

The Portal | Art Instalation

Art Collaboration with Lee Stringle and Melissa Fisher  

​The Portal

The portal was a video box inspired by the nickelodeons of the 19th century. The portal had a 4 inch peep hole that looked in on an HD video screen within the box. A thick glass lens installed in peep hole allowed the viewer to see all four corners of the video image by simply shifting their gaze. In addition, the lens also distorted the video image similar to a fun house mirror. The box was constructed by builder Melissa Fisher and decorated by painter Lee Stringle.

Conceptually, I thought it might be interesting to set up a video player that only one person could view at a time. In the past I have found that projections thrown on walls in busy venues often get ignored a few seconds after the audience sees them. The intended effect was to create scarcity and a bit of mystery, so that people in a crowd would ask each other “what’s in the box?” The idea was to install the box in galleries and rep cinemas around Toronto, and then have the Portal play various outtakes from my music videos and other strange visual experiments I was unable to sell clients on. Ultimately, the 20 pound video box proved to be too cumbersome to set up on a regular basis. With the advent of iPad I hope to redesign the box to be much lighter, and thus, allow me to use it more frequently.

DINOSAURLAND (Canceled SHORT FILM)

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DINOSAURLAND (SHORT FILM)

Rejected by Canada Arts Council Winter 2009

Artistic Concept

Intended Themes

The appearance of Dinosaurs have evolved and matured, stride for stride, with the imaginations of the artists that illustrate them. Over the centuries the evolution of the human consciousness has produced radically different projections of what extinct creatures might have looked like. Dinosaurland will examine how our view of ancient animals has changed and will continue to change, forever.

The film will explore how evolution takes place in art and how it mirrors the evolution of organisms. It will also explore how human perception informs scientific fact, and the blurred line between myth and reality.

Influences

Guy Madden + 70’s NFB naturalist lms + BBC’s Walking with Dinosaurs + Jan Svankmajer Animation.

Brief Story Summary

While wandering through the frozen ruins of a dinosaur themed amusement park, a artist appreciates depictions of dinosaurs through the ages. He examines Chinese dragons, 3 version of Iguanadon and his own work before coming to the understanding that biology, human consciousness, human culture are evolving in tandem.

Extended Story Summery

We follow the path of a lone artist as he tours a decommissioned Dinosaur theme park in the dead of winter. The park is ruined, littered ageing dinosaur replicas, rotting from neglect. Each of the replicas depict how dinosaurs were imagined by previous generations.

First, the explorer sees a centuries old dragon statue hanging in a tree. The explorer imagines the dragon from a mystic point of view. He see a morphing psychedelic snake, the representation of some ancient energy, more than a esh and blood creature.

Next, the explorer sees a series of Iguanadon ber-glass forms, of the kind made by naturalists over the past two centuries. These three versions of the same animal are radically different. In his mind, the explorer sees the Iguanadon morphing over the ages, as if it’s evolving in timelapse.

The explorer now begins to conceive his own imaginative versions of dinosaurs. Each is endowed with his curious and adventurous spirit. The explorer sketches swirling, jewel encrusted monsters that in the end, look very similar to the mythical dragons from the beginning of the journey.

Finally, at the edge of Lake Ontario, the explorer views a swan swimming among the floating ice. He imagines that the swan de-evolving to a feathered dinosaur, and then back to a swan again. The explorer then re-images swan. He pictures a multi-headed, multi-winged kaleidoscope of biology. To him, it is a possible future both for the bird and for visual experience.

Technical Treatment

Visual

The work will be a mixed media piece. It will combine pixelated live action footage shot in 4k digital stills, stop-motion puppetry and Maya CGI. All footage will have a heavy grain, over-saturated colours and dreamlike feel similar to 70’s cinema. A low frame rate will be used on live action sequences to match that of the stopmotion animation sequences. This will make each of the sequences harmonious with one another.

The dinosaur statues the explorer passes will be created from photographs of scale miniatures, that will later be composted into the scenes via After Effects.

The animation for the “vision” sequences will be a mixed media combination of digital animation in Maya or stopmotion claymation. The two will be combined digitally in After Effects.

Audio

The soundtrack will have electronic, ambient, minimalist and punk influences. Audio samples of dinosaur roars, snow crunching and other foly will be sampled and used in the music, similar to the approach of John Cage or Steve Reich. The soundtrack will be composed by Toronto musician, Dean Tzenos. The piece will be musically driven and there will be no dialog.

Approximate running time: 00;04;50. Four minutes, fifty seconds.

Credits

Writing, camera work, animation, prop building and editing will be executed by Jesse

Ewles (+2 assistants). Musical score will be composed and preformed by Dean Tzenos.

Opening Titles

Exterior; Day; Toronto Island Ferry.

1 [Bearded man in his twenties looks at the passing ice flows as his ferry approaches a frozen Island. Birds oat between the ice sheets. We see the boat approach the entrance gates of an old dinosaur park, covered in snow. The area is bleak, ice-covered and desolate save a giant particle board sign that reads DINOSAURLAND in large red letters.]

Exterior, Snowy Winter Day; Wards Island Park

2 [The explorer stomps through the snow dressed in a parka and huge boots. He drinks from a bottle of whiskey to combat the cold. He passes by a massive statue of a Brachiosaurus. It’s huge neck has split in two like a banana.]

3 [The explorer approaches a grove of trees. Wrapped around the tree is the Chinese dragon statue. It’s marked Zhou Dynasty. As the explorer stares into the mouth of the sculpture he has a vision. The statue’s mouth opens wide. It’s faded paint illuminates.

It’s rows of dragon scales come alive and begin to radiate outward like a sun burst. The explorer snaps out of the vision and marches on ward.]

4 [The explorer passes a huge statue of an Iguanadon. It’s marked BW Hawkins 1842.

The statue is naively sculpted, deformed by both primitive science, and imagination.

Further along, the explorer comes to a second Iguanadon statue 1940’s. It looks like a komodo dragon standing upright like a human. Last in line, is the most modern model of the dinosaur. It resembles the Iguanadon’s depicted in Jurassic Park and the BBC’s documentaries. As the explorer compares the three Iguanadon forms he has a vision.

He imagines the Iguanadon morphing from one version to the next and back again, as if the each interpretation of it is a stage in its evolutionary history. The explorer moves on.]

5 [Down on the beach, the explorer finds mounds of crushed ice washed ashore. Half buried in the ice is a pile of dinosaur bones. He passes them. Further down the coast, the explorer finds two dinosaur action figures lodged in the ice. The figures are painted unrealistically, in silver and white stripes. The explorer chucks and moves on.]

6 [The explorer begins to roll a snow ball. He rolls it from one end of the island to the other until it’s massively large. Once he tires, the explorer climbs up the massive ball and sits on it like a thrown. From out of his side-bag, he reveals a large red book. It’s bound like an encyclopaedia, and is filled with loosely-drawn ink paintings of dinosaurs.

The explorer takes out a red-coloured wax pencil from his bag. He begins to embellish the dinosaurs with red line work, making the images more surreal. He adds extra eyes, horns, spikes to the creatures. He gives their skin ornate markings. As the explorer works, he has a vision. He sees animated versions each dinosaur mutating and becoming embellished. They sprout extra limbs, and their skin becomes ornately decorated like Fabergé Eggs. The explorer closes his book. He moves on.]

7 [The explorer returns to the beach. In the water he spots a swan swimming comfortably between the ice flows. He imagines that the swan de-evolving to a feathered dinosaur, and then back to a swan again. Last, he conceives his own re-imagining of a swan, a multi-headed, multi-winged kaleidoscope of biology. A possible future both for the creature and the explorer’s art.

Cut to Black.

Credits.

TEN KENS | Refined

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TEN KENS~ Refined Listen here...

Rejected 9/19/07 What they made instead... Nothing

For ‘Refined’ I want to a make an early 90’s video that complements the early 90’s vibe on the album. What I have in mind is similar in aesthetic to David Lynch’s Eraserhead, except mixed with the old Louis Carrol poem ‘The Walrus and the Carpenter’. My pop-psych stop-motion work will be prevalent. Everyone in the band will appear in the video. *note* though this video is primarily focused on oyster eating very few actual oysters will be eaten (which is too bad because they’re delicious!). We’ll be faking the shots with empty sterilized oyster shells and corn syrup.

JE

Breakdown

0:00

We open with a slow moving pan through the graffiti alleys of Queen West.

http://static.flickr.com/52/121662761_5d60009ba6.jpg

It’s evening and the lighting is harsh with deep shadows.

As we continue down the alley we come across Dean, sitting on a picnic blanket on the ground beside two women. The three have their heads against the wall and are blowing large puffs of cigar smoke into the

sky in time with the music. They look stuffed. Surrounding the group are a number of party accessories. There’s a small t.v tray, some empty bottles and a metal bucket heaping with chilled oysters.

0:12

The camera pans right and finds Lee with his own heap of oysters and lady-friend. We have a super close-up of him splitting one of the shell fish with a shucking knife.

http://www.fs.fed.us/r6/olympic/recreation-nu/images/oysteropened_sealrockbeachjun04.JPG

He then delicately licks the center. To his right, his companion is eating much more aggressively. We get a strong, silhouetted profile shot of the girl throwing back the oysters. The clear slime runs down her neck and chest.

0:35

We continue down the alley. To the left we pass Ryan. He’s passed out, lying like a rag-doll with his head buried in shells. We continue on. We find Dan loading up a miniature wheel barrow with ice. He’s wearing a pair of industrial rubber gloves. Beside him is a huge fat man - cropped so we can only see his belly. The fat man hands another sack of oysters to Dan. Dan, halfhearted, splits the sack open with a knife and dumps the shells into the barrow (barely paying attention). As he casts the sack aside and heads back to refill his band mates’ platters, we notice a label on the side of the bag marked “EXPIRED”.

0:55

We jump cut to Dan shoving the oysters out of the barrow with a scoop. He tosses a few more Ryan’s way even though he hasn’t moved an inch. Quickly we cut between Dean, Lee and the girls all chowing down.

1:10

Suddenly everyone begins to feel ill. As we examine Dean, who is slouching and slack-jawed, we notice that

the girl beside him (who’s blurred by the depth of field) seems to have been mutated. Dean turns his head to look at her; as he moves the girl comes into focus and immediately returns to normal. He shifts his attention to the second girl on his other side. The same effect is repeated.

1:17

Meanwhile, on the other side of the ally, Lee continues to eat but with more craziness in his eyes. We see a wide shot of Dean looking back and forth at his slouching, sickly women, before cutting to Lee again.

1:32

Next we see a first-person view of what Lee is hallucinating. His companion’s head has been completely replaced by a giant oyster shell. Lee stares intensely. Her huge shell parts in the centre. A litter of clear slime pours out along with a thick tentacle.

2:00

We cut back to Dean’s terrified eyes, then cut to his girl friends. The top half of their faces have been replaced by oyster shells. They’re looking at one another, stroking each other’s arms. It looks as if they are about to lean into one another for a kiss. Just as they come close enough, the shells on their faces pop open, dumping slime and exposing their fat oyster tongues. The two begin French kissing with the oyster tongues. Dean does his “metal” scream.

2:15

As the build in the song begins, the fat man from earlier arrives on the scene, flanked by Dan. We pan up and see that he’s a huge walrus man. He licks his lips as he surveys all the tasty oyster heads in the ally. He begins to stomp down the alley. Dean looks terrified and hides behind the kissing oyster girls. Lee looks excited, Dan is unamused and Ryan is still passed out.

2:28

The walrus reaches Lee’s former companion first. He thrusts his head into her shell and begins to eat her. Slime pours everywhere. We cut frantically between everyone in the scene. Dan continues to walk around serving more and more oysters, oblivious to the goings on.

2:45

The walrus makes his way over to Dean’s oyster twins and separates them. As Dean recoils in horror, the walrus takes a girl in each arm and begins thrusting his head at each of them, biting them in turns. We cut between everyone once again. Dean is in the fetal position, covered in slime, Lee is spooning his shell-head girlfriend (stroking her shell) and Dan’s still tossing oysters at everyone. The walrus goes back and forth, biting the twins rapidly as the song peaks.

3:03

We end with a fall away shot of Dean screaming. Everyone around him appears to be human and passed out. Lee is stroking the head of his girl who’s lying on the ground. Dan is heading away with his wheel barrow.

Cut to black

What they made instead: Nothing

GRAND TUBA (ANIMATED SHORT)

Image by Jessica Rae Gordon

Grand Tuba

Rejected by BravoFact 09 /10/ 2010

Synopsis

A curious city girl with a massive Tuba attempts to join a band of unwelcoming street musicians.  After upsetting four members of the group with her awkward playing, the tuba girl is taught to harmonize by the sympathetic matron of the group.

Script/ Shot list

Setting:  Exterior.  Sun-set.  A fantasy version of a Kensington Market-style apartment block. The apartment block in our story is over grown with plants. Mature trees erupt from the side walk. A car on the street has been converted into a planter. A marsh with bulrushes, frogs, and birds has been built in an alley way.  The apartment block has a merchant stand at it’s base, and housing in it’s upper floors. On the roof, there is a church steeple filled with bells. Also on the roof, is a set of colourful bird houses.

a. [A girl sits in a wagon with an enormous tuba between her legs.  The wagon is being pulled by a large exotic looking bird, who is tied to the front of the wagon by pieces of yarn.  Each time the bird lands to rest, the girl blows her tuba at it to frighten the bird into the air again.]

b. [The girl, the wagon and the bird pull up to a strange apartment block.  Rhythmic musical noises are coming from the block, like the sounds of an orchestra tuning up.]

c. [On the roof of the apartment block an old man claps his hands rhythmically. Above him, a flock of exotic birds fly in patterns. The birds are moving to the rhythm of the claps.]

d. [Back on the ground, the bird tied to the wagon breaks free. Pieces of yarn dangle behind it. The bird joins the other exotic birds on the roof top. The old man appears at the ledge.  He barks at the tuba girl angrily. The girl frowns and hides her face behind her instrument.]

e. [Pulling her wagon herself, the tuba girl approaches a large pine tree growing out of the side walk. A boy sitting in it.  He is playing a fiddle. Girl attempts to get the boy’s attention by playing her tube. She makes no effort follow the tune the boy is fiddling. Irritated by the interruption the boy shakes his tree and drop drops pine cones on the girl. The girl slides her tuba over her body as protection. She walks past the tree. Pine cones bounce off her tuba armor.]

f. [Further down the street, two raccoons sit washing vegetables in a neighborhood pond. The raccoons have jingle bells tied to their feet. Girl with tuba bumps into two raccoons accidentally. She still has her tuba over her head and cannot see. They screech and run off screen. The girl removes the tuba from her body.]

g. [The girl with tuba sees an open store front. The sign reads “SUGAR JUICE”. Inside, a red-headed girl stands making juice.  Empty juice jugs come in one side of store, and full juice jugs zip out the other side on a clothes line.  As she works, the girl taps a tune on her juice jugs with a spoon. The tuba girl approaches and attempts to play along.  As the tuba is raised to her lips, the bell of her tuba bumps into the moving line of juice jugs coming out of the store. Jugs of juice pour into her tuba. As she begins to play, the tuba girl fires juice all over the girl in the stand. Startled, the juice store girl hides under her counter.]

h. [Walking back to the pond, the girl with tuba sees a second girl. She is playing a flute for the raccoons that were frightened off earlier. The raccoons are dancing for her. The raccoon bells are jingling rhythmically. The raccoons see the girl with the Tuba approaching. They snap their teeth and growl at her. Frightened, the girl with the tuba blasts her instrument at the animals. They scamper behind the flute girl. Protesting, the flute girl angrily blasts her flute at the tuba girl. A small spit ball flies out the end of her flute and hits the girl with the tuba.]

i. [Sensing a fight, the girl at the juice stand begins ringing a juice jug like a bell.]

j. [The fiddling boy approaches. He kicks a pine cone in the tuba girl’s direction.  Following him, is the girl from the juice stand. She’s jangling her juice jug. Her clothes are dripping with colourful juice.]

k. [In the sky, the exotic birds begin to circle like vultures.]

l. [The angry crowd gathers around the wagon.]

m. [Surrounded and frighted, the girl with the tuba topples into the pond.  She uses her tuba as a snorkel. The tuba makes tuba sounds as she breathes through it.]

n. [Suddenly, church bells ring out from a tower above. Everyone looks up in surprise.]

o. [From the tower, an elderly woman leaps. She cascades to the ground with a hand-full of bellropes. The elderly woman lands in the crowd. She reaches into the water and pulls the tuba girl out. The tuba girl has sails and pond slime in her hair.  The tuba girl shies away, blushing. Like a mother bear, the elderly woman scoops up Tuba Girl and along with her instrument into her big arms.]
   
p. [The crowd of angry musicians stare, dumbfounded.]

q. [The elderly woman hoists the tuba girl into the sky. The woman squeezes Tuba girl with a tight hug. A pleasant note rumbles from the tuba. The woman begins hugging the tuba girl repeatedly. A bouncing tuba bass line is created. The woman and tuba Girl strut around, visiting each of the other musicians.]
 
r. [One by one, the other musicians begin to join in, following the consistent rhythm. The song builds. The fiddling boy and dances a jig. The juice stand girl taps her juice jugs like a xylophone. The pet raccoons begin dancing on their hind legs while the flute girl plays.]

s. [We close with a final shot of the band of musician playing well together. The tuba girl is set down on her feet by the elderly woman, and continues playing perfectly on her own. She smiles wide while puffing her cheeks. The exotic birds zip between the players, flying in geometric patterns. The birds lift the tuba girl and place her back on the wagon.]

t. [Cut to black.]

Musical Concept

Throughout history the Tuba has been relegated to supporting roles in musical compositions. We seek to write a neoclassical score in which the Tuba becomes the featured instrument.

Technical Treatment

We will create a paper-cut animation using puppets and dioramas. The characters and sets will be designed by Toronto illustrator, Jessica Rae Gordon. The paper creations will be photographed in 3K digital and scanned at high resolution. They will then be assembled animated using Auto Desk Maya 2008 and Adobe After Effects CS5. The movement and aesthetic will be similar to Y. Norstien’s ‘Hedgehog in the Fog’.

The film’s score will be influenced by John Cage and Steve Reich and will be highly rhythmic with a seamless blend of foley sound effects. The work will be a silent film. There will be no voice actors, allowing for the film to be played internationally.

Storyboards bellow...​

Buy Now | Body Crash

​Buy Now | Body Crash Listen Here

Rejected 04/14/2008

Treatment

For “Body Crash”  I would like to make a montage of cliches from the classic Role Playing Games of the late 80’s and early 90’s. The final video will be realized in two separate animation styles which will be intercut with one another.  50% of the video will be animated using 15 inch tall stop-motion puppets shot in real life outdoor settings (ie. woodlands, marshes ect) The other half will be comprised of enlarged pixel-art animations reminiscent of the classic games.  All of the characters will share a distored, bug-eyed anime influence .

The cast of characters includes a crotchety but banal warrior toting a sword of ever-increasing size, a holistic magic-mushroom eating mage and a feisty thief who’s attacks foes with the cursed disembodied skin of his face. This party will venture through various forest settings bantering, fighting scorpions, building up their levels, buying items and preparing for a boss fight at the climax of the video. The final battle will feature a giant man-eating flytrap.  During the stopmotion versions of these scenes, each of the cartoon impact explosions, as well as the spells the mage casts will be built out of paper and composited into the scene.

J

What they made: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYBhbMj16VM

BAMBOLEO (Remix Video)

​

Directors: Jesse Yules and Cameron Tomsett

Cencept

Run Away school bus viral video

Summery

The majority of the video will be a low frame rate (stopmotion-stye) dance sequence viewed from a locked-down camera at the front of the bus.  As the bus travels, it will pick up various strange characters and surreal characters (children, old people, ghosts, dogs, alien blobs ect) who each perform unique dance moves aboard the bus.  Similar to Daft Punk’s “Around the world”, the video will start with one character popping up from behind different seats based on the music. As the song progresses and the bus travels to different destinations different characters will begin appearing from behind the seats. By the end of the video there will be a full variety of characters appearing from behind each seat synchronized to beats and hits of the song. We will also create wide shots of the bus speeding around the world give the video variety.  We would like to animate these wide shots, using a miniature bus.   The bus will drive crazily through unexpected off-road environments such as a swamp, a dump and a disco.  Also, the bus will make a dare-devil style ramp-jump through a flaming hoop.

Shot List

Overhead shot of a stop-motion bus rocketing down an empty highway.

Locked down shot of a school bus, one character appears from behind the seat popping up and down to the beat. 

Bus passes through a farm.

People dressed as pigs, cows and chickens appear from behind the seats.

Wide of shot of the bus driving through a river.

Everyone on board does the “wave” in their seats as new characters begin to appear. Fish people, Alligator people etc…  The pond water will be bed-sheets painted to look like water.  The swamp plants will be pieces of foam covered in real weeds.

Close-up shot of one of the bus’ fuel gages.  It’s marked “fun” and the needle is steadily rising. 

Wide shot of the bus driving through a graveyard.

Ghosts (people in sheets), vampires, warewolves characters etc…appear from behind the seats.

Wide shot of the bus driving through a discotheque.

Silver disco balls flood the bus. Balloons pop up from behind the seats as well as sweaty disco dancers.

At this point the once empty bus is packed full of different characters all bouncing up and down the music. The bus is a full out celebration with disco balls coloured lights and a whole lot of characters. bus can fly through the flaming hoop at the end and explode in mid air.

Delivery Format:  PAL Beta SP

J

Scarlet Fever ~ Crash and Burn

Scarlet Fever | Crash and Burn  What they made instead...

Theme 

Punk fable.

Synopsis

After sleeping for one hundred years, a clumsy character sets off on a quest for flight.

Story

We open with a shot of an ancient character who’s been napping against the tree for a hundred years. A flowerbed has grown up around her blanketing her body. She wears a giant wooden head, overgrown with weeds and berries. Finches and other songbirds crawl in and out of her eye sockets and mouth. The scene is bathed in orange light from an afternoon sun.

Suddenly, the Ancient awakens, startling the birds. As she wipes the sleep from her eyes, she dimly sees the birds taking flight.  The Ancient finds the sight hypnotic.  Still half asleep, she flaps her arms, attempting to follow the birds into the sky, before toppling over into the flower bed. Undeterred, the ancient wobbles to her feet and sets off on a quest for flight.

The Ancient passes passes a pond where she meets a Fisher character, struggling with a fishing rod, a tiny woman with a giant bonnet, her face is obscured by the shadow completely, except for large, brightly glowing eyes.  Leveraging the fishing rod with all her might, the Fisher flights to reel-in a large snake-like catch.  Seeking to help, the Ancient leaps into the pond and grabs the snake-fish by the tail. After some struggling, she heaves the fish up onto the shore. The Fisher is overjoyed and bounces around celebrating the catch. Grateful, the Fisher suggests the Ancient join her for dinner. An image of a roasting fish appears in a thought bubble over her head as she speaks. The Ancient declines and points to the sky. We see a clearing in the trees and beyond, a cliff face.  Circling the rocky plateau are a flock of black crows. The Fisher looks on with dread.  Reluctantly, she  scoops the snake-fish up and follows the Ancient towards the cliff.

At the summit, the Ancient and the Fisher find a dark figure sitting on a bolder, smoking a pipe.  This figure is a skeleton in robes, wearing a headdress of dried fruit and thistles. The Ancient approaches the skeleton and curtsies. The Ancient explains to the Skeleton, that she wishes to fly. She points to the birds in the sky and flaps her arms. The Skeleton smiles and laughs and with a wave of his robes he conjures a hand-glider. Transfixed, the Ancient walks towards the glider before being stopped by the skeleton’s outstretched hand. The Skeleton seeks payment. Eager to help, the Fisher offers the snake-fish.  The Skeleton accepts it but seeks further compensation.  He points to the Ancients large wooden eyes.  The Ancient does not flinch, and with a wave of the Skeleton’s hand, the Ancient’s eyes vanish, leaving two empty holes in her wooden face.  

As the song’s climax approaches, the Fisher leads the blinded Ancient towards the flying-machine.  Smiling and confident, the Ancient lifts the glider up her shoulders and begins jogging towards the cliff.  The Skeleton looks on confidently, puffing smoke from his pipe.  The Ancient dashes over the cliff.  The glider plummets.  Though she is in free-fall, the blinded Ancient is unaware.  She smiles broadly, laughing, exhilarated by the wind in her face.  She’s in ecstasy.  Her black hair, previously disguised by her mask, breaks free and unravels in air.  As the song ends we see a wide shot of the glider crash into the forest canopy, throwing up a swarm of sparks and debris.

J

!!! | Must be the Moon

!!! | Must be the Moon Listen Here

Rejected 03/30/07

Theme: Drunken party video, referencing the donkey sequence from Pinocchio.

Sinopsis

The scene unfolds at a crazy party held in a run-down 30’s style home. We tour the house with a POV shot, as if we’re seeing through the eyes of one of the eccentric guests.

The house is packed with young people. We work our way through the crowd. We drink from a bottle curiously labeled “!!!” brand moonshine. It has a picture of a donkey on the bottle and the liqour glows a florescent green. As we drink from the bottle, our view becomes progressively hazzier. We see trails, halos around the lights and eventually full on hallucinations.  

Eventually, with a final chug from the liquor, we see the heads of many of the guests morph and change into the heads of braying drunken donkeys. The donkey creatures party even harder than their human counter parts.

The party is divided into several rooms. Each room has a collection of donkey headed guests. In one room the guests are dancing. One male pulls on the exposed underwear of a female donkey with his teeth. A second female donkey comes up behind the male. She pins a tail to his butt.

In the kitchen the donkeys are eating piles of oysters and tacos.

In the bathroom two donkeys are shampooing a great black dog. 

As the video closes, we exit out onto the back porch. Several donkeys are cheering on a blind-folded donkey swinging a bat. Above him bobbles a donkey-shaped pinatta. The bat-weilding donkey bashes the pinatta in half, showering the the floor with with candy and a fluorescent green liquor.

Our final shot is of a donkey with his whole mussel burried in the crushed remains of the donkey pinatta, fiesting on it’s candy innards. 

J

The Fray | Heartless

Photo: Jason Taylor

The Fray | Heartless What they made instead...

Rejected 03/03/05​

Approach

The video will be a blend of low-frame rate filmwork blended with stopmotion animation. It will feature animated plants and very sad people. It will be shot in naturalistic way.

Synopsis

For “Heartless” I would like to structure the video around 3 tomb-like shrines that have formed in the homes of three severely depressed individuals. 

Each person has become frozen in time with grief. So much so that they have been over-grown by plants from their lack of movement. They have been swallowed up like buildings covered in ivy. The pants have become a death shroud, like something constructed by some ancient tribe. Each person’s sad face is visible under the layers of vines, leaves and lichen.

We find the first shrouded person propped up in the in the doorway of an emptied bedroom closet; an old television sits near by blinking with a staticy PBS-style loop of a mummy being assembled. A large window in the room has been blocked out by couch cushions. 

We find a second shrouded person half submerged in bathtub surrounded by floating candles. The bathroom window has the curtains drawn.

Our final shroud is found at a kitchen table. There are two plates of dried food, two stained wine glasses and a pitcher with dried flowers set in front of it. The kitchen window has horizontal blinds. They are shut.

We see a slight undulation within the vines, breaking the stillness of each tomb. The vines are tightening around their hosts.

We cut to a shot of a suburban skyline under grey cloud cover. Wind blows orange and yellow leaves into the gutter. 

Back in the houses, a gust of wind blows open the windows. The shrouds are hit with a violent light.

The shrouds begin to wilt and break apart. Layers of plants fall like leaves to the ground and are swept away. Outside we see a gathering storm; pieces from our shrouds are swept up into the air and joined by pieces from other unseen shrouds. Together, in the sky, the pieces assemble to form a dark cloud. The cloud dissipates. Soon after, it begins to rain.

Meanwhile, back in the tombs, the shrouds have receded. As the last bits shrivel and fall away, a heavily grieving person is revealed underneath each. Their eyes are red and swollen and their faces are soaked with tears. We close the video with three naturalistic shots. A young man rests his head on the floor, under the blue light of his flashing television. An older women rests her head on her kitchen table. We see a girl sitting fully clothed in a bathtub, slowly slipping beneath the water line.

Each person looks to the window as light and a cool breeze hits their faces.

Cut to black.

JE

Taking Back Sunday| Sink Into Me

Taking Back Sunday| Sink Into Me What they made instead

Rejected 04/03/2009

Concept

In Tokyo there is a group of people called “cyber-drifters”; they are subculture that has come to live fulltime in the small compartments inside city’s internet cafes. They spend the majority of their time cramped in widowless boxes, using their computer terminals as their soul window on the world.  I would like to create a high energy performace video that is confided in these restrained spaces. 

Synopsis

We open on an exterior shot of a 24 hour internet cafe.  It is night.  The cafe has a huge neon sign with an anime character snoozing on her key board.  We cut to a shot inside the cafe.  There is a long row of cubicals.  Several pairs of shoes sit outside the doors of each unit.

Each of the band members has their own closterphoic cubical filled with cyber-punk style homemade looking modintors, loose wiring and Manga posters.  The band plays instruments that look like steampunk versions of Guitar Hero gear.  They are literally bouncing off the walls in the small spaces. 

We cut to footage of the virtual lives the band has been leading on their computers.  They are using a crude 8 bit version of Second Life.  A simple narative is revealed in this online world: 

We see each bandmember’s avatar (8bit game character) hanging out in a chat room.  Each avatar looks similar to the original super Mario.  Each character is carrying little 8bit instruments.  A guitar playing avatar strikes up a conversation with a drummer avatar.

GUITAR PLAYER

Hey! Do you drum?

DRUMMER

But of course!

GUITAR PLAYER

Wanna cyber-jam?

DRUMMER

Right on!

[They begin to play.  It’s a two frame animation.  8bit music notes dance in space around them.  Cyber-groopy chicks beging to dance along side them.]

We cut to more live action performance footage.  We then revisit the avatars.

GUITAR PLAYER

Say WTF’s up with that guy?

[To the left of the drummer is an avatar carrying a little microphone.  He is weeping giant tears and there is a broken heart icon floating above his head.]

DRUMMER

His woman left him for a Second Life millionare.

GUITAR PLAYER

Rough stuff.

DRUMMER

Yeah.  He caught them making out in the guy’s sweet virtual condo.

[We see a shot of the 8bit Singer avatar hiding in the bushes outside the window of a crappy 8bit condo.  It looks like something out of the original Leisure Suit Larry.  Inside the condo a swanky Don Johnson-type avatar sits on a couch beside a Hot-babe avatar with big hair and red lips.  The Don Johnson avatar puts his arm around the lady, causing little red hearts to swirl around her head.]

GUITAR

Do you think he’d like to jam?

DRUMMER

Yeah he needs it!

We cut to more performance footage.

We cross cut between live action footage and the fully formed digital band rocking out.

As the song finishes we cut to a wide shot of the band in their cubicals; they are just as active as before but no sound other than the clicks from their digital instruments is heard.  It is revealed that the band’s huge music is completely isolated in their headphones.  We close with a shot of a young asian girl visiting each cubical with a tray of refreshments.

JE

Wax Manequin | Something to Hide

Wax Manequin (2009) | Something to Hide  What we made instead...

Rejected by VideoFact: 04/02/2009

Approach

The video begins like a short film complete with ambient noise as Chris makes his way to an outdoor performance in the middle of nowhere.  The music will not begin until Chris’ character begins to perform in the story.  Additionally, there will be dialog overlaid in subtitles as three characters attending the show chat during his performance.

Synopsis

We open at sun-set.  Wax Mannequin walks across the huge gravel parking lot of the Chandelier Place Banquet Hall in Hamilton.  The stones crunch under his boots.  He wears a black suit and is carrying a burgundy suitcase.  Ahead is a bonfire of wasted food the hall’s management have set alight.  In front of the the fire is theater seating for about 20 people.  Littered around the area are small trays of burning fuel.  Wax approaches the scene; he pulls decorative invitation card from his pocket double checking the address.  Wax arrives at the velvet rope stanchions surrounding the seating.  A scruffy looking young man in yellow t-shirt greets him; he is wearing Italian leather shoes and no socks.  He smiles warmly at Wax and ushers him up the isle to the bonfire.  Awaiting the musician there, is an amp and an old fashioned microphone stand.  The young man in the yellow shirt takes a seat beside a bearded fellow and young girl in the front row; clearly they are friends.  The bearded fellow’s date is a tween-age girl wearing a sequin dress, heavy amounts of cheap make-up and sparkles.  She looks extremely excited to see the show.    

Even though there are only three people in the audience, Wax begins to set up his equipment tensely.  He opens his suit case revealing a guitar that’s been folded in half by way of a hinge.  Wax unfolds the guitar and plugs it in to the amp.  At he moment he hits the microphone the music kicks in.  Wax begins delivering a thunderous performance to the small group.  As he plays Yellow Shirt and the Bearded man strike up a conversation:

BEARDED MAN

How did you get Wax Mannequin??

[the Bearded Man wraps his arm around the Tween girl.  She look beside herself with excitement.]

YELLOW SHIRT   

We promised him a chest tattoo.

[As Yellow says this we cut to a vision of Wax’s chest.  Tattooed roses and vines snake across his skin.]

[We cut back to Wax performing.  He kicks a flaming melon that has rolled out of the bonfire.]

YELLOW SHIRT 

He also asked to see the Leviathan.

BEARDED MAN

that old thing??

YELLOW SHIRT 

Yeah it’s weird.  People still love it. 

TWEENIE BOPPER

Where is it?

YELLOW SHIRT

Stuffed in the trunk.

[We see the rear of a bronze Cadillac parked off to the right of the audience.  An ethereal pink light is spilling out from the seam of the trunk and the car bouncing softly to the beat of the song.]

[More Wax performance.  At his side, in the distance, a group of bats drift by.]

BEARDED MAN

Jesus you’ve got bats out here??

YELLOW SHIRT 

They aren’t bats.

[The Tweenager sings along with the song]

YELLOW SHIRT

Check this out…

[Yellow pulls a sliver snub nose revolver from his waste-band.]

BEARDED MAN

Whoah, that’s sexy.

[Yellow shirt aims carefully in the sky and fires a shot.  A white and pink animal falls to the ground.  Upon inspection it looks like some kind of albino bat, except with much larger eyes.  The Bearded Man looks on without comment.  Wax stares intensely.]

[Nudging his Tween date, the Bearded Man encourages her to pick up the fresh kill.]

BEARDED MAN

Shame to let the little guy go to waste.  Go toss it in the back of Mr. Nathaniel’s car.

[The Tween looks at the Bearded Man uneasily, but stands up as if she has no choice but to comply.  Wax rocks on, keeping a close eye on the bat.  Delicately, the Tween picks up the kill and walks towards the trunk rocking quietly nearby.  We see a wide shot from the side as the girl opens the trunk.  At a distance we see a snake like monster squirming around in the trunk snapping it’s jaws.  It’s emitting a pinkish light.  The girl tosses the bat to the beast and runs back to her seat.]

[Wax Mannequin looks disturbed by the scene.  We close on a shot of his face as he raises a hankerchief to his mouth.]

Cut to black.

J