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After Effects

After Effects, Animation, My Art Blog |

July 10, 2014

| by Louie

Legaci’s Barricade: A Kinetic Typography Music Video

Legaci on tour w/ Justin Bieber

 

My favorite aspect across every artistic medium, is that they all create a personal experience. It doesn’t matter who the audience is, an artist possesses the potential to draw anyone into their story. Whether you’re an illustrator, musician, or fine artist, we each share a powerful ability to communicate globally without ever needing to learn a second language. This is most evident in music. From a catchy hook, a great beat, to a funky riff, a song can speak to you on different levels.

I’m not a musician. I wish I was to some degree, but I lack the mental wherewithal and deft touch needed to take ownership over musical instruments–particularly the one I own. go figure. So I dabble. I stumble through guitar tabs and enjoy my share of karaoke. Suffice to say, most of my experience in music defines me more as a general listener. But I’m a passionate listener at that. I know what I like. I also love how music makes me feel. How it can play along to your mood or shift it entirely.

The Pitch

A year ago, Legaci offered me a commission to create a “Lyrical Music Video” to one of their singles. Essentially they were asking me to create “Kinetic Typography.” Which if you aren’t familiar with the term, is just a way to creatively visualize the words of a song. Think “fun captioning” but using imagery, animation, and transition in conjunction with the words. In college, I had done a similar assignment, where I was tasked with using Adobe After Effects to creatively caption an audio snippet. I was never proud of what I came  up with, but it was great practice. Most importantly, it at least informed me of the process and would eventually inform my approach with my new project.

I took the opportunity. It was a chance to incorporate my passion in art within the stratum of Music. Where I likely would never post my rendition of a song on youtube, at the very least I could elevate the artistic quality of one. That was more than enough incentive for me to run with this project.

The Project

I listened to Legaci’s song “Barricade” several times, in order to grasp the meaning of it. They gave me creative to see what I could come up with on my own. Which is entirely understandable, as seeing how someone else interprets your creativity is fun. Once I felt like I had a good handle on what the song was trying to express, I started to visualize the words and match them to the beats and flow of the music. I began to separate what lines would best be expressed literally, and those that would benefit from something more abstract. I likened my process to choreographing a conductor for an orchestra. Thinking that my words were conducting the music was really helpful in producing a cohesive visual and auditory experience. Outside of several rendering nightmares, it was smooth sailing. I’m way happier with what I produced versus what I made in college. Which is a great because it means that I’ve grown.

The Render

 

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After Effects, Animation, My Art Blog |

June 27, 2013

| by Louie

Empower: Master of the Three Rings

The Pitch

A producer friend of mine contacted me about creating an animated flashback sequence for the above hip-hop theatrical production. I was intrigued by the premise. It was basically a variety show decorated with incredible talents (singing, dancing, spoken word, etc.) ,framed around a simple yet strong arc of tragedy, trial, and redemption. I was most interested in the setting: an old time circus. Circuses by nature have such a mesmerizing design aesthetic. From the playful yet haunting music, to the grandiose and chilling promise of the absurd, wondrous, and thrilling. I was hooked, but…

… I turned it down. My wife had just given birth to our beautiful and long awaited baby boy, Charlie Bastian. So in many ways I was deep in the maelstrom of early parenthood. I was still adjusting to my new responsibilities, which made accepting any gigs very risky. Especially one that was a major plot point for a very ambitious stage show. It was hard to turn it down, but I didn’t know if I could make the time commitment.

Our correspondence continued, with me promising to help find another willing animator. However the more we talked about the details of the project, the more I found myself planning ways to make time for it. Eventually, I said that I’d do it.

The Project

The original premise starts with a mother running from an threatening yet ambiguous entity. Eventually after a long chase, she is forced to leave her baby at a nearby circus in hopes of leading her pursuer away from her child. At which point the innocent baby is discovered by the circus’ mysterious ringmaster.

concept_characters

preliminary sketches

Once I was briefed on the background of the story and it’s myriad collection of captivating circus dwellers, I was ready to get to work! Figuring out where to go stylistically was the hard part. Although I had accepted this as a project, I was still bound by fatherhood and very much a part of my child’s welfare and upbringing. I couldn’t devote nearly enough time to create a traditional animated piece. I proposed doing it in the style of a motion comic. This would allow me to create quality drawings without having to magically create the time needed to draw frames of motion. Fortunately, that got the green light. I storyboarded each scene based on the basic outline of events along with musical score (thanks to Sam Genovese for editing the clip down to manageable size). After, I painted each scene in Adobe Photoshop. My goal was to use many separate layers that I would later animate in Adobe After Effects, composing the final product.

Below was the result of my undertaking!

The Final Render

The show was surprisingly entertaining. Not because I didn’t think they had the chops to put on a quality show, but because I didn’t anticipate the incredibly high level of showmanship and dedication displayed by all performers. Bravo!

Notable Asides

• Be sure to check out http://soulciety.org/. They’re the awesome bunch responsible for this production. They do a lot of great things for the youth and community and are totally worth supporting.

• My good friend filmed and edited the Empower trailer above. He is a talented filmmaker whose works are collected at http://nelsonnunez.com/.

 

adobe after effects, adobe photoshop, after effects, animation, empower, empower master of the three rings, illustration, motion graphics, soulciety | Comment

 

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