Student animation from Alghero

A couple of posts ago I mentioned my December trip to Alghero Sardinia to host some animation workshops for the Masters Students there. I've just seen that the short films made by the students have been posted on to YouTube, so you can see them here. With only three days, the 20 students split up into 4 groups, spending about a day on each project; they turned in some really interesting and experimental work.


To the students from this workshop and the staff of the University too for making my stay both enjoyable and inspirational... Grazie mille!

Return To Alghero III

This weekend, I've just got back from Alghero Sardinia where I've been teaching a three day animation workshop to students on the Masters course.

Thanks to Prof. Ceccarelli for inviting me back (for the 3rd time!) and to all of the students and other staff too for making me feel very welcome.

I'd devised three new projects for this workshop, using stop-motion techniques to bring typography and some 'found objects' to life. Thanks to the dedication of the twenty students we saw some strong short films/exercises; the groups spending a (long) day on each project.

Once again I was really inspired by the inventiveness of the work and how effectively the students worked together to make these films.

Animatti student film : Virus Detected

Another film made by some of my Sardinian students during the Animatti workshop last September has shown up on the web. Virus Detected is a mixture of stop-motion, green-screened footage and Flash animation; quite an ambitious work-flow for a four day project. Nice job!

♫ ♪ Sa Vela by Rossella Faa ♪ ♫

Well, after a little hunting I found out that Rossella Faa has a MySpace page.
This makes it possible for me to embed a link here to Sa Vela one of the most beautiful things you'll hear anywhere...

Go on, press this button ...sa vela by baa-bà (rossella faa)

But ambassador you spoil us ...

On Thursday night this week I went over to the Italian Cultural Institute in London's swanky Belgravia Square. This is the part of town where you find the grand embassy buildings; all imposing stucco facades draped with the flags of all nations...

The evening was a presentation of the work of artist Carolina Melis. The main event was a screening of her film Le Fiamme di Nule (see below). The film uses a mixture of dance and animation to tell the story of three Sardinian women engaged in the Nule tapestry competition. The scenes depicting the tapestries being woven were nicely expressionistic with giant threads and a very pleasing integration of black and white studio based live-action with animated sequences. There was also a sequence of archival black and white still photography in the film too. The music by Rosella Faa is especially beautiful, I'll be searching out more of this...

By chance I met with D.O.P. Pete Elmore at the screening, (I've worked with Pete on shoots at TANDEM several times before.) Pete used his own Bolex (with motor) 16mm camera for shooting the live action shots seen in Le fiamme di Nule.

After the screening there was a chance to see tapestries that Carolina has designed and to sample some Sardinian nibbles too. Pecorino cheese with fig jam and nutty torrone were amongst the edible delights on offer here.

All in all a nice slice of Sardinian hospitality and an interesting event.

Return To Alghero: Animatti 2011

Well, I've just got back from a 10 day trip to Alghero (Sardinia). This was a return visit to what has now become one of my favourite places in the world!

I was invited back to run animation workshops and make a presentation for the annual Animatti event there. This time, I also managed to fit in some exploring and fine dinning too... Many many thanks again to prof. Ceccarelli for inviting me over, being a fantastic host, and of course to the students too. I was hugely impressed by the workshop projects and final films the students turned-in; I hope these films appear on-line soon, and I'll link-up to them if they do.

***UPDATE***
OK, of the student films made at Animatti this year, this is the first one to show up on Youtube. 'Zodiac' made by Sara Pilloni, Lucrezia Urtis, Silvia Canu, Marcello Monti, Gabriele Desogus. This is one of the group projects the students went on to make after the workshops we did. These films were made in about 4 days (with lots of night time work too of course.)

***END OF UPDATE***

This time I took my DSLR camera along and had a bit more time for taking pictures, so here is my adventure represented in a few photos I took along the way...

Alghero is a beautiful and ancient Mediterranean coastal town.

'The dungeon' in which we worked.

Alghero's marina with yellow submarine.

Some stacked chairs near the market.

Students creating stop motion animation.

More students of the Animatti workshops.

Alghero's marina at dusk.

Prof. Ceccarelli introduces Michele Abbas of Framestore.

In Alghero the sun always sets over the Mediterranean sea: spectacular.

Animatti

Here's a video about Animatti; the animation summer school I was invited to in Alghero Sardinia for a few days back in September 2010. Well, I'm going back to run more workshops there this year, and for a little bit longer this time... More news soon...