Well, let's say it's a very select group who have discovered my typographic web series The Futura Gold. Fortunately, amongst the people who have found it, were the team who put together L'Oeil de Links; a rather special TV show about web creativity shown in France on the CANAL+ channel.
A couple of weeks ago I got an email from Jeff Tinard the scheduler for the show, asking if they could broadcast my films and record a Skype interview with me. The resulting programme was broadcast yesterday and I'm pleased there's already an online record of the show on the CANAL+ website. The clip above gives an excellent introduction to the history of the Futura typeface, then follows with Episodes 02 and 03 of The Futura Gold complete with an interview with the director. Hmm, is that really me grinning like a madman through all this?
After a day or so, I can say that having this film selected by Vimeo has come as a very nice surprise. Although the film has been online for three years with only a trickle of views, it suddenly spiked to around 12000 views in the 24 hours following the selection. The film has received a good few hundred Vimeo 'likes' and 'followings' too. Many thanks to all those who've supported the film and helped 'spread the word' by adding it to their blogs and sites etc.
On October 26th last year I posted the first of the Futura Gold films to YouTube. The first episode (seen here) has just hit 3000 views. The subsequent two films, nothing like so many.
Releasing some work in a series was something of an experiment really, just to see if this idea might gain some momentum. The curve isn't really heading the way I'd hoped, so I'm taking a little time off this project. I'll work on a few other things and take stock for a while.
This isn't to say there won't be any more; just don't be expecting another one soon...
Here's the latest episode of The Futura Gold. This is my new typographic animation series in which all the characters and backgrounds are made from the letters, numbers and symbols of the Futura typeface. If you like this stuff, you might like to head over to the TheFuturaGold facebook and twitter pages too.
Okay, here it is, my first new animated film in a while. This is the first episode of what may become a new epic series. The Futura Gold develops the ideas and techniques of my short film TXT ISLAND a little further, but this one has an open-ended storyline which I hope to add to if there is sufficient interest in this.
For anyone still waiting for a follow-up to my 2009 short film TXT ISLAND something animated is coming soon just for you... The new release wont be a new short film; rather a pilot episode for a new series of shorts!*
The tantalizing two minute first episode of The Futura Gold is pretty much ready apart from a few sound tweaks, so should be coming soon to an online video platform near you...
Oh alright then, here are a few stills from the new work...
I was recently asked if I'd make a typographic artwork thing as a gift for a friend illustrating one of her favourite quotations. After lots of false starts, I went for a three dimensional assemblage that fits inside a 5"x7" box frame (so this artwork is pretty small). The box shapes are formed from thick watercolour paper and the text is coloured vinyl cut with my CraftRobo cutter/plotter. The font used is inspired by cinema signage, it's called 'Now Playing'.
In preparation for the animation workshops I'll be running again at the Animatti event in Sardinia very soon, I've been making several three dimensional letter-forms out of folded card.
I first made Illustrator drawings of the letters. I wanted to make 100mm high models based on the upper case letters of the Futura typeface. The Illustrator files would have to include the fold lines and any tabs needed for gluing the models together.
I found it was a good idea to differentiate the fold lines and the cut lines by placing them on different layers in the Illustrator file.
I also found it helpful to colour code these lines differently (Green for folds, red for cut lines).
From Illustrator, I exported the image to my CraftRobo cutting machine. I specified that the layers I had chosen for 'folds' should receive a perforation cut and all of the rest of the lines be treated as cut lines.
I loaded up the CraftRobo carrier sheet with a sheet of 160gsm white card and set the machine going. There's something very satisfying about sending your data to a robot to do all of the tricky work for you...
I could get two letters on each sheet of A4 card and the CraftRobo took around two minutes to cut each sheet.
Folding the letters together is pretty easy (especially with the pre-scored perforated edges for the folds) and it just takes a dab of Pritt stick or similar to glue the tabs together.
Et voila...
UPDATE 17/01/2017 WITH NEW VIDEO ADDED!
I've now made a 'how to' video showing how to make these letters. This video shows how to use Adobe Illustrator to create the letter templates and then a demo of how to cut the letters (with scissors), score the folds then fold and glue the letters.
* Potentially.
