LIAF presents UK Animator Focus at the University of East London (UEL), an all-day event from 11:00 – 19:00, Saturday 12 December. We’ve gathered together some of the most passionate, honest and insightful experts from a wide range of different areas and backgrounds who are ready to cover all manner of vital topics to help you on your way towards working in the animation industry. Each animator is ready to impart their knowledge and answer your questions in three carefully chosen sessions. For anyone currently working in the film and animation industry, thinking of working in the industry or just plain curious, these three talks are indispensable.
Add to this a very special enhanced screening of our annual British Showcase, 90 minutes of the best short animated films made in the last 12 months with several filmmakers in attendance, and you’ll get an exceptional opportunity to see what British animators are doing, how they’re doing it and how the art form is travelling.
Read on to find out more about each of our four very special UK Animator Focus Sessions.
Session 1 – The Joy in Artifice with Barry Purves
Session 2 – Storyboarding for Animation – How & Why with Luc Chamberland
Session 3 – Storytelling for Animation with Robert Bradbrook
Session 4 – British Showcase with Numerous UK Animators!
At UEL buy tickets
Please note, there will be no tickets available on the day of the event. Advance booking only. One ticket gets you into all 4 events.
Event supported by Film Hub London, managed by Film London. Proud to be a partner of the BFI Film Audience Network, funded by the National Lottery.For more information please go to: www.filmlondon.org.uk/filmhub
Session 1 – The Joy in Artifice with Barry Purves
Through the use of dozens of thought-provoking stills Barry will look at how animation, particularly stop motion animation, fits in with the other arts, and how it should celebrate artifice and use all its’ quirky qualities to maximum effect. Barry will try to answer ‘what is animation?’
Barry will also be joining us on LIAF 2015 Opening Night for an onstage talk and screening Barry Purves – The Naked Animator
Please do take a look at the genius at work on the set of Tchaikovsky in the clip below
Barry Purves Biography
Barry Purves is one of the UK’s outstanding animation directors, with a career spanning 25 years, over 60 international awards (including BAFTA and Academy Award nominations) and many lifetime achievement awards. He has animated and directed numerous series for television such as The Wind in the Willows, Rupert Bear and most recently, the award-winning Toby’s travelling Circus. He has worked in significant roles on such feature films as Mars Attacks! and King Kong, and directed over 60 commercials and titles sequences. In 2015, Barry has had 60th birthday retrospectives at the Edinburgh International Film Festival, the Bristol Puppet Festival, a film festival in Venice and here – at the London International Animation Festival.
Session 2 – Professional Storyboarding for Animation – How & Why with Luc Chamberland
Storyboarding is an essential filmmaking tool. This presentation will unlock why storyboarding is so indispensible to film and animation, how to go about crafting that vital tool and some of the ways Luc Chamberland has learned to make a storyboard “speak”.
Please do take a look at the trailer of Seth’s Dominion, one of Luc’s most recent masterpieces, in the clip below
Luc Chamberland Biography
Luc Chamberland is a Montreal-based animator and director. After graduating from Concordia University, Luc embarked on a nomadic career that eventually landed him in London, where he created animation for several feature films, including Steven Spielberg’s ‘We’re Back! A Dinosaur’s Story’. He was also director of animation on the Dreamworks feature ‘Joseph: King of Dreams’ and has 25 years experience as a professional storyboard artist at some of the largest studios in America and the UK including Industrial Light and Magic (ILM). ‘Seth’s Dominion’ is the first film that Luc has directed, animated and co-produced for the National Film Board of Canada and it is screening at this years LIAF.
Session 3 – Storytelling for Animation with Robert Bradbrook
‘Often when we start to write for animation, we forget our natural instinct in telling stories to each other. By looking at how we verbally entertain our family and friends, this workshop helps animators to develop more dramatic films, that are both emotionally engaging and leave the audience with something to think about.’
Please do take a look at the trailer for Robert’s most recent animation Dead Air below
Robert Bradbrook Biography
Robert studied geology as his first degree and worked as a cartographer before specialising in animation. This early focus on landscape has subsequently influenced his approach to filmmaking; he is interested in storytelling through landscape, rather than through conventional characterisation. For example, he enjoyed using the dynamic coastal scenery in his most recent film ‘Dead Air’ (screening at LIAF 2015) to reflect the characters’ worries and uncertainties. Between personal films Robert runs his own company, and provides animation for film, television and new media. Recently he has produce animated scenes, title sequences and visual effects for the feature length documentary about Tony Benn ‘Will and Testament’. As well as being Senior Tutor at the National Film and TV School and Middlesex University he gives talks and storytelling workshops to colleges, festivals and production companies around the world.
Session 4 – British Showcase with Numerous Animators!
Does anything define British Animation? The wealth of styles in this recent crop of films in the British Showcase would seem to deny any binding characteristic other than diversity. The breadth and mixture of animation techniques alone make this a rich and varied treat. They are adeptly put to use, each film projecting it’s individual vision, it’s own slice of life. This programme, made up of 16 short animated gems, chosen from a record 478 entries, is an extremely encouraging window onto what looks like a very bright future for British animation. The funny films are genuinely funny, often with a subdued, understated, surprisingly sophisticated level of humour and the films that are endeavouring to examine topics with a deeper social import do so with a maturity and sensitivity that is equally rare.
The Infinity Project (Will Anderson, UK)
Please support independent animation and help save these forgotten, malformed and starving drawings.
2’40, 2015
The Lady and the Fly (Jon Link & Mick Bunnage, UK)
A lovestruck fly falls for the woman of his dreams, only to find himself bound in a web of his own deluded nightmare. Voiced by Mackenzie Crook and Paul Kaye.
6’40, 2015
Things I Should Stop Thinking About Thinking (Dan Castro, UK)
A film about boobs, sex and boys being happy – or not. A brief look at what stress feels like from inside the head of a youngish bloke.
1’15, 2014
MANOMAN (Simon Cartwright, UK)
Glen is barely a man. In a desperate attempt to tap into his masculinity he attends a primal scream therapy session.
10’40, 2015
Way Out (Yukai Du, UK)
A stunning portrait of the internet age – our heads constantly buried in our screens.
2’55, 2014
Lamps (Patrick O’Mahony, UK)
A young Victorian lamp lighter encounters a problem only he can solve.
6’25, 2015
Mr Director (Andy Martin, UK)
Mr Director shares his ups and downs of a lifetime making movies whilst reminding us of the mountainous body of work he has created.
6’50, 2015
The Evening Her Mind Jumped out of Her Head (Kim Noce & Shaun Clark, UK)
One cold winter’s evening, a serious woman is forced to lighten up when her mind jumps out of her head.
7’30, 2015
Pombo Loves You (Steve Warne, UK)
A distant father is forced to confront a heroic but troubled past life as a 1980’s TV character, Pombo.
11’50, 2015
Stems (Ainslie Henderson, UK)
A eulogy to the short life span of stop motion animation puppets.
2’25, 2015
Unhappy Happy (Peter Millard, UK)
I get up and have breakfast. Don’t get old. I’m so Unhappy Happy.
7’10, 2015
Laws of Nature (Joe Soulsby, UK)
Be kind to your environment – or if not, beware.
6’45, 2015
If the Cuckoo Don’t Crow (Steve Kirby, UK)
If the cuckoo don’t crow, then you know there’s wind coming…” Brian from Melton recounts how his mother, Doris, was the woman who predicted the October 1987 hurricane and famously phoned the BBC, but was told not to be so daft.
1’50, 2015
Unspoken (Laura Keer, UK)
A young child’s fear of school and classmates.
2’20, 2015
Mr Madila or the Colour of Nothing (Rory Waudby-Tolley, UK)
A series of conversations between the filmmaker and a gifted spiritual healer, exploring the inner mind, the fabric of the universe, and the nature of reality itself, through the sacred art of animation.
8’35, 2015
The Five Minute Museum (Paul Bush, UK)
Thousands of artefacts from the collections of small museums are brought to life in an animated history of human endeavour.
6’35, 2015
