Posts Tagged ‘ Robert Lyons ’

TIME-LINE (SVA & NYU Animation) by Robert Lyons and company.

March 21, 2012
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Time-Line 3

Warning: One of these segments includes frontal nudity, but simplified. Probably nothing to get offended over. I love anijams. Whatever or however the grouping works, I love seeing how different artists can be from one another, even with the same guidelines in mind. It’s an excellent project for animation students, and Robert Lyons has proven that here with a 9 minute collection of short animations by various students.             Created by over 40 students, across 8 years, from 2 different schools, Time-Line was an ongoing project in Lyons’s continuing education classes. Begun in SVA (1993-1997) and completed in NYU (2000-2001), each student had to begin and end their individual animation the same way, with a black line bisecting a white frame horizontally.             The idea of beginning and ending with a single line allows plenty of space to improvise. There is some wonderfully imaginative visuals going on here, and there is a distinctiveness to most of them which in turn distinguishes not only each artist’s abilities, but also their own ways of thinking. For example, some artists choose to have the line become part of a structure such as...

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Happy Holidays…

December 25, 2011
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Happy Holidays by Dayna Gonzalez

…from all of us at ASIFA-East. For the Viewseum’s first Holiday occasion, here are two clips: one from the past, and one from the present. The first is a set of Holiday identifications made for Nickelodeon by Curious Pictures, submitted by Robert Lyons. The clips are traditionally animated, and feature techniques such as back-lit art, lens filter effects, water color in time lapse, motion control camera moves, and in-camera multiple exposures. Very simple and very warm. The second is a rendition of the “Nutcracker Suite” by citizens of a swamp, animated by Dayna Gonzalez. Complete with colorful characters including frogs, toads, rabbits, possums, beavers, owls and fireflies. Dayna offers a nice, serene gift to us all in this clip. And with both of these animations in mind, we are reminded that there is more animation history to be a part of in the coming years. Happy Holidays, everyone.

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Time Lapse by Robert Lyons

October 18, 2011
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Time Lapse by Robert Lyons

This week’s Viewseum exhibit is one of Robert Lyons’s many timelapse films. This particular film explores the difference between a quiet country life and the energy of a fast-paced city. Timelapse is one of the most unique tricks you can pull off with a film camera. You can capture things that a human eye can’t capture, like the cloud transformations shown throughout the film. Some of the city imagery include scenes of New York’s local art and animation community (keep an eye out for Indie King Bill Plympton hard at work). Some scenes are from Bob’s own career as a cameraman, both in animation and special effects (and yes, that is the USS Enterprise in front of the blue screen, you curious Trekkies). I admit some sentimentality in posting this film, because of a recent article that details the end of motion picture film cameras. It is sad, but not surprising. Bob’s film experiments remind us that there is a beauty to celluloid that can’t be replicated in the digital age.

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“Rites” by Robert Lyons and U-Arts Film-Digital-Film

September 20, 2011
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Rites by Robert Lyons and U-Arts Film-Digital-Film

This week’s Viewseum entry is an example of an alternative/experimental style called “Cameraless Animation.” Robert Lyons regularly teaches Stop-Motion and Experimental Animation, and his trademark is ending each course with a collaborative-class project, often involving original film-stock. “Rites” was made with his ”Film-Digital-Film” (35MM Class) at The University of the Arts in Philadelphia, hand-made directly on 35mm film-stock. In the digital age, celluloid is used less and less commercially. But artistically, there is still something alluring about film and its warm, physical feel. And Bob (as he is known to friends) and his classes continue to be reminded of that. And in turn, they remind us (the audience) as well.

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