What started off as a seemingly simple exercise in creating a dialogue and performance driven story, further developed into quite a complex task to complete. The entire film is set in a car, and believe it or not, the most efficient way of shooting this -is with the car in a studio against green screen. The background environments were composited in at a later date once the edit was locked. Aside from the visual effects, extensive sound design, foley and music where required to add appropriate emphasis to the story arcs. I am extremely lucky to have had so input from such a generous crew, particularly in post production. It really is heart warming when other creative people believe in your project, and devote as much time as they did.

Now is the exciting part where the film is put out into the world through film festivals. I will be creating a page here soon with details on all the festivals that the film is playing at, as well as photos and crew list. Stay tuned.
For those on Facebook, there is a page that has been setup with some of this information already: https://www.facebook.com/OffCourseShortFilm

Check out the brief teaser / trailer above.

Off Course

Starring: Kick Gurry, Pier Carthew and Adam Schmerl.
Written, directed and produced by Leo Baker.

Olivia Still is a super talented hair and make up artist, with a head full of creative concepts and a keen eye for aesthetic detail. Liv and I became good mates after working on a short film together for Nick Verso. Liv and I later teamed up to shoot some stills for a piece about this talented writer / director Natasha Pincus.
Liv wanted to take a bunch of honest shots showing a ‘day in the life’ of this cool woman. We had a great time shooting the piece. Natasha was not only great to hang out with, but a super easy person to photograph!

Take a gander at Olivia Still’s website to see the full piece we put together. Here are a few shots from the shoot.

Shot on Nikon D800 with old skool Nikkor manual lenses.

Wardrobe sourced by Lauren de Innocentis.
Make up by Di Baker with assistance from Gracie Baker.
Shot on Canon 5D mkII, 85mm F1.2 lens -thanks to Andrew Noble.
Location: Gigibaba restaurant, Collingwood.

The wave shape is supported by aluminium roof-lining stuff.


The wave surface is made from brown paper with white pencil and white Posca paint pens. The foam and spray is made from white paper.



The surfer is made from plasticine and Sculpey with a wire and foil armature. We used an external rig to hold the surfer, which was later painted out.

I kept all of the paper off cuts and then used them for recording audio elements for the sound design. Here is all round sound man Dane Cody working his magic with the off cuts.


Fun project!

Johnny Mackay and Heath Crawley from the band approached me with the brief of using felt, to compliment the album artwork which had been created in felt. They were also interested in my background in animation, which they were keen to incorporate with the clip.
The resulting idea I came up with was a fusion of live action photography with some animated elements that tie in the intention to use felt. Instead of a flat cutout style felt animation I went for three dimensional felt props that the main character would interact with. So every prop that Johnny’s character interacts with will be made of felt, with the intention of making his mundane, routine life seem fuzzy and possible a bit overwhelming or dull.

We had 2 “working bee” days where we all got together and made all the props for the clip. My talented friend Tim Tropp from the label Klezinski made Johnny’s amazing tailored felt suit. I made the watch

I wanted to have a fairly monotone colour palette for the piece, which would allow for a colourful warm crescendo when Johnny’s character finally gets to see the sun at the end of the story, which sadly is “the briefest of ecstasies”. So the main vibrant colour was yellow.

Additionally, I shot the most of the footage at 8 fps, and got Johnny and Heath to act essentially 3 times slower -which resulted in motion that is approximately correctly timed, but with jerky odd imperfections that would match the imperfections of the stop motion animated elements.

Here are some production stills from stills photographer Ian Laidlaw:

Here is the stop motion setup Lucy and I setup to animate the perception that Johnny’s character had looking out the windows. We used Lucy’s Canon 7D and Dragonframe stop motion software.

There is no lip sync to this clip for a specific reason, but that is a secret which will hopefully be disclosed by the band soon in the coming weeks! Stay tuned!!

Many thanks to everyone who worked on the clip, for their generous contributions to create this fun piece. Great team! Fun times!

Video credits:
Producer: Leo Baker
Director: Leo Baker
Director of Photography: Matt Wood
Stylist / Art department/ Prop Makers: Hayley Callander, Lauren De Innocentis.
Assistant Art Department: Charlotte Callander
Additional Prop Makers: Tim Tropp, Lucy Fahey, Leo Baker, Felicity Marshall
Hair & Make Up: Nadja Mott
Costume Designer: Tim Tropp
Editor: Leo Baker
Visual Effects: Leo Baker, William Gammon
Animation: Leo Baker, Lucy Fahey
Stills photographer: Ian Laidlaw
Catering: Grace Baker

Special thanks: Ben Bennett, Chas Forrest, Felicity Marshall, Adrian Harrold, Senora Lilliana, Andrew Noble.

interview part 1
interview part 2
interview part 3

Cheers to ozanimate.com!

http://www.churchilltrust.com.au/site_media/fellows/2011_Baker_Leo.pdf

During my Fellowship I travelled to Japan, Hong Kong, U.S, Canada, U.K, France and Germany. I met with many people from animation businesses and educational institutions. The report focusses on the positive aspects of industries abroad, looking at ways the Australian industry could be re-invigorated to a more sustainable level.

I really hope this study will benefit the Australian industry, and also be a great resource for anyone around the world to draw from.

Thank you to all the generous contributors, I hope you all get something out of the study in return.
Please pass it on to whoever you wish. I look forward to hearing any feedback.

Tokyo Animation College. Tokyo, Japan.

Pixar. Emeryville, USA.

Agency – Clemenger BBDO Melbourne
Director – Leo Baker
Art Director – Shane Dawson
Copywriter – Ben Birchall
Animators – Leo Baker, Luku Kukukuku
Agency Producer – Jason Byrne
Account Service – Sarah Galbraith
Sound Designer – Craig Conway
Voice Talent- Josh Earl
Online Editor – Sam Coates
Post Production Manager – Helene Carter
Client – Melbourne Food and Wine Festival

EP now released through iTunes. Get it here!

Production information:

Shot on locations around Melbourne, Australia, in August 2011.
Shot with a Canon 60D with Ziess ZF and Lens Baby lenses.

Credits:

Director: Leo Baker
Cinematographer: Matt Wood
Editor: Leo Baker
Art Direction: Leo Baker
Compositors: Leo Baker, William Gammon
Costume Design: Amy Dickinson http://www.blondemoss.com.au

Band members:

Tessa Pavilach – vocals, piano
Ed Crocker – drums
Lauren Meath – cello
Pat Morgan – guitar
Tom Pettit- bass

Thanks to:

Kate Baker for set dressing help, Felicity Marshall for catering and location survey assistance.

I have been working in the Australian film industry for the past 13 years, specialising in visual effects and animation. I have worked on many projects of different scales within this field. I have learnt that the trend of successful animation in Australia is often achieved through hard work, often against much adversity, and in reality we have a small animation industry that really struggles to maintain ongoing business. This basis was the motivation for my application for this Fellowship.

The purpose of my Fellowship is to examine successful models of animation production facilities overseas, learning key factors where the Australian animation industry could be strengthened to a more sustainable level of ongoing creative work.

I will be meeting people from large corporate entities to smaller companies and successful individuals; that are perhaps more applicable to current Australian models.

I am particularly interested in how this area of the arts is embraced in different parts of world, hence the demand for animated content and allocation of funding. Where possible I will be exploring these different methods and sources for funding, as this is a key factor and differs significantly across the globe.
Another key element I wish to examine is where education institutions feed the demands for the industry such as in Tokyo, Vancouver and Paris where seemingly sustainable cycles have been created. I also hope to look at links with associated industries, such as film visual effects, literature, comics and computer games. Are there cultural correlations where multiple industries are thriving in parallel?

I believe there are multiple factors all with differing weight that effects the success of the animation industry anywhere. If I look at examples from different parts of the world I can provide an information base that can hopefully help make a change for Australia. One element that we are not lacking in is talent, just how to best foster and support it.

I am honoured to have this opportunity to follow the legacy of Winston Churchill. Winston Churchill is an inspirational figure in my mind as one who exemplifies perseverance against adversity. Such attributes I have had to adopt at times when working with animation in Australia.

It was Winston Churchill who said: “Difficulties mastered are opportunities won.” With my collated findings, I hope to help overcome the industry difficulties here, and help initiate a more knowledgeable outlook for future opportunities in the Australian animation industry.

I would like to express my thanks and appreciation to the Churchill Trust and my sponsorship by the Victorian Churchill Fellows Association. I feel very privileged to have this opportunity.

I will be heading off in September travelling to Tokyo, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Portland (Oregon), Vancouver, Toronto, New York, London, Bristol, Paris and Berlin. There are many people I will be meeting and interviewing along the way.
If you are in one of these locations and would like to meet up please fire me an email!

Upon my return I will be writing a report paper, which will be made available for anyone to access. I hope it can be a valuable resource for all creative, enterprising people.

Just to keep things arty, I have included two scraperboard / scratchboard pieces of Winston Churchill that I have created. The first image shown is ink painted on a white chalk board, then scratched back. This thicker board was better for reworking and scratching fine detail. The second is a thinner, black board, where it was easier to cut away solid areas for a more contrasty result.