For this years Nuit Blanche I was asked to be a part a project called Words Travel Fast. The idea is to get poets and animators together to make some moving poetry to be screened all night on all the LCD screens in the TTC. Here are my two animations (click on the thumbnail to view):

I got paired up with a really cool guy named Matthew Tierney. We meet for a beer and he gave me his latest book, The Hayflick Limit, from which I chose two poems for the project.

For the first animation, Whereabouts of a Couch Potato, I wanted to use a bright colourful imagery. Technically speaking I mixed luminescence with regular colour channels to get materials that half glow and half receive shadows. Here are some shots of the process:

Here’s one of my test videos for the nuclear blast sequence:

For the second animation, Optic Nerve, I wanted to go totally black and white with big bold text. I went with big clear helvetica and simple diagrams. Though at times a little disjointed as far as the fluidity of the poetry was concerned, it was a constant struggle knowing I had to somehow incorporate every word of the poem into the work. Here are some shots of the process:

Here is the original title sequence for Optic Nerve, it eventually had to be cut away:

I really liked working the Matthew, the project was a great deal of fun. It was also pretty cool to watch my work while waiting for the subway.