Because we knew I was about to be very busy again with my new book, this time last week, John and I decided to spend a day doing a bit more filming. It's been 2 months since we made the last one, the How to Draw with Watercolour Pencils demo (which I'm proud to say has already had well over 6000 hits - thanks to those who helped with that!).
Anyway, we wanted to keep the momentum going. With my foot problems, we had to stay in the studio, so we shot more of me demonstrating how I created various characters from my books.
We began by re-shooting bits of the earliest film: Drawing a Cat, because it was too difficult to see parts of it, especially the initial stages of me demonstrating (we hadn't bought our fancy lights at that point). I decided to demo something slightly different though this time round, to make it a new film too, so instead of the singing kitten from the first film, from Baby Goes Baaaaa! I drew the kitten from Baby Can Bounce!, sharing an ice-cream with a cute spider:
It takes AGES. I really understand now why film sets are so boring! It's mostly about getting the lighting set up. It's amazing how incredibly dark a very bright room can look, plus there are all sorts of issues with me getting silhouetted against windows, reflections off the books, or sunlight going in and out. We generally have to have the blinds down and then re-light the room artificially, to keep it constant.
Then there's noise. All phones have to be disabled to stop someone calling in the middle of the shot; the computer has to be completely off (too much fan-noise); all windows have to be closed (even when we are frying under the lights!) in case of background noise... it's a right performance. Would you believe it, we had just got set up when a neighbour had a contractor round to pump out their drains - it held up play for over an hour!
The final spanner-in-the-works is me. I like to do my talking off-the-cuff, so it sounds as fresh and natural as possible. That means it often needs a fair few takes before I stop fluffing it, or saying something that sounds completely idiotic.
It was funny: above the desk in the photo at the top, everything looks pretty normal but, down below, we had to lash my bad foot to the cross-beam of the drawing desk with one of John's belts, because I still had to keep it elevated. It is even packed in ice, wrapped in the tea-towel:
As well as the kitten demo, we also shot films of me drawing all three bears from Bears on the Stairs:
John is working on the editing now, why I am getting on with The Jungle Grumble. I will of course let you know when they are ready for viewing. In the meantime, you can see all our films to date on my YouTube channel.
Anyway, we wanted to keep the momentum going. With my foot problems, we had to stay in the studio, so we shot more of me demonstrating how I created various characters from my books.
We began by re-shooting bits of the earliest film: Drawing a Cat, because it was too difficult to see parts of it, especially the initial stages of me demonstrating (we hadn't bought our fancy lights at that point). I decided to demo something slightly different though this time round, to make it a new film too, so instead of the singing kitten from the first film, from Baby Goes Baaaaa! I drew the kitten from Baby Can Bounce!, sharing an ice-cream with a cute spider:
It takes AGES. I really understand now why film sets are so boring! It's mostly about getting the lighting set up. It's amazing how incredibly dark a very bright room can look, plus there are all sorts of issues with me getting silhouetted against windows, reflections off the books, or sunlight going in and out. We generally have to have the blinds down and then re-light the room artificially, to keep it constant.
Then there's noise. All phones have to be disabled to stop someone calling in the middle of the shot; the computer has to be completely off (too much fan-noise); all windows have to be closed (even when we are frying under the lights!) in case of background noise... it's a right performance. Would you believe it, we had just got set up when a neighbour had a contractor round to pump out their drains - it held up play for over an hour!
The final spanner-in-the-works is me. I like to do my talking off-the-cuff, so it sounds as fresh and natural as possible. That means it often needs a fair few takes before I stop fluffing it, or saying something that sounds completely idiotic.
It was funny: above the desk in the photo at the top, everything looks pretty normal but, down below, we had to lash my bad foot to the cross-beam of the drawing desk with one of John's belts, because I still had to keep it elevated. It is even packed in ice, wrapped in the tea-towel:
As well as the kitten demo, we also shot films of me drawing all three bears from Bears on the Stairs:
John is working on the editing now, why I am getting on with The Jungle Grumble. I will of course let you know when they are ready for viewing. In the meantime, you can see all our films to date on my YouTube channel.
10 comments:
Love your films:) It seems you did a real film studio at home:)
Thanks so much for your generous sharing of your craft with people out here in cyberspace. Coming by your blogs is always inspiring. Can't wait to see your new video. Cheers and thanks!
PS
I hope your foot recovers soon.
I broke a small bone in my foot once and I remember the pain. Kept it up on my drawing board at work for a while. Ouch.
M.J. from the west coast of Canada
I was looking for some illustrator related blog site to read contents as regular basis. & finally found your nice blog! I'll definitely read your post as regular basis.
Thank you guys!
And hello to C P - glad you found me. Welcome aboard :-)
It's really looking most stunning one. Plenty great illustration and striking sharing of these drawing this bear. Artistic and crafted job.
We are really grateful for your blog post. You will find a lot of approaches after visiting your post. Great work.....Amazing !!!!!
Very interesting those . Thank you so much .
Such a cute work that is. really awesome work done.
I am just loving your post very much. thanks for sharing.
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Thank you. Lovely feedback from everyone :-)
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