Trippy, amazing, and "how'd they do that?" are a few ways to describe 'Skazka,' Mill+ creative director Rama Allen's main titles for OFFF St. Petersburg.
Director:
Rama Allen
Production:
Mill+
The titles bring to life the process of collaboration through an experimental combination of masterpieces together in one video using motion capture from professional dancers, and watercolor and oils suspensions reactions.
From Rama, "I wanted to create a visual allegory for the creative process through collaboration. The piece is told through the choreography of two beings that discover each other, dance together to create, collide in a moment of conflict, then find their way through the conflict to become even stronger partners once again."
The goal was to use 'traditional' human input to define much of the animation of the piece. The dancer animations are all from mocap of two dancers the team worked with. The typography is all hand painted and then re-interpreted in 3D. Much of the 'effects' and textures are built from experiments shot with various inks and pigments.
Art Director Chris Palazzo describes the design process: "The roots of the work are in the live liquid-light shows pioneered in the 1960's. I experimented with different chemical and visual reactions using vials, petri dishes and eye-droppers. We found some beautifully violent, oozy, primordial combinations. By the end of it I felt like an alchemist or a mad scientist."
Go ahead… watch it again. You'll discover something new each time!
Production: Mill+
Director: Rama Allen
Art Director: Christopher Palazzo
Executive Producer: Danielle Amaral
Producer: Tia Perkins
Director of Photography: Adam Carboni
Soundscapes: Fall On Your Sword
Music: Darkness Falls
Editing Company: The Mill
Editor: Charlotte Carr
VFX & Design: The Mill
Executive Producer: Danielle Amaral
VFX Producer: Jason Bartnett
Pre-Viz: Navdeep Singh
Coordinator: Georgina Castle
Technical Director: Andreas Berner
Lead Designer: Yossanun Sangpattharamatee
Particle Designer: Gabriel Pulecio
Designers: Yossanun Sangpattharamatee, Gabriel Pulecio, Christopher Palazzo, Viraj Ajmeri
Typography Design: Christopher Palazzo
Animation & Compositing: Gabriel Pulecio, Viraj Ajmeri, Anthony Dodero, Lloyd Alvarez, Dave Rogers, Ashley Tyas, Justin Bakies, York Capistrano, Yossanun Sangpattharamatee, Christopher Palazzo
NYIT: Matt Cornelius, Steve Gehrhardt, Joseph Kerkovich, Raymond Martinez
Choreography: Ayo Jackson
Performance: Leonides Arpon, Ayo Jackson
Special Thanks: Heather Fullerton, Boo Wong, Eduard Dimasov, Joseph Hodgson