backstage with Beats Antique

On November 15th, Beats Antique played the Fonda Theater in Hollywood to a sold out house.  I was invited to bring some friends who worked on it.  This is me with the band and Edgar Humberto Alvarez who helped out by sculpting the train and the initial versions of the band.  I put a little display together of their puppet alter-egos and gave it to them after the show.  Photos courtesy of Edgar's Go Pro.

Also, Dragonframe, the software that 9 out of 10 animatos uses for shooting stop-motion these days, featured our music video on their blog:  Beezlebub


And furthermore, Obscura put together this super-piece about the show and the projection mapping endeavor (and I love that last shot of Zoe!):

Beats Antique “A Thousand Faces” Tour from Obscura Digital on Vimeo.


Here's what it looks like during the concert, courtesy of a spectator who posted it on youTube:

Beelzebub featuring Les Claypool, by Beats Antique

Beats Antique's Beezlebub from Webster Colcord on Vimeo.

"Beezlebub" music video released

The music video/concert film that I just finished animating for Beats Antique and director Ivan Landau is going live today at FUSE TV.  I was able to produce it with generous help from the owners of Shadow Machine, with sculpting assistance from my friends Edgar Humberto Alvarez and Rich Zimmerman.  I also re-used an old puppet that Damon Bard and Lionel Orozco helped build (a robot) and a record store set built by Dave Waddle a number of years ago.  I'm looking forward to seeing it in front of a live audience when their concert comes to Hollywood next month.

Beats Antique "Beezlebub" rehearsal photos

2013.09.13 - photos by Ivan Landau from Beats Antique concert rehearsal, showing images from the music video I just finished as they are projected onto the stage during the live performance.  Click on each for the larger view.

Beats Antique concert film/ music video

Here's a teaser for the big clay animation project that I've been working on independently, using a space at Shadow Machine.  The director is Ivan Landau, whom I worked with at The Orphanage in San Francisco, and the whole project is being produced through a company that does large-scale projection mapping, Obscura Digital.

Ivan is giving me a lot of freedom to put wild images on the screen as I see fit, and I'm using a lot of old characters that I've had in boxes for years.  I've also been doing a lot of previs off-and-on while working on this.  I'm featured in the video below and there are clips of some of my animation.  More info and pictures to come.

 

Webster's reel of Ted postvis work

Since I finished working on "Ted" in early 2012, I've been keeping busy with both stop-motion and previs projects in Los Angeles.  I had a little time in-between shows to cut together a reel of my some of my postvis work from the movie.  This includes temp Ted shots and a few of the temp VFX shots that I did (sky replacements with shooting stars, a photo replacement). There's no accompanying music our sound fx, just intermittent dialogue.  Also, VFX supe Blair Clark asked me not to do any lip-sync for Ted, so it's just facial expressions.


Webster Colcord postvis work for Ted from Webster Colcord on Vimeo.

a mutant

I haven't been drawing much lately.  But here's a mutant that I just drew tonight.  This is the mutant that I tend to draw when I can't think of anything else to draw.  I think he's a close cousin of one of the "Make Your Own Name" monster cards from the 60's, by Norm Saunders.  I've animated him before in little snippets.

Dark Minions pictures

Unfortunately, Amazon Studios did not pick up the "Dark Minions" series.  I animated on the pilot at Shadow Machine, it's mostly an animatic with about 7 minutes of finished animation. You can watch the pilot here:  Dark Minions on Amazon Prime  Too bad, but it was super fun to work on and the team at Shadow Machine was superlative, to say the least.  The other animators on the pilot were Hilary Lyle, Rachel Larson, Dan Driscoll, Drew Hodges, Cean Huckabay, and Owen Klatte.  All under the Animation Supervision of Misha Klein and directed by Ross Shuman.

Straight To Hell Returns stop-motion animation breakdown

In 2010 director Alex Cox ("Repo Man", "Sid & Nancy") contacted me to create two new stop-motion skeleton shots for his 80's film "Straight to Hell", which was getting some new VFX for a re-release.  After completing the shots, I pitched to him the idea of doing a third shot in stop-motion for a different part of the film.  This is a breakdown reel that explains the making of the three shots.  And thanks to my old pal Lionel Orozco for giving me a very kind write-up about this on his site:  Stopmotionworks
 

Dark Minions trailer released

Amazon has released the pilot episode of "Dark Minions".  Viewers can post their reviews to get it greenlit for a series.  I worked on this at Shadow Machine, it's mostly an animatic with about 7 minutes of finished animation.  Trailer below, watch the pilot here:  Dark Minions on Amazon Prime

clay-on-glass rooster element

Shot some clay-on-glass animation today for a personal project on a spare stage at Shadow Machine. This is an element that will be composited into a live action shot for a documentary. The smudges on the glass won't show up because it was shot frontlight/backlight, which means that there's a perfect silhouette for each frame of the animation.


clay-on-glass rooster element from Webster Colcord on Vimeo.

2013 Character Animation Reel

Webster Colcord 2013 Character Animation reel from Webster Colcord on Vimeo.

Animating for Justin Kohn at Chiodo Bros studio

I animated this mechanical contraption on Tuesday for Justin Kohn's "War of The Worlds" project at Chiodo Bros studio in Burbank. Justin made the puppet, which is quite a tricky thing to animate - for one thing, it's extremely heavy! I think the best shot done so far was one that Justin animated last year, here's a link:  Justin Kohn Martian Walker shot  

Ted Oscar shoot

I did the mocap record/delivery of Seth for this Ted appearance at the Oscars. Would love to post a still from the shoot but it would get me in trouble:  Ted On The Oscars