44. Deadman's little helpers

So a few students from RCDC (Ravensbourne College of Design and Communication) backed the film's kickstarter. I met them at the Kickstarters end's drinks, and for what ever reason when they're not busy at school or on personal projects, they want to help on the film... Instead of partying and having fun! Crazy peops.

So they're helping me shading some shots. To make sure everything is consistant I made this little "tutorial" on how to shade beard and hair on the film:

Hair-Drawing

You can check it out in high quality on vimeo: https://vimeo.com/65075512

Anyway thanks Andreas, Amy, Ashley, Andreas and Matt

42. Same old, Same old

Damn, I've been dead busy with playing fancy dressing and drinking (for the live action of the film, obviously - well mainly) that I forgot to post last week! Anyway there is much more black on the character now, and shading takes twice longer... If you want to start a 2d film, hand drawn, here's an advice, make everything white! Damn that black T-Shirt is killing me.

So you can forgive me, here's a little GIF, the walking drunk (it's not the shot that caused me lots of pain):

Walking

32. Music Rights

Ok, where to start with this... So it's xmas and out of self absolution I decided to finely deal with the Music Rights. The film is based on my sketch book witch contains shit loads of lyrics from songs I like. To give the  short film the same spirit, I asked my musical friends to cover some famous songs.

Since I'm planning to get it into festivals and/or on the net, I need to clear the music rights.

I started writing that post and after half an hour it was 3 pages long... Music Rights are somewhat complicated.

I'll try to sum up:

How does it work?

2 différents rights/licence:

-  synchronization licence: is the licence to use the lyrics / partition / writing. It's the right to use a song if you re-record it yourself.

- master use licence: is the licence to use a specific version of a song by a specific artist on a specific album.

Those licences are for using on images/film. To use them on a format (i.e. CD, tape, whatever) its yet another story.

So in my case I mainly need Synchronisation licences since I'm going to use covers.

How to get them?

Publishers hold the rights on behalf  of the artist. So licenses for a same song can be hold by different publishers. Lets say 3 artists wrote a song, and one sang it, the right can potentially be hold by 4 publishers.

To know witch publisher holds witch right you need to go on those 3 websites: www.ascap.com, www.bmi.com and www.sesac.com and find the specific song you want. You need to go on all 3 of them because there repository are not the same... Sweet.

You then need to contact the publishers and ask them for the licence you want. In the case of Warner and Chappell there's an online form to fill, it's pretty strait forward but quite specific. You will need to explain how you're gonna use the music, what is the film about and other stuff.

For some other publishers (for exemple EMI) you need to contact them directly by email or phone.

Why get them? 

When you aim at having your film in festival, it is mandatory . If your aiming at showing it to your mum, at a wedding or to a small youtube audience, you should ask for them, obviously, but it's probably not worth the time and energy  you and they'll spend.

The reason why I'm getting them is because my friends are spending time making covers and I want to be sure to be able to use them.

 

Usually producers deal with the music rights and I thing that a bit of négociation is involved. I contacted a few publisher and I haven't heard from them yet (Xmas brake I think) I hope the price they'll ask me for will be reasonable, that is between 0 and 50 dollars, but until they contact me, I have no idea what's gonna happen... STRESSFUL!

we'll see.

 

22. Back to Black

I finished the pencil animation for the Bedroom sequence, Those of you who bought the book had a preview of what the film animation will look like, thanks for your feedbacks!

I switched  back to shading for a few days before starting a new sequence witch involves a different drawing technique...

Here is what 3 hours of shading looks like:

[vimeo 51915738 w=500 h=281]

9. New BackGround

Last week was a bit slow, mainly due to the fact that I spend 5 hours colouring A THIRD of an A3 in red. Using a O.4 mm pen... Bloody Diner sits. It felt like Math lessons all over again!

Anyway, I'm one background behind, I will catch up somehow this week.

Mooe sent me the first draft of here Harry Nilsson's "One" cover, and it's brilliant,

I can't wait for you to hear it!

Mean while listen to here other songs, HERE. They're perfect for a monday morning. Or any other time!

This week plan is a bit serious...  Apart from the thursday afternoon Old Fashioned Stroll.

I need to sort out a proper PLANING for the backgrounds. I've finished 6 of them, out of 60 and I only have a few weeks to finish all of them.

I started by the hardest ones, yet I need a realistic schedule. Today starts the 9th week. It needs to get a bit more intense.

Any one care to Produce me?

The great news is that I am 20 Books away from adding 1 more month to the production! Making it a proper 6 month production.

Here is one of the new BackGrounds, a Motel Room:

Feel free to leave comments HERE