Animations

Silent Movie Screen Test No. 6 (Ghent)

Featuring Fumiyo Ikeda. Filmed at Vooruit in Ghent by Pavol Liska. Edited by Kelly Copper in New York. Music is Tango Jalousie, performed by Leo Reisman and his Orchestra (1925).

This video is part of a series of stop motion animations that were made in 2011 and 2012 by Nature Theater of Oklahoma as a preparation and exploration for a projected animated film that would eventually become Life and Times - Episode 4.5. The films were composed from individual still photographs shot with a Cannon Mark ii camera in various locations while the company was on tour with Life and Times - Episodes 1 and 2. No one in the company had ever done animated film before, and we were learning as we experimented. Breaking down time into individual still moments was a challenge both for the directors and the actors involved. The individual photographs -- done often over the course of an entire day -- were later assembled in Final Cut at a rate of 10 frames per second to create the motion.

This animation (featuring dancer Fumiyo Ikeda) was one of a series of animations we made in the style of silent film using text from Life and Times - Episode 7. However, inter-titles proved a very slow way of working with such an exhausting amount of text. We knew that if we would make a full length movie in this same way, it would be twice as long as any of the episodes we had made previously, so this idea was eventually abandoned.

To see other animations in the series, click here:

 

Alison Animation Test (Antwerp)

Featuring Alison Weisgall. Filmed in the environs of Antwerp by Pavol Liska. Edited by Kelly Copper in New York. Traditional music by Brenkacs Gypsy Ensemble (1924)

This video is part of a series of stop motion animations that were made in 2011 and 2012 by Nature Theater of Oklahoma as a preparation and exploration for a projected animated film that would eventually become Life and Times - Episode 4.5. The films were composed from individual still photographs shot with a Cannon Mark ii camera in various locations while the company was on tour with Life and Times - Episodes 1 and 2. No one in the company had ever done animated film before, and we were learning as we experimented. Breaking down time into individual still moments was a challenge both for the directors and the actors involved. The individual photographs -- done often over the course of an entire day -- were later assembled in Final Cut at a rate of 10 frames per second to create the motion.

This animation (actually more of a time lapse) was filmed in an outdoor area near deSingel in Antwerp. The voiceover here talking about ice cream is actually Pavol's - from a recorded notebook.

To see other animations in the series, click here:

 

Empire!

'Empire' by Nature Theater of Oklahoma is a project inspired by Andy Warhol's 1964 silent, black-and-white film Empire (8hrs. 5 minutes in length) which is a static shot of the Empire State Building from late afternoon into night. You can watch a ten minute clip of Warhol's original here.

We’re going to remake this film - all eight plus hours of it; but instead of filming the Empire State Building, we’ve decided to create an animated version, and we're asking everyone in the world to participate. This 8 minute clip is an example of some of the work on the project thus far.

We are building this animation entirely from 4"x6’’ index cards. Each index card is initially stamped with an image we've designed of the Empire State Building, and those contributing may create and design and decorate however they choose with two stipulations: 1) Please try to recreate the SAME image 10 times. Even though the goal is to recreate the same exact image in each card, the natural details and imperfections reveal movement in what initially seems static. And 2) please only use 2D techniques. We will scan these in order to make the film, so 3D submissions (while I‘m sure they would be awesome...) will be unusable.

If you are interested in participating, please email your name and mailing address to empire@oktheater.org. We will send you an envelope of 10 cards and you can work your artistic magic and send them back to us. While you will receive credit for helping us, these cards will not be returned to you.

Currently there is no deadline for requesting cards. Work on this project commenced in 2013 and we will continue the work... until we get it done. But please hurry! We do really want to see it completed before we die.