Engagement blog

After first visiting our three Stateside artists in April – James Frye, JA Tan and Angela Weddle – Dom and Jeremy have been back for a second visit to again...

Today is Tuesday. We met once more outside the Tan’s place at 8:50 and walked to the studio. JA has a Wacom tablet which his dad bought for him. He...

On Monday we met at 8:50 outside the Tan’s apartment and I walked with JA to his studio. His mentor Jeanne (who is also a tenant of the studios) met...

I arrived in Vancouver late on a Friday night in the pouring rain. JA’s parents had arranged for us all to meet on Saturday afternoon, just so JA would know...

Last session with James today. I’ve procured an iPad for him. He is rather taken with the book ‘the animator’s survival kit’, which I’d given him on the first day...

I’ve found a bit of open source software called pencil 2d. James is already familiar with working on a computer using a pen tablet. Thats how he does most of...

Today I met James. He has a small office in the basement of the house.  We talked for a while about his hopes and goals as a film maker.  He’s...

I met Angela at her tiny flat in San Antonio. There are art materials everywhere and the walls are adorned with artwork. We talked for a while about the project...

CTS Trainer Dom Pitt is in San Antonio, Texas working with Artist Angela Weddle, one of the awesome creatives we’ve been connected to via Debra Muzikar at the Art of...

The final workshop has come and gone. I’ve really enjoyed these six and would rather like to return to Lynx to do more. For this last session in this series...

This final session brought together all the skills the participants had been able to practice in the previous workshops to create a fantastic short film about friendship. The work that went...

After the success of the first lip-syncing workshop I thought I’d try and push it a bit further with a spot of character interaction. I got the guys to co-operate...

This week I brought some reference cards and foldover clips along and flipbooks were made. I had several examples which were eagerly thumbed through. Only a couple of people really...

I tried to get people a bit excited about pixillation – using people and objects as the things to be animated – and I busted out the laptop to show...

This was the first workshop of six that we are running at the NAS Lynx Centre in Weston Super Mare as part of the Exploring Diagnosis project. Last time we...

Ginny Russell recently led on a film about the autism community’s questions for a biomedical consortium that is developing drugs to treat autism called EU-AIMS.   Two public events organised...

We did things a little differently this time around and had some Lego figures for people to animate with should they wish. Not everyone is a confidant model maker so we...

We also had some paper cut out animation under a camera. While the cutting out was a hit the group were not too keen to animate with it so Dom,...

We used a green-screen again but this time around we were able to use videos as a backdrop which resulted in a close encounter with a steam train barrelling down...

Working with plasticine is extremely comforting. Warming it up and rolling around in your fingers is probably something I could do for a good few hours. Slowly something emerges from...

As the day winds to a close we had outside with Jess, to experiment popping a water balloon in slow motion like the Slo-Mo Guys while filming with a high...

We all sit around the table and roll the plasticine around and start to shape and squeeze. There is some shouting, some disconcerting cries of “Cat-Bear!”, there’s laughter but mostly...

During our last workshop at Stalkcombe we set up a live green-screen set which allowed the residents to film themselves in front of an image of their choosing here are...

To get warmed up we would get the participants to pick their favourite colour that they would like to use and then their favourite animal or character that they would...

Danni’s finished animation featuring horses

Two elephants, William and George, having a bath. A finished animation from the first workshop at Stalcombe House

A finished animation from the first Stallcombe House animation workshop featuring a James Bond styled scene

We set up a live green screen in the hall so that the residents could see themselves on a big tv projected against a background of their choice using green...

Our first interactive workshop happened on the 24th of March at Stallcombe House, and it was a fantastic success. The team from Calling The Shots brought two ‘workstations’ for the...

By the end of our first workshop the participants had created their own short films using stop-motion with the help of the teachers. They created their own characters, stories and had...

We began the workshop introducing everyone to stop-motion animation, a process using multiple photos to create a moving image. We started off exploring how stop-motion works with a few basic shapes...

Our first workshop is at Stallcombe House. Stallcombe House is a residential community for adults with learning disabilities. It has a holistic and organic approach to personal health and the...