Some recent sketchbook drawings, drawn from the window seats of various cafes around Scarborough.

I’ve recently been putting together a portfolio. Here’s a mini sample:

I was recently commissioned by Jotta (along with several other artists) to make a short, looped animation for projection onto a huge 10ft wide wall of water at Latitude festival. Because it’s a loop, the piece I made is only roughly 10 seconds of animation, however since I cleverly decided to animate every frame with coloured pencils, in many colours, it was quite labour intensive nonetheless. The design of the lady in the film I have to thank Emil Nolde for- she is based on a study I did in coloured pencil from a painting of his hanging at the Art Institute of Chicago. I’d wanted to incorporate it into moving image ever since I first drew it, and I am quite proud of the end result.

Here is the animation itself:

And here is a video where you can see the film, and some of the others, as they are being projected. Mine starts from about 0.54:

In the past few months I’ve been up to some exciting things, that I thought I would update here.
First, Jackie and Kevin 1977 screened at several more festivals- One Voice Youth Film Festival in Bournemouth and Animated Exeter, and will also be showing out of competition at Stuttgart in May. I was incredibly excited to learn that my film won two awards at One Voice, for Best Animation and Best Soundtrack, and also placed second in the Graduates ‘Animation Direction’ category at Animated Exeter, where the judges said described it as “An incredibly original idea, executed in a consistent and sensitive style.“
This especially was an incredible honour, and I wish I could have been there to experience it. Animated Exeter is where I first got the chance to try animation, where I fell in love with it and realised that it was what I wanted to study at university. So to be recognised there is amazing.
Jackie and Kevin 1977 also screened on the opening night at the Regal Cinema in Evesham (as part of a mini programme put together by Encounters) and is being shown as part of the BBC Big Screens project, which shows short films on big, public screens in 22 cities across the UK. I only heard about this by a friend walking past the screen in central Cardiff whilst J&K was showing, so perhaps lots of people have seen it now, which is nice.

In non-J&K related news, We Weren’t The First Ones Here, a film I made in second year with Kate Broadhurst, Emma-Rose Dade, Helen Dallat and Joseph Wallace, featured on animation/motion graphics blog Motionographer, as well as various other places online. You can view the post here and also link through to the film on Vimeo.
So this isn’t just words, here is a picture of an actual award with Jackie and Kevin written on it.

Recently I went to London for a couple of days with Helen Dallat for the British Animation Awards, as her graduation film Bare (which I wrote the story for) was nominated in the Public Choice category. It was really exciting to get to be a part of such a big event in British animation- I had a lot of fun at the awards and the after-party, meeting lots of interesting people, even if I did feel slightly out of place and intimidated amongst all the ‘real’ animators. London was gorgeous and sunny, so we spent a lot of time sat on the Southbank drawing.

At one point I started drawing a man who just happened to be in my eyeline. Part way into drawing him, I starting thinking how much he looked like Marcus Brigstocke. Then a little further into drawing him I realised it was Marcus Brigstocke. And I drew him by accident. Hello Marcus.

How cool is this??!
Jackie and Kevin 1977 is also screening in Exeter at the beginning of December in a festival called Two Short Nights. But first is the world premiere (as ridiculous as it seems to call it that) at Encounters, which I am very honoured and excited to be a part of.

After finishing Jackie and Kevin 1977 in May this year, I’ve started sending it out to some film and animation festivals, which is kind of scary but very exciting.

This month I found out it is going to be screened in competition at both Encounters International Film Festival in Bristol, and Up-And-Coming International Film Festival Hannover. I am super excited about Encounters as it’s a pretty big deal and also I am moving to Bristol soon so hopefully I will get to see a lot!

At Up-And-Coming, I get to present my film and have a Q&A with the audience, which might make me die of fear but hopefully will be a really great experience. I’m really looking forward to seeing how other people, beyond just my classmates, friends and family, react to the film. Hopefully it will be well! I’m also looking forward to getting my first chance ever to use my extensive vocabulary of useless German words that has mysteriously stuck with me since year 9. I will get taschenrechner into a conversation.

In July I spent 3 weeks travelling around America. It was completely amazing, and I really want to go back, but I think that may have to wait a while unfortunately. I went to four cities, and would happily revisit all of them, but mainly the fact that just these four cities were all so completely different from each other makes me want to see every other one too.

My favourite was probably San Francisco, even if only for the fact that there are so many good things to draw there.

Houses on ‘Postcard Row’

A shop on a corner in Haight Ashbury

People walking through Washington Square park