Preludes Mixed-Media-Animation by Matthew Rankin

Preludes Mixed-Media-Animation by Matthew Rankin is a highly esteemed winner of the very prestigious 2020 A' Design Award in Eisen in Filmdesign Competition Category.

EisenFilm· 2020

Preludes Mixed-Media-Animation

by Matthew Rankin

Client: Matthew Rankin

A' Design Award in Eisen Winner in Film Category

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The Design

About Preludes Mixed-Media-Animation

Preludes ist eine kurze Mixed-Media-Animation, die auf dem gleichnamigen Gedicht von T. S. Eliot basiert. Der Film dauert eine Minute und acht Sekunden und verbindet Eliots Bildsprache mit einer eigens komponierten Musik. Die Szenen sind durch Thematik und Klang miteinander verknüpft, nicht durch einen einheitlichen visuellen Stil. Die Arbeit vereint 2D- und 3D-Animation, modelliert in Cinema 4D, gerendert mit Redshift und zusammengesetzt in After Effects. Luftaufnahmen wechseln auf die Straßenebene, wo Figuren hinter Bildschirmen aneinander vorbeigehen. Die Animation reflektiert das moderne Leben anhand eines älteren Textes.

The Recognition

About the A' Design Award in Eisen

Preludes Mixed-Media-Animation ist Gewinner des A' Design Award in Eisen, einer prestigeträchtigen Anerkennung für gute Designs, die die beruflichen und industriellen Anforderungen erfüllen, die an gut gestaltete Schöpfungen gestellt werden. Eisen-Gewinner zeigen großes Können, hohe Spezialisierung, fachkundiges Verständnis und die kreative Kapazität ihrer Schöpfer. Von Preludes Mixed-Media-Animation wird erwartet, dass es eine hochgeschätzte, bewunderte und geliebte Schöpfung ist, die praktisch und innovativ ist. Dieses mit dem A' Design Award in Eisen prämierte Design integriert bewährte Branchenverfahren und weist kompetente technische Merkmale in Verbindung mit Know-how und Talent auf. Preludes Mixed-Media-Animation wird für seine Gründlichkeit geschätzt und ist darauf ausgelegt, Verbesserungen der Lebensqualität zu liefern, die dazu beitragen, die Welt zu einem besseren Ort zu machen.

Behind the Design

Press Kit

Credits, team members and technical details provided by the designer.

Unique Properties: Preludes is a mixed media collaborative animation based on a poem by T.S. Eliot. The process involved the poem being chosen by the producer, who then invited a musician to compose a one-minute piece which was handed off to me to provide to create visuals on both the the words of Eliot and the music.
Dimensions & Packaging: Duration: 1-minute, 08-seconds
Tags: poetry, animation, motion graphics, 2D, 3D, after effects
Production Technology: Preludes utilizes both 2D and 3D animation all composited in After Effects. The scenes with 3D were done in Cinema 4D and rendered using Redshift. It also uses several After Effects plugins such as Video Copilot's Sabre, Rowbyte's Plexus, and Red Giant's Particular and Form.
Design Challenge: The challenge became putting the many ways this manifests into only one-minute and matching those visuals to an already created musical composition. And that's how an aerial view helps to alienate us from the tracking signals on the street and we are suddenly shifted to street level view to see faceless people bumping into one another with screens blocking the vision.
Research: For this project the research fairly straightforward. It started with a cursory reading of the poem, Preludes by T.S. Eliot, and listening to the soundtrack created by Angus Macrae. I listened to the audio repeatedly to let it sink into my memory and to help with visualizing general concepts. This was followed by seeking out deeper analysis of the poem so that I better understood the themes, ideas, and symbols. While I could certainly have skipped this step it was profoundly important as I went along and was searching for visual fragments to add to the density of the piece.
Inspiration: Preludes is based on T.S. Eliot's poem of the same name and a one-minute musical soundscape provided to me and composed by Angus Macrae. The whole project was organized by a group called Campfire Poetry that uses poetry as away to promote collaborations between musicians and animators.
Project Duration: The project was started 20 December 2019 in New York City and completed in February 2020.
Operation Flow: I was immediately drawn into Eliot's non-narrative and slightly abstract form, even though he was describing a very defined and concrete world. I took that as an opportunity to create scenes that were thematically, but not necessarily aesthetically, connected. Instead, I chose to let Macra's soundtrack be the connective tissue weaving together Eliot’s view with my own as I explore how our modern world looks and feels in the context of Eliot’s ideas.
Team Members: Director/Animator: Matthew Rankin
Producer: Max Rothman
Music/Sound: Angus Macrae