MD6001 and MD6003 Week 21 - London Animation Club talk with Edwin Rostron
On Tuesday 3rd March 2015 at the Green Man pub in Fitzrovia, London, Edwin Rostron was the featured guest at the London Animation Club. He studied for a BA in Fine Art at Sheffield Hallam University and then studied MA animation at the RCA. Martin Pickles, organiser of the LAC, met Edwin at the RCA in 2006. Edwin mostly works on pencil and paper using abstract shapes and assisted Martin with his graduation film. He also works from home using computer software.
Top: Martin Pickles. Bottom: Edwin Rostron.
Staff from Tiger Aspect attended the first half of the talk. They use CelAction for Mr Bean Animated series. The same software was used to produce Charlie and Lola (2005 - 2008) and Tiger Aspect also produced the original live-action Mr Bean series. CelAction is more common in the UK whereas ToonBoom is more common in North America.
The first film shown was the first time Edwin worked with drawn animation (Morris and the Other). It has a surreal look with many hybrid characters.
Edwin works by tapping in something subconscious and including things that surprise him. He uses experimental animation that is not planned in advance. Edwin came from a fine art degree and never thought of animation as a commercial thing.
Edwin made a blog with other animators. He showed animations by artists and animators he interviewed for the blog.
Edwin's other film Visions of the Invertebrate was made in 2011. He collaborated with a friend who makes music and writes. This one is more colourful. It was made of pencil drawings on A4 paper, scanned into a computer and coloured in Adobe Photoshop. Edwin and his friend improvised it as they worked on it.
Edwin doesn't like making animations where he knows what he's doing because he finds this tedious.
The first film made by someone other than Edwin was Fruit Fruit by PeterMillard, an RCA graduate. It is made up of lots of painted drawings as well as a small proportion of photography.
Of Unknown Origin (2010).
Crux Film was made by Lilli Carerre and Alexander Steward who are now married. Again it has abstract shapes. They make films in their own right.
Martin went to another event hosted by another Martin who did experimental animation.
There is a London Animation Club YouTube channel.
A lot of Edwin's work is flat. He prefers to work in 4:3 because the 16:9 widescreen format makes him think his animations look more like films.
Watching Mysteries with My Mother by Ben Marcus has lots of colour and text.
Edwin has a Vimeo channel.
Our Selves Unknown (2014) has no sound and was made as a gallery installation rather than a film. It has caption cards similar to those in traditional silent movies. Edwin made it by tracing over photographs much like rotoscoping.
Most of Edwin's university animations were made using a collage style and Tipp-Ex.
Caleb Wood produced a film called Yield. It is made of photographs of animal roadkill.
Al Jarnow's Cosmic Clock is about time travel and changing seasons.
Velocity by Karolina Glusiec, an RCA graduate. It has more narrative than the other films shown during the talk.
Cul-de-Sac of Mortality (2012) is one minute long. Edwin made the film with a music producer called Will.
Edwin likes a lot of painters. He finds abstract paintings inspirational and things he doesn't do, such as painting, more inspirational than other animations. He is currently working on a continuation of Watching Mysteries with My Mother. I find Edwin's animations reminiscent of Wassily Kandinsky's paintings.
