“Waste of Space” - Trailer

A Personal Project combing elements of metalwork, set design, puppet fabrication and stop motion. The boy has outgrown the comforts of his best friend.

The TV

This project started with the process of creating a copper tv from scratch. I started with creating a paper mockup to rough out the dimensions. I then cut the metal into 3 different pieces using a sheet metal foot shear. The metal was annealed and form folded for the curved side piece. I used a jewelers saw to cut out the implied “screen” of the tv, and used various sized drill bits to achive the look of the buttons on the side. The antennas were made with 24 gauge copper wire; melted with a torch at the ends to create the rounded edges. I soldered all the pieces together, filed, polished and added a sulfur patina which I then filed away in certain areas for detail. I did not start this project with the intention of creating an animation, but after I finished i was intrigued by the idea of bringing it to life via stop motion.

The Dog

For the fabrication of the dog puppet I made an armature out of 24 gauge steel so that the head, ears, legs and tail could all move separately. I needle felted the fur, nose and eyes to embody a melancholic energy.

The Stop Motion TV Shows

The Room

The miniature set was a very simple aspect that consisted of glueing together a cardboard room and decorating with the intention of creating a character of a boy who feels as though he’s outgrown his childhood and therefore drowns himself in various forms of media to escape his loneliness.

The flooring was watercolor paper, cut into strips, detailed with a fine tip pen, and coated with modge podge for a gloss effect. The wall paper was colored blue paper distressed with watercolor to make the room look dirty.

The lamp is made from paper, pained with watercolors and folded into various shapes. The light is a practical led bulb.

The rest of the lighting was simple; I diffused a handheld light and bounced it onto the set using a white piece of paper.

The Props

The props were scale miniatures created from a mix of thin cardboard, printed photos and distressed with watercolor.

I wanted the props to embody a defiance of innocence. The combination of remotes, casettes and playboy magazine paint the picture of the unseen

The TV shows that are played withing the copper tv are small stop motion animations I originally made for personal practice, but ended up using for this project. My main goal when creating art is finfing ways to intertwine the various forms of media I have a passion for. Using stop motion footage for the TV was, in my mind, the most ideal way to bring together forms of

art we don’t usually see mixed. I love being involved with every aspect of a creative project from conceptualizing , to fabrucating to editing. For me this project is the ultimate culmination of of all the medias I love creating with.

Editing

The process of editing this project was extremely tedious and time consuming, however, I learned alot about what you can achieve in post production. The stop motion animations were made prior using dragonframe and premiere. The method used to insert the footage into a still frame of the room was done on DaVinci Resolve. I warped the footage and overlayed a low opacity refletion onto the inserted footage in order to make it appear more like a tv screen.

The Audio was a mix of source music and various sound effects consisting of footsteps, a door closing and tv static.