Director
Gertie Takes a Trip to the Moon and a Man Recycles
| This animation is, in part, an homage to some of my early cinema favorites. First, a dinosaur is hatched, then she disintegrates and a moon and stars are formed. Eventually, a flying space vehicle treks into the moon, and, inside, an embryo evolves into an old man. All takes place within one-and-a-half minutes. | |
 The Moon | |
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Gertie Takes a Trip to the Moon and a Man Recycles was started in the fall of 1971. I had received a filmmaking grant from Smith college, with which I made a film that was a demonstration of T’ai Chi by, and interview of, Master T.T. Liang. Because I had come well under budget, I was also able to buy supplies for a frame-by-frame on paper animation. At that time, I drew 400-odd drawings on paper, and attempted to capture them on color 8mm, and later on b/w 16mm. With both efforts there were camera problems, and I never got a satisfactory print. The soundtrack was a simultaneously-played audio tape with simple sitar droning and a group’s meditative chanting (“Ja-ray Ra-day, Ja-ray Ra-day, Govinda Ra-day …”) For this latest incarnation, I digitally captured the drawings — frame-by-frame — and placed them on the video edit program’s timeline with a four-frame default for each image. The tune was created with a music generating program, which I subsequently edited to fit the tempo and different sections. I maintained only a snip of the sitar drone and added squeaks, motor sounds, tinkle noise, and one short spoken sentence. All of this effort is a lot of work to go through for one minute of film. “Gertie …” was finally completed in January 2001, so I can truly say that this 1½ minute animation was 30 years in the making.
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Photos © 2001, Demian
All contents © 2001, Demian
Demian’s Résumés: Directing || Writing || Visual || Photo Gallery || Acting || Business
Demian — Sweet Corn Productions
206-935-1206 — demian@buddybuddy.com
P.O. Box 9685, Seattle, WA 98109 — buddybuddy.com/sweet.html