Bad Romance, literally

Here's my literal video version of Lady Gaga's new hit, Bad Romance. UMG filed a copyright claim on the YouTube release and made it unavailable worldwide. I'm contesting the claim, as the video constitutes a Fair Use under parody and social commentary exemptions.

Until then, or if, here it is at Funny or Die:

Bad Romance - Literal Video Version - watch more funny videos

Lev Myshkin's Digital Tonic

Here's my 2008 - 2009 demo reel and a preview of the videos on my YouTube channel.

This is the first time I've taken advantage of YouTube's new 1080p upload capabilities that were made available in November. The picture quality is great, but if you're on a Mac and you want HD (my Mac anyway) the frame rate drops out the bottom and the video gets very jerky when the "HD" button is pressed.

It's not an error in compression, but an error in the way Macs handle Flash. So, if you'd like to watch this in HD on a Mac, here's a quick fix - navigate to the video main page on YouTube and add the following tag to the end of the URL, no quotes "&fmt=22".

This will display the video in an HD mode Macs handle much better. Interesting note: even when booting in Windows on the same machine, the same problems exist with the HD button and the &fmt=22 tag is the solution. So, it's not an OS issue.

Enjoy:

Timing

It builds:

Truckers Delight

I don't recommend watching this thoroughly hilarious and raunchy animated music video by Jérémie Périn at work. But do watch it, as long as 8-bit scat humor and graphic sexual acts in caricature don't bother you:

Iron Maiden on the Harp

You can't see his fingers dancing over the harp strings quite as clearly as I'd like, it's one of the best parts of seeing a harp played, but this is such a great performance I wanted to post it anyway:



And because you only get one harp related post per year, a shout out to my man Harpo:

Crying

Before the days of auto-tune you lived and died by the way you were able to bring it live, unfiltered. Roy brought it:

Courage

I stay on top of current events and international affairs, and I have a pretty good handle on Russia. To put things in perspective for the following video, the only place more dangerous for journalists than Mexico is Russia.

And this guy, Alexey Dymovskiy, is a cop who is speaking out against corruption.

"I am tired of putting people in prison who are not guilty," he says at one point, and watching the weariness traverse his face it's easy to believe he's done just that more than once.

This is what courage looks like:

Misirlou (Μισιρλού)

Here's a classic song with clever execution:



And of course:



Watching the suits playing backup in this video is half the fun. Dick Dale is made of win, style and skill.

Marriage (брак)

Here's the latest animated film by Garry Bardin that I've remastered and reformatted for hi-def viewing on the YouTube channel that I'm managing for him:

Garry Bardin's Films

The way he uses common objects, in this one rope, to capture raw human emotion continually amazes me. In some of his other films he uses matches (clay matches that are so convincingly created in the image of real matches you have to look hard to pick it out) and steel wire.

There's one where the characters are invisible, but that's a surprise for later.

So, here it is. Marriage (брак). Enjoy:

Sailing Stones

If you click on the picture it'll take you to a hi-def version that'll take your breath away. Incase you've never heard of them, pictured in the lower right quadrant is a sailing stone at the Racetrack Playa in Death Valley:

"The sailing stones (sliding rocks, moving rocks) are a geological phenomenon where rocks move in long tracks along a smooth valley floor without human or animal intervention. They have been recorded and studied in a number of places around Racetrack Playa, Death Valley, where the number and length of travel grooves are notable. The force behind their movement is not understood and is subject to research."

-Wikipedia, sailing stones

Inspiration

I watched this video for the first time three years ago. It blew my mind. I watched it again, and again, and again. I still sit through the whole thing at least once a month.

After having my skull rocked by Lasseg Gjertsen's masterpiece I was struck with the realization that making videos had become accessible to guys like me, that you didn't need million dollar equipment to do good work, that you didn't even need a hi-def camera. Just a good idea, an editing program or two, and practice.

This is what inspired me to begin making my own videos:

End of the Road, literally

Here's the latest literal video on my YouTube channel, Digital Tonic. Vocals, lyrics and audio mixing by the perpetually hilarious and talented Alex Heitlinger. Video editing by yours truly:

Dolphins Are Geniuses

I've always figured Dolphins to be the sea's equivalent of humans, but not quite as intelligent. After all, these opposable thumbs of ours. They're a big ego boost.

I pictured them as sort of high-order Lassies of the sea, like Flipper. Which I always loved to watch when I had a chance to zone out on cable television at my grandparents.

Anyway, they might be smarter than us:

"One day, when a gull flew into her pool, she grabbed it, waited for the trainers and then gave it to them. It was a large bird and so the trainers gave her lots of fish. This seemed to give Kelly a new idea. The next time she was fed, instead of eating the last fish, she took it to the bottom of the pool and hid it under the rock where she had been hiding the paper. When no trainers were present, she brought the fish to the surface and used it to lure the gulls, which she would catch to get even more fish. After mastering this lucrative strategy, she taught her calf, who taught other calves, and so gull-baiting has become a hot game among the dolphins."

-Why dolphins are deep thinkers (The Guardian)

Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger

Happy Halloween:

Fitter, Happier

This animation is a nice reminder that a focused, minimalist approach can be more effective than the most complex, shiny surfaced, IK rigged and 3D character meshed production:

It's Just a Ride

Here's a video I made with one of my best friends, Isaac Cody Smith. The couple in the video are his parents, Tamye and Steve. They handled the painstaking process with aplomb. It took about 650 frames shot individually using a Nikon D70:

Artillery Playground

I found this incredible picture while reading an article on the EnglishRussia website about child soldiers during WWII:

War Is A Racket

The following statement was made by the most highly decorated man to serve in the Marine Corps at the time of his death. He was a two-time Medal Of Honor winner (one of which he tried to return because he felt it wasn't deserved - they told him tough shit, you not only have to keep it you have to wear it), a Major General and a badass with three nicknames. After grinding it out for Uncle Sam, he reached the following conclusion:

"I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents."

-Maj. Gen. Smedley "Old Gimlet Eye" Butler

He wrote the book, WAR IS A RACKET, and though I haven't read the whole thing yet the first few chapters are riveting.

Freddie Mercury, Literally

Just got done working on this. Did it over the weekend as I needed a break from a big animation project I'm working on (secret for now). Working on a video when you're working on another video as a method of relaxation might not make sense, but it works for me. Most of the time I don't need breaks from work so much as diversions from my all-consuming main projects so as not to go insane:

Marvel Motion Comics

Just finished working on this motion comic for the Marvel Motion Comic contest over at Aniboom.

The starfield in the background got pretty chunky due to the level of compression I had to apply for upload, but overall the animation came out looking pretty damn good.

I had a great time working on this and broke a sweat more then once. I'd love to develop the whole comic:



Watch more cool animations at Aniboom