I am a formally trained Medical Illustrator, having obtained a Master's of Art and Medical Science degree at University of Illinois at Chicago. After working several years as a freelance Medical Illustrator, my day job morphed into web development, then information/interface design, then enterprise application design. However, at the other end of the candle I have pursued painting, animation, video editing, documentary film, 3D modeling/animation, photography, web development and various other types of computer tinkering.
Untitled
This short animation was projected large scale on a wall as part of a gallery exhibit called "Sensory Overload". It attempts to blend reality with fantasy by starting with a top illuminated canvas that produces an evolution of gestural figure drawings processed from film. This version of the animation is much faster than the original…I wanted observers to wait and watch the slowly morphing figures. The dripping red liquid was meant to remind the viewer that the canvas was still a real thing.
Mid Coast Road Rally 2012
Mid Coast Road Ralley 2012: This was the third iteration of the road rally I filmed (2011 and 2008 previously). This short excerpt from the movie features
a compilation of video shot from inside and hanging outside of cars by myself and two other road rally drivers, Sean and Bill. About half was shot using my GoPro camera on the
end of a custom "selfie" boom I made that could stretch out to about 15 feet. The video was styled to look like a comic book
illustration using Adobe After Effects. The background music is "Broken Mix" by Noctopus.
An additional excerpt can be seen here
Short promotional film for Ruff Coast
Victoria Island, British Columbia
This short film was made during a morning dog walking excursion to one of the many beaches surrounding the southern tip of Victoria Island, BC. It was filmed on a Sony HDR-HC3 Handycam using the 3 second high speed film option (at about 90 frames per second) and a wide angle lense. In post production, I slowed the video down to about 85% of its film speed. It is set to Lakme by Delibes.
Projects with Lee Ann Conlan
Art Dissection
This was the first project I worked on with Lee Ann back in 2007-2008. It is meant to be a progressive, creepy, exploration into some of the more abstract and moody pieces of her artwork. It was created for large scale projection at her gallary show. The concept for this animation was loosely inspired by an animation from the Quay Brothers called "Street of Crocodiles".
Sketch
This was a project I worked on with Lee Ann using timelapse film of her work. My sketches of her drawing transition to her sketches of her subjects which eventually transition into the subject herself. The transition effects were created in Adobe After Effects.
Additional Video Work of Note
Promotional film for My Charity Life
This animation was created for mycharitylife.com, a website that allowed its customers to easily donate money to various charities. The goal of the project was to create a fifties styled animation, taking inspiration from some of the old educational slide shows that came with a record. The scenes were first blocked out in sketches I did on my iPad, which I then imported into Flash to create the actual animation. I then exported it to Adobe After Effects for post processing. I recorded and mixed the narration and audio separately using Soundtrack Pro.
Promotional video to raise money for a "Girls Rock" event in Des Moines, IA
Animation for The Slaughterhouse halloween attraction
This is a 3D animation created in Blender as an online teaser for the 2017 iteration of Slaughter House, a haunted house attraction in Des Moines, IA.
Intro projection for Neighborhood 3: Requisition of Doom
This is a 3D animation created in Blender which was projected as the very opening of a play called Neighborhood 3: Requisition of Doom by Jennifer Haley, and performed by the Des Moines Social Club. The animation is meant to simulate the game in the play, which uses the very neighborhood the player lives in as the world they play the game in. I created an entire neighborhood of houses and streets in Blender for this sequence. In addition to this were various interior and exterior stills that were rendered for each scene and projected on three screens arranged in a triangle around the audience to produce a surround-like effect.
Corporate intro for Horror Show Entertainment
This animation was created for Horrorshow Entertainment, a production company specializing in horror films. The gravestone with title and Medusa model was constructed and rendered using Blender. The additional effects were created using Adobe After Effects.