Tokyoplastic visit Hyper Japan!

Sam Lanyon Jones, half of iconic directing duo tokyoplastic agreed to come along to Hyper Japan Festival at the O2 to find out what it was all about:

 We found a Bonzai tree exhibit...

We found a 15ft giant model of the head of Titan from 'Attack on Titan' soon to be released as a live action film...

Sam chatted about about upcoming festivals in Hokkaido

 He introduced us to the world of Bubble Tea...strangely delicious and a little chewy!

We sampled authentic cuisine, a kind of omelette pickle lolly, and a sweet red bean pancake fish, made by a man in a fish hat, naturally.

We met some interesting people, including a fellow graphic novelist...

 Finished off by a spot of shopping for some beautiful comics and books...

We had a lovely afternoon out, thanks Sam!

The post Cannes post...

Smith. open and close Cannes Lions 2015 with a ... ROAR

Our talented Toronto based collective Smith. created stunning visuals that capture the energy and atmosphere of the Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity.  If you weren't lucky enough to attend the opening and closing Gala or see them on the massive screens at the Palais de Festival - then check them out here:

Opening Gala Film:

Closing Gala Film:

For a look at some behind the scenes footage of what went into this project, check out Smith's Facebook page here.

Introducing...Breakfast of Champions!

We are very excited to announce Breakfast of Champions are joining our roster of talented directors. This London based innovative motion graphics collective have already worked with an impressive array of brands and clients, including 02, McLaren, Intel, Nike and HTC.

As all our followers know, we love to share a bit more about our Directors, so we headed over to Covent Garden for a cuppa and to find out what makes them so special...

PP: So who are you?

BofC: Breakfast of Champions – headed up by James Murphy and Justin Lowings.

PP: Where in the world were you born /grew up?

BofC: James was born in England but despite sounding like Prince Charles, regularly claims he’s Irish.  ‘You’re not a horse if you’re born in a stable’. Justin grew up in Cambridgeshire, and isn’t quite sure if he was in some way the inspiration behind Stephen Hawking’s gravitational singularity theorems. 

PP: So who are Breakfast of Champions - where did the name come from?

BofC: We are a collective of about 10 people, depending on who’s giving birth or deported at any time.  Our 3d guy lives in Tokyo and our main Maya animator is in LA, so we do work funny hours.

The name’s from a book by Kurt Vonnegut ‘Breakfast of Champions’ the story of "two lonesome, skinny, fairly old white men on a planet which was dying fast".  It’s clever, funny and good illustrations too.

PP: How would you describe your style /styles - How has it developed over the years?

BofC: We’ve always focussed on adding personality to our projects. We got very good at taking dry and complicated content and making something fun from it. So I guess our style has developed from that. Whether we shoot it, make it in 3d or animate in 2d, we always try and have fun with bright colours and simple illustrations.

PP: Who/ What has been the biggest influence on your career?

BofC: I think the London has to be our biggest influence. The inspiration is infinite. The diversity of the people and its creative culture means there’s always something to inspire you to be better.

PP: Is there one project you feel is a bit of a favourite, and if so why?

BofC: Probably the Intel Ultrabook film https://vimeo.com/59658465

We wanted to show how technology could be beautiful, from an aesthetic point of view rather than simply being about clock speed or performance.  So we came up with the idea of the construction of one of the machines, in a slightly whimsical way. 

Somehow we even got the client to buy into the weird candy worm things we have shooting out of the screen, alien style.

PP: Where do you see the future of Breakfast of Champions? What are your hopes and dreams?

BofC: We’re not interested in being big just for the sake of it, so it’s definitely about quality rather than quantity.

We want to deliver high quality, thoughtful, personality driven films.  To have people watch & engage with them.  It’s quite a privilege when people let you into their living rooms to take over their TV screens, so we’ll do our best to deserve that.

PP: Tell us a secret about Breakfast of Champions that no one else knows.

BofC: Ah, really?  Well, one of us has been in jail and one’s a cage fighter.  And there are no vegetarians.


To view work by Breakfast of Champions please click here