Beautiful and clever student animation

Here's some exceedingly lovely student CGI animation that also manages to tell a great little story. I'm reminded of Neil Gaiman's story "Other People" from his excellent collection Fragile Things (to say more would be a spoiler!).

Hemlock by Tyson Ibele (Thanks, Noah!)

[#1 posted by Xopher, February 16, 2009 12:04 PM]

Man, that is GREAT STUFF.

I'll ROT-13 my question, since it contains a spoiler: Nz V gur bayl bar jub guvaxf gur svefg thl jnf n ebobg sebz gur ortvaavat, naq gur jngre whfg ohearq njnl gur syrfu furyy? Rivqrapr: gur eng.

[#2 posted by spejic, February 16, 2009 12:21 PM]

(ROT-13 answer) Ab - V guvax vg vf gung gur jngre tvirf rgreany yvsr ol gheavat gur qevaxre vagb n ebobg. Gur ebobg zna jnfa'g cebgrpgvat gur jryy nf zhpu nf cebgrpgvat crbcyr sebz qevaxvat vg.

[#3 posted by Anonymous, February 16, 2009 12:28 PM]

I'm with spejic (side note: ROT-13 is awesome!).

Blizzard should hire him for their cinematic department; in the beginning I felt like I could be watching a trailer for Diablo III, the atmosphere was so spot-on.

[#4 posted by Xopher, February 16, 2009 12:34 PM]

Nu. Gung znxrf n ybg zber frafr, npghnyyl.

[#5 posted by jimh, February 16, 2009 12:58 PM]

MAH BUCKIT. I WANTS IT.

[#6 posted by libraryboi, February 16, 2009 1:22 PM]

You can learn more about Ibele at his web site http://www.tysonibele.com/Main/main.htm

He is self-taught and an exceedingly talented CG artist as this short and his other gallery videos demonstrate.

[#7 posted by Doug Nelson, February 16, 2009 1:52 PM]

An AJAX rot-13 app wouldn't be the worst idea for blogs in general.

[#8 posted by GaryG, February 16, 2009 2:49 PM]

xaaaaannnnn-aaaaa-duuuuuuu-ooooooo

[#9 posted by Itsumishi, February 16, 2009 5:17 PM]

An AJAX rot-13 app wouldn't be the worst idea for blogs in general.

Certainly would be nicer than trying to decipher disemvoweled messages.

[#10 posted by Dustin Driver, February 16, 2009 5:24 PM]

I love how he can only communicate with gurgles, whistles, and plumes of steam. Nice touch.

Bravo.

[#11 posted by Anonymous, February 16, 2009 6:33 PM]

Huh - I was thinking the water had a switching type of property, and so that who ever drinks it goes from flesh->mech, or vise versa, and that the last person who has drunk it must stay until someone else comes along.

[#12 posted by Hippocratic Oaf, February 16, 2009 6:50 PM]

From the outset, this reminded me a great deal of The Cat With Hands.

In case you haven't seen it, it's another short film.
YouTube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=unGHoD8ysk0

[#13 posted by edinblack, February 16, 2009 7:09 PM]

Bears a certain family resemblance to Jan Svankmajer's 1992 short film Food (Part 1)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=39j7bypVxL8

[#14 posted by tsteele999, February 16, 2009 8:08 PM]

I spent 10 minutes looking for my copy of "Fragile Things" when I remembered I got the paperback and probably left it in the break room at work. A little Googling and I remembered it was the story about Hell.

[#15 posted by Jude_Calvert_Toulmin_FDL, February 17, 2009 1:14 AM]

Thanks for posting this. Amazing.

You may like the work of Carlos Villarreal Kwasek. His short Climber, made whilst still a student at Vancouver Film School, has won many international awards. You can see that here, it's a couple of minutes long.

His animation reel is here, no less stunning.

[#16 posted by Anonymous, February 17, 2009 5:16 AM]

That was REALLY good.

[#17 posted by Anonymous, February 17, 2009 9:40 AM]

why is it that animations by "students" are better than major film companies most of the time. I think they are higher in quality and always have a cooler story line. iLike.

[#18 posted by Anonymous, February 17, 2009 12:52 PM]

It just goes to show, you can't be too careful.

[#19 posted by Anonymous, February 17, 2009 2:28 PM]

lrnu v graq gb nterr, gur jngre unf orra gbyq gb tvir rgreany yvsr, ohg haxabja gb gur zna, tvirf yvsr va na ebobgvp sbez. v thrff gur ebobg naq gur zbhfr gevrq gb cebgrpg crbcyr sebz n greevoyr sngr...

-ROT-13 rocks :D

[#20 posted by padster123, February 17, 2009 2:40 PM]

Really nicely done. Great lighting and a super camera style (where lots of student CG shorts fail).

WIN!

[#21 posted by John_T, February 17, 2009 11:23 PM]

Cool vid.

The ROT13 comments prompted me to make a mozilla ubiquity plugin for it.

In-page conversion, sweet. Check it out here:
http://tinyurl.com/rot13mozilla

Even if you couldn't care less about ROT13, I'd highly recommend checking out ubiquity.

[#22 posted by Anonymous, February 18, 2009 12:37 PM]

this was a bit creepy

[#23 posted by Anonymous, February 18, 2009 4:32 PM]

This guy is far from a student. More like the god of animation. check out his website to see more awesome.