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Staff Picks

  • Probably one of the most uplifting, succinct, emotionally touching and truly thoughtful piece of video journalism I’ve seen in 2019. Bob Ross has touched just about everyone on planet Earth. Nearly three decades after his untimely death in 1995, everyone seems to want to know — where are all the Bob Ross paintings now?

  • This Staff Pick hit me right in the feelers.

    It’s a short film from Joan Bosch (he/him), a Spanish filmmaker “based between Madrid and Barcelona.” From the short film’s description on Vimeo:

    “(Life) While Traveling” is a short film about the way we look to the world when we travel. It’s about colors, shapes, textures and details that surrounds us every day, but we only realize when we are far from home.

    Gorgeous, emotional, and even a tad nostalgic. Really motivates me to take stock of what we have here, on Earth. Joan really hit me in the feelers on this one. Enjoy.

  • Working at Vimeo, there’s no shortage of Staff Picks to go through and watch in the archives. This was Staff Picked originally in 2011, but I just happened across it today!James W Griffiths is the director of this short, and I don’t have much else to share other than the video description:

    Shot entirely on the Nokia N8 mobile phone. Winner of the Nokia Shorts competition 2011.

    For context the N8 was released 9 years ago. It had a 12.1 megapixel resolution which was unheard of at the time. But also, not great when we’ve been spoiled 4K+ resolutions as of lately. It also had a 16GB SSD, and a SD memory card slot.

    It’s extraordinary and really wonderful what we can achieve around such simple medium constraints.

  • Mitski : A Pearl

    From the video description:

    This music video was initially created on the computer using several pieces of 3D animation software. After the digital version was finalized, all 1,480 frames of the video were then individually printed using ink jet printers. Once an image was printed, it was then painted, drawn, and illustrated on top of using traditional animation techniques. Lastly, the newly illustrated frames were scanned back into the computer and sequenced into the final film.

    This animation film is another work of art from the Brooklyn studio, Art Camp. Ravishing, delicious and ambitious — just a few words to describe just how amazing this animation is. The style, the process, and the music pairing are a match made in heaven.

    It’s just so fucking good.

  • Stems

    Sam Morrill, Director of Curation at Vimeo:

    Sentimentality is a tricky thing. For those of us who possess it, experiencing “all the feels” can provide a deep well of emotion to draw from, enhancing our response to — or remembrance of — any given person, place or thing. However, like any well, it’s deep, dark and you can fall down it if you’re not careful. When it comes to our physical creations and possessions, sentimentality means the difference between tossing something in the waste bin and keeping it on a bookshelf for time eternal. Take an inanimate object that has been imbued with a life and identity of its own, like a stuffed animal, and you can begin to understand how one starts down the path of becoming a hoarder. Ainslie Henderson is to sentimentalists what Willy Wonka is to chocoholics. Since releasing his BAFTA-nominated directorial debut, “I Am Tom Moody” in 2012, Henderson has established himself as one of today’s preeminent stop-motion animators, lauded for his uncanny ability to breathe life into any manner of puppet, anthropomorphic or not. Henderson’s newest film, “Stems,” is an empathic ode to the artist’s puppets and today’s Staff Pick Premiere.

    […]

    Despite the final film’s modest runtime, production took the better part of six months, a testament to the painstaking work inherent to stop-motion and central to Henderson’s ability to bring his characters to life. “I take my time,” says Henderson, who is then quick to point out that the design of the puppets is every bit as important as the way in which they’re ultimately animated. “They should have a kind of ‘aliveness’ even before they move, that way you don’t have to do terribly much in the animating to bring them to life.” When asked if he ever gets attached to his creations, Henderson’s response is perhaps unsurprising: “I cherish them. Even the ugly, or half-finished ones get a place on the shelf in my studio. They’re like this weird, constantly growing little family who stare out at me from the windowsill as I’m working.”

    Wonderful camerawork, stop-motion and sound design.