Daniella Orsini

Daniella Orsini talks about using SMP for Vodaphone and more...

Hi Daniella, thanks for talking with us. Can you tell us how you came to be a filmmaker/animator?

I've always been interested in art and much to my parents dismay was drawing all over my bedroom walls as soon as I could hold of a crayon. From there I moved on to colouring competitions and paint by numbers, but I didn't begin animating until I started on my Art Foundation course. It was a a bit of an accident really because I initially went there to study Photography, but I made friends with a lovely girl called Leonie (who taught me to knit) and we ended up deciding to make an animation together. They didn't really cater for animation on the course so we had to make-do by taping the camera to a pile of books to use as a tri-pod. That's not the worst of it, the only cameras available were Sony Mavika Floppy Disk cameras which could only hold 9 photos on a disk. And we had one disk. Despite all this we successfully made a stop motion plasticine animation, mixed with live action and hand drawn 2D animation, which we presented to the class dressed as ushers handing out popcorn.

From then I was hooked, all I wanted to do was make animations. I studied Multimedia Arts at University where I began specialising in cut-out animation. Whilst at University I made an animation about a monster called Bob Ordello, which was selected for the BAFTA 60 Seconds of Fame Award. I was the North West Regional winner and a UK National Finalist. I attended the BAFTA's and had my animation screened in Covent Garden.

After finishing University I was offered a job in Oslo, Norway creating animated backgrounds for a touring theatre production. So off I went, convinced that it was joke and that nobody would be waiting for me when I landed at the other end. Thankfully I was greeted by a smiling face. Working in Norway is where I was exposed to animating using multi plane, so as soon as I got home, saw in hand, I set about making my own table and I've used it ever since.

What are your recent productions, where might people see them?

When I returned from Norway I was awarded funding from Ideastap and I made an animation for the 'Reading Single Homeless Project' to help them to promote the wonderful work they do in supporting homeless people in Reading. Amazingly, it was this animation which later secured me my dream job with Loose Moose in London. In July this year I completed animating the stop motion, short film 'Being Bradford Dillman' which has received official selection for the 2011 London Film Festival and the British Animation Awards 2012.

Since completing 'Being Bradford Dillman' I have been commissioned to create corporate and commercial animations for clients including Vodafone, Microsoft, McDonalds and Deloitte. All of my work can be viewed online on my blog (http://www.daniella-orsini.blogspot.com) and vimeo page (http://vimeo.com/user1622820).

What hardware do you use?

I have quite a basic set-up when I'm animating at home in our semi-spare room, I just use a small rostrum and lights, black out the window with heavy duty material and I use my Canon 1000D which is great because it has live view! When I was animating 'Being Bradford Dillman' it was a bigger set up for me, but it was still quite a small scale production, in the very dark basement of a hairdressers in Soho, London. I had my home-made multi-plane animation table, some Kino Flo lights and a few dedo lights for when they were needed. I used a Canon 550D (again because it has live view) and Stop Motion Pro.

Then I just make sure I've got the finishing touches of a kettle and my radio and I'm ready to go!

How does Stop Motion Pro help your workflow?

I use Stop Motion Pro because it's very straight forward and easy to pick up, which is exactly what I want. Time management is so important when you're an animator, there's never enough time, so there's nothing worse than having your characters set up and waiting for you and you can't figure out how to use the software! The tool on SMP that I couldn't live without is the onion skin, I use it at 50% so I can see the previous frame and the current live frame so you can see the movement progression. I use the audio sync a lot as it is so important to get the timings correct when you are lip syncing a character talking and if you are animating to music, it'd be impossible to it without the audio sync.

I also love being able to view each frame at full size so you can check the focus and hunt out any unwanted bits of blu-tac that might be trying to make their screen debut!

Can you tell us a little about how you make the imagery in your work? How do you make your puppets?

I'm a bit of a hoarder when it comes to scraps of paper, something with a nice pattern or an interesting shaped envelope. I use quite simple shapes in my character design so I love texture in paper to help give it more depth. If I don't have a texture I need I often scan fabric and print it out onto card. I also like working with materials, especially felt and wool. I love things to look handmade, it has so much more charm and I like to look at things and know that someone has spent a lot of time and care making it.

What is next for you and your animation?

The nature of animation work is very up and down, so in between job hunting, I am working on developing some personal projects to keep myself motivated, one of which is a stop motion music video. Animating is all I want to do so I'm going to keep at it and try and do it for as long as I possibly can!

Thanks Daniella!