STOIK Video Man 3.0

I've just stumbled across this website http://www.stoik.com/products/videoman/ and found a piece of editing software that seems quite good and very cheap for what it says it does.
I 'll download the trial some time this week and have a play with it to see what I think.

Nick's reply on my third year puppet heads

I got a reply to the email I sent to Nick Roberson today:

Hi Alistair,
What a great start!!! I love the sculpts. I would say thet the male has eyes that are set more into the head slightly by the look of it and this works well. The girls are rather 'stuck on' ( possibly something to do with the cheeks) but with all the other stuff to do this is very minor.
The hair for me is fab, its flat style is great and you could certainly push this further next time into more of a defining style.
Looking at these images, I am very keen to see the bodies and the animation of course!!
As for painting, you may want to shade the heads, (that is what I would do) but again its time that is the biggest enemy as you know.
Keep me posted.
As for me i am due to visit NEWI soon for a 2 day sculpting course which i am now doing at 11 unis around the country. Staffs have a very good stopmotion only course ( the only in the country) and may have an an M.A. if you are thinking about studying further.
Anyway, hope to catch up soon.
Regards Nick.

Some encouraging words.

Tattoo Design

On February 1st five of my friends from Derbyshire came to visit for the weekend. One of them mentioned that he wanted to have a tattoo done some time after they got home but the design he had wasn't quite what he was after. He wanted to know if I could alter it for him to what he needed. I said I would because it was a simple alteration he wanted and because he was a mate.

I got this email after he got back to Derbyshire:

"Hello Ali, hows you been since we left wrexham? This is wierd, its been ages since I sent an email to anyone!

Ok the tattoos, tattoo 1 is how the tattoo looked before I blew it up in photoshop. Tattoo 2 is the tattoo picture i'll be taking to the tattoo man to use as the template. As you can see in pic 1, the ends of the tattoo kinda extend, curve slightly and thin out to points; however, in pic 2 they just go blunt on the ends. ( probably because the quality of pic 1 is so bad and small, that when i blew it up in photoshop, it really looked rubbish! lol)

I've already spent ages on my comp, sharpening tattoo2 up, however I wondered if you would be able to un-blunt those ends for me, feel free to do as many different styles and techniques cuz you can send them all to me and I can pick the one i like the most. If you are wondering what the tattoo is of, its my zodiac sign for cancer the crab, but as i have 2 tribal tattoos already, i wanted my zodiac sign with a tribal look.

I've looked in the tattooists and they didn't have what I wanted, this was the only pic I could find of a tribal zodiac sign. There is no rush at all to do this ali, I totally understand you have your studies to do, and I am in no rush to get this tattoo done. Base it around your own time, when you are able to do it, I don't want it to affect your accademic and social time. There is no deadline. I can't tell you how greatful I am that you'll help me out like this. This tattoo as gonna looks ace. If there is anything I can help you with just let me konw.

Thank you Ali

Adam "

This is the picture he sent me:

and this is the one I sent back:

He was really pleased with the result and sent me a text today letting me know he'll be getting the tattoo done a week on Saturday.

Email To Nick Roberson

I emailed Nick Roberson again today to show him what I'm doing in my current project.
Here's what I sent:

Hello there Nick.

Its Alistair who you met at NEWI and then again when I visited Cosgrove Hall in July last year.
I just thought I should probably get in touch again and show you what I have been up to on my current project. I've attached some pictures of models that I'm working on at the moment. I only have their heads done so far. They are Jack and Jill from the nursery rhyme of the same name. The heads are made out of Fimo and the eyebrows and pupils are removable so that I can move them about. They're held on with double sided tape. I'm cutting their mouths out of card. They actually look really good. I can also move Jill's hair about which is held on with a piece of wire. I plan on giving the skin and eyes a coat of paint before I animate with them since they are sort of blotchy and dirty but thats just down to the Fimo.
So, what do you think of them? I would have liked to have had more done to show you but ran into a lot of problems at the start.
How are things going for you with your work? I hope everything is going well.
Regards,
Alistair Stuart

MeView.co.uk

I finally got around to paying a visit to MeView.co.uk today to have a look at what they are about. I decided to take a look after seeing posters and postcards that had been put around the studio.
It appears to be a site like YouTube with the difference of being able to get paid for any videos that you upload, provided they meet their upload conditions.
Ater reading their terms and conditions though I'm not sure that I want to (or can) upload any of my work because they state that "we can use your clips for any purposes and you licence us to use these clips in any way we require, including using them in any media and licensing other people to use them on our behalf."

I think I'll stick to showing my work off on YouTube for the time being.