Filmmaker Anthony Cerniello decided to work on an odd side project. When attending his friend Danielle’s large family reunion, he and a photographer photographed all of her youngest cousins up to her oldest relatives. With the help of 3 animators, they processed all of the photographs via computer software (After Effects, 3D Studio Max, and Nuke) after selecting family members who shared similar bone morphologies. The result is an impressive video that encapsulates the decades-process of aging down to about 5 minutes. Somewhat magical and bit eerie. I challenge you to watch it without being distracted.
Cerniello notes:
I wanted to make a person, I felt like I could tell a story with that, but it ended up feeling slightly robotic, like an android. I’m OK with that. Things never come out the exact way you plan them, but that’s the fun. The score I imagined would tell this woman’s life, with events speeding by as she aged, but in the end I thought it would be more interesting to go with an abstract piece of sound, and my friend Mark Reveley really came through because I love how it sounds.
Although the video was published in 2013, it still remains a favorite video of mine regarding aging.
A breathtaking mini-panoramic photograph I snapped 1,100ft high on top of Breakneck Ridge Mountain, NY overlooking the Hudson River. The rocks here are older than dinosaurs and has their origins in what is called the Grenville Orogeny Event: over one billion years ago, “Africa”* collided with “New York” and “Canada,” pushing up the land into mountains which extend from northeastern America down the “Texas” region. Analogous to 2 cars crashing head on; their hoods will raise up in a crinkly-folded manner. https://goo.gl/photos/YV8dn1wcUrDk3e5y8
I did not have my wide angle lens with me, so I resorted to using my beloved Canon 70-200mm IS II 2.8 at the shortest focal length and snapped 4 photos from left to right. They were stitched in Adobe Lightroom to create the panorama photo.
*Regions are in quotation marks due to the nameless landmasses that existed at the time and to provide a frame of geographical reference.
I wanted to make a person, I felt like I could tell a story with that, but it ended up feeling slightly robotic, like an android. I’m OK with that. Things never come out the exact way you plan them, but that’s the fun. The score I imagined would tell this woman’s life, with events speeding by as she aged, but in the end I thought it would be more interesting to go with an abstract piece of sound, and my friend Mark Reveley really came through because I love how it sounds.
