Lunchables Sweepstakes - Allosaurus Build

Ian Pilger and I were assigned the Allosaurous for the Lunchables Sweepstakes to win a trip to The Smithsonian. We worked in tandom at Curious Pictures.

I was great to collaborate with such a talented sculptor.

Ian sculpted The skull and Legs and I made the rest. I first made the armature modular so we could work separately and then assemble for the final animation Puppet. The hips had keyed registrations for the tail the spine and the legs. The spine had a flexible rib cage with registration for the arms and head.

Unpainted Animation Model

modular Armature

We also needed a retro flashlight so I used a control knob from a vintage stereo and a piece of plastic from an old toy to make the flashlight. It had a 6volt bulb that could be controlled from an external power source.

actual size

Weis Holiday Spots

This was a rare case were I was hired to build, animate (stop motion), and composite for Weis Holiday Commercials. Usually its one of the three but usually not all. I was even able to have my dog Lucy in both spots :) She was paid with tons of dog treats and food from the shoot.

I made all of the gingerbread men seen in the christmas spot. All of the food products were actual size and then composited into the miniature set we built. I really enjoyed rigging the lights for these sets. Most of it was purchased doll house scale with customized features. I updated the fridge to be stainless steel and made the island counter top into a butcher block.

Recessed Lighting in Kitchen

We animated the turkey in stopmotion. Instead of rigging the turkey with an armature I decided it would be best to rod it and then puppeteer it into poses and remove the rods in post. 

I posed the legs and Martin worked the wings

We were able to achieve our poses through the use of  a monitor. 

When we were happy with the pose we were able to grab a frame in Dragon. Dragon is a frame capture and playback program for stopmotion.

you can see both spots for Weis here.