Dimitris Armenakis & # 39; Temporary Combating Overconsumption within the 21st Century
Last month, Dimitris Armenakis, a graduate of the Royal College of Art, was finally able to release his graduation film All You Can Eat entirely online. The 2019 film by Armenakis was selected for more than 40 international animation and film festivals and received several nominations.
"Animation and film festivals are a great experience for filmmakers because not only is their work presented to a larger audience, but it's also a welcoming place to network and meet people who share the same passion," says the animator. “We can say that last year's downside is that in 2020 most of the festivals were online due to the pandemic outbreak. Hopefully we can enjoy physical screenings again soon. "
All You Can Eat is about overconsumption in the 21st century. Cartoon characters are used as products of postmodern society, and Armenakis says the original idea behind the film was to tell the story from the perspective of the consumer, not the consumer. “The action that sums up the idea of overconsumption in the film is eating,” explains the animator. “I've always been inspired by urban structures, the elements of which I first used in my BA film Absorbed. During my MA studies, I took references from London and Athens, the city I grew up in, to portray this dystopian, endless city that I envisioned for my graduation film. "
The film is in the form of a 2D animation, with each frame hand-drawn and containing references to cartoons from the 1930s. “I really enjoy drawing elastic and expressive cartoon characters, hence the inspiration from the 1930s style,” says Armenakis. “For humans, I also went for frame-by-frame animation, but this time I used charcoal brushes and rough outlines. This stylistic juxtaposition extends to the worlds in which the characters live: the black and white metropolis in front of the blue mountains of a happy comic world. "
Early in preproduction, Armenakis started working on sound design with Charlie Carroll, who picked up most of the sounds you hear in the final film. During production, Gennadios Arvanitis worked on the voices based on the storyboard using a Casio SK-5 sampling keyboard. “For the visual aspect of the film, 3D animation was used for lighting and piecing together. I exported image sequences of the 3D compositions and animated them in TVPaint, ”explains Armenakis. “With this technique, I had to animate the same movement twice, first in 3D and then again in 2D. In the end, however, it really helped blend the characters with the rest of the world and put them together. "
All You Can Eat is the first project where Armenakis led a small team. In addition to directing, designing and animating, he had to make sure everyone else was on schedule and all deadlines were met. "I also had to edit a few bits of the sound, which was interesting because I experimented a lot," notes the animator. “For example, I separated different parts of the soundtrack, namely Miss Strange Bird from Rita Moss. This allowed me to use parts of it in different takes of the film and use the original track towards the end of the film. "
Armenakis looks back on the work after almost two years and is largely satisfied with the result. "I can't help but recognize elements that I would change," he says. "Given the circumstances, the budget and the tight production schedule, I tried to apply what I had learned and apply it to the next project. So I would say that I am satisfied with the outcome of All You Can Eat as it is not just for a specific period of time in my work, but also taught me about governing, organizing and of course developing my animation skills. "
The animator hopes viewers will see All You Can Eat as an explanation. "The film shows how invasive we can be because of our greedy culture for the freedom and space of other beings," he says. "If we recognize a part of ourselves through the people in All You Can Eat, I believe it will be the first step in changing our consumption habits and the society in which we live."
Since the start of All You Can Eat, Armenakis has been working as animation director on Cody Wagner's documentary Raising Lions, a film about children diagnosed with ADHD due out this summer. He is currently working on an animated documentary called Sympathy for the Undertaker, directed by Elizabeth Rivera Bootzin.
"I also started working on the sequel to All You Can Eat!" Armenakis adds. "At the moment I'm working on the script and hope to start production in the summer of 2021."
@ lv.rmn