Rollercoaster 2:09

A man's heart rides a rollercoaster while he sleeps.

I imagined Brooklyn as a nostalgic ruin filled with screeching infrastructure and moribund lots. Part day-trip / part kitschy funhouse ride, the loop-like construction of the film alludes to the circularity of a heartbeat as well as to the endlessly recurring, topsy-turvy cycle of human emotion.

I created all of the artwork from scratch in Photoshop and animated individual layers in After Effects. The biggest technical challenge was matching the 3D space created by the forced perspective in the drawings to the actual, digital 3D space in After Effects. The solution was to keep the layers relatively close together and let the drawings handle the illusion of depth.

Directed & animated by: Tavet Gillson
Sound design: Chris Smith
Music: Arms
Made at CalArts (2008)

Stills from the PAINTINGS & DRAWINGS section: