The Milkshake Menu.

Milkshake Menu. from Kim Smith on Vimeo.

Stopframe taken with an DSLR, edited with Final Cut Express.

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The chalkboard animation.

Tomorrow is the deadline for our project which is an extension of the Chair project. Yesterday, out of desperation, I decided to go ahead and just see what would happen if I did the chalkboard animation. I needed something that I was confident with (I chose text, of course) and that I knew I could do in a couple of hours. Even so- with my health being all shaky, I had to go and lie down several times while doing this. It's just a bit ridiculous that I can't even stand up and draw on my chalkboard for more than 20 min. But- I did it. It was slow and painful, but I did it. (I'm not complaining- it's just important, i think, to document what happened.) Here are some images of each 'title':





There are several negative things I could say about it, BUT focusing on the positives here they are:

-a lot of thinking about 'atmosphere' meant that I wanted to include a little bit of my house or 'the space' in which i drew this. I decided to draw straight onto the cupboards, instead of having to paint new boards which wouldn't have saved me time or energy.
-one colour of chalk to keep it simple and to keep the pops of colour to the background- focusing your eyes on the drawings as the colour pieces would be out of focus and keep it from being coming boring.
-used my new lense which has an f-stop of 1.8 so that the focus could be very precise and i could do it in natural lighting.
-the actual text translated great onto chalkboard.
-thought of little transitions which would flow one into the next.
-drew the ingredients separately so i could borrow a slightly cheesy technique of overlay from some of the Elvis videos i've been watching.
-thought about black and white, but decided that the actual chalkboard looked much better when it was the only thing in black and white (see previous point about colour).

Overall, I think it looks good- it looks like it's just magically appearing on the board, like a fun interactive menu (showing you what's on offer and what's in it, and changing like flicking a channel). Plus I chose a song which is an 'oldie' and doesn't distract too much from what's going on.

When Vimeo decides to accept my video, I'll post it. [:

p.s. i think i will still produce the recipe cards with drawings of the musicians on the back (just digital prints)- as a supplement to this. maybe i should make a youtube playlist too, of my favourites- so in theory:
you watch the animation, you get inspired, you read how to make them and you listen to the songs while you enjoy a drink with your friends.
does that have a narrative? it's more of a 'make your own narrative'.

Johnny Rockets, Sunvalley Mall, California.

Found this on my blog from the summer of 2008.

Diners are my life. <3

p.s. check out that cheeky little doily under my drink! i'd forgotten about those!

Diner Chair sketchbook start.

I've been really behind with blogging and this Diner Chair project so, I'm working hard to catch up on it all. Went to Budapest with the college last week (or the week before... I'm losing track here) which was incredible, I'll do some updates on that later. In the meantime, deadlines deadlines.
Here are some favourites from my sketchbook for the Diner Chair so far. (I've put a watermark-my name- on these, just in case they end up on tumblr without credit like some of my other sketchbooks have)



Found a lot of lovely images of 40's/50's cars from library books. Playing with using found images and drawings together. mainly just practice, but I like how organic they look.

Again, more photocopies from library books, cut up and rearranged.


Then, with some left over images, and papers from my stash (and old magazines)- trying to think about all the things that went into the inspiration for the chair.

Moving on from the cars... a bit of Happy Days drawings(more in the book). I'd like to go back and do some drawings from screen, wasn't really happy with any of them.

thinking about text. and then- there's a lot of notes from my online research (which i didn't scan) and them some drawings of different kinds of exteriors of the Diner through the ages. I was really fascinated to see how different they are.







I know it's all a bit away from the actual chair, but I think it's important to get a good overview of the culture and history of where it was used, as it's quite unique. I've still got more research to sift through and make into something that makes sense visually.
Been really enjoying using pencil more. I've used the same one for all the pencil drawings in this book so far, and it's nice to see all the different marks it can make, just worried it might get a bit smudged in the book. Anyway, rambling now.

oh my gosh. this is the best thing ever. tootsie pops are my favourite anyway, but now i love them even more. holy moley. and the intro is quite fantastic too. ack.

music for the diner.

I'm a sucker for an old fashioned love song.
A bit of du-op and rock n' roll.

and this, just because it's a hillarious video: