There was much excitement when we were offered the opportunity to create the Opening Event Titles for Node.

It also came with a good dose of trepidation as this would be viewed and judged by all of our industry peers. Even so we were pumped and ready to go.

At the time we started the project, Dan Braga was working with Tim at Luxx and Alex Barnett was teamed up with Mike at Never Sit Still. Luxx and Never Sit Still were sharing the same space, which made this kind of collaborative project so easy to work on. Client gigs were a little quiet, so we had some time on our hands to sit and down and discuss approaches.

- Tim Clapham, Luxx

The overall concept we came up with was ‘The Journey Through Creativity’. This journey, we as creative people, take when we work on a project.

Starting with the initial ideas, concept, style frames, through production, modelling, animation, lighting, rendering, sound design and finally delivery. We have all been there and we knew that the audience would relate to this as we all travel a similar path on each project we undertake.

It was Dan who came up with the titles for each scene. We did actually change things around a little, but these are the initial scenes we set out to create.

• Mountain of Ideation
• Cave of Conceptualism
• Valley of Creation
• Waterfall of Manipulation
• Node of Delivery

The opening shot is a landscape made from paper and screwed up paper rolls across. Pencils appear, each pencil representing an idea. The pencils grow and become a forest of pencils, they climb a mountain until they reach the summit and the ultimate pencil rises up. The pencil drops, falling into a chasm of darkness.. The project has begun.

Out of the darkness elements appear and slowly form. The light spills further into the cave, this is the dark world of production. The environment is formed from stalactites made from styluses, lenses cluster on the walls, through the darkness we see computer screens lighting up and we start to sail down a river of data. The once dark and gloomy cave is now illuminated with ideas.  Monitors flicker and flash, keyboards light up and lights run along wires.

Things are traveling faster now, we are near the finish line. We rush down the river, passing rocks made from knobs and dials. There’s no going back, we hurtly over the edge of the waterfall and plunge into the water below.

We bob to the surface and slowly float to the final delivery moment where the Node logo is revealed, if only we could get that damn USB plug in!

- Mike Tosetto, Never Sit Still

“This was an exciting project for us. Node had only taken place once the year before, and the industry was very keen for the 2017 event, so we knew we had to dial it up with the opening titles.”

Whilst client work was a little quiet during production of the Node project, 2017 had been a massive year for Luxx and Never Sit Still. And to this day, it remains the biggest working year I’ve ever had. We had already delivered the lighting of the Sydney Opera House Sails for VIVID,  and we’d also worked on the opening titles for Adobe’s Make It conference. Two huge projects that we’d poured heart and soul into, so I’m not gonna lie, I was burned out and exhausted. 

What kept us going with the Node project was the freedom Jimmy Cowen (Node Festival Director) gave us. Total creative control, allowing us to make a project we would be proud to watch amongst our peers at the event. I was also lined up as a keynote speaker, so these titles had to be solid. This was a tough project for the team, although a lot of pressure fell on Tim’s shoulders as he took the reins as technical director, meaning he was often helping the rest of us problem solve before getting his own shots done.

- Tim Clapham, Luxx

“There were plenty of challenges to solve along the way, and we would have loved more time to spend crafting and tweaking the finer details, but this was a fun project and we were proud of the result.”

Technical details

Completed in Cinema 4D using X-Particles and rendered in Vray

Credits

Concept : Tim Clapham, Mike Tosetto, Dan Braga, Alex Barnett
3D Animation: Tim Clapham & Mike Tosetto
Sound: Smith & Western