Contents
+44 (0) 7919 967836 lauratofarides@hotmail.co.uk www.lauratofarides.co.uk
01.
About
02. 03. 04. 05. 06.
Personal Projects Second Year Film - Couch Potatoes Music Video - RADSTEWART “HOTDOG” Anijam - Dont Cross Me One Minute Wonder - Verglas Graduating FIlm - Facet
09. 09. 10. 10. 11.
Work Experience Music Video - Underclass “Beat Your Fist” BFI Animation Camp - Calling the Shots Ben Mitchell - Bullies Evil Genuis Studios - The Patsy Aardman - Shaun the Sheep Movie
About Laura Tofarides is an animator and documentary filmmaker with strengths in character animation, direction, camerawork and editing. She is proficient in Flash, Preimere, Final Cut Pro, Stop Motion Pro and Dragonframe. She is currently working to improve her skills in Photoshop, After Effects, InDesign and Maya. She is always keen to learn and is quick to pick up new techniques. Her award winning short film “Don’t Cross Me” won the Anijam Best Film award in the 2013 Encounters Film & Animation Festival. She has worked with many companies including BBC TV, Sky Arts, The Hay Festival, Harklee Films, Anytime Films, Evil Genius, Ben Mitchell and Aardman on various animated and live action briefs. She graduated from The Bristol School of Animation in 2014 and is currently a freelance animator in Bristol, UK. Her future ambitions are to gain more experience in a studio environment to further develop her skills. She would like to be working in the feature film, documentary, commercial and music video sectors as a producer/director.
01.
Second Year film - Couch Potatoes For my second year film I worked in a team of five alongside Chloe Hill, Madeleine Grossi, Nuradilah Abd Rahman and Abg Masduqi. My role was lead animator for the stop-motion sections as well as producer for the overall production. It was a 90 second comedy which we entered into the DepicT film festival.
02.
Music Video - RADSTEWART “HOTDOG� I made this music video for Cardiff based band RADSTEWART as part of my experiments in moving image class during my study abroad semester in Hong Kong. I wanted to explore using fixed focus for the live action shots on DSLR cameras .I incorporated rotascoping and animation over the live action footage to tell a narrative of a foreigner exploring the new city and integrating himself into its culture.
03.
Anijam - Dont Cross Me I made this short film in a team of four alongside Hannah Welch, Madeleine Grossi and Tom Gran for the Anijam 48 hour animation competition. At the beginning of the challenge we were given “The Journey� as a starting phrase and we came up with the idea of an angry security guard who wouldnt let anyone cross his bridge. This film went on to win the competition in 2013.
04.
One Minute Wonder - Verglas This one minute stop motion was made in six weeks. I designed and built the set while Roos Mattaar designed and made the puppets and we both animated. We wanted to develop our charater animation skills and so it is a simple narrative of a man lost in a forest and is helped to find his way by a fox. By keeping the narrative simple we allowed ourselves to tell the story through character expression which was both challenging and rewarding. It was entered into the Northwest Animation Festival in Portland, OR, USA.
05.
Graduation Film - Facet My final year film is an animated under camera documentary and is the first film I have created myself. It is an exploration of the ideas of home and nationality. It explores individuals thoughts and opinions regarding how they view themselves and wider society in an increasingly globalised world. The film poses the central question ‘what does home mean?’. Its contributors come from many different countries and have a variety of different life experiences in regard to travel and immigration. These opinions are juxtaposed by one another to form a kind of narrative discussion and to present a theme. I plan to submit it to animation and documentary festivals over the next year.
06.
07.
WORK EXPERIENCE
08.
Music Video - Underclass “Beat Your Fist” I worked on this project for Harklee Films in Cardiff. The music video tackles the issue of domestic abuse and I rotascoped sections which were used as a kind of visual metaphor for the woman’s entrapment. The film has been used to promote the band on their Youtube and Facebook pages.
BFI Animation Camp - Calling the Shots I worked at this residential BFI training camp for 1619 year olds teaching them animation techniques. Throughout the week we had sessions on scriptwriting and storyboarding, pitching, design and five different kinds of animation. I mentored a group of five young people and helped them to produce a short hand drawn film by the end of the week.
09.
Ben Mitchell - Bullies This short film is about two old friends meeting up after a long time apart. I worked on it in flash doing lip sync for one of the characters.
Evil Genuis Studios - The Patsy This short crime drama/comedy was funded though kickstarter and had its premiere at the Cube cinema, Bristol. I worked on it doing audio breakdown, lip sync and animation in toonboom.
10.
Aardman - Shaum the Sheep Movie I had three weeks work experience at Aardman at Aztec West on the Shaun the Sheep Movie. Whilst there I was working as an animation assistant producing replacement mouth shapes for the Farmer and Bitzer characters for two weeks. For the last week I was given a puppet from the Pirates film and a test station and with Loyd Price as mentor produced some test animation. This was my first time using a ball and socket armature and so it was a fantastic learning experience for me to use industry standard equipment and see what its like inside a large working studio.
11.