As the lights in Carter Auditorium dimmed, string music swelled and the screen sprang to life with rich, hand-painted visuals of the night sky as the screening of Amazon Prime Video’s “Undone”– a dramedy series about time travel, mental health and family– commenced.
In attendance were Steph Swope and Craig Staggs, co-founders of acclaimed animation studio Minnow Mountain. This is the group responsible for the breathtaking visuals of “Undone” as well as numerous other animated projects, including Emmy-winning film “Tower” for PBS and “Apollo 10 ½: A Space Age Childhood” for Netflix.
“We specialize in rotoscoping,” Staggs explained during the lively Q&A portion of the event. “That is what our bread and butter has been for these three big projects.”
Rotoscoping is a frame-by-frame animation technique that involves illustrating over photographs and videos to bring uniquely stylized visuals to an animated work.
“We call it ‘performance capture’ because that’s really what it is, it’s capturing the performance of the actor,” Swope said. “We’re working with the actor, actually, more than the other animators in many ways to – not enhance – but just show what they did.”
In a process that involved the creation of over 900 oil paintings, Minnow Mountain left no element of “Undone” incomplete in contacting fellow animation studio Submarine to paint the series’ backgrounds entirely by hand.
“They’re painting as fast as they can, the paintings are wet, they photograph them, put them over here to dry and then the next one– they churned them out,” Swope said.
Among their more extensive projects, Minnow Mountain has produced short-form rotoscoped works, including a music video for the band “The Black Angels” and the opening credits for YouTube series “Critical Role,” which the co-founders remembered particularly fondly.
“It was really fun, it was something I’ve always wanted to do, which is fun fantasy stuff,” Swope said. “We do a lot of regular life stuff so it was great to break out and play with swords and (fall) through the air.”
Stagg agreed but remained appreciative of their larger productions as well.
“We do some short-form acts but we really found that we’re good at volume,” Stagg said. “We have leveraged the fact that Steph and I are kind of analytical nerds who love to count frames and count ears and eyes and fingers.”
Among the crowd of students and community members, graphic design major Jake Bean remarked on how it felt to interact with industry professionals at the event.
“Sometimes, it’s kinda jarring to look at these big companies, so to get a one-on-one with people behind the scenes feels comforting in a way, because you’re getting a more hands-on experience,” Bean said.
Bean expressed a strong appreciation for Minnow Mountain’s work as well, having had some experience with rotoscoping in the past.
“I didn’t realize it was a big thing,” he said. “I’ve done more short animation projects using rotoscoping but to see it on a large scale like this is pretty crazy to me so it’s cool; it’s inspiring.”
Computer science major Vicente Castilleja shared a similar perspective.
“I loved looking at the art and how the process is made and learning from it,” Castilleja said. “The green screens used, the actors performing, and then the art on top of it all. There’s more options in computers if I’m looking for it.”
To close out the event, Staggs and Swope had no shortage of industry tales and advice to share. From recommending students to keep their portfolios and résumés relevant and easy to read, to anecdotes of Staggs’ experience during his first animation job on the 2006 rotoscope film, “A Scanner Darkly,” the pair certainly had a lot to bring to the table.
“I drew Keanu Reeves for eighteen months,” Stagg said. “I drew the beard so much that I counted all the whiskers. Here’s a tip: he does not move his eyebrows very much.”
Both seasons of “Undone” and Emmy-winning film “Tower” are available now to watch on Amazon Prime Video.
