Sean Donnelly from Aw+Modest: Exclusive Interview

Sean is filmmaker who works in animation, live action and documentary. He is behind the comedy central show “JEFF and some aliens”, sean also directed music videos for Bo Burnham, Kirk Hammett from Metallica, Tally Hall, The Mountain Goats and recently for ghost, he worked on the aniamtion of “mary on a cross” that is in rite here rite now and the “the future is a foreign land” animation that is on ghost’s youtube page. Sean has also worked on many other things, you can see the full list by clickling here and he is curently working on his own movie releasing soon, called “rip off”.

How did the collaboration with Ghost begin? When did Tobias Forge contact you, and what was your reaction to the project proposal?

My girlfriend, Liz Toonkel, is a talented production designer (Marcel the Shell, Emily the Criminal) who helped design the Ghost pop up at the Whiskey a go go, which was directed by her old college friend Alex Ross Perry. She also designed the Jesus He Knows Me video that Alex also directed. When Alex was co-directing Rite Here Rite Now with Tobias, they wanted to try and make a live action music video for Mary on a Cross to show this part of the story. It was too expensive to pull off all the things Tobias wanted to do, so I think Alex had the idea to do it animated and reached out to me then. I was excited to get to work in this 60’s animation style for such a unique and beloved band. So the short answer is I got the job because of my girlfriend.

How long did it take to make both the ‘Mary on a Cross’ and ‘The Future is a Foreign Land’ animations?

Mary on a Cross took about two months because we had a little more time and we also had to develop the style. The Future is a Foreign land took about a month but our animators were working around the clock to make that happen.

Was there any difficulty when it came to animating a ‘Scooby-Doo’ like style for “Rite Here Rite Now”?

This gets into some nerdier animation territory but let’s go there ! A lot of animation these days is made with “rigs” which basically means you separate all the body parts and head and then you can rotate the limbs using key frames. It takes time to set up these rigs but once you do it’s much easier to animate, although it can sometimes look a little stiff. But in the 60’s they were drawing every frame by hand as a unique drawing which gave the animations of that time a very different feel. Tobias wanted this video to look and feel like it was made in 1969 which meant we had to do it all frame by frame, which was a lot of work. It also meant that any notes or adjustments had to be redrawn frame by frame as well. I want to give a shoutout to our animators Ben Luce and Xilia Faye who put so much time and love into these two videos.

Were there some scenes animated but later cut? How many hours of planning and decision-making were put into assembling the storyline of both music videos ?

The first step of the process is I make an animatic, which is a series of storyboards timed out to the song. That way we know exactly what shots we need and how long they need to be. At the final stage of Mary on a Cross, I adjusted the timing a little in a few areas so we had to extend some shots or cut some short but there were no full shots deleted. In the Future is a Foreign land though, Ben and Xilia (my animators) wanted to add two quick shots at the beach house before he goes outside to play with his band. They did a great job with the shots but the timing felt too quick to me to jam them all in. We might release those shots sometime soon though for the fans to see. I know there are some more Easter Eggs buried in them too. I was thinking of posting a directors commentary over the animatic as well for the fans to see a bit more of the process, so keep an eye on my YouTube channel (YouTube.com/durtysean)

How do you approach storyboarding and character design?

Storyboarding is my favorite part of the process. It’s the time where anything is possible, and it’s fairly quick and easy to try out different ideas. This is when you can see if the story is working and if there are any slow or boring areas that need to be finessed. No two storyboarders would board a scene the same way, and there are infinite options of how to frame things and where to put the camera. I think it’s important to build a consistent visual language and be intentional about why you are choosing to show things in a certain way. And I think it’s important for each cut to be motivated in some way. I usually do really messy storyboards pretty quickly. Then once I have something I can see, I keep adjusting them and changing them until it feels right. I don’t think it’s a good idea to spend too much time drawing beautiful, well rendered storyboards because then you get attached to them and are less likely to want to redo them or make them better. Also I would rather put that time and energy into the final product that people will actually see.

For character design, I think there is an interesting point when I’m drawing a character and suddenly it becomes alive to me. It can be so subtle like moving the eyes a little or changing an expression slightly and then suddenly I can hear their voice and imagine them being alive and not just being a flat drawing. I often draw a first pass and then keep making small adjustments until suddenly I hit that moment. I also think choosing the colors is a very important step and will greatly impact how the character feels and meshes with the backgrounds. For these videos we tried to avoid white and black and grey and wherever possible tried to use something with a little color instead. I want to note that Ben and Xilia did all the character art for these videos, and I would give them direction by adjusting them and tweaking colors and send them back updated versions. Also my friend and animator John Howard Thompson helped me with some of the color choices.

What software and animation techniques did you primarily use to achieve the final look of the videos?

The backgrounds were painted in Photoshop and the animation was done in Toon Boom Harmony. We then put it all together and did all the compositing and camera moves in After Effects. A lot of the subtle vintage feel comes from the effects and compositing pass in After Effects.

How did you interpret the themes of the songs visually in the animations?

For each video, I had a call with Tobias where he walked me through what he was imagining. He had a pretty clear idea for what he wanted for the Mary On a Cross video. He knew it started with her storming out of the Whiskey A Go Go and then being chased by Nihil back to their house in Laurel Canyon. He knew he wanted her to throw him through the front door and that he would continue to chase her through LA. He mentioned possibly running through a cemetery and the Hollywood reservoir. He knew he wanted it to end with them kissing and then him waking up alone in the hotel that turned out to be on a Hollywood Studio lot, with her walking away. So the main challenge for me was just figuring out how to make that all work with the different beats and movements of the song and time it all out. Sometimes I needed to add more things and invent stuff to make things last longer. I came up with the idea of her hiding in the coffin and then pulling him in at the end. Ben and Xilia had a different idea using the Hollywood sign but that inspired me to come up with the idea of her looking crucified on it.

For the Future is a Foreign Land, he had less clear of a story or idea for the video. He talked me through some of the themes and of the song, and we kind of built the beginnings of this story together in real time. We decided to have it pick up right where the other one left off. I asked him how he would get home or who he would call and he said “He could call Mr Psaltarian and go back to his house in Malibu." That's when he came up with the idea that the Ghouls would be there and he could be playing the song with them that he just wrote for Sister. When I listened to the song, I pictured scenes of him holding Sister while the fascist regime burned all around him as the lyrics describe. I pitched him the idea of Nihil looking out at the beach and imagining / hallucinating those different scenes and he liked it. It was cool to be able to be in the same location the whole time but be able to turn it into all these very different worlds and time periods. Tobias knew he wanted it to end with him sending the reel to reel he just recorded to Sister. Throughout this process, my animators Ben and Xilia got really into Ghost and went deep on the lore. They had lots of little Easter Eggs and ideas that they wanted to work into the scenes as well. It was a great collaboration between all of us.

How much do you think the animations add to the overall flow of the story that Ghost’s music tries to tell compared to the live-action?

Animation is a really cool medium because with just a few people we are able to build whatever worlds we want. We can go to the future, we can show a horrific fascist regime, or do a car chase through 1960's LA, and a bunch of other things that would be super expensive to do in live action. But it's not just that it's cheaper, it also gives it a more playful, surreal and dreamlike quality. It can also feel serious and emotional, and I'm really touched by how many people I've seen online that said The Future is a Foreign Land made them cry. I think it's really cool that Ghost has been able to build such a powerful community through their music and the lore Tobias has built. It was really fun to step into that world and tell some of these stories through animation.

What was the fan reaction to the videos like compared to your expectations?

I try not to think too much about the reaction to something when I'm making it. I just try and make the thing the best I can, and how I would want to see it, and just hope that other people will like it too. I was really blown away by the responses to both of these videos. It was so cool to see all the impressive fan art that people were making, hours after The Future is a Foreign Land came out. It was also really cool to see how many people loved the Mary on a Cross video too and how close they looked at all the details we put in there. I think the Ghost fans are unlike anything else I've encountered in my career, and I feel lucky to have been able to step into this world for these two videos.

Thank you, Awesome+Modest, for sharing your insights and experiences with us. As we wrap up, we’d love to hear more: can you talk about any hidden details or Easter eggs fans should look out for in the videos?

I don't want to call out any particular Easter eggs because that would take away the fun of it all. I think it's been really cool to see all the different ways people interpret all these things in these videos. Sometimes people's takes are exactly what I was intending, and sometimes they are saying something I never thought of but that I also love and think works too. Thanks so much! Appreciate that. This was a lot of fun.

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