This fall we had a motion graphics course at school, centered around a design contest for NRK3 (Norwegian National Broadcasting). We were to come up with an eight second short, a “jingle”, to play between programs.
The jingle had to convey NRK3’s image and values and so on of course, a difficult feat. The station has a lot of low-brow series running, and its main separation from the sister channels NRK1 &2 is its humor, its not needing to take itself too seriously. NRK1&2 are all about family values and whole-heartedly fun, NRK3 can let itself go with programs such as “embarrasing deseases”, Bondi beach and Rick and Steve (“the world’s happiest gay couple”).
And this is where my character comes in. When we first got the brief from the NRK execs, they were practically running around the room, talking about “openness”, “acceptance”, and “a little weird, but funny”. The first thing I did was doodle a funny naked guy, running around the page waving his junk. Later this idea transformed into this happy drag-queen-fellow in my movie.
Now, it might be hard to see everything that’s going on in those measly eight seconds, and it’s supposed to be that way. When you see a little short like this god knows how many times a day, you need to see something new every time, to keep things interesting.
The story is basically a man coming home to his boring, black/white, two-dimensional home. But as soon at the door closes behind him, he unwinds, the music starts, and his true identity unfolds. All within the first three seconds, mind you. For the rest of the film he just dances about the house in his red bra and fruity hat, nothing special there.
The film didn’t get picked up in the end, but that’s fine, only a small fraction of the contestants did. This way I can do what I want with it, like show it to you!
