this project started in 2009. the idea was: every time i pop in a new roll of film into my camera, use a few frames to do a bit of animation. this was to be a ritual I'd enact every roll of film. the first time i put this practice into action, i actually went through about 3 rolls. it's easy to get swept up in the spirit of making inanimate objects move. i kept adding onto the animation when i'd get an idea of what should happen next. after awhile, i tired of it, and forgot about it. at the end of 2010, i decided it needed to be wrapped up, finished or not. so i did a couple days of sound design, and titles/credits. the sound added quite a lot, and made me appreciate all the work i'd done.
the name animating ritual can be taken as a pun (ani[mating ritual]) or not.
there was a live action portion that never made it into the film, starring aaron zonka and myself as grumpy starving british men stuck in a room. for undisclosed reasons, it was too dangerous for them to leave the room, so they made due with the few bits of food they still had—apple cores with various spices.
2010