Stop Motion Geek

Atomic Monster logo. Photo courtesy of Norman Yeend. “At the time he made contact, he was working as an assistant to James Wan on the film Aquaman ,” Norman Yeend—a thirty-year veteran in the stop motion industry as a director, animator, and model maker—tells Stop Motion Geek, describing a moment towards the end of 2017 when he got the call from his friend, coworker, and fellow Australian, Craig Sinclair, a producer, who pitched to Yeend what became his next labor of love—one which checked all the right boxes for him to stoke his passion for classic, practical-effects movie monsters and their delightfully fun flavor of mayhem. “James had mentioned to him that he was keen to re-create his company logo using primarily stop-motion and miniatures, and Craig figured he knew just the guy for the job.” For Yeend there isn’t a pivotal moment he can pinpoint when his passion for stop motion was first ignited, his love for the medium instead one which slowly grew from his youth, the ea...

The Tin Woods concept art by Ann Tseng. Photo courtesy of Nick Boxwell. “I had just started listening to the audio books of the Wizard of Oz series and the Tin Man struck me as the most tragically interesting character,” Mattzilla Duron—a sculptor, mold maker, prosthetic makeup artist, and twelve-year veteran at Laika—tells Stop Motion Geek about the moment that sparked his most recent project: The Tin Woods , a short film created in collaboration with photographer and videographer Nick Boxwell, which—based upon author L. Frank Baum’s Oz series—tells the origin of The Land of Oz’s Tin Woodsman. “My sculpture was of the Tin Man mid-swing, frozen in time. A sad ‘Oh no, I’m stuck but still alive’ moment. He was that way for over a year before Dorothy found him and freed him. It really struck a chord with me. How awful it would be to not be able to die, and frozen and aware of everything around you?” Shortly after creating it, the product of that moment’s inspiration—Dur...

The Tin Woods promo photo. Photo courtesy of Nick Boxwell. “When you have a near death experience almost everything you want to do that’s emotionally important becomes more urgent,” says Portland-based videographer and photographer Nick Boxwell, explaining to Stop Motion Geek his driving motivation for collaborating with close friend Mattzilla Duron—a sculptor, character designer, and twelve year veteran at Laika Studios—to launch the ongoing Kickstarter campaign to fund their first stop motion short film, entitled The Tin Woods after the character whose story hope to tell—that of the Tin Woodman of Oz. “I have lots of half-baked scripts and half-started projects going on at all times,” Boxwell continues, “but if I do die soon I’d like to leave behind one personal film, and I hope it’s this one.” Inspired by author L. Frank Baum’s classic books set in the Land of Oz, The Tin Woods tells the story of how Nick Chopper, a human, came to be the Tin Woodman of Oz—a story which...