Durham College Animation students draw high praise from Drowned in Sound website

A still image from the video created by Animation – Digital Arts and Animation – Digital Production program students for The Flower’s of Hell song Opus 66 Part 1. The student-made video is featured on the band’s DVD titled Live at the Music Gallery and recently received praise for its high quality of work.

January 25, 2011

A number of students from the Animation-Digital Arts and Animation-Digital Production programs at Durham College recently earned high praise from Drowned in Sound (DiS), a well-respected, editorially independent music website based in the United Kingdom, for their work on an animated music video.

Working collaboratively, the students created a video for Opus 66 Part 1, a song by Toronto- and London-based experimental music group The Flowers of Hell.

The four-minute animated video features highly stylized artwork in both black and white and colour and appears on The Flowers of Hell DVD titled Live at the Music Gallery. The video is loosely based on the work of 19th century artist Aubrey Beardsley, an English illustrator and author and pioneer of the Art Nouveau style.

The students worked to realize the vision of Greg Jarvis, lead guitarist of The Flowers of Hell and a Durham College instructor in the Music Business Management program.

“As an artist you never want to give up creative control of your work,” said Jarvis. “It was nice being able to work directly with the Animation students on the video. They realized the vision I had and I am happy with the finished product.”

DiS’s review of the video describes it as a striking piece of animation that does enormous justice to both its creators and musical accomplices. The positive review was posted to its website toward the end of last year and in particular speaks to the high quality of the student’s work. It is considered to a coup for Durham College and the Animation program as DiS is known for its sometimes harsh critiques.

The music video is just one of many pieces produced on a regular basis by Durham College’s School of Media, Art & Design. For more information on the college’s two-year Animation – Digital Arts or three-year Animation – Digital Production programs, please visit the School of Media, Art & Design website.

To view the video for Opus 66 Part 1, please visit www.youtube.com/watch?v=6D5BZ4ITC8U.