MASTERCLASS| JAMES CAMERON Graphics Package
2021

ROLE: art direction / design / animation

I had the pleasure of working with Masterclass to create a graphics package for the film legend himself, James Cameron.  The graphics package included a Main Title animation, 14 Chapter and 34 Subchapter animations, plus smaller graphic elements that appeared throughout the class.  I’m so grateful to Lauren Fundora and Adriana Blacarte for bringing me on board, and for the whole teams help in achieving our final look.

PROCESS|

James Cameron has been highlighted for pioneering several technological advances in his films, but we rarely get to intimately see his creative process that often begins with a sketch. Our class graphics built upon several of his concept sketches, which he created for some of his biggest films. The main title is a rapid sequence of Cameron’s drawings vignetted within abstract compositions of his name. Meanwhile, layers of his sketches, as if slices of his brain, push through the spaces around the canvas. We primarily used photoshop and after effects to rotoscope, composite and animate the original sketches.  A huge thank you to the hard working team including Arpi Aleksanyan for her design direction, Heather Hardison for her incredible illustrations and Dom Soo for his design and animation assistance.

The process of direction started in such a unique way compared to where we landed in style. Since James Cameron has developed some pioneering Technology within the Filmmaking Industry, my initial direction fell deeply into a technological dream world coming into vision through the invisible tracking systems often used within digital creations. Since technology is the reason James’ can bring his dreams to life, I thought that approaching a digital world, created from his mind and applied to a physical space could be an interesting approach to his teachings. As we progressed through development, I am happy the direction changed to concentrate on a side of James’ that is hardly known; his incredible artistic skills and the ability to bring his visions to life through his own drawings and interpretations of his imagination. Here is a bit of the progression breakdown of where the ideas started and how they grew into bringing James’ own illustrations to life. 

REASEARCH & DEVELOPMENT|
Style Frame Development

Our initial idea was to represent Cameron’s process of generating 3D worlds for his films. I used Unreal Engine and Blender to design surreal worlds that construct themselves over time.  They would progress from invisible grid systems and tracking points to a fully rendered environment. That idea eventually progressed into creating 3d realms that formed from sketches, suggesting that ideas flow from James’ mind onto paper and into the real world. Initially, Heather Hardison and I turned 3d renditions of James’ Worlds into stylized sketches, which led us to using James’ original concept sketches for the final look.

C R E D I T S

Class Creative Director: Ankush Jindal
Creative Director: Lauren Fundora
Producer: Adriana Blancarte
Art Direction: Brittnie Diamant, Arpi Aleksanyan
Design/Animation: Brittnie Diamant, Arpi Aleksanyan, Heather Hardison, Dom Soo