Lucas Zanotto

0:00For our second speaker of this evening lucas sanato is a designer animator and director based in helsinki his charming kinetic characters and playful animated loops have never failed to put smiles on our faces however he's also garnered some impressive accolades including an apple design award and the golden lion in cannes he's joining us this evening to provide an insight into his multi-disciplinary practice spanning illustration commercial directing and 3d animation smiles very much guaranteed too I can assure you lucas please turn on your audio and video so we can say hi hi there how's it going yeah I'm very well thanks how are you yeah good good hi good you're in a very smart kind of studio looking space is that in your in your studio yeah we adapted to the corona situation.

0:45So we have this shared office and we have this corner with like studio setup very nice which is very comfy yeah exactly well listen I'm going to hand over to you. So if you want to kind of start sharing your screen yes and everyone else I guess yeah just a reminder to please put your questions for lucas in the chat and I'll try and get to them after after lucas has finished his his talk perfect that looks great I'll already do it yeah.

1:10So yeah thank you very much for letting me speak here very honored thanks for listening as well I yeah I'm I'm lucas I I'm italian but I'm based in helsinki I come from a product design background I studied that in milan I worked there a few years and after that I started moving more towards graphic design and filmmaking and animation and what I did the last 10 years plus is mainly directing commercials for different brands I show you one clip I did about four years back or three years back where we decided to make a cake with drones so this is all completely done in camera it shows pretty well I like I like to work with with in-camera tricks and I like combine different mixed medias and this is just a good example to show how I don't know maybe not seeing stuff too serious but trying to make fun with it.

2:23And this is this was a very nice project as it was all custom-made we had four pilots on set it was all completely done in camera and it was a good fun so this is what I mainly do for living I also do character-based work.

2:39So this is I started a company seven years ago that is called yatatoy and it focuses on children content we it started with an app and we made a couple of apps it was fairly successful I also published a couple of books and it's just a very nice journey we are very proud of it we won apple design award in 2018 and it's just a brand I'm I'm super proud to have created and it's just an ongoing journey we're working on a fifth app and and it's good fun I also do a lot of self-initiative free projects so this came out of boredom I started painting black dots onto paper plates and I went into the nature and placed them and make a picture and it was just always so nice to see how just by placing this simple eyes onto things suddenly you have empathy for for this character that you create and I made a block and it was called having a face and it went pretty pretty well it had a big response and I was I had it became a thing I carried these plates with me on every holiday for a couple of years. And it ended up that pictoplasma are one of my favorite festivals in berlin it's a character focused festival they asked me in 2015 to make their identity so we made this nice time-lapse clip with in the finished landscape with snow. And this eyes attached on on rocks and it turned out very nice you can have a look online I also started playing with kinetic sculpture so this is I did this in our living room and I just wanted to take this simple white dot and the black dot in front and just creating this very simple sculptures that suddenly come to life by just very simple movement and it's it's very very pleasant to see I think it's nice to create again this empathy to some object which has just some rolling balls or something. And it's just very pleasant to do here are very sad notice the ice cream on the side this turned into a exhibition that I did in berlin I did it in milan I did it here in helsinki and I was also at some stage invited to china to shenzhen for a conference to have a talk there.

5:18And it ended up that a new shopping mall opened and they wanted to have installation on one of their main buildings so I sent them this test I did and they sent me back a few weeks later this this video and I was super impressed because it became bigger and bigger from this living room little ice now we have this six meter high ice in the middle of of shenzhen and I really like the contrast of having this analog very simple motor between these skyscrapers and shenzhen in general it's very tech so it was really really lovely to see I started also playing a lot with 3d software as I come from from the background of building a lot of stuff I like the tactile and I like analog but I noticed that doing that in 3d has actually a very similar similar approach and a similar satisfaction in the end and I try just to break down with simple shapes how much can I break down an animal that you still recognize it. And I started to make these little loops which I put together in a little clip a little short movie called minimals and it's just very simple simple loops simple shapes but still you can tell straight away what kind of animal it is so it's good fun I also started playing with hands and different loops with different kinetic hands and I started feeding instagram and other social platforms with it. And it the response was pretty good people really enjoyed this this seamless loops and they watch watch it in continuously and it just relaxes them I think and yeah I did a couple of those hands this one is called nuts and then at some stage I brought back these eyeballs and I made these swings and I have these different moods and I called them mood swings and I put it on twitter and it went pretty viral it had something like 1.5 million views within an hour and I just thought there. There is something.

7:31So I I continued making these loops with these different moods and this rolling eyes and and people really responded to it instagram started to kick off and and it was good it's good it's good fun I really love doing this format because it's very short and I can do it quickly I can maybe do it in a couple of hours I like to make the music to it as well.

7:52And then you can just upload it and the project is kind of closed you have always these little projects and these little ideas and it's really nice to break it down to the movement and the shapes like this is the rolling duck and this is a caterpillar and it's really joyful to do and people with people tell me they thank me they come back with people mainly with anxiety or panic attacks or just stressed feelings in general they come back to the to the account to just relax and that's a really really very very nice feeling to to get so because it's it's just positivity so I really enjoy doing it.

8:34And I continue exploring this.

8:37This is a dance modes so we have I introduced these lips as well which come back often and it's just it's it's nice because it it led me to quite a quite a lot I connected with a lot of different people in the industry and it brought me lots it brings me jobs now. And it brings me also lots of nice collaborations so this for example is a collaboration with kos I really admire his work. And I was really super honored to do this this project together it was just a great fit with his crossed eyes combined with my loops it's slightly political so it got quite a lot of attention.

9:18So yeah let's hope the best for next week and this was a project with with you guys actually with it's nice that so you got commissioned for from tick tock to choose different artists to play with the logo and just interpret it on a word I got excitement and I came up with this blowing up logo that just swings through the for the room and it was fun because I think I was the first in line so I had I had an account because of my daughters which had like five followers and they they said I need an account because they want me they want to link it to some making off material and and then when it went up it just exploded I guess suddenly got something like 80 80k followers within one day and it's just it's just a it's a very weird platform but still I continue feeding it.

9:20And it's just good exposure so yeah.

10:23I want to finish now the talk with another collaboration I did with one of my favorite musicians called rival consoles and I made made this this little loop and he was super kind to put this mini track on top and it turned out beautiful ♪

11:00so and that's it thank you thank you for listening follow me on instagram thanks so much lucas that was amazing great kind of whistle stop tour through your work we've had a couple of questions also put to you through my audience fantastic first person asks lucas what other artist subjects inspire your work when did you start cultivating this style so maybe a couple of questions there in one well okay and not small ones either yeah like what what artists inspire in general or I think so yeah yeah well well I don't know I think my my absolute favorite artist or designer is bruno munari which I always refer as my favorite but I mean but I mean that's from the classics and of course it goes to dieter rams and somari and all these big names but I there is a lot of people doing great stuff and I I follow different people there's a little community around instagram and and I there is a lot of people that inspire me daily with really nice stuff so it's just it's not maybe a specific artist in that sense right. And I guess the second part of the question was kind of around your style your personal style which is very unique I mean I guess yeah where did that when did you start cultivating that yeah well I think I work very since a very long time on it.

12:23And it's just it's I guess it's crystallizing it's just evolving over time. So it starts with choosing stuff you like and filtering out things you like and zip them into your stuff and you do that over and over and over and at some stage I guess your taste comes through I guess that's the style it's more of a question of taste I guess and filtering yeah interesting you mentioned in your in your talk that it takes a couple of only a couple of hours to make one of those short loops but I guess I'm really intrigued to how long it takes to come up with the ideas behind them I mean so meant so much of your work seems relatively simple in the execution although maybe not making a cake with some drones but the rest of it certainly does you know like black dots on a white background or on a white plate you know it's so simple but the idea must take you a while what's the kind of perfect environment for you and how long does it take to come up with an idea like that yeah I mean finally you go into a loop actually so once you maybe you you have an idea you make one this inspires the triggers already a new idea to another one and it just again builds up but a lot of I don't know in bed I guess falling asleep you you think a lot.

13:35And then suddenly comes up and the next day you kind of need to make it because you just want to to do it or create it.

13:42But I guess it's an ongoing thing in the head do you have a notebook by your your bedside table and yeah no I used to draw a lot lately I actually no I I just crumble it in my brain and try to remember it I guess fantastic well I think that's kind of difficult to replicate if you're not you and you've got your genius brain but thanks very much for that lucas I really appreciate it thank you yeah you can now turn off your audio and video but yeah really appreciate you joining us