Animation, Die Art - Interview With Christoph Grosse Hovest

Christoph Grosse Hovest only just graduated from FH Dortmund where he received a diploma in communication design but he has been working as a freelance designer since 2002. His experience is evident in his short we recently featured here on the IT’S ART website, and IT'S ART VOL#12. We had a chance to talk to Christoph and what we wanted to know is where did he get the inspiration for this peculiar and poetic world.

Christoph Hovest: This project was actually my senior project at FH Dortmund. The initial idea came from the film location where the shots were generated. A few semesters back I had an illustration workshop at school where we had an exercise that required us to work with photographs. It was then that I discovered "Phoenix", an industrial complex of buildings that has been abandoned. This complex made a strong impression on me and I had the idea to revive the cold steel and to use this surreal place as a home for unusual creatures. All of the shots were taken by extraordinary photographer and good friend of mine, Christian Kalbhenn (christian.kalbhenn-[at]-web.de).

IA: Tell us a little about your creative processes for the character design.

CH: I began by creating the characters on paper and then I created the 3D characters. It was a continuous process and I was constantly developing the forms and moves, which is the basis of the

CH: The sound and the music were composed by a friend and fellow student of mine, Alexander Kersting (www.stereokompost.de). When the project was in its early stages we started some sound tests to define the different moods. I didn´t have to do anything more than say "brilliant." At no time there was anything to criticize. I should let Alexander explain a bit more about the sound.

Alexander Kersting: No sound was taken during the shot, so I had to create every noise from scratch. The basic idea was to produce a composition with noises made by the characters and their individual spaces.