Hammers writes:
This Halloween, Australian animator Stephen Hamacek is releasing a teaser for his new project “The Love Me or Die” – an animation based on the music of the legendary C.W. Stoneking.
The Love Me or Die is a dark, animated fable of desire, obsession and consequences. It follows a skeletal balladeer as he journeys through a mysterious, 1920’s world of gritty streets, voodoo apothecaries and misty bayous in his quest to seduce the innocent Matilda with arcane magic. But the story takes a tragic turn, with the price that both he and Matilda have to pay.
The animation draws visual influence from stop-motion animation and from the black-and-white cinema of early sound animation and film.
The New Orleans and day-of-the-dead styled film has already received some support, thanks to a Noosa Council Regional Arts Development Fund grant, and the project has just secured a sponsorship deal from the video collaboration platform Frame.io, saving the filmmakers thousands of dollars. "The Love Me or Die" is being created using Blender, but there are still so many additional expenses involved in a production this complex, and a huge amount of work still ahead. So we are looking for crowdfunding help, sponsorships, and partnerships that will assist in bringing this ambitious project to completion and on to film festivals around the world.
“Making an animation like this is such a labour of love” says Hamacek, a self-taught animator, with a background in music production and sound design. "I can't wait to share our progress so far and see it take off from there".
You can watch the teaser countdown to a live Halloween release on Stephen’s ‘Hammers’ YouTube channel, and we'd love you to follow @LMODanimation on Instagram and Facebook.
“We really need people to jump on the website and contribute some funds to help get this project over the line” says Melbourne based co-producer Katrina Mathers. “We can work for years in our bedrooms for nothing and we’ve been very lucky to secure some key sponsorship which has helped us make the teaser, but there are always out of pocket expenses we need to cover - so if you’ve saved $50 in lockdown, please consider helping to keep us making the dead walk for our film!”
