Slug Love

Worms Get Romantic in Buck Animation for the 2015 F5 Creative Festival

When the creative design-driven production company, Buck, was asked to create content for the 2015 F5 Creative Festival, Buck’s Art Director Chris Phillips wanted to evoke the feeling of ‘hugging your loved one as hard as you could’. Chris Phillips was responsible for the design and animation for Slug Tongues. He was going for a simplified and slick style for the video, instead of something grotesque. ‘There wasn’t any research done on style nor what it would look like, other than Google searching slugs mating. And please, don’t do that!’

Art Director Chris Phillips and Wilson Brown from Antfood told us more about the process behind Slug Tongues:

The Plus: Who wrote the poem? C
hris Phillips: The poem was written and produced by Antfood. When I first heard the song, I was very surprised. Antfood took this piece to a place I was not anticipating, but it truly makes it unique. It brought that intensity along with a clever sense of humour. It’s supposed to be fun.

Wilson Brown: We wanted to address and convey different aspects of love in various ways. For Slug Tongues we came up with the bizarre idea to allude to 70’s R&B/Soul Breakdowns – the moment about where the band drops down to a vamp, and the vocalist really opens up his heart to the listener. We took inspiration from Barry White, Micheal McCary and the kind of emotional breakdowns, Lenny Williams.

TP: Were there any creative or technical difficulties in its creation?
CP: I used Cinema 4D, my go to choice for anything 3D. The biggest technical difficulty was having the worms appear to be truly gripping each other. With such a short deadline I had to come up with a simpler solution, which sadly still caused quite a lot of headaches. I had lots of long nights watching the computer do simulations, cache files and multitude of other nerdy things I’m not entirely savvy with.

TP: What was the thought process behind the music choice?
CP: The music choice was all Antfood. They’re geniuses! WB: We called our friend Brian Kesley, who plays bass in the Parlour Tricks. All we asked was that he started out neutral, speaking broadly of love. Brian recorded about 20 minutes of material, so there are plenty of gems that didn’t make it into the final piece. We’re really happy that Chris, Buck and the crowd at F5 enjoyed it as it was a strange idea. It was so fun to write, produce and record.

TP: What are you working on now?
CP: I’m pretty sure I’m not allowed to say what I’m currently working on, but it is very cool and it’s almost complete.

Credits for Slug Tongues
Directed by: BUCK Creative
Director: Orion Tait
Executive Producer: Anne Skopas
Producer: Kaitlyn Mahoney, Ann Seymour
Lead Art Director: Chris Phillips
Art Director: Yker Moreno, Ben Langsfeld
Design & Animation: Chris Phillips