Friendly Robot using Future Slums in his piece titled, 'The Grail'
Friendly Robot
Friendly Robot is a director, concept artist & designer from Paris, France. For the last nine months he has been freelancing after spending 5 years on staff at 17mars, a Paris-based motion graphics studio. Since then, he has co-directed a short called Passage with Ash Thorp kit (watch below). We were lucky enough to virtually sit down with the rising artist and talk about his style, where he came from and what he's created so far.
Friendly Robot began making art as a 4-year-old in France. Drawing was a way for him to synthesize the world around him into visual stories and expressions, and he began like most children by doodling and sketching, but by the age of fifteen, he was feverishly painting and creating fully hand-drawn comics. As a self-taught artist, Friendly Robot spent years working on his craft before landing his first studio job at age twenty-four.
From an early age it was clear that Friendly Robot not only had a strong grip on visual story-telling, but was very purposefully using the stark contrast of light to cultivate striking images where the viewer's eye could immediately understand the conflict of the story.
We were lucky enough to stumble across Friendly Robot during the Art Deco #kb3dcontest. Below you can see him playing with the use of red to highlight the fear and loneliness in a far-advanced civilization, perhaps controlled by robots, as well as a more modern slum environment, but both juxtapose that red heavily with more muted grays, blacks and purples.
The striking red silhouette of a human is contrasted with a Matrix-like robotic organism. Art Deco #kb3dcontest entry
This more moody exploration again uses red to sharply contrast, but the loneliness of the scene is more abstract and muddled. Using Future Slums
The Grail
Friendly Robot made "The Grail" for a previous MDC x KB3D contest, which tells the story of a girl who has discovered the "Holy Grail" -- an ounce of hope for the future-- in a dark, desolate world that has left the younger generations in ruin. Within two seconds of seeing the image, the eye is drawn to the white silhouettes of hope surrounding the little girl, highlighting her discovery in a world of utter darkness. Here we see that it is the sweeping moment that evokes the viewer's emotion to hold onto the image; what's important is the big picture that Friendly Robot is constantly trying to paint, not the finer details.
With all his projects, Friendly Robot does a basic black and white block out to view the negative space and to easily see the stark light contrast. On the right we can the composition highlighted in a red grid, displaying the symmetry and visual hierarchy of the piece.
Short Film: No Signal
Friendly Robot created 'No Signal' as an experimental title sequence, depicting an astronaut who is struggling with his perception of reality. Reality, memory and madness were the three keywords that influenced his concept, and teasing the idea of a bigger movie or TV show was the goal. It is safe to say that he achieved the goal in creating this compelling piece, and in creating this completely on his own, he was able to grow certain skills that were applicable to his artistic and commercial success. It's mostly influenced by the art of Simon Stalenhag and Jeremy Geddes, as well as the historical events that took place in the Spring of 1985, when the Foton caspules were launched from Plesetsk Cosmodrome in Russia. Friendly Robot's interpretation obviously comes with a vivid creative license, but to check out more of his process on this piece, you can visit his Behance profile.
Short Film: Passage, co-directed w/ Ash Thorp
Each scene within Passage is conveyed like a chapter within a book. The Fetus begins the story with the representation of birth, followed by a beautiful human skull that signifies the beginning of the end for humanity, as it creates the life form that will ultimately be the undoing of humankind; AI. What ensues through this two and a half-minute piece is a visually-pleasing, allegorical movement through the rise, glory and fall of mankind. For more behind scenes, check out Ash's extensive look behind the collaboration with Friendly Robot.
Friendly Robot has been in freelance land for the last nine months; a stark contrast to working at a studio for 5 years. Luckily for him, when it comes to juxtaposing opposites with thought and grace, he is well on his way to becoming a master. He is currently focusing on a commercial project, a future, self-produced film that will continue to explore more themes that interest him, getting better every day in story-driven designs, and finally enjoying the journey in the process.
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Chris Gouchoe
KB3D Director of Digital Marketing & Customer Experience
