A robot needing a new hover wheel for his truck takes a broken woman instead. It changes his life.
This is a sweet little animated film that is ultimately about finding the one we love and the things that we will do for them, and they for us. Even though I found it a bit eerie that the girl girl robot in the parts dump (I know its about robots but I am disturbed by the only woman we see is in a trash dump- but I'm reading way too much into this)
What is a amazing is that this was done by director Danny Bourque over two years. It's an amazing achievement.
This is a small scale gem you need to see.
SUNSPARK impressed the hell out of me. I couldn't believe on person did all of this alone. I liked the film so much that I reached out to director Danny Bourque to see if he would answer a few questions via email. He said yes. What follows are the nine questions I sent him.
I want to thank Mr Bourque not only for taking the time, but also for making such a wonderful film.
STEVE:The film took you years to do. How do you stay focused on the one film and not wander off? Did your friends and family remember what you looked like?
DANNY: Believe it or not, during that time I still managed to train for and perform the Grand Canyon Rim-to-Rim hike with my parents, traveled with an old film school buddy to a remote cemetery in Texas to catch the total eclipse, visited Costa Rica for the first time, and purchased a kayak to explore the Puget Sound area around where I live. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t thinking about getting back to working on Sunspark while I was on each of those trips. Part of what kept me focused and motivated to see the project to its end was choosing a deadline and sticking with it. I specifically chose the SXSW early deadline to have my film completed by. Even though SXSW passed on the film, it still helped me get it to the finish line.
STEVE:You did everything on this yourself, how did you manage to do it all? I ask because it seems most one creators tend to bring someone in for some part, primarily the music. Why didn't you take help to do the film?
DANNY: Over the years I’ve steadily built up an array of skills by pursuing different hobbies and interests. I’ve been comfortable with visual composition ever since I discovered photography in high school, eventually working for a while as a photojournalist for The Times-Picayaune newspaper in New Orleans. I created my own live-action short films and documentaries throughout my college years. In my 30s I took up electronic music as a hobby and found myself performing live multiple times under the name Glitch Black, including twice in the New Orleans House of Blues, and even having one of my albums named among the top 10 synthwave albums by Metal Hammer Magazine. I also used Glitch Black as my artist name when creating short 3D animations, looping gifs, and other experimental visualizers. Sunspark is what happened when I decided to combine all my collected skills into one big project.
And with an 11-minute runtime, one of the final hurdles was just getting the entire film rendered. I ended up using the Render Network to render all of the film's individual frames online. Most people are familiar with the idea of a traditional render farm where you're working with a centralized pool of machines that has limited capacity. The Render Network works differently by connecting creators to a decentralized network of computer users around the world who can contribute the collective power of their idle GPUs. And with a grant from the Render Foundation, I avoided spending months rendering the film frame by frame on my own PC.
STEVE: I know its robots, and I'm over thinking this, but I found it kind of weird/creepy to have "dead" robots at the parts place. Has anyone mentioned the eeriness? Do you for see a future where humans have something similar when we get to a point where we can just switch broken parts?Apologies I keep seeing Victor Frankenstein going to a one stop shop...(Sorry I'm a monster kid and my brain leans into the ghoulish)
DANNY:You’re definitely the first to mention this part feeling creepy or eerie! If you go to a real junkyard you might find old cars, computers, and other objects of daily life. If robotic helpers were commonplace, there’s no question older models would eventually follow this same path. The point Sunspark tries to make is that there can still be value found in things that we are so quick to throw away.
STEVE:What were and who are your inspirations for the film?
DANNY:My biggest inspirations include the videogame Machinarium, the 1998 Oscar-nominated short film More, and the movies The Iron Giant, The Brave Little Toaster, and WALL-E. Most of these touch on themes of transcendence through personal sacrifice and finding value in things that have been discarded.
STEVE: There is something about the emotional center and humanity of the film that reminds me of Kid Koala's SPACE CADET. I was wondering if you saw the film and if so what you thought of it.
DANNY: I haven’t had the chance to see Space Cadet but I really want to. I first discovered it when I was researching film festivals for Sunspark and I hope one day I’ll finally get a chance to see it.
STEVE:What was your path into animation? Were you a filmmaker who fell in love with the art form or are you just an animator? Or are you going to be like Yeon-Sang Ho or Brad Bird and swerve from animation to live action?
DANNY:After earning my MFA in Film Production, I took a full-time corporate video editing job in New Orleans. Over time I picked up on how to create basic motion graphics animations. Eventually this led me to creating 2D character animations in After Effects and Flash. I also began to toy around with 3D animation in Blender, and years later found myself working at an advertising agency where I learned Cinema 4D. Over time I became comfortable enough with Cinema 4D and After Effects to the point where making Sunspark felt possible.
STEVE:Everyone talks Disney and Ghibli- but what films - animated or not, that you think people should see?
DANNY: The stop-motion short film More from 1998 is only 6 minutes long, but its story is told so powerfully through its synthesis of visuals and wordless music. It’s one of the biggest influences that first propelled me on my filmmaking journey, inspiring me to make my first short film in 2001 called Neverthought.
STEVE: Who are the filmmakers who make you drop everything to go and see?
DANNY: Of directors who still produce new work, my list would include:
Denis Villeneuve - has consistently created the very best in modern sci-fi
George Miller - I’ll never get enough of the world of Mad Max. I’m hoping we get a sixth from Miller.
Alfonso Cuarón - I wish he did more sci-fi
Michael Mann - I love gritty urban criminal stories and I have high hopes for Heat 2
Kathryn Bigelow - consistently creates hard-hitting cinema
Robert Eggers - his movies often feel like you’re living in a daguerreotype photo from nearly 200 years ago
Paul Thomas Anderson - just an all-around incredibly competent filmmaker that never seems to miss
Stanley Kubrick (undead) - I would watch anything from zombie Kubrick
STEVE: SUNSPARK is done, so what's next? Will there be a crew this time?
DANNY: I’m already nearing the completion of my next animated short Eye for an Eye for a Nose. This time I did recruit an actress to voice some characters, but other than that I’ll be the entire crew once again. I’m taking lessons I learned from Sunspark but still giving myself new creative and technical challenges to solve. Now that I’m nearing the end of its production, I can confidently say that I’m even stronger now in my overall animation skills than when I started. I recently launched the social media accounts for Eye for an Eye for a Nose here: https://www.instagram.com/eye4eye4nose/
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