While stop-motion animation has been around since the silent film era, Stoopid Buddy gives it an irreverent and often R-rated twist. While mainstream Hollywood looks for sources offshore, Stoopid Buddy prides itself on creating everything in house. With its own model making, wardrobe, set construction, lighting, grip and camera departments, the studio operates like a traditional, self-contained studio, but the comparison ends there. The mostly millennial team of directors, camera operators, editors and writers collaborate in ways that blur the historic divisions of labour. With log cabin offices and a Winnebago executive suite, the creative team is often rewarded with Boy Scout merit badges. The collegiate atmosphere works for camera operator and best boy Andrew Malek: "This is not your normal work environment. We all do everything. It's an awesome place to work."
"We have a constant need for small, focusable and dimmable fixtures," says gaffer Dwight Campbell. "The Source Four Mini is perfect for us."
"We found the ETC units gave us much sharper optics for a lower wattage, just like the grown-up Source Fours," adds cinematographer Aaron Wise. A nearby cart carries a full range of pre-cut gels and accessories. "The fixture is truly versatile. The 50-degree with diffusion works great as a keylight and the 19-degree makes a good hot backlight or gobo effect," Campbell comments.
Wise and Campbell came to Stoopid Buddy after film school, paying their dues as grip, gaffer and camera techs, mainly doing features and commercials. "We grew up with Source Four, and for the larger sets, we still use the full size fixtures with a 375 watt lamp," says Campbell. "The Series 2 LED Lustr would work really well for us here, especially with the CYC attachment."
(Jim Evans)
