Before I talk about my painting session tonight, I want to say something about the first VR film I’ve ever watched; Dear Angelica, while it’s still fresh. I just took off the headset and here we are. Later I’ll look into it, add due credit to the artists, but for now I just want to express my reaction. It was animated, all of it painted. There actually wasn’t a lot of movement, it seemed to mostly consist of stroke hierarchy in forming the shapes and figures of the scene. I was, as the viewer, anchored so that no matter how I moved the elements of the scene moved with me. I couldn’t sneak any peaks behind the curtains of the characters or props. It was beautifully painted, immediately giving me a lot to live up to. This review, by Adi Robertson, describes the art by Wellsley Allbrook: “It’s by turns sweeping and intricate, from the lush fantasy sequences of Angelica’s movies to the roughly sketched outline of Jessica lying in bed, pages of her letters fluttering to the floor beside her bed. Each section unfolds around you with a loose dream logic, so you can walk through Jessica’s memories as they fill in, linger, and eventually disappear.”
What really blew my mind was the immense grandeur of some of the scenes. The scale was emphasized by a contrasting rhythm that alternated between these grand-scale rococo-styled realms to small, minimalistic character-driven setups that were saturated by an imposing negative space and felt a lot like being at a play.

Tech questions:
– How was this done, I’m guessing Quill. Later edit: Yep.
– How was the character work so smoothly volumetric, it feels too good for freehand. Later edit: And yet it is. Allsbrook is just that good.
– How can a scene be blown up that large in physical space? Later edit: A few tests show that the ‘blowing up’ effect is done by setting the scale before drawing the image (see post “Movin’ on up“).

The story was about a girl watching old movies in bed, staring a fiery redhead named Angelica who is eventually revealed to be her mother. She has a larger-than-life presence – it’s Angelica that lights up the overblown scenes, leading the viewer to step around clockwise then back again, jaw-dropped, neck craned in awe. These scenes are mesmerizing and she is the star. We become her daughter, transfixed by this heroine, fascinated by her wild grasp on life as they laugh their way through her daughter’s best memories, cigarettes dangling from their lips. It doesn’t matter that she can’t distinguish between the stories in Angelica’s movies or her actual memories. I can very much relate to this as what it’s like to lose someone whom you deeply loved. The feeling of them washes over the hard lines of reality, melting fact and fiction and emotion together into a lake of colourful grief. In the end, Angelica loses a staggering, dizzying battle against a dragon she is no match against. As she slowly succumbs, her daughters words, pink script that has supported the narration since the opening credits, cascade in a slow explosion all around her. We then see her daughter standing over her hospital bed, Angelica the superhero now a small, frail being. “Real life,” says her daughter, “is nothing like the movies.”
Finally, Angelica finds herself as an astronaut floating in space. She isn’t sure what’s happening and calls out for anyone who might here, in a timid, amnesic voice. We hear her say “I have a daughter”, as she falls slowly smaller and further away.
It hit me, that part. I know the feeling. I wonder where he is too, my own Angelica. I hope he’s not lost in space, although he’d probably be pretty blown away by it at first. I hope he’s not left all alone. I hope that for us all.
Before painting, I’d been chatting with the niece of he who recently passed. This is the story I told her, before we said goodnight:

I have this spot up here, at the farm, where we were once just stomping around in the mud. You know, like little kids.. just stomping around in the rain, getting dirty in the mud like it was our daily business. And I have him framed in my mind like that, whenever I pass the spot. I always just say hi, so casual. No one drove me crazier but I never loved anyone more.

Credit where credit is due:
Dear Angelica : Oculus Story Studio, directed by Saschka Unseld (formerly from Pixar)
Illustrator / Animator : Wesley Allsbrook
Incidentally, after pouring through her work I am blown away by the her talent. Her work is an inspiration. She studied at the Rhode Island School of Art and seems to have achieved great success early on. Recently she is becoming more known for her work as a VR artist – worth an investigative piece at some point, ie. how the transition came about, how she learned, etc.