At Element X Creative our staff is a violent, war-mongering bunch. It’s true. Our peeps are grouped together into “islands” and they have every means of weaponry available to them. Tools of malice from USB powered NERF dart rocket launchers to paper airplanes armed with deadly hardened plastic at the tip. Animator island rages against lighting island, modeling/texturing island faces off against TD island.  The rivalries run bitter and deep. Every so often a weapon comes along that alters the face of  workplace faux warfare forever. Ladies and germs, we give you the Desktop Cannon!

http://www.koreus.com/video/mini-canon.html

Want. Need. Now.

One of the many, many responsibilities of being a Creative Director here at Element X Creative includes reenacting famous movie scenes with beloved celebrities. Just look at this photo of our own Brad Herbert and comedian Dan Aykroyd as they portray the lucrative parapsychology professors specializing in ghost removal. We’re talking about 1984′s Ghost Busters people! Brad bumped into Mr. Aykroyd on a shoot and the two goofballs posed for this classic photo. We would show you Brad’s picture with the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man, but the image is far too graphic and disturbing for young viewers…

The industry is all about insight and perspective, and wonderful sites like Animation Career Review help students, professionals, and business owners keep up with all of the industry news around them. We at EXC do our best to keep up too, but it can be hard to find the time between costuming our Predator mannequin and shooting soft foam nerf darts at unruly artists.

Chad Briggs however was fortunate enough to lock his office door and dull the sounds of screaming employees just long enough to answer a few questions for Animation Career Review. Check out what Chad has to say about artists, the studio, and animation in general in the article below. Happy reading!

Chad Briggs Dishes on Element X Creative’s Unique Style

Element X Creative expands its repertoire of entertainment possibilities by adding Gregory Gunter as head of Story Development. Greg’s a native Texan who graduated from SMU. He spent many years in Chicago, Boston, NYC, SD, Los Angeles — even a little time in Paris (the French one!). He taught at UCSD and at Harvard University, worked for Disney for nine years at Feature Animation, then at their Global Entertainment division, and finally as Vice President Creative for Disney Broadway where he worked on Mary Poppins among others.

While at the Mouse-house Feature Animation, Greg helped developed stories and characters for Bug’s Life, Toy Story 2, Tarzan, Emperor’s New Groove and many more of your favorites (Lilo and Stitch, Finding Nemo et. al.). Gunter was so excited about the new properties being developed he actually started playing air guitar. (And he wasn’t half bad).

Our obsession with nerf guns in the workplace has elevated to a daily ritual, but as to when each day this will take place, is something only our servers know. You see, our crackshot programming team put their skills to good use when they hacked one of our servers to send out a company-wide full screen alert to all of our workstations at a random time during business hours. What was once a stray foam dart or two in the office throughout the day, has turned into full-on warfare when the alert is triggered. Sometimes it happens right after we arrive in the morning, other times it is during a client meeting in the afternoon (don’t worry we have guns laying around on the conference room table for them too – no one is safe). We’ll fully admit the office shuts down for a good 10 minutes while we take care of business, but the adrenaline rush is a welcomed jolt as we push into the late hours around the office.

Every day there seems to be a new twist to the game, as our staff learns the strategies of one another, they adapt to different tactics each time. The rules are simple – if you get hit, you are out, last person standing struts around the office for the rest of the day as big man on campus. I sat out the past few days so I could run around and capture the mayhem that ensues and also the all-out attitude that everyone here has. It’s really a fun to time to just let loose and mix things up a bit. Take a look at some of the pictures below of everyone in action, and take special delight in my photo journalistic skills being absolutely thrashed as a group of hostiles wrecked me in the end. I am definitely trading my camera back in for weapon with a little more respect.

This post is an entry for the Make work fun contest being hosted by pfl.com.

3:23:16 PM – It’s not a matter of IF, but WHEN.

4:46:02 PM – IT’S ON. Every man for his own.

4:46:05 PM – Two easy targets – don’t let it go to your head Matthew.

4:46:22 PM – If you are 6′ 7″ you make any gun look small.

4:47:03 PM – Stand-off with client. This is how we earn your business.

4:47:42 PM – Mike goes mobile with another signature drive-by.

4:48:34 PM – Dennis finds yet ANOTHER place to camp and snipe.

4:50:07 PM – My camera is no match for complete mutiny.

It’s always great to get praise for our work from clients, but there are few things as magical as helping craft a world that makes a child smile from ear to ear. In an exciting new venture, Element X Creative partnered with Motus Digital to develop and present Herby the Elf on his very own Elf Hotline. The premise of our collaboration was simple: Use Motus’ new realtime 3D motion capture setup to drive a computer generated elf that we concepted, modeled, and textured. Throughout the holidays several live sessions were set up where different organizations could Skype in and chat with Herby live via web cams. The response was overwhelming and heartwarming to say the least.

One of the more memorable chats Herby had was an exciting visit with kids at Children’s Medical Center in Dallas. A group of 25-30 kids were brought into a conference room with a large screen. They were a little nervous at first, but after Herby broke the proverbial North Pole Ice, the kids were singing, dancing and celebrating Christmas! Later, one of Santa’s helpers took a laptop by the rooms of patients who couldn’t join the group … so they could talk one-on-one with Herby!  Check out Herby in action and hear it from the main elf himself!

The Stars at Night Are Big and Bright! (CLAP CLAP CLAP CLAP!!!) Deep in the Heart of Texas! For all ya’ll non-native Texans not familiar with the beloved state-known song Deep in the Heart of Texas, (1) we’re sorry and (2) it sure does get stuck in your head. Especially while we were crafting the motion graphics for “Celebrate Texas 175″.

In commemoration of the 175th Anniversary of the Texas Revolution, Director Michael Cerny completed an extensive film series of twenty-one Texas history tid-bits. Everything is bigger in Texas, including the history, so just sit back and enjoy this sneak peek featuring Dallas native Luke Wilson as he discusses the incredible achievements of Texan automotive designer Carroll Shelby.

No, we haven’t started a weird support group of some kind. Texas treasure & animation guild, A Bunch of Short Guys recently held their tenth annual Industry Giants event. Animators, game developers, VFX artists & students came together to learn new techniques, hear industry leaders speak, and network with their fellow peers. Element X Creative has sponsored the event since its very first show and is proud to be part of the tradition and give back to the community at large.

This year’s events featured such luminaries as John Carmack, founder & lead programmer of acclaimed i.d. Software (Quake, Doom), Allan McKay, VFX Supervisor of such films as Superman Returns, Blade Trinity, DayBreakers and Transformers 3; Jason Manley, founder & President of Massive Black Inc., ConceptArt.org, and The Art Department, and Rita Street, the President of Radar Cartoons & founder of the international non-profit organization, Women in Animation. The event was a rousing success – propelling Dallas’s animation and game community to even greater heights.

Visit the Industry Giants Website

Race (carefully mind you), don’t walk, down to the DMA to see Sculpting Space: 299 Chairs. The an inspiring exhibit by Dallas ISD architecture magnet pupils. EXC and the DMA partnered up to produce this exhibit video, which follows students from Skyline High School’s architect program led by Tom Cox & Peter Goldstein.

All of the parties involved, along with the help of mentors & collaborators Gary Cunningham and Rizi Faruqui of Cunningham Architects, watched as the young artists transformed DMA’s gallery space by manipulating standard plastic school chairs into one coherent, sculptural piece.

Sculpting Space: 299 Chairs by Skyline High School