Download a Quicktime movie excerpt from 67 Aluminum Plates. 1.1 MB. or download the entire movie. © National Gallery of Canada.

The production team: Jordan Craig, Karolina Craig, Jean-Claude Kalache, Rob Anderson, Carol Beecher and Jan Pinkava. Photo courtesy of Carol Beecher.

Jan Pinkava, right, speaks with Charlie Hill, curator of the Permanent Canadian Collection at the National Gallery, about proper handling of the sculpture. Photo courtesy of Carol Beecher.

"ATTENTION! Feel free to give any shape you want to this sculpture. Gently move the aluminum plates. The artist would like you to share in the pleasure of handling the forms in space..."

So reads the plaque next to a large, metal, moveable sculpture in the Garden Court of the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa. It was early October, 1998,and Oscar-winning director Jan Pinkava (Geri's Game) was in town for the Ottawa International Animation Festival, taking place just a few blocks away at the National Arts Centre. Browsing the gallery, Pinkava was struck by inspiration to take the artist's words quite literally, and animate the piece. He approached the gallery's staff, who were receptive to the idea and got to work clearing the red tape involved with filming in a public place.

Pinkava used a straight wooden board to move all of the arms of the sculpture in unison. Photo courtesy of Carol Beecher.

67: The Magic Number
The roughly six-foot, seven-inch high sculpture, titled "Column," is made up of 67 relatively lightweight aluminum plates, connected to a column on which they rotate freely. It was created for the Canadian centennial in 1967 by Ulysse Comtois, a former film editor inspired by his craft. Comtois, now 67 years old, lives in Granby, Quebec and was thrilled to hear of the project.

Pinkava enlisted the help of colleague Jean-Claude Kalache of Pixar Animation Studios; Rob Anderson, Jordan Craig and Karolina Craig of Ottawa-based animation studio, Dynomight Cartoons; Denis Lelong, an animator from Paris; and Carol Beecher of the Quickdraw Animation Society. Within 24 hours, they were set-up in the gallery, filming "Column" one frame at a time.

An overhead view of the production stage. Photo courtesy of Carol Beecher.

The Production
Dynomight Cartoons provided the set-up to film the animation digitally: a Sony DCR VX1000 Digital Handy Cam connected to a Macintosh PowerMac 8500/180, using Strata Video Shop and Adobe Photoshop to capture the images. After Rob did the technical set-up, Jordan and Karolina manned the computer while Jan and Jean-Claude animated the sculpture. The crew averaged roughly five seconds an hour, working from about 8 a.m. until 5 p.m. In all, about 35 seconds of animation were created, shooting on ones and twos. Toward the end of the shoot, a few additional animators helped out.

The next day, the footage was edited together in Adobe Premiere. Specific movements such as the corkscrew-like action were cycled, to create a one-minute completed piece. Ed Eagen of local sound studio 12th Root created a digital score by using samples of Pinkava saying "67 Aluminum Plates," the title of the film. Chris Mullington of Television Factory also collaborated on the final sound and video mixing.