Manny Machado's Birthday Garden Gnome Jamboree! (Bobbleheads invited, too.)
My yearly animation for the Orioles remains at the top of the list of am-I-really-working-or-is-this-all-a-crazy-dream jobs. But somehow it was about to get much better.
After seeing a creative Dodgers promotional video for Adrian Gonzalez Bobblehead Night (more VFX than stop motion) and an excellent Twins promotional video for Josh Willingham Bobblehead Night (no stop motion at all), I figured that I could make something for the Orioles in the same vein. I mentioned this to the folks at Orioles Productions and they were immediately enthusiastic.
It just so happened that there was going to be a Manny Machado Garden Gnome Night three days after Manny's 24th birthday and the O's wanted a video to celebrate both.
John Sumner (my perennial partner in crime on these spots) and I started brainstorming. John drew up some simple boards and I submitted them. The scoreboard team said the designs look great... but where was the script? Script? Yes, I'd be writing a script where several current players on the Orioles would voice their animated bobblehead likenesses! If there was a way to top the thrill of the yearly scoreboard animations, this was it!
Here it is:
Full Credits
Director/Animator/DP: Pete Levin
Art Director/Fabricator/Storyboards: John Sumner
Specialty Mouth Fabricator: Greg Sesma
Chris Davis as Action Figure Chris Davis
Adam Jones as Bobblehead Adam Jones
Manny Machado as Garden Gnome Manny Machado
Buck Showalter as Garden Gnome Buck Showalter
Matt Wieters as Bobblehead Matt Wieters
The Baltimore Sun, WMAR Channel 2, and WJZ Channel 13 and The Score did some coverage of the video!