Apr 2, 2024

Pedro Conti's stop-motion inspired CG for "Acabou, Mas Tem..." Perfect fit for the music video

Brazilian artist Emicida has released a music video for the song "Acabou, mas tem..." directed and produced by Pedro Conti of Flooul Animation. directed by Pedro Conti of Flooul Animation.

The video features animation that is as smooth as the flow of Emicida's lyrics and beats. By using clockwork toy characters and sets, Conti gives the video a playful stop-motion aesthetic that moves and evolves in a satisfying way that is appropriate to the song's swinging nature.

Conti has known Emíssida for several years and has long been a fan. The director told Cartoon Brew how excited he was to collaborate with the musician on his latest video:

I wanted to give something back by his beautiful music. His music has helped me through many moments in my life, especially after I lost my father in 2018. I ended up doing a 3D print of the emicida and we met in his office.

The two had tried to work together in the past, but the timing was not right. This time, though only briefly, their schedules aligned. According to Conti:

The production deadlines were tight, so we had to come up with a really creative solution: ...... The process was very collaborative between Emicida, my co-director Diego Maia, and myself. Similarly, my company Flooul Animation and Emicida's company Laboratório Fantasma worked closely together on this video.

Because of our mutual history and admiration for each other's work, Conti says he was given free reign to develop and produce the video in the style of his choice. These boundaries we set really helped us to be very creative in editing and design. The overall setup was simple, but we added a lot of complexity and variation to make each part of the song and video special.

Conti says he used the song's story about a person in a rough spot who wants to feel better to guide the animation. Like the conflicting lyrics, the animation was intended to be incongruous:

We decided to use a very childlike style and take this little character on a deep and intense journey.

As the song progresses through mini-movements of varying tempo and emotion, the animation becomes more and more chaotic, until finally the song and the visuals merge comfortably.

To develop the stop-motion inspired visual aesthetic, Conti and his studio team used Autodesk's 3ds Max, Zbrush, and V-Ray for CG animation and Blender for 2D animation. Post and editing was done in After Effects and Adobe Premiere.