Roundup #017

Oh hai there! Sorry, it's been a few weeks hasn't it since the last roundup? That's why I've knocked off the 'weekly' from the title, I think these blogs will come a bit more sporadically! It's been a fun few weeks though, with lots of things going on, so let's dive in shall we!?

First up, I'm really excited to say that the Gromit Unleashed 3 sculpture trail is now live, and I can share my contribution: 'GNARLYBOT'!

Inspired by the fluro excess of 80’s skateboarding films like ‘Attack’ and ‘The Search for Animal Chin’ as well as ‘Gleaming the Cube’ and ‘Thrashin’ (as well as good ol’ Back To The Future) - this is my love letter to skating and skate graphics, which were so inspirational to me! My Norbot is adorned in lots of my own homages to some of those iconic graphics of skate culture!

The wonderful Ruth Broadway brought my design to life, taking it from a 2D design to a wonderfully bonkers fluro fella! Then my good friend Jamie Cross weaved his magic and applied the vinyl finishing touches! (We’ve worked together on every single Gromit sculpture I’ve ever done!).

He’s on display at Quakers Friars in Cabot Circus from June 30th until August 31st along with all the other sculptures making up the Gromit Unleashed 3 trial! He’ll then auctioned off for charity at the end of the trail, raising vital funds for the incredible Bristol Children’s Hospital! I hope you get to see him on the streets of Bristol and be sure to tag me if you get a pic with him!

I've been away recently giving a few talks in a few places, some virtual, others physical, which has been lovely! I headed up north back to the motherland, the East Midlands, where I visited creative studio Linney to give a neon-soaked presentation in their amazing virtual production studio with the most vibrant screen I've ever seen - I've never seen my #ff1493 pink so bright!

Whilst I was up in Notts, my family joined me and we went to stay with our old friends Norm & Emma. They both run Waste Studio, an amazing creative studio based in the heart of Nottingham. Me and Norm are pretty much the same person; both into design, toys, characters, animation and an abundance of side projects! We spent a lot of time waxing lyrical about all things creative, but spent even more time playing on his epic pinball machine collection!! We discovered that if you pop a GoPro inside the machines then you get a very trippy light show!

Talking of talks, I was lucky enough to head back to the beautiful Battersea Power Station to give a talk to my friends at Apple, about the behind-the-scenes of our 'Wallace & Gromit Shot On iPhone' project we all did together at the end of 2024! It was such a blast to be back inside that iconic building - I got a big pang of excitement when I stepped off the tube and saw those two huge chimney stacks, it brought back such great memories!

Lastly, thanks to the hospitality of Apple and their agency MediaArts Lab, I'm heading to Los Angeles to give that creative talk to the LA teams! In fact, I'm typing this up in Heathrow airport, waiting for me flight!

I'm sure there'll be loads of updates in my next round-up, so I'll save all that excitement for the next one.

Catch you all soon

- Gav.

P.S I'm missing out a huge update here of starting a 'toy company' with my children, called 'Strange Kids', thanks to diving into the world of 3D printing but that deserves it's very own blog of how it all happened. I'll do that when I'm back from me trip! Until then, have a peep at strangekids.toys

WHAT AM I PLAYING?

I've got Death Stranding 2 downloaded and ready to go, but sadly I haven't had chance to sit down and start yet. In preparation for my trip to LA I've been dipping back into the streets of Los Santos in GTAV!

WHAT AM I LISTENING TO?

First off, I've ditched Spotify finally and moved over to Apple Music! Spotify have long been racking up red flags; from terrible streaming profits for artists to platforming podcast nutjobs, I've meant to jump ship for a while but the news that the founder is now funding an AI military start-up was the last straw!

I'm back on my noisy guitar stuff at the minute:

• Bring Me The Horizon – POST HUMAN: NeX GEn
• Turnstile – Glow On
• Stray From The Path – Clockworked

We caught some sets from Glasto on the iPlayer, The Prodigy's was phenominal, so so good. Catch the whole thing online if you can, as it was all awesome!

Turnstile's set was equally as good too, and great to see such a good mosh pit at Glastonbury!!

I'd fallen off BMTH for a while but this track really caught my attention and got me checking out their Post Human: Nex Gen album, it's full of chunky riffs with loads of fun digital glitch stuff!

WHAT AM I WATCHING?

I'm now working my way through Season 2 of ANDOR and man, it's even better! I'm only getting to watch an episode a week really, so aside from that the main thing we are putting on is Series 19 of Taskmaster!

It really is the perfect TV show, I love everything about it. This series in particular is gold because of the variety of contestants!

WHAT'S CAUGHT MY EYE?

Basically, we've had KPOP Demon Hunters on repeat since watching it for family movie night a few weeks ago. It's so SO good; the animation, the music, the design - if you haven't seen it, then go watch it and listen to all the bobs that are the soundtrack!