William Laboury, a maker spirit at Short Film Festival Clermont

«Play Dead», from William Laboury, awarded at the International Short Film Festival Clermont-Ferrand. © DR

Exceptionally, two films from the same director, William Laboury, were in the competition of the 2016 International Short Film Festival Clermont-Ferrand that ended on February 13. Even more exceptionally, both his short films won awards, at the end of the 38th edition, ever more popular (160,000 admissions, a record attendance). Still exceptionally, William Laboury, fresh out of the prestigious Femis (higher education French school for image and sound trades), is an offspring of the net culture and DiY that stands out from the rest of the films presented in all three competitions (national, international, lab) of the largest short film festival in France.

Of course, the mixed techniques (datamoshing, found footage, mashup, 3D animation, 3D scan…) are present, but Play Dead (national competition, Canal+ award) was the only film from the 2016 competition to stage a bunch of merry makers (well, merry…) and their 3D printer. In order to produce the film, William Laboury used the skills of a maker who made a Potato Gun (more dangerous than it appears) and a Liberator, the 3D-printable handgun that made the headlines in 2013. “It took us twenty odd hours to make the Liberator without the dangerous mechanism”, explains William Laboury.

«Play Dead», William Laboury (trailer, 2015):

In Hotaru, lab special jury award in Clermont, no makers but a mix of “infrared cameras, 3D scan and a moving datamoshing”, he adds. The scenario, that the fans of Chris Marker – of whom the young director is a part of – will identify as a mix of La Jetée and Level Five, stages a young woman with hypermnesia who is sent into space to meet potential extraterrestrials and who gets lost in the meanderings of her/our memory.

«Hotaru», William Laboury (trailer, 2015):

Makery is far from turning into a film critic, but we are not getting carried away by reckoning on the fact that William Laboury is only beginning to make news… Evidence of this with this mashup self portrait that he produced for the San Sebastian film festival.

«Hello», William Laboury, mashup self portrait (2015):

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