The Brothers McLeod Tease Us
So what do you get when you mix The White Stripes with Monty Python? 
It’s called ‘The M Man,’ and it’s a short film by Greg McLeod that’s both tweaked and twistedly entertaining. ‘The M Man’ employs a red/white & black color scheme, mixed with Ralph Steadman’s shotgun splatters and just a touch of John Cleese to deliver one very watchable bit of weird. The ‘The M Man Trailer’ is currently visible on the Brothers McLeod website, home of animators Greg and Myles McLeod.
If the name doesn’t ring a bell, The Brothers McLeod did ‘‘The Uncredibles,’ the Tony Blair spoof. Their shorts have also appeared on “BBC ONE, Channel 4, E4, BBC CHOICE, Atomfilms, and nokiashorts.com,” according to their website.
And according to the owner of that website, the short was animated in Flash and then edited in Final Cut. Seems like the way to go, from what I hear. I’ve even heard that Final Cut takes in SWFs. Is this true? Beats the piss out of the ol’ PNG export method, if you ask me. You need a terabyte for every minute of footage when those PNG sequences start stacking up.
Greg also hinted that the full version of ‘The M Man’ 
will be out in January, complete with it’s own website. It’s well deserving, having watched a sneak preview. Very cool look, with a slow-burn humor that could easily play in the States on IFC after ‘Greg the Bunny.’
Let me leave you with this line from ‘The M Man:’
“…and soon we’ll be left with one obese T-Rex. I’ll throw him at the Mexican Peninsula.” You’ll just have to wait…
December 20th, 2005 at 7:49 pm
After Effects and Sony Vegas also accept swfs. And there is a plug-in available from Flashants for Premeire Pro
December 20th, 2005 at 11:44 pm
John Cleese? The White Stripes? Monty Python? John Cleese? Where are you getting this from?
For that matter, where did you get that quote from?
Are we watching the same preview? Because I didn’t see anything in that short preview that showed any promise of “funny”…. Just, as your title says, “tease”. Dropping names here did intice me to watch it; and it turns out you’ve done a dirty trick. Stop it.
December 21st, 2005 at 2:35 am
I always use Quicktime Pro to export a QT from a swf with the animation codec. It looks great, but it only works with a version 5 swf, but since version 6 and 7 swfs only have extra web functionality, it’s no big loss. The exported QT can then be imported into Avid systems or Final Cut or Premiere.
December 21st, 2005 at 8:58 am
Re. the preview – I know it’s a bit vague but I didn’t want to give too much away. It’s done a few festivals and the feedback has been good so I hope when you see the final film you’ll enjoy it.
Re. Exporting from flash.
I export direct to QT (uncompressed) from flash then straight into Final Cut. Occasionally I’ll play about with a scene in After Effects
December 21st, 2005 at 11:18 am
Dude! Congrats on the new job! And thanks for the CDs. Hope you are well! And say hi to the lady friend for me. MERRY X-MAS!!!