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[10th Day of GIFmas] Yule Love This

Matt Powell puts a modern twist on a Christmas tradition.

The holidays are upon us and 2016 is nipping at our heels. The only decision harder than what gift to get your grandmother is what GIF to attach to inter-office emails and Slack threads. We've gathered some of the most festive GIF artists on the net for a series called 12 Days of GIFmas. We'll shine a red and green spotlight on the creative process behind these shareable bites of holiday cheer.

Animator Matt Powell excels at capturing singular thoughts and moments in GIF form. The wonder at staring into an impossibly beautiful geode, for example, or the curiosity of gazing at intricate gears in motion. He manipulates familiar objects to capture the mind's interactions with them.

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For the holidays this year, Powell made a take on the timeless Yule log. With his imaginative color palettes and knack for showing— not telling—stories, he preserves the log in his minds eye for posterity. We asked Powell about his process and how he makes such an age-old symbol feel new again.

The Creators Project: Can you briefly explain the idea behind the GIF?

Matt Powell: I wanted to capture the warmth and spirit of a fire around this time of year, but set it in a palette people don't usually associate with Christmas. Hot pink is the new red & green… or somthing.

Run me through the process of creating the piece. What tools/techniques did yo use?

It was the classic sketch, sketch, sketch again creative process. One thing that helped me with this was printing out a few pages of templates for the hexagon shape (as this was a piece created for #ShapeChristmas 2015, there was a form requirement) then jotted down any ideas, whenever they came to me. Made sure to do a couple of rubbish ones, just to get them off my chest before I landed on the concept that stuck. Then it was iterations in Adobe Illustrator for the artwork and After Effects/Photoshop for the fire animation. I chose to stick to geometric primitives over realistic flames, so it would fit with the surround. Great thing about that limited palette is that it compresses to GIF really well.

How are you celebrating the holidays? 

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This year's a fun juggling act balancing work and nursing my poorly five-month-old baby!

What kind of stuff do you have planned for 2016?  

It's a little vague, not got anything in stone but I might end up with a proper website, instead of my lackluster Tumblr page! I also want to take risks with more illustrative GIFs next year, as the whole primitive shape loops in C4D thing has started to wear a little thin for me. They might not get as many guaranteed likes, but they'll be more fulfilling creatively.

Click here to visit Matt Powell on Tumblr.

Related:

[1st Day of GIFmas] Watch Santa Kick It Poolside

[2nd Day of GIFmas] A Very Snarky Christmas

[3rd Day of GIFmas] Have Yourself a Twisted Little Christmas

[4th Day of GIFmas] Vintage Photos Reinvigorated with Holiday Spirit

[5th Day of GIFmas] Saint Hoax Remixes The Weeknd's Hair

[6th Day of GIFmas} The Gift That Keeps on GIFing

[7th Day of GIFmas] A Swirling Holiday Rorschach Inkblot

[8th Day of GIFmas] Sasha Katz's Decked Out Computer

[9th Day of GIFmas] Santa's Dreaming of a White Russian