Gravenhurst’s Nightwatchman’s Blues / Farewell, Farewell – limited edition (1300 only) double A-side, double 7″ pack, in handprinted, numbered, fold-out poster created by Thomas Hicks

CR readers may recognise the name of director Thomas Hicks - he was one of our second Warp Records competition winners (CR June 2005) in which he won the opportunity to direct a film to a track by Gravenhurst entitled I Turn My Face To The Forest Floor. Now, three years later, it gives us an enormous sense of well being to hear that Hicks is still working with Gravenhurst – and to see this, their latest collaboration…

Back of 7″ package number 208

Hicks has recently completed a new stopframe animated promo for Gravenhurst track Nightwatchman’s Blues – one of four songs that appear on a just-released limited edition seven inch single which comes packaged in a unique, numbered, hand printed foldout poster sleeve – also created by Hicks (shown above).

In fact, each of the 1300 limited edition poster sleeves displays the handprinted artwork of one frame of the promo. “I made a series of hand block prints,” explains Hicks,” each one would be folded to make a sleeve for one of the 1300 limited singles.

Unfolded poster sleeves

Printing blocks used to print each poster

“This series was designed to animate,” Hicks continues, “so when the 1300 frames were photographed and run in sequnce it is very simple animation to make a promo.”

Here are some images Hicks sent CR of his studio set up for this job and, finally, the finished promo:

Gravenhurst - Nightwatchman’s Blues from Thomas Hicks on Vimeo

View this and more of Hicks’ work on his Vimeo page: vimeo.com/user269192