Tag Archives: Colchester

Research part 3 (Colchester)

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Recently, I went to Colchester for the day before Christmas (2/12/13) to do a little research. First I went to see Colchester Castle. Despite it was closed for the winter, so I look around the outside the castle and its area anyway.

Also, around the Colchester Castle area there was some statues with roman themes.

Some interesting facts about the castle from the wiki page:

  • The castle is built on the foundations (or the podium) of the earlier Roman temple of Claudius (built between AD 54–60).
  • Building began between 1069 and 1076 under the supervision of Eudo Dapifer, who became the castle’s steward on its completion. Building stopped in 1080 because of a threat of Viking invasion, but the castle was completed by around 1100. Many materials, such as Roman brick and clay taken from the Roman town, were used in the building and these can easily be seen.

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And finally went into Colchester itself (3 minute walk from the castle) and took some images what I might use as influence for my background drawings.

Photo-11_12_2013-19.03.10-16

All in all, a nice few hours day out of Colchester.

Bye.

Research time (part 1: the smart research)

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Its research time for my Fake Essex History animation project, and first I started to look at Horrible Histories with the Rotten Romans to basically give me a quick history lesson of the Roman Emperor in Britannia in the first century .

Horrible Histories

Then, I started to look at Time Team episodes from Essex, I was much inspired from the Colchester episode on how the Romans did in the first century and explain more on Colchester in the first century.

Time Team (Colchester)

Time Team (Southend)

Then, I watched the 1980′s TV show Chelmsford 123. The series was set in the Essex town of Chelmsford in the year AD 123, and concerned the power struggle between Roman governor Aulus Paulinus (Jimmy Mulville) and the British chieftain, Badvoc (Rory McGrath).

Chelmsford 123

Then, I watched Monty Python’s 1979 film Monty Python’s Life of Brian which tells the story of Brian Cohen, a young Jewish man who is born on the same day as, and next door to, Jesus Christ and is subsequently mistaken for the Messiah. And in one of the sketches, Michael Palin who played a character called Pontius Pilate who can not pronounce his R’s, talk about his friend Biggus Dickus.

Monty Python Biggus Dickus

After watching Python, I looked at French comic book Astérix, written by René Goscinny and illustrated by Albert Uderzo. Basically the comics are set in Roman times in France and follows the journey of Asterix and Obelix.

asterix

And below I’ve found on YouTube the 1967 animation movie Astérix and the Gauls:

Astérix and the Gauls (1967)

Next, I looked at Bob Godfrey’s animation work, for more on the story, which includes animations such as Henry’s Cat and the DIY Cartoon Kit. Which, was quite funny lies in each of his animations.

Henry’s Cat

DIY Cartoon Kit – teaser

In part 2 of my research next time out the Fake Essex stuff.

Bye