Freez Black

Here is Kassatly Chtaura's new AD to introduce the new flavor Freez Black. Working on the sexy concepts of Nathalie Masri is always fun and daring in the advertising world. Our projects are turning into pleasure specially with Fouad Mezher, Ashley Choukeir and Karim Kneisser. I think we are building an ideal team, at least for me :)

much love for all the effort and trust.

Client: Kassatly Chtaura - Freez

Creative: Nathalie Masri
Illustration: David Habchy & Fouad Mezher
Character Animation: Ashley Choukeir
Layout Design & Animation: David Habchy

Music : Karim Kneisser

Puppet Making for Stop Motion

Last month, I lived one of the most intensive and charming weeks of my life. I had the chance to give a workshop in Puppet making for animation where i met nine of the most inspiring artists from Lebanon and the arab world. It all happened within Beirut Animated Festival, in its second edition, organized by Cinema Metropolis and Samandal Magazine.

The participants had different backgrounds; printmaking, illustration, 2D and 3D animation, music, cinema ... and this mixture gave a great potential to start the workshop with.

The schedule of the workshop was so challenging; we had to finish 9 puppets with all their accessories, decide on a story, do the storyboard and move to the animation part, editing and music.

How to do all these tasks in one week with participants who are not all familiar with puppet making and stop motion animation ?

Above these limitations, something unexpected happened; a great group energy multiplied our efforts. We used to work till 5 am in the morning, take shifts sometimes, reschedule everything for one reason; we love what we do. We kept enjoying our time till the last minute of the workshop and we finished the movie just before the screening schedule of the festival.

The movie was short but with great potential and a lot of love.

I learned a lot from this workshop. Now i really believe that everything is possible when you meet the right people.

Thanks everyone for believing in this project and i hope we ll have the chance one more time to rock ...

Please watch the Short movie we did and the workshop process.

Workshop Moderator: David Habchy
Assistants : Ashley Choukeir, Nadim Saoma.
Participants:
Lama Sawaya
Nour Bishouty
Ahmad Beiruty
Avak Avakian
Elie Maatouk
Salam Al Hassan
Nadia Rais
Ghalia Al Barghouthi
Mohamed Fathi

The workshop took place in two amazing animation studios in Lebanon; La Palma & Kurio motion studios.

Thanks to Sarah Maali and Joelle Kiame for their great help :)

Thanks to AFAC for funding this workshop.

Wehde - 1

Last saturday, i was on my way from Beirut to Egypt when i saw in Virgin Megastore Tania Saleh's new album "Wehde" shining as the number one most selling album :)

It feels so good after all the hard work, to be appreciated by the audience.

Thanks everyone for suporting Lebanese artists' efforts .

Tania Saleh - Wehde Music CD

For many reasons, this is one of my favorite projects i did so far. It s the Music CD of Tania Saleh's new album "Wehde". I m a big fan of Tania's music; when i discovered her first album, i kept looping the songs specially "habibi khelsoo l dafater" that i adore. Now, here i am designing her new album.

Thanks Tania for the opportunity and for believing in me :)

The Design process of the CD was not that easy. When we started brainstorming, Tania, William Choukeir and me, we wanted to create an experience throughout the CD, a journey where you discover a hidden world. William designed this brilliant package that brings a music CD out of its borders.

This unfolding act leads to a panoramic format. It s perfect for the Wehde scene on the corniche of Beirut where all the lebanese citizens from different backgrounds are gathered.

Tania and Maria Ghazzaoui went to the corniche and took many pictures as a reference for the coming steps.

I used some of the photos, distorted them and later added some illustrations to create the characters like the yanaseeb guy.

Aalia is my favorite character in the CD and it started from this sketch and later i added some newspaper texture and some colors.

All the other illustrations in the CD started with pencil drawings and edited later digitally. i photographed as well a lot of papers as a base for the illustrations.

some parts are done separately and combined into one composition digitally.

The cover and back cover, was based on a photo for Tania Saleh by the amaziiiing photographer Tanya Traboulsi. The styling goes to Petra Abou Sleiman, a pretty lady with a great sense of "zo2". I did some color correction for the photos so they fit the CD atmosphere and added some pencil drawings and paper cuts on top.

Here is a preview of most of the album. But this is not to be compared with the feeling of the printed CD. so GO BUY IT ! :D

Tania Saleh's CD is available in all Virgin Megastores and in case you don't find it, just wait few days and you ll get it coz the CD is being sold like crazy and it s now # 2 best selling after Feiruz :)

Tania Saleh - Wehde Website

Hello jami3an,

I proudly present for you Tania Saleh's new website, designed for her new album "Wehde" :)

George Rouhana is the interactive designer behind this amazing website. Tania, George and me had long discussions about how to design the website and the mixture of George' logic, practicality and great sense of design and animation along with Tania's conceptual, artistic background and the love for details was a great platform for my illustrations to grow. I m lucky again and again to work with these people, work is not really work anymore ...

Tania Saleh live in concert at Pierre Abou Khater Thater, USJ, Damascus road, May 5 & 6 at 9 pm. you can't miss it :)