The Brilliant creative team blog

Dumb Ways to Die is a beautifully animated Melbourne Metro Trains transport safety ad which features colorful characters singing a catchy tune as they set fire to their hair, poke a stick at a grisly bear, get their toast out with a fork or use their private parts for piranha bait.

The video is also designed to demonstrate the danger and stupidity of playing on train platforms, tracks and level crossings by the myriad of other dumb ways to die.

The song is performed by Melbourne artist Tangerine Kitty, the song was produced by Cat Empire keyboards player Ollie McGill.

Along with the song and clip on iTunes and YouTube, Metro Trains are developing posters and announcements at stations and educational material for school students.

I was initially attracted to the website by the aesthetics of the design and intrigued by the multitude of cassettes on display.

After a few clicks I realised that Mixibits.com is simply a music sharing site dedicated to restoring the love for the old mix tape, It’s about finding music, compiling a tape and sharing with people.

I know there are many other sites that offer the same service as mixbits but by the shear genius of including cassette tapes as a visual medium makes it that much more awesome. It really takes me back to the good old days of recording tunes by holding up a tape deck to the radio and later on, badly mixed rave tapes on my £200 direct drive turntables and mixer with the sticky cross fader. Even the search function for some reason reminds me of flicking through my hefty vinyl collection.

MixBits.com.

We haven't had to many Christmas tunes playing in the studio this year, I think we are all a little sick of them to be honest, but it's not really Christmas without a them is it. If you're kind of feeling the same, why not check out these alternative Christmas mixes to get you in the spirit for the big day!

Benji Boko's - A very Christmassy remix mixtape

Marc Hype - The worlds second greatest Christmas tape

Enjoy :)

This is possibly one of the weirdest music videos I have seen since the Apex Twins 'Come to Daddy' video!

It's a wonderful concept, extremely well produced and involves monkey men playing instruments... what more could you ask for.

Liquid - Sweet Harmony

This video sparked off something amazing for me back in 1992 (wow, that really is a long time ago) as well as the memory of being berated by my parents for calling up The Box video channel to view it more than ten times. Watching this for the first time led me to the decision that I wanted a career that involved being creative.

I didn?t know how anyone could produce something so inspiring or what the job title would be of this awesome creator, but I wanted in. Knowing what you want to become at the age of eleven even in today?s society seems pretty crazy but I was awe struck, and not just by the messages, the pretty girl, location or the tune itself, it was the combination of audio, video and typography working together to form something bigger.

Watching it 19 years on it looks rather cheesy and shabby in places but it still gives me the overwhelming feeling of unlimited possibilities and the passion to explore them.

Fourth installment of the ?Up The Walls? project.

I?m not going to give you any clues on this one, well... apart from the fact it?s a Steven Spielberg film obviously.

OK... one clue, the film starred a rather young Christian Bale.

Third installment of the ?Up The Walls? project.

A film based around the rap, break dance, graffiti scene of the early 80?s.

The two scenes that really make this film for me are the battles between the ?New York City Breakers? (blue) and the ?Rock Steady Crew? (red)... see what I did there, blue over red, clashing... *sigh* never mind!

This was a big film for me when I was younger, although having watched it recently it seems to be a lot cheesier than I remember. Still, a great film was strong morality throughout.

Here is a Youtube clip from the film.

This is the second installment of my poster project.

I have been warned not to put this one up... downstairs toilet it is then. There?s 10 internet?s in it for you If you can guess the film correctly (not really too difficult is it).

Having moved last April to a new place we have finally finished decorating... phew!

That said the walls needed something, so I set myself the task of filling them. Minimally-detailed was the order and I set to work.

Designing artwork for your living room wall is kind of like designing a personal identity or website for yourself, you have tons of ideas, filter out the good ones, artwork, ?um and ah? over it, artwork again, leave it for a while and come back with fresh eyes, artwork some more, agonize uncontrollably until you?re sitting in front of something you feel you can live with for the foreseeable future.

With the project in full swing I thought I would share some of my hard work. This piece is a drastic rework of a movie poster and one of my favorite films.

As its an ongoing project I will hopefully be updating the series often and might be able to convince the other guys to allow some of them adorn the Brilliant walls!

As half the studio are currently expecting I thought that this amazing animation called ?Genese? by Ramos David depicting conception through to birth in a ?Right here, Right now? homage stylee, to be rather appropriate.

It really is a beautiful piece of work on a rather gross journey and certainly worth five minutes of your time.