In the past, many have inquired about documenting the construction of his ships using time lapse photography. The problem was that his toothpick liners were so big and took so long to build, that keeping a camera steady for years at a time would have been impossible. Then one day, as luck would have it, Wayne was commissioned to build a 45 inch model of the SS Algonquin schooner for the Village of Algonquin IL celebrating 150 years of incorporation. Being a web programming knowing how to build small animated gifs, Wayne built small spinning graphics before, but nothing like a large screen movie. With the exception of his cell phone and disposable cameras, he never owned a real camera in his life!

Enlisting the help of his ship photographer and friend Ed Lines Jr., the artist was given a quick lesson in shutters and exposures and how to take a picture. Using a borrowed Nikon and tripod, Wayne took 4200 photos of the entire construction of the Algonquin, including close ups, moving he camera, experimenting with camera angles to accent different phases of construction. He compiled them 100 at a time using his Ubuntu box, then converting each segment to an MP4. The MP4 segments would be sewn together with a cheap video editor. It became clear in the beginning that certain repetitive parts had to be sped up to avoid a useer turning the video off. As a time lapse, the video would run for almost an hour. When the artist sped up the frame rate, it became more of a stop action animation that a piece by piece time lapse. Suddenly, there were now other possibilities, and other things to replicate with toothpcks other than ocean liners.

Being a musician as well as artist, Wayne felt washed up as a guitarist. He did not want to join another band and keep flogging the same dead horse as he seen other along the way. In the afterglow of the Algonquin, he started to plan his NEW rock band Wood Zeppelin, a band like the Archies, a cartoon with real musicians playing it's music. He build a series of small characters of toothpicks and wire. They could contort and flex like a human being. He also built a dog. Through a series of 3 motion tests, the artist learned how stablize light and animate characters and their movements. With every test, an enormous amount of progress can be seen lighting, motion, instruments, props and backgrounds. Motion test 1 was an animatin of a dog and small human characters skipping rope. Motion test 2 saw the first large scale human character and an animated drum set. Motion test 3 introduced green screen effects, new animated backgrounds with foregrounds and new Wood zeppelin characters enteracting with musical equipment.

It took a whole year to get to this point, but now Wayne Kusy is going to create his first pilot video powered by Wood Zeppelin and a whole lotta toothpicks.