Surfacist.com is the portfolio website of Jonathan Weiss. Jon is a commercial artist specializing in digital motion graphics for screen, broadcast, and live performance. His work also includes digital compositing, color correction, and keying/rototscoping, as well as still photography, illustration, and graphic design. Jon lives and works in Pawlet, Vermont.

Want to talk about an upcoming project, or just say hello? Please get in touch: 183 VT Route 133, Pawlet, VT 05761 • jon(at)surfacist.com • 802-268-0022

What is a Surfacist?

Some years ago, while trying to explain my work to a colleague, I jokingly described my philosophy of design as a "surfacism." It's a made-up word, but it stuck, and surfacism has become a term that both describes and informs my work. As an animator, I am a specialist in 2.5 dimensional digital compositing-- I deal with flat planes, surfaces. But in a more figurative sense, I see all the visual work I produce as a surface. Often designers will talk about their craft as a process of organization, of laying out elements to optimize function. In this way of thinking, design takes on the characteristics of architecture. But unlike architecture, you can't experience work on screen by moving around it, or walking through it, or running your hands over it. This work is not so much like a building as it is like a reflection of a building in a pond, an image lacking depth: a surface. As you look at it, you evaluate it: is it beautiful? Ugly? Graceful? Awkward? All these aesthetic judgements are informed by our culture, our expectations, and our personal taste, but they are all passed on a simple visual impression that the artist is responsible for. Thinking about design this way, concept and execution are inseparable, and a strong concept, narrative, or visual effects technology can't function without equally strong visual craft. It's not just the story, it's how it is told.

Sound interesting? Drop me a line, I'd be glad to talk about it some more.