Invasion of the Color Snatchers

Last quarter, a group of students at Portfolio Center was put together to create a unique back to school display for Prismacolor Products at a local art supply store, Binders. As we sorting through all of our various ideas and concepts, someone suggested "Invasion of the Color Snatchers" as a joke. Surprisingly, we all loved it and latched onto it. Like the zombie baseball bat idea, the idea that was presented as a joke is the one that sticks because it is crazy and different. 

The story behind it became a post-apocalyptic future where the world has been invaded by horrid color consuming creatures from outer space known as the Color Snatchers. 

A quick concept I did for the aliens. Their design was inspired by Prismacolor pencil sharpeners.

The only way to defeat the Color Snatchers and restore color to the world is with products that can be found within the Prismacolor supply depot in the center of the store. The supply depot was put together using shrapnel and wreckage by a band of renegades in order to keep the Prismacolor products safe. 

Another concept I did to sell the idea to the owner of Binders.

In the end we only had about two days to put the whole thing together. It was a crazy two days filled with lots of coffee and no sleep for all of us. All we really had to work with was foam core, cardboard, spray paint, wire and trash bags. We also made propaganda posters to call the people to action against the aliens as well as newspapers to spread around the store to help tell the backstory. It was a crazy couple days but we all had a blast. 

My set design and building skills came in handy

 The aliens had foam core and wire bases and trash bag skins

This is me hot gluing the final letters on...I need a haircut

A dead drone

Inside the supply depot 

The entrance to the supply depot... under attack  

I took some videos of the process and slapped them together to music. Mostly interesting if you are my mother. 

Invasion of the Color Snatchers from Michael Schwalm on Vimeo.

It all turned out pretty cool. I wish we had more time and resources to make it look even more like my concept but I am pretty sure that that is how every project I ever work on will turn out. 

Me with one of my babies... after a haircut.