David Firth, Fat-Pie
"Crime is a shit that needs wiping out"
“Crime is a shit that needs wiping out”. Not your usual tagline for a superhero but David Firth’s series of dark and comic cartoons, including net crusader Burnt Face Man, have built up such a following on www.fat-pie.com that he was commissioned by the BBC and Charlie Brooker to do a series of animated skits for BBC 4′s Screenwipe.
His work often contains a large amount of abusive language and dark imagery and tends to explore topics of a disturbing or surreal nature, such as depression and mental illness. Some of his work may be described as dark humor, while much of it is very much experimental and surreal.
Firth, only 26, picked up his first video camera aged 13 and has been making movies since. Website fat-pie was created almost ten years ago and Firth has been prolific in posting his wares.
His prowess with Flash and cleverly making use of his skill in claymation combines darkly comic wit with perhaps some chemical aids, to create thought-provoking, disturbing and poetic cartoons and images combined with his own self-penned music to compliment his tones.
He later moved onto Macromedia Director and continues to create cartoons made completely of his own drawings.
Firth has since produced whole series of mini-documentaries about his mate Devvo, a stereotypical chav character, played by his friend and collaborater Christian “Chrust” Pickup. The mockumentaries follow the day-to-day lifestyle of an ASBO youth doing all the stuff you’d expect whilst producing an acerbic tapestry of anti-social Britain. The character was so popular that he has appeared on Channel 4′s hilariously awful show Whatever! As well as many other media appearances.
Firth’s inclusion on the Newgrounds website proved his big break as the third episode of ultra-creepy Salad Fingers cartoon featured on it’s front page. He went from getting 50 – 100 hits per day to well over 13,000, bringing him to the attention of the Beeb’s arts department.
His cartoon series Burnt Face Man follows a hapless superhero who’s powers are rather limited and who ends up causing more crime than he prevents. Cartoon Jerry Jackson is written in idiom and is once of the most un PC things you’ve ever seen.
Firth has branched out and makes electronic music under the pseudonym Locust Toybox, indie music as part of the Grape Digging Sharon Fruits. Mostly inspired by the music of Aphex Twin, tracks are available for free download on his website.
Deeply troubling, wildly amusing, creative and sometimes just plain wrong; immensely talented Firth has created an outstanding platform in his fat-pie website to launch his work into the mainstream
