Just walked in the door from all day at Asifa-Hollywood’s first 2-D Expo.It was a blast - and for us, a big success. I just want to thank all the panelists and exhibitors who showed up - Stuart Ng, Steven Silver, Bob Harper, Eric Goldberg, John Andrews, Mr. Lawrence, Scott Shaw, Mark Kausler, Milton Knight, The Animation Show, Bert Klein, Jim Capobianco, Raul Garcia, Rita Street, Tom Sito, Carole Crowe, Eric Holman to name but a few… there are too many people to thank. Special kudos to Amid Amidi and Antran Manoogian, as well as all our volunteers, who deserve our thanks for a spectacular day.

This is a re-post and update on the Asifa-Hollywood 2-D EXPO which Amid and I will participate in tomorrow, Saturday, June 26th, in Burbank.Please come! The 2-D EXPO is a day full of panels, screenings and discussions on the current state of traditional (aka hand drawn) animation. Confirmed panelists & guests include Eric Goldberg, Shane Glines, Raul Garcia, Mark Kausler, Ronnie Del Carmen, Bert Klein, Tom Sito, Jim Capobianco, Eddie Mort, Lili Chin, Jorge Gutierrez and Gabe Swarr. Amid Amidi, Rita Street, Tom Sito and I will be moderating panels. Panels cover topics such as “2-D THE NEXT DIRECTION”, “FLASH ANIMATION”, “DOING IT YOURSELF”, “DISTRIBUTION” and “NETWORK PROGRAMMING”.In the evening we will be presenting a program of UNSOLD PILOTS with Scott Shaw!, Micah Wright, Mr. Lawrence, Rusty Mills and others. There will be a networking area with a few exhibitors, including bookseller Stuart Ng, animators Stephen Silver and Bob Harper, Digicel, The Animation Show and an Asifa booth which will take consignments, selling artists sketch books and artist materials.All of this starts at 9am on Saturday June 26, 2004 - and keeps going on till 9:00pm on the Burbank campus of WOODBURY UNIVERSITY 7500 Glenoaks Blvd. (Buena Vista & Glenoaks). Admission prices for the panels vary: Asifa Members $20. Students $15., Networking area is free admission.Join us! It’s going to be fun. Please check the Asifa website for more info. If you’d like to help us out, be on panels, sell sketch books or volunteer your time to this event, contact me directly jbeck6540@aol.com and I’ll point you in the right direction.

Wow, here’s a HUGE LOAD OF PHOTOS from this year’s Annecy Animation Festival. They’re courtesy of Joseph Gilland, a fine chap who I hung out with at the festival. He’s a veteran animation artist who was visual FX supervisor on LILO & STITCH and now heads the 2D and digital character animation programs at Vancouver Film School. His festival photos cover everything from the town of Annecy to the people, the parties and the final awards ceremony. I took only a fraction of the photos that Joe took, and I’m too lazy to post them, but here’s a shot of me sandwiched between two superb talents - Peter de Sève (left) and Bill Plympton.

Excerpted from today’s Daily Variety:

“DodgeBall” star Vince Vaughn has gotten Warner Bros. revved up again about “Speed Racer,” a live- action adaptation of the Japanese cartoon series. Project casts him in the role of Racer X.”Speed Racer” has remained a viable title at the studio, despite a decade of false starts. The pic almost got to the starting line with such directors as Gus Van Sant, Hype Williams, Alfonso Cuaron and Julien Temple — the latter of whom had Johnny Depp ready to star before the vehicle stalled because the budget was too high. Vaughn revived it by pitching a streamlined take that concentrated more on character and a family angle than budget-busting race scenes.
“I’ve been a fan of the show since I was a kid and I always liked the theme of the protective older brother who can’t reveal his identity,” Vaughn said.

Nice new interview with Mike Judge HERE.

Two interesting articles at AWN.com. First, a very useful SURVEY by Chris Robinson that asks independent animators a simple, yet crucial, question: “Where do you find the money to finance your films?” This should really become a regular series on AWN or somewhere else. Next is an ARTICLE by Deanna Morse, who was on the selection committee of this year’s recently concluded Zagreb Animafest (incidentally, another animation festival which I attended while in Europe and that I’ll write about shortly). She shares her experience of having to go through 1,500 entries in two weeks to come up with the 245 films which screened at the festival. One of the most interesting parts of the piece is where Deanna highlights “common tendencies” in the festival entries and creates a list of the recurring themes and characters in the short films that she saw.

Will Campbell has a funny story at blogging.la about working with the late Lorenzo Music, the animated voice of GARFIELD, at a suicide prevention center in the late-’80s. He presents a compelling case for why voice actors might want to think twice before volunteering as crisis counselors. [UPDATE: Mark Evanier, who produced the GARFIELD TV series, confirms and adds to the story about Lorenzo's volunteer work at NewsfromME.com]

Last time I saw Seamus Walsh and Mark Caballero, genius founders of stop motion studio Screen Novelties International, they were telling me about this wacky project they’re working on that involved producing stop motion tests of Hitler, Mussolini and robots. I didn’t quite know what to make of it, but it sounded intriguing to say the least. Now Harry Knowles at Aint It Cool News has a big PREVIEW of the project-in-development, called AUTOMATONS, from the perspective of the writers: Ed Solomon (MEN IN BLACK, LEVITY) and Chris Matheson (BILL & TED’S EXCELLENT ADVENTURE). And if it’s anything like Harry is saying it’s going to be, this could be one of the most outlandish and subversive animated features in years. You can bet I’ll be bugging Seamus and Mark to show me some of the animation tests for this project next time I see them.