Courtesy of our pals at The Animation Show we have four copies of the new dvd set of the ANIMATION SHOW Volumes 1 & 2 just out from Paramount and MTV Home Entertainment. The first four entrants that answered the question posted earlier today won one of these beauties.

CONTEST NOW CLOSED!
Our winners were Stewart Shaw of St. Albert, Alberta, Canada; Raymond Delgadillo of Pico Rivera, CA.; Ian Jones-Quartey of Brooklyn, NY; and George Col—n of Hayward, CA.

Not sure what’s better - the title of the blog or the actual blog itself. “Mary Blair Cannot Be Killed” is an irreverent but loving tribute to the lasting impact of Blair’s work. The site is new but there’s already lots of fun artwork by various contemporary animation artists including the piece above by Joe Orrantia. And just for the sake of posterity, let me reprint the wickedly cool blog intro here:

The night air stinking with the pungent aroma of perfume, gin and Lady Chesterfields, the celebrated Disney colorist, water color artist and illustrator terrorizes the night and kills everything she sees. Never in the history of the United States has a monster of such size and power, and horrifying hatred of man made itself known! Say your prayers because MARY BLAIR CAN NOT BE KILLED!

(via Thinking Animation Blog)

Last month we posted links to some vintage French and German animated commercials. Now here’s a here whole bunch of 1960s and ’70s animated commercials from Italy. And if you liked those, there’s a lot more ’60s spots at MondoCarosello.com including this Bruno Bozzetto one and some fun TV show bumpers. I didn’t really see many spots that had stand-out animation, but there’s some interesting design throughout, and considering how rare these are, they’re certainly worth a look.

(Thanks, Michael Pinto)

Today is a big day for our friends at the Animation Show. It marks both the theatrical premiere of their third edition as well as the release of the ANIMATION SHOW Volumes 1 & 2 Box Set. Mike Judge and Don Hertzfeldt deserve props for creating the Animation Show and providing a way for US animation fans to see quality animated shorts on the bigscreen.

The Animation Show has generously offered 4 boxed sets for us to give away to Cartoon Brew readers. We’ll ask a trivia question tomorrow morning, Wednesday, at 9am Pacific (12ET), and the first four people to answer correctly will each receive a set. The dvd is packed with tons of superb films including MT. HEAD, WHEN THE DAY BREAKS, WARD 13, HELLO, THE MEANING OF LIFE, GUARD DOG and ARIA. It also includes commentaries by Bill Plympton, Corky Quakenbush and Don Hertzfeldt, bonus materials for various shorts, and a mini-documentary about the history of the animated short.

The new theatrical edition premieres tonight in Santa Barbera and Seattle. It’s also playing this week in Boston, Portland, Tuscon and New Brunswick, NJ. For a complete list of cities, go HERE. Here’s the trailer for the third edition:

Files this one under “Commercials For People Who Can’t Get Enough Of Polar Express and Monster House.” Apparently the people who own the Orville Redenbacher popcorn brand feel they can boost sales if they reintroduce their dead pitchman as a grotesque Uncanny Valley-esque CG character. There’s an article in USA TODAY about the new spot along with a short clip. I love this quote from the ad agency guy: “We don’t want people to fall over and faint because Orville’s back.” Somehow, I doubt they’ll be experiencing that problem.

For the record, here’s the appealing real Mr. Redenbacher:

(via BoingBoing)

The first footage for Disney’s upcoming live-action/2d-animated film ENCHANTED has appeared online. A few seconds can be seen at the tail end of this unbelievably annoying Disney promo. Before anybody starts complaining about the generic designs though, bear in mind that the film is parodying these Disney stereotypes.The hand-drawn animation is being produced by James Baxter’s studio. Character designer Harald Siepermann has posted a page of his character designs for the film on his blog.

Jeff Jonas, an artist at Sony Online Entertainment and the the son of Golden Age animation artist Homer Jonas, has written some hilarious memories of working as a Hanna-Barbera copy boy in the 1970s when he was still a teenager. He offers a disclaimer in the piece:

Sorry these reminiscences are not politically correct, but the world was not PC back then. They smoked and swore and cursed. Some of the tough gals would call me Homer’s puppy, they said I needed a collar and leash…. all this through the cigarette smoke. Yikes… run away!

Still, I’d take Seventies H-B any day over the gloomy corporate boardroom vibe of contemporary LA animation studios. I can’t remember the last time I visited a studio in LA where I didn’t leave feeling depressed and blue.

Kip W has posted some amazing animation artifacts on Flickr: coverage of the 1941 Disney strike as reported in New York’s leftist daily paper PM. There’s some great cartoon drawings and photos (like the one above) in the articles. Kip initially posted these in Cartoon Brew’s Animation History Archive group on Flickr. Feel free to join - lots of folks are sharing stuff from their collections as we unearth rare cartoon history together.