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POSTS FOR “May, 2009“Cartoon Brew's home for up-to-the-minute, unedited announcements and press releases direct from industry sources.
May 14, 2009 1:30 pm
I was, and still am, a huge fan of Dreamworks Kung Fu Panda. But the announcement today of the a new Nickelodeon TV series based on the movie has saddened me. If ever there was a character with the potential to fuel a series of theatrical sequels, it’s Po. I don’t expect Jack Black to be providing the voice and personality of the character for the TV version. A TV series poised to appear before the second film (now in production) seems like a business decision based more on a way to make some fast cash, rather than a sincere effort to nurture a worthy property. Going to series doesn’t neccesarily negate the possibility of further theatricals, but it sure cheapens the franchise. Couldn’t Nick have been simply based a series on the Panda’s co-stars, The Furious Five? 34 Comments » posted in Ideas/Commentary, TV 
May 14, 2009 1:00 am
One person who doesn’t need a plug on Cartoon Brew is Mo Willems. Successful animator turned popular children’s book author, Willems now returns to animation with two new short films based on his books. This Saturday afternoon at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art in Amherst, Mass. Mo will be premiering two new animated shorts based on his books, produced by Weston Woods: Don’t Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus! – animated by Pete List with Willems voicing the Pigeon and Jon Scieszka as the Bus Driver; and Knuffle Bunny Too – animated by Karen Villarreal with the voices of Willems, his wife and daughter as the family. For more info on this Saturday’s film screening and book signing, go to the museum’s website. 4 Comments » posted in Animators, Books, Events
May 13, 2009 7:31 pm
Canadian animation studio Fatkat has shut its doors. The studio employed 100 people at its peak providing service work on shows like Skunk Fu!, Chaotic, and SuperNormal. Studio founder Gene Fowler has posted a long blog entry with information about the closure. In the post, Fowler says that he and a few of his friends are gathering together to launch a new studio called Loogaroo, located in Miramichi, the same city as Fatkat. The story of the studio’s shutdown is more complicated than it appears. In his post, Fowler blames the production of a new series called Three Delivery, calling it the “most demanding and torturous production I have ever seen,” and says his “heart goes out” to the crew that had to work on the show. That show was created by Larry Schwarz (Kappa Mikey), who runs the New York studio Animation Collective, which as you may recall, was having its own problems paying artists a few months back. Additionally, this CBC article from a few weeks ago offers juicy details about Fatkat’s finances. It says that the Canadian government had awarded over $1 million in grants to Fatkat since 2005, but had decided to withdraw its funding in the past few weeks because “Fatkat does not have the revenue stream it had anticipated.” 34 Comments » posted in Business, Fatkat
May 13, 2009 10:27 am
It never fails to excite me when I see a student film by somebody who gets it. And 23-year-old David Ochs plainly and clearly gets it. Who’s Hungry? is his freshman(!) film at CalArts, and it’s confident to the hilt. The film, a gory take on the tale of “Hansel and Gretel,” grabs your attention immediately and doesn’t loosen its grip until the credits appear at the end. Before we go any further, watch the film: Christopher Meeks, his story teacher at CalArts, has written a blog post with some fascinating details about the film:
Meeks also offers insights about the year-end CalArts Producers’ Show screening and the risk that David took by making the film:
If you’re curious about how the film plays to an audience, watch this recording of the raucous reaction it received at one of the school’s student screenings. ‘Nuff said. 90 Comments » posted in Shorts, Student
May 13, 2009 10:15 am
As a follow-up to Amid’s post yesterday on Disney’s Pinocchio trade ad, David Lesjak (who runs two of the best Disneyana blogs on the web: Toons At War and Vintage Disney Collectibles) sent us this double page trade ad from 1932 (click thumbnails below to read at full size). “Attached is an ad which appeared in the October 1, 1932 edition of the Motion Picture Herald. I downloaded the images a long time ago from Steve Geppi’s Diamond Galleries “Scoop” e-newsletter. It shows that as early as 1932 Walt Disney was publicly providing the names of those who worked at the Studio, even going as far to list the names of the women who worked in the “Tracing and Painting Dep’t,” as well as staff in the “Reference Library” and “Music Library.”   Interesting to note the copy running along the bottom of the ad: “To produce a single Mickey Mouse or Silly Symphony requires full time of this organization for two weeks.” Only two weeks? In each department? Animation alone took three or four weeks, even then. Can anyone clarify what that line meant? 12 Comments » posted in Disney
May 13, 2009 8:22 am
The 17th annual edition of Anima Mundi, South America’s largest animation festival, is coming up this July in Rio and São Paulo. The deadline for short film submissions has already passed, but they are still accepting entries for Web and cell phone animated works. The festival is progressive in its embrace of new media and has been running both of these categories for a number of years. Marcos Magalhaes, one of the co-founders of Anima Mundi, tells me that, “The Anima Mundi Web contest is celebrating its 10th edition (being one of the first of its kind on the Internet) and Anima Mundi Cell is in its fifth year. Both contests are very popular and disputed among Brazilian animators (open to beginners and professionals) but we want more international submissions this year!” If you’ve created recent work for the Internet or cell phones, the festival will accept submissions until May 25. Entries can conveniently be uploaded online to their server. Rules and on-line entry forms for both competitions are available on their website AnimaMundi.com.br. 3 Comments » posted in Events, Internet/Blogs
May 13, 2009 12:57 am
Juxtaposed by Alex Myung, one of the films that I’d highlighted in last week’s review of the SVA student screening, has been posted online. In the YouTube description, Alex writes, “This is a personal story and serves as a depiction of my experiences in dealing with my own adoption and acceptance of others.” He also has a blog at TheLemonFish.blogspot.com. 13 Comments » posted in Shorts, Student
May 13, 2009 12:49 am
This is one of the most sage pieces of filmmaking advice I’ve ever run across:
Who said it? Architect Frank Lloyd Wright. He offered this golden nugget to Disney artists during his visit to the studio in the 1939. Historian Wade Sampson has written a nice article—“Why Frank Lloyd Wright Disliked Fantasia“—which appears at MousePlanet.com. And here is the link to the transcript of Wright’s entire Disney talk. |
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