Dear Sesame Street,

We, the undersigned, would like to register our concern over the contest you are now conducting with Aniboom. We are concerned that your contest includes a solicitation of original design concepts, characters and content to be produced on a speculative basis by cartoonists, artists, motion designers and animators.

This approach, requesting new and original work to be created in competition, is one that we believe seriously compromises the quality of work that is entered into “competition” and is questionable, at best, for a reputable organization to request.

Sesame Street has long been a highly esteemed provider of educational programming for children. From its inception, it has shown respect and support for the independent animation, film, and design communities. Artists have responded by creating lasting work – that is as valuable for children and adults today as when it was first created. We applaud that work, and hope that Sesame Street will continue to push the fields of animation and film-making. As such, we also think that Sesame Street should uphold the ethics and professional behavior we’d like our own children to grow up with. Is the education we want to pass on to them that artists’ and animators’ work is not valuable? That the only way to ‘make it’ is through winning a contest?

There is a more appropriate way to explore the work of various artists. A more effective and ethical approach to commission new work is to ask a pool of talent to submit examples of their work from previous assignments as well as a statement of how they would approach your project. You can then judge the quality of the artist’s previous work and her way of thinking about your project. The artist you select can then begin to work on your project by designing an original solution to your criteria while under contract to you, without having to work on speculation up front.

Design should not be a one-way street, with artists creating work in a vacuum. We believe the best design, art and content comes at the request of a specific brief, mission or client. Speculative design competitions and processes result in superficial assessments of the project at hand that are not grounded in a client’s specific needs. Art always has something to say.

There are few professions where all possible candidates are asked to do the work first, allowing the buyer to choose which one to compensate for their efforts. (Just consider the response if you were to ask a dozen lawyers to write a brief for you, from which you would then choose which one to pay!) We realize that there are some creative professions with a different set of standards, such as advertising and architecture, for which billings are substantial and continuous after you select a firm of record. In those cases, you are not receiving the final outcome (the advertising campaign or the building) for free up front as you would be in receiving an original film or character design.

There are many artists, animators and cartoonists who can provide you with original and highly creative new work that will far exceed your expectations, with respect for an appropriate budget and schedule. We can think of dozens off of the tops of our heads who we’re sure would love to work with Sesame Street. And we’d would love to point you in their direction.

We believe that “leveraging the power of the web” is an exciting prospect and casting a wide net can quickly provide many interesting results. But we think that more considered curation and the selection of applicants whose goals may be more closely aligned with your own can provide better results.

It’s your contest, though and you are free run it as you wish. But you will do so without our participation.

Your consideration of these professional issues is greatly appreciated.

Sincerely,
Cartoon Brew
Motionographer

See the full list of document signers and how to put your name on the list after the jump. (UPDATE: Over 200 people have now signed the letter.)

Read the rest of this entry »

Did you know that Adventure Time creator Pen Ward drinks Shasta Cola in the bathtub? How about that Sony animator Kim Hazel wants a remote control airplane? Or that even Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane can’t get decent customer service from AT&T? If you love useless minutiae about the lives of other people, Twitter can fulfill those needs.

Animation artists are beginning to join the site in significant numbers, though at the moment the number of graphic designers and illustrators using the service seems to outweigh the number of animators. If you’re just getting started with Twitter, here’s our list of twenty-two animation Twitterers who are worth following, as well as three feeds that are related to Cartoon Brew and the Brewmasters. Feel free to share your suggestions for twittering animators in the comments.

Read the rest of this entry »

One-man creative powerhouse Dax Norman, whose short film The Last Temptation of Crust we featured in episode 4 of Cartoon Brew TV, recently completed a fan music video for the Rafter song “Juicy.” The video employs a style he calls “double-image animation” in which he fits dozens of different characters into the shapes of the primary characters. The result is trippy and one you’ll have to watch at least a few times to catch all the craziness.

I also have to share a non-animation art piece that Dax recently posted on his blog: it’s called Super Mario Coke Head. Recycling has never been this much fun:

It’s Monday and that means another new episode of Cartoon Brew TV. Today’s offering is The Last Temptation of Crust by Dax Norman. We knew we had to offer this short on Brew TV the moment we saw it. It’s a unique vision in computer animation that one doesn’t run across often. Watch it on Cartoon Brew TV.

Today offering on Cartoon Brew TV is The Last Temptation of Crust, a graduation film created by Dax Norman at Ringling School of Art and Design. It’s a CG short quite unlike any other that we’ve seen recently, and is directed with an assured sensibility that brings grittiness and cartooniness into the world of computer animation.

Dax Norman’s creative endeavors don’t end with this short film. In fact, he can’t stop creating, whether it’s bowling pin characters (buy them here), paintings, psychedelic animation tests and various artistic experiments. His home on the Internet is DaxNorman.com.

Dax Norman will be participating in the comments section so if you have any questions for him, feel free to ask. We also asked Dax to give us background on the project. Here, in the filmmaker’s own words, is everything you need to know about The Last Temptation of Crust:

It is a true honor to be included on Brew TV, thank you so much. This website is an invaluable tool for animation artists and fans alike.

I’d like to tell a bit about where “The Last Temptation of Crust” came from. This tome, as wacky as it may seem, is based on a true story, so I will begin at the “First Temptation of Crust.”

It was less than a year before I was to start production on my senior thesis at Ringling School of Art and Design, in Sarasota, Florida. As I was walking home from school I noticed something glowing. This object that caught my eye would later capture my imagination. Sitting on a bus stop bench, with a streetlight shining upon it, was a perfectly pristine piece of cherry pie, encapsulated in a clear to-go box.

Here is where most people would say they looked around, wondering if anyone was watching, or if it was some kind of trap. I guess that’s just not the kind of person I am. I inhaled the pie. It was absolutely scrumptious.

One of the factors that might have contributed to this automatic response I had to the pie would be my love for food, and more particular, free food, as anyone who witnessed me trolling all of the free pizza events at Ringling can surely attest.

So after this happened, I went about my walk home, and thought little of it.

Only a day later, in my concept development class, I was called upon by my teacher, Jamie Deruyter, to tell the class a nugget of story that could possibly be good for an animation. So of course I told about the pie. Everyone reacted favorably to the story and that is when I realized it could be a viable idea. Basically, it is a man vs. self-situation, where the character decides whether to eat the pie, or not.

The next semester was pre-production; this is when I began creating storyboards, character designs, and an animatic that would form what was to become “The Last Temptation of Crust” the next year.

Brent Lewis, a classmate, came up with the title. “The Last Temptation of Crust” perfectly encapsulated what I wanted to say in this story, and almost acts as a concept statement in and of itself, as well as being an ironic play on the Martin Scorsese movie title.

During the course of the year, the story kept evolving and mutating during production. My wife actually came up with the idea for the band-aid part, which was spectacular. Once I built Frank Finkerton, the protagonist, in 3D, he took on a life of his own. I was just having fun thinking of ways he could become sloppier.

I really wanted to limit the dialogue and try to tell the story with little words. Frank Finkerton makes lots of noises, but only says two words.

The look of the film was also very important to me. I had not really seen any gritty CG environments, so that is something I wanted to shoot for. Everything I have seen in CG is too clean and shiny for my sensibilities. Animation is an exaggeration of real life, so I wanted to portray the world based on how I see it. Unfortunately, the world Frank Finkerton lives in is not an exaggeration; I would routinely find band-aids, old socks and discarded lobsters on my walk home from school. I looked heavily at the paintings of Edward Hopper, and the photography of William Eggleston for reference and inspiration.

Last but not least, a few words on the character, Frank Finkerton. My goal was to make a character that I could imagine existing outside of this one isolated story. In my favorite movie, “The Big Lebowski,” the Coen Brothers do this perfectly and I think that is a reason why the film is so beloved.

I sought to make a character that is not idealized in any way. Frank is basically a likeable goofball, but he thinks he is the coolest guy in town. He is a legend in his own mind. The biggest compliment I would get, upon seeing Finkerton, is that people would say, “I used to know a guy like him.”

Originally, Frank was conceived as an odd amalgam of Bill Murray’s Big Ern from Kingpin, Randy Quaid’s cousin Eddie from Christmas Vacation, and R. Crumb. Around the time I had started animating the piece, however, I found a book in the Ringling Library that blew my mind, “Wolvertoons” by Basil Wolverton. This was a major revelation to me, and no doubt would partially form the way Frank would act. I even made a drawing after I was finished, of Frank Finkerton in Wolverton’s style, as homage.

His actual movements, oddly enough, were subconsciously inspired by my own. My wife says she sees a lot of the way I act in him.

The actual production for the short was 6-7 months long and included modeling, texturing, rigging, layout, animation, lighting, rendering and compositing. I did all of this for “The Last Temptation of Crust” myself, but with considerable guidance and advice from my teacher, Keith Osborn, as well as classmates and all of the Ringling Faculty. The talented Neil Anderson-Himmelspach composed the original score for the short.

My next CG short that I recently started modeling characters for, continues where “The Last Temptation of Crust” leaves off. Frank Finkerton heads into the bowling alley seen in the short. Finkerton will aim to win the affections of an unknowing lady at the lanes. It will be called “Llavarse los Manos” (To Wash the Hands).