Don’t let the title of this post scare you. We haven’t started stalking any animation artists (not yet at least). Thanks to Apartment Therapy, everybody can have a (legal) peek into the quintessentially midcentury LA home of Seonna Hong, who is currently the art director of Nick’s The Mighty B and has done background painting on My Life as a Teenage Robot, Powerpuff Girls and Teacher’s Pet, among other shows.

Here is a message from Treat Studios co-founder Matt Layzell:

Thanks very much for the attention but we’re not actually connected to the film director Danny Boyle. We are a new animation studio based in London although Daniel Boyle, who works in our team, is a talented animator and illustrator from Kingston University, where we all met. Its easy to see where the mistake has been made and we’re not sure how this rumor got started but just wanted to clear it up. Thanks again for posting us on the site as I am a regular reader of cartoon brew and hope your readers will still want to check out our films.

Danny Boyle, director 28 Days Later, Trainspotting and this year’s early Oscar frontrunner Slumdog Millionaire, has started an independent animation studio with five young and talented British animators: Julia Pott, Robin Bushell, Will Crook, Matt Layzell and Alex Robinson. It’s a little unclear as to why he’s chosen to align himself with these particular artists or what they’re planning to do, but they recently posted a Halloween viral (see below) to promote themselves. Their website TreatStudios.com offers nothing at the moment except a playful bit of animation about trees and paper.

According to /film, Boyle had previously tried to create an animated project but gave up, telling the Hollywood Reporter: “You talk about indie financing being troublesome — animation is so expensive because you can’t estimate how long its going to take. On most films, if you haven’t stopped after 12 weeks, they’re going to stop you anyway, whereas an animated film can go on for years and years.”

Also interesting is this comment from Boyle to ComingSoon.net in which he talks about how animation is a “weird different discipline” because it means he has to give up some of his control to the process:

“It’s a weird different discipline, it’s very strange. You’re more like a ringmaster, kind of organizing this huge army of illustrators who can change the movie. It’s really weird. They often do scripts and they have no gags in them at all, but then you see the finished film and it’s full of funny gags, and they say that it’s not in the script, that all comes through the process of the animators. It’s like learning the skill of letting certain ones of them off their leash to do the gags.”

(Thanks, Rohit Iyer)

Not enough people talk about animation budgets and salaries and I think that’s a shame. It’s hard to produce good work without knowing what it costs to make something. Brad Graeber, creator of Captain Capitalism, was faced with this situation recently and decided to actually do something about it. For the past year, he’s been researching animation budgets and has created this unbelievably useful interactive animation budget chart that shows animation budgets from the 1920s through today. The graph allows you to view production costs by minute, second, foot and frame. Brad writes a lot more about the project on his blog. Hopefully this spurs even greater discussion in the industry, especially about music video, commercial and Flash animation budgets, which seems to be where a lot of people underprice themselves nowadays. Brad has provided a super-valuable service for professionals and students alike and we should all thank him.

I’m really digging the video for Autokratz’s “Stay the Same” directed by Laurie Thinot and animated by Gustavo Almenara. It’s an oddly entrancing mixture of infographics and illustration-like images set against a white background. The director Thinot recently signed on to Partizan Lab for commercial repping. More of Thinot’s work can be seen on her YouTube page.

Twenty-two years later, Luxo Jr. is no longer a kid, and he’s developed other interests that are a bit more mature than beach balls. The short is by Mark Grundy.

(via Kottke)

This weekend, Picturebox, the publisher of the John K book I’m working on, is having a massive book and magazine sale at their place. I’ve browsed through the selection and there’s plenty of quality and rare stuff that’ll interest anybody into cartoons and illustration. It takes place on Saturday and Sunday, November 15 and 16, from 12-5pm. Available at affordable prices are hundreds of volumes about graphic design, illustration, fine art, graphic novels, imported manga, vintage children’s books, silkscreened books, prints, and tons of design and art magazines. Credit cards will be accepted. Picturebox is located at 121 3rd St. (corner of Bond) in Brooklyn. Take the F or G train to Carroll St., exit at Smith and 2nd place, and walk down 3rd St. to Bond.

Pixar’s Burn-E is the short that’s attached to the Wall-E DVD coming out next week. It’s directed by Angus MacLane.

(via Kottke)

Disney’s Roadside Romeo has opened in India and it’s a huge hit. Let me repeat that: It’s a HUGE HIT. According to a Disney exec, “in its first four days it exceeded the entire Indian gross of The Incredibles.”

This means only one thing. The population of India is clearly not ready yet for animated films. It’s understandable, I mean didn’t they just introduce automobiles into the country last year or something. So here’s my proposal: All animation should be immediately removed from the nation of India. I’ve written a letter outlining the plan.

Dear People of India,

As of tomorrow, anything animated—whether CG, stop-motion, Flash or drawn—will be taken off of your airwaves and out of your theaters. Additionally, any DVDs containing animation can be dumped in useless neighboring countries like Pakistan and Bangladesh. Furthermore, a moratorium will be placed on any animation currently being produced in India. Send your animators home. Trust me, nobody wants to see this crap anyways. As part of your cartoon re-education, all children’s toys based on cartoon characters must be traded in within 72 hours for books about Renaissance painting and storytelling how-tos by Robert McKee. As a goodwill gesture, we will also ship you Richard Williams who will conduct his popular Masterclass in India’s 200 largest cities.

We’ll try the plan for two years. Don’t worry, good ideas like this take time. When the fine people of India feel they’re good and ready to respect the animation art form, I will personally send over a print of One Froggy Evening. If you enjoy that more than you did Roadside Romeo, we’ll send you Dumbo the following month. If you still enjoy Roadside Romeo, we’ll take more drastic measures like defrosting Walt and sending him over to help you see the light. Either way you’ll finally be able to see that your enthusiasm for Roadside Romeo was one huge terrible fucking mistake. Don’t feel too bad, even animation-savvy countries make mistakes sometimes.

Do we have a deal India? Let me know when you have a moment. We’ll go to In-n-Out afterwards to celebrate.

Sincerely,

Cartoon Brew