I’ve written fairly often about the contemporary evolution of animation beyond the flat, rectangular, non-interactive screen. Animation will increasingly be integrated into the built environment over the coming years, and new applications of the art form will evolve. One exciting area I hadn’t considered, however, is how animation could be integrated with a natural backdrop. These possibilities are explored in the impressive projection mapping experiment “Lit Tree” by Seoul/London-based Kimchi and Chips which encourages audiences to interact with trees through an animated interface:

Through the use of video projection, a tree is augmented in a non-invasive way, enabling the presentation of volumetric light patterns using itʼs own leaves as voxels (3D pixels). We have developed our own structured light system (called MapTools-SL) which scans the location of every pixel in 3D, allowing a cloud of scattered projector pixels to be used as 3D Voxels.

The tree invites viewers with a choreographed cloud of light that can respond visitors motion. As visitors approach, they can explore the immediate and cryptic nature of this reaction. The tree can form gestures in this way, and can in turn detect the gestures of its visitors. By applying a superficial layer of immediate interaction to the tree, can people better appreciate the long term invisible interaction that they share with it?

The most fascinating by-product of such an idea is that the animation could potentially assist plant growth. It would be cool to get some biologists involved and have them collaborate with animators on developing this further:

Since the colour temperature of light produced by a video projector’s bulb is similar to the surface of the sun (5800K), we suggest that over time, the tree could naturally react to the light that is projected onto it….We listen to the tree’s reaction through the detailed 3D scans of its shape that are produced by the projection system. This type of photosynthesis would also allow for the tree to self-optimise for projection. Leaves which are in shadow from the projection move out to find the projector’s light. Furthermore light wasted inside the tree is absorbed in photosynthesis, which converts local carbon dioxide to oxygen.

More details on the Kimchi and Chips website.

The geekiest, and therefore coolest, animation-related Tumblr I’ve seen: Smears, Multiples and Other Animation Gimmicks. Tumblr users are invited to submit their own examples of these animation ideas. The blog is run by Michael Ruocco, a promising recent grad of the School of Visual Arts whose knowledge of classic animation is second to none.

(Disclosure: Michael did some work for Cartoon Brew last year and has also assisted me on some of my recent book projects.)

Canadian artist Eric Bates made Sayonara while studying animation in Japan at the Kyoto University of Art and Design. “This story was inspired by my life in Japan and having to say goodbye myself,” he wrote on his site. “Every part of this animation abstractly relates to my experiences, friends, foods, things I saw, and things I felt over this time.”

I love the mix of minimally rendered CG, detailed puppet modelmaking, and hand-drawn animation It’s fun to watch how he put it all together in this video:

(Thanks, Tim McCourt)

Semi-disturbing fact from an interactive John Lasseter graphic in the Wall Street Journal: He received 74 rounds of applause in the course of a single day at the studio! According to the paper, “During the day’s five half-hour-long and two hour-long meetings, each time Lasseter signed off on a scene the room erupted.” I usually get one round whenever I leave a room, but dozens every day is just plain nuts.

It obviously begs the question, What happens if you don’t clap?

Bill Porter’s On Time Off will either inspire you to head to the beach or make you want to stay as far the hell away as possible. His melancholic and satirical take on beach life stems from his own experiences working in an ice cream shop in Cornwall. It’s a Royal College of Art graduation short that I first encountered on the festival circuit back in 2008.

Reuben Sutherland, whose zoetrope music LP appeared on the Brew a few months back, recently directed this music video for Seasick Steve’s “You Can’t Teach an Old Dog New Tricks.” Sutherland has packed the video with weird and funny imagery, and his rhythmic repetition of visual elements and handheld camera effects nicely match the energy of the song.

(Thanks, Noel Barrot)

A trailer (en français) for Bibo Bergeron’s long-gestating CG feature Un Monstre à Paris has popped up on the website Catsuka. Bergeron, a veteran animator who co-directed the DreamWorks features Shark Tale and The Road to El Dorado, made the film at his French studio Bibo Films. Un Monstre à Paris opens wide in France in October.

(via Sketchcrawl Twitter)

Continuing the trend of documentaries that incorporate animation, Ali Samadi Ahadi’s The Green Wave recounts the “Green Revolution” following the 2009 elections in Iran. The film uses live-action interviews and video footage from the protests alongside original animation created by Ali Soozandeh (art director), Ali Reza Darvish (drawings), and Prof. Dr. Sina Mostafawy and Ali Soozandeh (motion directors).

The Green Wave, which appeared at Sundance earlier this year and is currently on the festival circuit, premieres in New York this week as part of the Human Rights Watch Film Festival and will screen on June 18, 19 and 21. A q&a with the director is scheduled after every screening.

ASIFA-San Francisco president Karl Cohen wrote in the ASIFA-SF newsletter that the film is “not an intellectual discourse, but a powerful emotional experience…The story is so powerful and gripping that it didn’t bother me that much of the ‘animation’ was simply camera movement over static drawings or that the artwork was not of the highest quality. What counted was the story of the suppression of a popular movement by a brutal regime.”

For more info, visit The Green Wave website or watch the trailer below:

Designer Chris Abbas downloaded a public domain archive of still images captured by NASA’s Cassini Solstice Mission and composited them into an animated short. The pixilation approach shows fly-bys of Saturn, its rings and other objects in Saturn’s neighborhood. Abbas made some stunning artistic and editing choices that transforms raw scientific data into a marvelous visual achievement. For more details about the imagery, visit Astronomy Picture of the Day.

(Thanks, Pell Osborn)

“In a room there is a box. In the box there is a forest. In the forest there is a lost child.” The Smaller Room (Der Kleinere Raum, 2009) by Cristobal Leon and Nina Wehrle may be short, but its claustrophobic and foreboding atmosphere leaves an impression on the viewer.

(via Jeff Scher’s Twitter)

Striking mixture of stop motion imagery and experimental techniques in “Second Song,” a music video for TV On The Radio. The director is Michael Please whose Royal College of Art graduation short The Eagleman Stag was awarded a “special distinction for student film” at the Annecy International Animation Film Festival this weekend. The short also won the BAFTA earlier this year.

Video credits after the jump.
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John Kricfalusi and Gary Panter speak about their collaboration with clothing line Stussy to create Marvel comic-related merchandise.

(Thanks, Jason Groh)