*Disney animator and character designer Jin Kim has started a sketchblog that includes the humorous image above of animator Glen Keane playing the role of his character Tarzan.

* DreamWorks character designer Shannon Tindle is peeved (and justifiably so) about the new Blu-Ray DVD edition of Sleeping Beauty and how all of the DVD’s bonus features and documentary material omit mention of one of the film’s primary visual architects: character stylist Tom Oreb. When I wrote about Tom Oreb in my magazine Animation Blast back in 2001, there was admittedly very little information available about his career. It was only after a year of research and interviews with the likes of Vic Haboush, Ward Kimball, Ollie Johnston, David Swift, Iwao Takamoto, Marty Murphy, Ray Aragon, and Oreb’s sister Mary that I managed to compile a substantial account of his life and work. Today, thankfully, it’s a different story. Everybody is aware of Tom Oreb and his invaluable contributions to the Disney studio…well, everybody it seems except for the people that Disney hires to produce documentaries about their company.

* “Of Cabbages and Kleins” is a thoughtful (and thought-provoking) essay by animation historian Michael Barrier about labor politics, the Disney strike of 1941, animator Phil Klein and liberal journalist Naomi Klein (author of No Logo).

* I can’t remember the last time I’ve been jealous of anybody, but I’m definitely jealous of my animation pal Matt Jones who recently visited the legendary cartoonist Ronald Searle in France. He writes about the experience on his blog. Matt also runs the fine Ronald Searle Tribute blog.

* Richard O’Connor of Asterisk Animation has written an insightful post about collaborating with Kim Deitch and They Might Be Giants on this piece of animation:

“Historically animation was only achieveable by the highly skilled animator, but with GoAnimate, animating is possible for everyone to do.”

I’ve watched the demo at GoAnimate.com. Now I’m going to watch it again. And later, I’ll watch it some more times. Seriously, it’s that awesome bad.

(Thanks, Warren Leonhardt)

Once again, tomorrow Wednesday October 8th, I will be the featured guest on Stu’s Show on Shokus Internet Radio. This will be my eighth visit to discuss all things animation with Stu and his listeners, live beginning at 4:00 p.m. PDT (7:00 p.m. EDT). Topics this time will include the upcoming Popeye Volume 3 DVD box set from Warner, the new Looney Tunes Golden Collection Vol. 6 and our plans for Cartoon Brew TV. As always, listeners will be encouraged to call in with their questions and comments on the station’s toll-free telephone number. Click here for more details. Tune In, Turn On and… Call Us!

Why draw when you can filter? Release your inner Richard Linklater with the Video Cartoonizer.

“Upload a personal home movie, hit a few buttons, shout action and let our Video Cartoonizer do all the work. Who knew full motion animation could be this easy?”

You be the judge.

(Thanks, R.T. Inoue)

Seth MacFarlane recently launched his new ad-supported animated shorts series “Seth MacFarlane’s Cavalcade of Cartoon Comedy” through SethComedy.com. The show is structured through Google’s Content Network with sponsors such as Burger King. As you can tell by the embedded episode, the reason for discussing this on Cartoon Brew is clearly not because of the content (left-over Family Guy gags that demean both the terms “cartoon” and “comedy”) but because of its novel online distribution model, which could open doors for other filmmakers. According to Ars Technica, here is how money is made on the shorts:

The episodes are short, ranging from under a minute to no more than two, and so far, they only consist of a preroll sponsorship-type ad (which is animated in McFarlane’s style, so it’s not very jarring at all) before the actual video. For now, the two available shorts are sponsored by Burger King, and they are cross-posted to the “BK Channel” on YouTube…As with much web video these days, episodes of the Cavalcade of Cartoon Comedy can be shared with friends and embedded onto blogs and websites. The interesting part of the deal, however, is the revenue distribution. The videos will be run on sites across the web, basically as both content and advertising. Each time a viewer clicks on a Cavalcade video or ad, advertisers will pay a fee that gets split between MacFarlane, Google, the production company partner Media Rights, and the site hosting the video.

No one has the solution yet for how filmmakers can consistently earn money by placing their work online and in fact there may be dozens of solutions. What’s not in doubt is that the integration of advertising and content has proven to be one driving factors behind the growth online short film distribution. Experiments like MacFarlane’s will only help everybody figure out the models.

Some of my favorite blogs have just posted some unusual posts of interest, all worth a look. Back in December, Don Brockway took a look at Donald Duck and His Crappy Cars. He’s just posted another hilarious follow-up.

John Vincent is infatuated with Columbia cartoons and other animated oddities. He’s got a lot of worthwhile posts and frame grabs to prove it on his Uncle John’s Crazy Town blog, including his latest on take on the obscure Screen Gems Color Rhapsodies series.

And finally, another shout out to Rob Richards, the Disney obsessed organist-at-the-El-Capitan, who maintains several Disney blogs, including one on Animation Backgrounds. He broke his usual train of thought by abruptly posting about a background on Cambria’s New Three Stooges. In doing so, he may have found the only redeeming feature of this otherwise forgettable TV cartoon (the backgrounds and the new color footage of Moe and Larry, but I digress…).

There are still some retrograde film festivals that penalize filmmakers for putting their films online, but progressive festivals are embracing the Internet as a vital component of their programming strategy. Take, for example, the Holland Animation Film Festival, which today began accepting entries via YouTube for its newly announced web competition, which allows online audiences to see the entries via YouTube and help choose the winner. Here are the details:

For the first time the Holland Animation Film Festival 2008 launches an international competition for web animations. The web competition will be open for entries from Monday, September 8 onwards. On HAFFTube you will find a link to the entry form for the web competition. Please read the regulations and note that your film should be uploaded on YouTube before submitting the entry form. HAFFTube will gradually fill up with animated films from all over the world.

The Holland Animation Film Festival will rate the films that have been entered for competition. When we have reached our set limit of 50 films, the voting begins. Every week, films will be voted out to make room for the new entries. Deadline for entries: Wednesday October 22.

An international jury of filmmakers selects the winner out of the final 50 titles. The winner will be revealed on the opening night of the festival at November 5.

Award-winning filmmaker Signe Baumane writes to tell me that yesterday somebody flagged her one-minute short The Very First Desire Now and Forever for having “objectionable content” and today the film was pulled from YouTube. What was so objectionable in this short, which we’ve plugged before on Cartoon Brew? A baby innocently squeezing milk from its mother’s breasts.

What happened to Signe’s film should serve as a warning to all filmmakers who choose to use a free corporate service like YouTube to host their film work. But the bigger issue is that YouTube should consider addressing the arbitrary policies they hold towards “objectionable content.” There are currently thousands of videos on their site displaying full-frontal male and female nudity in art, whether it be the work of Michelangelo or Matisse. It’s a slippery slope when YouTube begins passing judgment on what qualifies as art (painting and sculpture) and what doesn’t (animation). If the site’s policy is strictly no nudity, then it should be consistent about it across all forms of art. And if it’s the natural act of breastfeeding that YouTube deems so offensive, then a good first step would be to remove all of the live-action videos on their site featuring woman breastfeeding their children.