I’m not sure how this 2D clip from the upcoming Disney game, Epic Mickey, fits with the rest of the game and clips we’ve seen, but it’s certainly intriguing. Here Mickey and Gremlin Gus explore Mean Street, and encounter the Phantom Blot and Walt himself (as a statue, with Oswald):
UPDATE: The 2D cut-scenes in the game were produced by Austin, Texas-based Powerhouse Animation Studios.
(Thanks, Matthew Gaastra)
Here’s another update from the folks at the upcoming CTN Expo: Sylvain Chomet’s The Illusionist is now set for an opening night advance screening, on Thursday November 18th. All advance pass holders will be admitted.
Also, it’s just been announced that Chris Wedge from BlueSky will be attending and speaking, as will Enrico Casarosa (story artist and illustrator at Pixar), Bobby Beck (no relation) from Animation Mentor, and HB Lewis (designer, illustrator, writer for Disney, BlueSky, DreamWorks). Pixar will host an animators panel again this year and yours truly, Jerry Beck, will moderate a discussion with the principals of Barcelona’s Headless Productions.
The CTN Expo II will be held November 19th-21st in Burbank. Word is the CTNX hotel (The Burbank Airport Marriott) is 93% sold out. Overflow rooms (at full rates) will open up, but if you are thinking of attending, book now and save. For more information, click here.
Do you want to attend this exhibit of Warner Bros. animation artwork?
Me too!
Too bad none of us can see it though because it doesn’t actually exist. These enticing gallery concepts were created for fun by David de Rooij who co-directed the short Slim Pickings Fat Chances. He was inspired to make these images after seeing this post on the Animation Backgrounds blog.
Animation studio Titmouse (Metalocalypse, Megas XLR) has opened a New York studio in the Tribeca district of Manhattan. The image above is an announcement for their opening party which took place last Friday. The New York studio will be producing the second season of the Adult Swim series Superjail!, and is also developing future projects.
The New York branch, which follows their successful home base in Los Angeles, represents a homecoming of sorts for co-owner Chris Prynoski, who runs the studio with his wife Shannon. Prynoski established his career working at MTV Animation in New York on shows like Beavis and Butt-Head, The Head, and Daria as well as creating the series MTV Downtown.
The opening of a top-tier studio in New York is welcome news because the number of studios here that produce series animation on a par with LA outfits can be counted on one hand. I can think of just Augenblick Animation, World Leaders and Curious Pictures. Even better, Titmouse is a studio run by people who actually like cartoons, and they have solid credentials in TV, commercials, music videos, and games. If their raucous studio launch party was any indication, Titmouse’s arrival promises to breathe new life and energy into New York’s animation industry.
If you can’t find me in October, you aren’t trying hard enough. But before we discuss October, tonight Cartoon Dump (9/27) returns with its usual disreputable mix of sketches, songs, puppets, stand up comedy and the absolute worst cartoons ever made. Join Frank Conniff as Moodsy, the Clinically Depressed Owl, Erica Doering as Compost Brite, J. Elvis Weinstein as Dumpster Diver Dan and Jerry Beck as “Jerry Beck”, along with special guests Dave “Gruber” Allen and Erik Charles Nielsen, 8pm at The Steve Allen Theater, 4773 Hollywood Blvd. • Free Parking! • Advanced Tickets here • Phone: (323) 666-9797 • Map & Directions • And friend us on Facebook.
Tuesday October 5th is my 3rd annual Halloween animation screening at the CineFamily/Silent Movie Theatre. This year I’m sharing the stage with Seamus and Mark from Screen Novelties, who have curated a special spooktastic show featuring several monster movies of their own along with clips and shorts of their most dearly beloved creepy creations. The second half of the evening we’ll screen a very rare 35mm print of Disney’s The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad, featuring of course, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow. Join us – it should be a howl!
I’ll be showing vintage 16mm cartoons to open the Janet Klein show on Thursday October 7th at the Steve Allen Theatre. This month we are celebrating both Janet’s new album, Whoopee Hey! Hey! and my book The 100 Greatest Looney Tunes Cartoons. I’ll be signing books and Janet promises to sing several songs from classic cartoons. It starts at 8pm. Tickets: here.
I’ll be attending the Ottawa International Animation Festival October 20th-24th where I’ll be doing a book signing (Thursday October 21st at 6pm), and screening a program of vintage cartoons now deemed “Inappropriate For Children” (check the website or program book for times and places).
On Thursday October 28th I’ll be doing a book signing (at 6pm) and screening (at 7pm) to celebrate The 100 Greatest Looney Tunes Cartoons at the Wexner Center For the Arts at Ohio State University in Columbus. We’ll be screening 35mm prints of several classic cartoons on the big screen. Check the WexArts website for more information.
This week, from the top, a San Diego Union-Tribune editorial cartoon (9/3) by Steve Breen; Mother Goose and Grimm (9/24) by Mike Peters; Nancy (9/21) by Guy and Brad Gilchrist; Chuckle Bros. (9/23) by Brian and Ron Boychuck; Hari Kiwi (9/20) by Steven Degryse (aka “Lectrr”) and The Argyle Sweater (9/23) by Scott Hilburn.
(Thanks to Jim Lahue, John Hall, Ed Austin, Kurtis Findlay, Jed Martinez and Uncle Wayne)
Imagine a cross between Team America and A Town Called Panic set during World War II. Ewan McGregor, Timothy Spall, Tom Wilkinson and Alan Cumming provide voices for directors Edward McHenry & Rory McHenry’s Barbie-doll epic, Jackboots on Whitehall. Sony Home Entertainment has picked up the film, but a U.S. theatrical release is uncertain, though the film will play several festivals in the next few months (The San Francisco International Animation Festival will screen it on November 11th). Jackboots on Whitehall will open October 8th in London.
Great weekend read: Michael Heilemann explores how George Lucas created Chewbacca, or rather how he…um…borrowed…it from somebody else. The piece’s valuable insights into the creative process apply to all the arts, though they are particularly applicable to filmmaking, in which the final product is formed by the hands of many, influences come from all over, and authorship is often opaque:
Chewbacca didn’t spring to life out of nowhere, fully formed when Lucas saw his dog in the passenger seat of his car. That’s the soundbite. A single step. The reality is complex and human. From vague names floating around, the kernel of an idea, changing purposes and roles of characters, major restructuring, the design hopping from person to person, scrapping the existing concept and going down a different path, seeing existing things in a different light and having to conform a range of ideas to complement and enrich one another.
(via Kottke)
Zack Snyder’s adaptation Kathryn Lasky’s Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole opens today. The critics opinions are mixed, the LA Times says it looks great but is too dark for youngsters; the NY Times considered this a minor release and let a C-string reviewer cover it. I’m seeing it at an ASIFA-Hollywood member’s screening next Thursday. If you’ve seen it, or are seeing it this weekend, let us what you think.
When the Warner Bros. Animation Department was located in Burbank in the 1980s (the period when they were producing the Greg Ford/Terry Lennon movies, shorts and TV specials), veteran animation artist Richard Thomas and background painter Alan Bodner created several murals to decorate the hallways at the studio. The murals were eventually removed by Warner’s Chuck Seaman in December 1992 when the animators were moved to new offices in Sherman Oaks (at the start-up of Tiny Toon Adventures).
Mr. Seaman has held onto them for the past 18 years and now needs to find them a new home. Either separately or all together, Seaman is looking for a buyer. They are on drywall and steel studs. Click the photos above to see enlarged images. If interested, contact Chuck Seaman wcsthink-at-yahoo.com
When I bumped into Stephen Neary a couple nights ago, he told me about his new animated piece “Toxie” which debuted on NPR.org this morning and can be seen here. Produced for the show “Planet Money,” Toxie reenvisions a toxic asset as a cute but destructive pet creature. Stephen directed and animated, and Connie Li Chan provided assistant animation and backgrounds. The piece communicates a difficult concept quite effectively, and there’s some really nice character animation to boot–an impressive accomplishment especially considering their turnaround time was just three weeks.
This is the trailer for The Experience, a Jimi Hendrix-themed short that was produced to commemorate the fortieth anniversary of his death this year:
In the depths of a tropical valley, an adventurous young man discovers with surprise a giant amusement park dedicated to rock’n'roll. Curious, he decides to try a psychedelic Rollercoaster haunted by Jimi Hendrix. He is greeted by a mysterious jailer, looking like a voodoo sorcerer. During the ride, entirely on the rhythmes of the song “Voodoo Child”, the spirit of Jimi Hendrix manifests in the form of a voodoo doll.
The combination stop-motion, live-action and CG short was made by the French collective Pirates Pépères whose twelve members have an average age of 22. Like Nina Paley and her film Sita Sings the Blues, these guys made their animated film without bothering to license the music. Now they’re trying to raise $6,700 to license Hendrix’s “Voodoo Child” from Experience Hendrix, the company that manages his musical estate. Afterwards they plan to release the film on-line.
The first time we wrote about Kirsten Lepore, she was studying at Maryland Institute College of Art where she’d made an inventive hand-drawn short called Story from North America. Now she’s a grad student in the experimental program at CalArts, and she’s turning out some top-notch work.
Bottle is the story of an unlikely friendship between a clump of sand and a pile of snow–a far more engaging concept than it may sound and the type of story that can only be told through animation. Kirsten uses stop motion to create a believably bittersweet fantasy within the natural outdoors, and her masterful storytelling has the ability to make us both smile and reach for a box of tissues.
If the heartwrenching final shot of the film is too much, here’s a brilliant and funny bit of animation she did that’ll cheer you up.
Not letting anything go to waste, stop motion animator Jessica Bayliss made this stop-motion pixilation documenting the last moments of her friend Lindsay Nack’s lovely 5-year-old dreadlocks.
Death Buy Lemonade created by Kyu-bum Lee at Sheridan College is the shortest film in Cartoon Brew TV’s Student Animation Festival. Don’t be fooled by its running time though. Within its brief length is contained a solidly constructed story, personality-driven animation and chuckles. To learn more about the production of the film and to comment about it, please take the time and visit Cartoon Brew TV.
