Think of it this way: some little kids will get one of these overpriced but neat-o little trinkets as a gift… and then make the connection between still pictures and animation (especially with the Disney branding on it)… and then get interested in the art form… and of all those kids, several of them will become staunch animation fans… and a handful of them - those fascinated enough to study the flip books picture by picture, leaning what motion looks like one still frame at a time - may even become animators.

I’m just waiting for someone to abuse the system and upload a grossly inappropriate video for it.

I guess if people don’t want to do it themselves they can pay to have it done .

It doesn’t have an imitation leather slipcase or fancy Disney wraparound cover , but software for printing your own flipbook from a video sequence is already out there:

http://www.tweakersoft.com/flipbooktweaker.html

They sold these back in the mid-90s.

I don’t see anyting wrong with this. It never claims to be animation. It’s just a flipbook. DUH!

That’s actually pretty awesome. I don’t know how you can compare that to cheaply produced animation, since clearly it’s a novelty, and a pretty good one at that.

My only complaint is that shipping is restricted to the United States only. I wonder why they don’t use both sides of the paper, though. Seems like kind of a waste.

I want the 10 seconds where Kim Possible does a cartwheel and we can see up her skirt.

I think it sounds awesome.

Corey K: Flipbooks are actually one of many ways I got into animation as a kid. I think a cereal was giving away Nicktoon flipbooks once, and I had a whole bunch of them. It was neat because you could see each frame of the animation (even if it was just something like Hey Arnold or Rugrats). You see those and you want to try it yourself in the corner of your maths book at school.

If one of these little books as a gift inspires a kid to create their own with their imagination, that can only be a good thing. But of course this is Cartoon Brew, where the glass is always half empty. =P

They need to do the concept one step better. Disney could take their existing 3D models from Mickey Mouse Funhouse and match their movements to the movements of a child in a home video.

Customers send in a vid of their child dancing (leaving some room for their favorite character to be inserted) and they get back a flipbook with their kid bopping along with Mickey or Donald (just like Gene Kelly in Anchors Aweigh) Cost would be a lot more than 13 bucks, but it would be a lot of fun!

I’ve cut up printouts and pieced together flip books by hand and $12.95 would almost be worth it for the time it takes.

Who cares that someone might not make a good one? You might just as well complain that cameras are sold to the masses.

I think it’s a fun idea.

Kind of a harsh commentary, much? I agree with Corey in that it could get kids interested in the art form.

This is just a poly by Disney to sweep actual Disney animation under the rug, and pass ‘Hanna Montana’, and ‘High School Musical’ off as Disney ‘animation’ just because they have the ‘Disney’ name.

I think this is a cool idea!
Where is it suggested this is a cheesy shortcut to consumers animating on their own(?!)?
It has nothing to do with “creating animation” but instead with watching a scene from a favorite animated film in a fun new (well, old) way. Everyone loves flipbooks, not just animators or diehard fans. If these were put out without the option to choose your own scenes t’d be a big so what-they already have for decades. I’m sure you wouldn’t think it was an example of over-merchandising if it was an old Fleischer or WB cartoon of one’s choice that one could pick.

“Flipbooks are actually one of many ways I got into animation as a kid. I think a cereal was giving away Nicktoon flipbooks once, and I had a whole bunch of them. It was neat because you could see each frame of the animation (even if it was just something like Hey Arnold or Rugrats). You see those and you want to try it yourself in the corner of your maths book at school.”

I remember those! I believe they came with Kellog’s Frosties. They were surprising high quality though, not something I would discount as a cheap plastic toy usually given with cereals. There are some very creative flipbooks made and posted on Youtube.

ok. i just spent 10 mins on the product site. i think it’s a great idea actually!!
i think jerry misunderstood the intent of the product. The Terms clearly states that you have to own the rights to the video you upload. so basically you can only use your own video. and i have lots of video of my kids that i’d love to share with family and friends. and it’s not like i always have a video player on hand everywhere i go. but i can slip this in my pants pocket or my wife’s purse. I guess that’s the purpose to the slipcase.
unless you are an animation purist, i don’t think it’s even possible to draw out all the moments i want to capture in my life. that’s why they invented cameras! Kudos to disney! will definitely order some.

That’s a good point..what would they do if you sent them a clip from a classic cartoon from a studio other than theirs? Would they turn it down? Hmm.

Pretty cool. I would do this myself but it would take too much ink and paper.

I used to love this one I had as a kid of Toy Story. one side had buzz “falling with style” off the foot board of the bed. flip it over and its the sequence where woody points, says “buzz look there’s an alien!”

“Where!!!???”

Woody laughs hysterically and falls off.

I loved acting it out myself trying to get my voice to match the lips.

I want one!!!

I’d love to have a flipbook of 1:18 through 1:28 of this trailer here…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fw76QgoNc3o

This is actually a cute idea. I’m not sure why some of the comments seem so hostile towards it. The obvious intent is to let people capture video of a treasured family moment and create a flipbook out of it. I doubt people want to use it as a shortcut to creating animation.

Man–some of us will complain about ANYthing.

i love this idea. It’s great. Imagine a neat gift of this from your bachelor party or last shindig? The more inappropriate the better i say! and a disney logo to boot? It’s corny and fun and easy.

Welcome to 2009 buddy.

Without thinking? Without doing anything at all?
Excuse me, but I believe that a bias will not work to impact someones purchase of this. Think of the casual consumer and not of the Super Elitists… Families would love this, Kids will be entertained and people like me and others would see this as a great and wonderful gift!

Who cares for what Disney Markets? Are you offended by this? Is there something wrong? Marketing has never been spot on, but this is a move in the right direction.

I think it’s a pretty lame idea, but it looks like people who actually have home movies would get a kick out of it. Seems a little pricey, considering the moment when you show it off will only last 15 seconds.

Sorry, I don’t understand the criticism in the post, Jerry. Can we only own paintings we created? Can we not buy movies we didn’t film? We didn’t “put effort” into those either.

Do you expect computer illiterate people to find and purchase software to print each frame? Or are you saying they should rotoscope their homemovies onto a tiny flipbook?

I must admit that when I read the news I just laugh, but then I was curious to try this custome-service for the flip books…well, I must admit that I really enjoyed it, I uploaded a little movie of my beagle dog howling just for make a try: the final result was a bit kitsch, it’s weird to see a 60-pages book with the face of my dog upon it and all decorated with a Bambi art.
Two things that let me upset:

-the fact that this kind of products are avaiable only in the USA (as someone here has noted)…who knows, at the moment I don’t need it, but it’s one of that stuff that someone could buy one day in his/her life!
-First I believed that I could insert in the flip pages a disney animated charachter which “apparently” interact with the “animation”, but actually there’re only stastic arts, pity!
BTW It could be considered as a good gift for a family with a baby or a young couple!

Things are a bit upside down here I think. A Mickey Mouse/Optimus Prime love child gets gushed over, but a flip book is panned? If you can upload ten seconds of ANY video, maybe someone will upload a cartoon they made?

I don’t think I’d want a flip book of that time I got diarrhea on Star Tours.

Got nothing but love for flipbooks, but I’d like to know who in the world (aside from Marc) honestly thinks ‘Hanna Montana’, and ‘High School Musical’ are being passed off as Disney ‘animation’. Uh… uh?

Oh, and can the first Brew-er who sends in a clip of Bugs Bunny to be flipbook-ized get a No Prize?

“maybe someone will upload a cartoon they made”

Great idea!

ok, tried it… uploaded a pretty good video of my wife jumping around…. the quality of the flip book just sucks very badly.