Truth be told, I’d never heard of Al Jarnow prior to learning about this screening, but I’m curious to see more of his work now. He did a lot of work for educational programs like Sesame Street and 3-2-1 Contact, as well as his own work. From a press release about his work: “Al Jarnow captured life’s scientific minutia and boiled it down for easy consumption between cookie eating monsters and counting vampires. Coupling time-lapse, stop motion, and cel animation with simple objects found in every day life, Jarnow deconstructed the world for an entire generation.

This Friday, February 12, there will be two screenings of his work at 92Y Tribeca (200 Hudson Street) at 7pm and 9pm. Both screenings are the same (sixty minutes of his films and a thirty-minute documentary about his creative process). Jarnow will do a Q&A after the 7pm screening and introduce the 9pm screening. Tickets can be purchased at the 92Y website. Additional screenings of his work will take place in Chicago on February 19 and 20th at the Gene Siskel Film Center. They will begin at 8pm each evening.

If you can’t make the screenings, a dvd of his work, Celestial Navigations, is being released later this month with 45 of his films, the documentary about his work, and a 60-page booklet. It’s a reasonable $25 at the Numero Group website.

(Thanks, Heather Harkins and Greg Condon)

I’m happy to confirm the news - first reported on TV Shows on DVD - that Warner Bros. is indeed continuing to release Looney Tunes on DVD beginning in April.

Two new single disc releases are scheduled for release on April 27th - with more being planned for release later this year. The first two in the Looney Tunes Super Stars line are Bugs Bunny: Hare Extraordinaire and Daffy Duck: Frustrated Fowl. No bonus material or audio commentaries - just straight cartoons. Fifteen on each disc, restored, uncut and previously unavailable on DVD.

BUGS BUNNY: Mutiny on the Bunny (1950), Bushy Hare (1950), Hare We Go (1951), Foxy by Proxy (1952), Hare Trimmed (1953), Lumber Jack-Rabbit (1954), Napoleon Bunny-Part (1956), Bedevilled Rabbit (1957), Apes of Wrath (1959), From Hare to Heir (1960), Lighter than Hare (1960), The Million Hare (1963), Mad as a Mars Hare (1963), Dr. Devil and Mr. Hare (1964) and False Hare (1964).

DAFFY DUCK: Tick Tock Tuckered (1944), Nasty Quacks (1945), Daffy Dilly (1948), Wise Quackers (1949), The Prize Pest (1951), Design for Leaving (1954), Stork Naked (1955), This Is a Life? (1955), Dime to Retire (1955), Ducking the Devil (1957), People Are Bunny (1959), Person to Bunny (1960), Daffy’s Inn Trouble (1961), The Iceman Ducketh (1964) and Suppressed Duck (1965).

Going on sale today: the Ralph Bakshi Mighty Mouse The New Adventures complete series on DVD. Everyone reading this blog should own a copy. This is the 1987 show that began the creator-driven movement in television animation - and launched the careers of John K., Bruce Timm, Andrew Stanton, Jim Reardon and many many talented others.

I’ve got two copies of this DVD set to give away. It’ll go to the first two people in the comments section below who can correctly answer these three questions:

On this series what is the name of Mighty Mouse’s girl friend?? What is the name of Mighty Mouse’s secret identity? And what is the name of Mighty’s orphaned kid sidekick? CONTEST NOW CLOSED!

I urge everyone who didn’t win the prize today to order it on Amazon or buy it at Best Buy, Target, Wal-Mart or where ever DVDs are sold. You know you want it. You know you need it! If you ever wanted to be Mighty Mouse: Click Here!

And if you do pick it up, send us your comments!

I just got an advance copy of the Ralph Bakshi Mighty Mouse The New Adventures complete series DVD — and it turned out a lot better than I could have hoped. Most of us have been clinging to bootleg videos or our own deteriorating taped-off-the-air VHS copies for 20 years; now we have gorgeous restorations to enjoy for all time. Rewatching these has been an incredible pleasure; they hold up quite well. Sure, the animation is a little funky compared the shows that have come after, but this series has earned its place as an “industry game-changer”.

I was proud to act as a consultant on this DVD project from its inception. The only credit I receive here is as “Animation Consultant” in tiny letters in the credit roll on the bonus documentary (which is better than my non-credit on the two Woody Woodpecker DVD volumes from Universal). I might as well point out a 21 year old in-joke - note the headline on the newspaper (above left - click thumbnails above to enlarge) from the second season cartoon, Still Oily After All These Years: “Beck-Bakshi Detente!”.

Below are a few menus and the back cover. The DVD goes on sale January 5th, 2010. Good sales could lead to the restoration and release of more classic cartoons from the Viacom vaults (the vintage Terrytoons of Mighty Mouse, Heckle and Jeckle, the Fleischer Betty Boops, Famous Little Lulu’s and George Pal Puppetoons). I can’t promise anything, but every purchase helps the cause. I’d appreciate it if you’d spread the word.

GIVEAWAY IS NOW CLOSED. WINNERS WILL BE ANNOUNCED LATER TODAY.

We’re giving away two signed DVDs of Signe Baumane’ s Teat Beat of Sex series. She’s really been hitting her stride as a filmmaker these past few years, and the fifteen episodes that comprise Teat Beat are some of the funniest and most uninhibited pieces of animation I’ve seen in a long while.

To participate, simply write “I want a dvd” in the comments section of this post. We’ll choose two winners at random. The giveaway closes today at 2pm(PT)/5pm(ET). If you miss out on winning a copy, you can purchase a dvd for $19 (includes shipping) at TeatBeat.com

Here’s one of the episodes. Some might consider it NSFW.

In 1990, Chuck Jones sat down with animation director Jeff DeGrandis to discuss the art of drawing and character development. On February 1, 2010, the non-profit Chuck Jones Center for Creativity will release the chat onto dvd as the Chuck Jones Master Series. The project, designed to be a fundraiser for the organization, will be available on two separate 45-minute dvds. The first dvd can be pre-ordered for a minimum donation of $19.95. For more details, visit the official Chuck Jones blog and to order the dvd, contact DVD(at)ChuckJonesCenter(dot)org.

Here’s a preview:

This review is long overdue - by a year in fact - and I hope Richard Williams and Mo Sutton can forgive me for the delay. They sent me a review copy of Wiliams’ Animation Masterclass DVD, The Animator’s Survival Kit and I have watched it in fits and starts over the past year with animation director Yvette Kaplan. As a non-animator, I was highly entertained by Williams lectures, drawing and demonstrations, but I realized that Yvette was a better judge of the information, knowledge and principals being discussed. Therefore, I’ve asked her to write this review for readers of this blog:

Richard Williams’s 16-DVD box set is an impressive and impressively packaged expansion of his best-selling book of the same name. Based on the now legendary Masterclass he taught at Blue Sky Studios in New York, actual footage of the class itself has been combined here along with over 400 specially animated examples of the principles he covers. Between the classic and in-depth nature of these lessons and William’s touching sincerity, generosity of spirit and profound love of the art form, if he had titled the set “Animation’s Survival Guide”, he would not have been wrong.

And Dick Williams does indeed dig deep in this extensive tome. More than thorough, it sometimes borders on the obsessive; but what is an animator if not obsessed? Dick Williams is obsessed with the beauty of movement, and he has structured his lessons very specifically, with the basics, and even before. In DVD #1, accurately titled, “Starting Right”, he describes how he himself learned the art of animation through dedication, hard work, struggle and persistence spread over the course of many years. Of course he stresses the importance of life drawing and keeping sketchbooks, but it’s when he gets personal that the real magic starts. He has no end of praise and credit for the impact of his mentors, most notably master animator Milt Kahl, of whom he speaks with obvious affection and even awe. According to Williams, it was Kahl who opened his eyes when he was just starting out, who got him seeing and thinking in a special way, and pushed him to strive for excellence and beauty.

Next, he moves on to the tools of animation. Disc 2 is titled “Timing and Spacing” and it is actually an entire DVD dedicated to the beginner’s animation class stand-by, the bouncing ball. But this is a lot more than your standard bounce or ball: Williams breaks down the laws of physics and weight in such detail only a mathematician could compete. He treats even this seemingly mundane animation exercise like a work of art in progress. He shows us examples of every possible variation and how the spacing (between the drawings) determines everything. There are so many possibilities and choices it made my mind reel. Yet challenging as the concepts are, Williams happily manages to make them ultra clear by using a Penny moving across a variety of spacing charts, an example I thought brilliant in its simplicity and clarity.

He then moves onto even MORE Timing and Spacing, since after all, “It’s all in the timing and spacing.” On this DVD he breaks down the concepts of exposure sheets and the numbering system, whether to use one’s or two’s, and how to decide where in-betweens should fall. He proves his points with clear and sometimes amusing examples of how variations in spacing charts, or the skill level of the in-betweener, can make or break the movement and sometimes surprise us, in both good ways and bad.

The level of detail and sense of endless possibility that Williams applies to everything is nowhere more evident than when he talks about the animated walk. He devotes four whole discs to this one topic, acting out nearly endless variations with his own amazingly rubbery cartoon body. He dissects the low, the pass, the high and the contact drawings, the flexibility of joints, and then moves on to variations on the themes like sneaks and runs and of course animal walks, using stunning animated examples. He impressed me completely by breaking down a horse gallop , (something I always found daunting) in such a way as to make it clear to me for the very first time. He even breaks down an 8-legged walk with patience and clarity, and I’m positive that if there were such a thing as a 12, or even 200-legged creature, we’d have seen that too!

Appropriately, Williams ups the ante once basic skills are internalized. Getting deeper into the difference between merely making something move and making it live and breathe, he becomes his most inspiring with Disc 9, which is devoted to Overlapping Action and Weight, and Disc 12, on Anticipation and Accents. He also loosens up a little with a couple of discs devoted to fun principals like “Takes” (what animator could resist that one?) and a disc titled “Vibrates”. That one is a particular favorite of mine as I love to use the technique in my own limited way to add little nervous trembles and tics when appropriate to liven up an otherwise talking head on a TV series.

It’s only during the last few discs, that Williams finally puts the icing on this well made cake and gets down to focusing on creating animated performance. There are two discs devoted to Dialogue animation, yet surprisingly only a single disc for Directing and Performance. Two discs on Timing and Spacing, four discs on walks and only ONE on how to make a character ACT? Isn’t that the heart and soul of animation and what we all want to achieve? How can that be?

My guess is the answer lies in Disc #16: “Putting It All Together.”
By the time the conscientious and dedicated viewer has made it to this point, he or she has delved deeper into the techniques of animation than most students ever get the chance to. Yes, it was a long journey, but now, armed with the proper tools, and a master’s mind set, the Animator’s Survival Kit graduate can start his or her work in earnest: making characters live and breathe and think and act. Not like carbon copies of someone else’s work, but in their own unique voice.

And it all becomes clear; by consolidating the fruits of his many years of love and labor into a finely crafted and curated tour of a Master Animator’s mind, William’s has given us the same gift his mentors gave to him. This time, packaged for a new generation, inside a single, albeit BIG, box on 16 DVDs.

Sounds like a pretty great gift to me. You can watch excerpts from the Masterclass or order the set directly from Williams on his website.

Starz Film-Roman is producing this new animated direct-to-video feature, Dante’s Inferno: the Animated Epic, through animators in Japan and Korea. It’s based on a popular video game and - be warned, especially those who had a problem with Hairballs - the trailer below is graphically violent.

(Thanks, Sandra Khoo)