I like this clever little video on animation production from Cirkus Animation out of New Zealand. It’s obviously slanted towards their numerous, and clueless, clients and producers:

(via Motionographer)

Masterpiece 2.0 is a social media animation project by Dutch artists Baschz and Selfcontrolfreak, and according to them, “the first ever unique painting made with a Web 2.0 approach.”

Even after reading the description of their process, I’m a bit confused by how the interactivity worked, but I highly recommend checking out the finished piece, which is visually striking and quite inventive. What follows is an explanation of the project by the artists:

In the summer and fall of 2009 a multilayered canvas and animation was
created which could be influenced and followed by website visitors online 24 hours a day. Six weeks long and through actions like Introduce Object, Shirt ‘Em and Cameo Appearance website visitors could interact with leading character Selfcontrolfreak.

Each sent in gesture added a new animated interaction as they were painted layer-by-layer into the growing animating canvas by Baschz. Every new layer was photographed seperately and together with the other frames created the animating canvas, leaving the end canvas consisting of well over 100 different painted layers. The whole coming-of-art process could be followed live through a webcam and Twitter feed, on YouTube, Flickr, Facebook, Fotolog, etc.

NY animator Tom Smolenski was looking for a good 6B pencil to animate with (in 2010 no less—what a masochist!) so he tested a bunch of pencils to find the best one (I’ve always been partial to Tombows myself). Much of it comes down to personal preference, but Tom’s list is good for getting a sense of what’s available. What are your favorite pencils?

I saw Yulia in Annecy last year, and now everybody can view it online at the filmmaker’s website AntoineArditti.com alongside a few of his other pieces. It’s a cute concept with an unexpected ending. According to Arditti, the film was first animated in CG, then printed onto paper and drawn with traditional tools. It was produced by Metronomic.

Dreamworks’ How To Train Your Dragon got a little unintended publicity this weekend in Hollywood. A man alleged to have put up a large, “supergraphic” billboard in violation of Los Angeles city law was arrested and held on $1 million bail over the weekend.

The massive movie ad was draped over a 1927 building on the corner of Hollywood Boulevard and Highland Avenue, property co-owned by Kayvan Setereh, the man arrested. The ad was strategically positioned to be seen by the throngs attending next week’s Academy Awards ceremony, both in person and on television. According to the L.A. Times, “the city outlawed such signs in August, arguing they are unsafe for pedestrians below and that they could prevent firefighters from entering buildings in an emergency. Critics also decry them as visual blight.”

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From the top: Brewster Rockit (2/26/10) by Tim Rickard, The Argyle Sweater (2/27/10) by Scott Hilburn, and Off The Mark (2/23/10) by Mark Parisi

(Thanks to our usual crew of comic strip mavens: Uncle Wayne, Jim Lahue, Charles Brubaker, John Hall and Jed Martinez)

Regular Brew readers are aware that I collect old Little Golden Books relating to animation and have frequently mentioned my admiration of the recent “retro-stylized” Golden Books for current Disney and Pixar films. Add Nickelodeon to the watch-list. I just discovered Mr. Fancypants, a Spongebob Squarepants tie-in, at my local Barnes and Noble last night. The book was published as a commemorative to celebrate the sponge’s tenth anniversary and features great artwork by animation artist Caleb Meurer. Take a look — Random House has posted the first few pages online:

If you thought this week’s Speedy Gonzales news was bad… Warner Bros. has now teamed with Bollywood to create Bird Idol:

(Thanks, Aaron Simpson)