J. J. Sedelmaier (The Ambiguously Gay Duo, Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law, The Colbert Report’s Tek Jansen, etc.) will be back next week at the New York Comic-Con. This year, Sedelmaier will discuss interpreting the work of print cartoonists and illustrators into animation in a talk titled, Translating Art in Animation. Sedelmaier will show the work of such artists as Garry Trudeau, Barry Blitt and Al Hirshfeld, among others, and will demonstrate how he translates their work into animation. He’ll also screen a selection of his studio’s work for Saturday Night Live, The Colbert Report, Cartoon Network’s Adult Swim and other clients.

Translating Art Into Animation takes place on Sunday, Feb. 25, 2007, from 3:00 pm – 4:00 pm, at the Jacob Javits Center.

To take a break from his day job as a CG animator at Nexus Productions, Brew reader Ben Cowell created a stop-motion music video for the The Schla La Las animated entirely with Lego. The video, which has a lighthearted lo-fi charm, can be viewed here. Ben has also posted a making of page.

Spurred on by my recent posts criticizing Cuppa Coffee’s Zootube contest (here and here), animation artist Keith Lango has written some general thoughts about understanding the value of your creative properties. Using his own experiences as an example, Lango stresses one key point—”don’t ever, ever, ever give away rights to your work blindly, without condition and without real value in return. Rights have great value.”

In his post, Keith also uses the boys at JibJab as examples of artists who understand and practice good business. I love how JibJab’s Evan Spiridellis responds in the comments section that they’re not really doing anything revolutionary; in fact, Evan writes, “The case for retaining your rights goes straight back to Walt. If people are unaware of the Oswald fiasco they should read their animation history.”

Cartoon Brew’s Jerry and Amid are pleased to welcome our friend Chris Robinson and his new semi-regular column Alone Stinking and Unafraid. We’re sure that many of you already know who Chris Robinson is, but for those that don’t, Chris is one of the leading experts on Canadian and independent animation, a noted author and critic, and the Artistic Director of the Ottawa International Animation Festival. And he always has something interesting to say.

illustration by Theodore Ushev

I’ve always had a thing for angels and the belief that there is this unseen thing that surrounds all of us, that guides us along our way. I don’t mean some winged creature or anything cornball like that, but just something, something earthy. For example, I’ve been working on this book Fathers of Night for a couple of years. The coincidences that I’ve encountered while writing this book have sometimes left me stunned, speechless… there were so many that I started to see them as more than coincidence…. that they were markers, signs, guides that told me I was on the road I was supposed to be on.

I have met two real angels in my life. One was Helen Hill, an American animator who lived in Halifax for a few years. The other was her husband, Paul Gailiunas a doctor and part time musician (he headlined the Halifax band Piggy that produced an infectious cd in the late 1990s called Don’t Stop the Calypso). You could not meet two more joyful people. Helen stood out for two reasons. First, she had a pet pig. I always found that to be funny. Kelly (my wife) loves pigs and was always envious of Helen and Paul for taking a pig into their Halifax pad. Helen even made a point of stopping at our office in 2000 or 2001 (I think she was on her way to the States, can’t remember) to bring the pig by. Kelly has a nice shot of the three of us with piggy by her desk. “That was my favourite day in the office ever,” says Kelly.

The other vivid memory is Helen’s film, Mouseholes. I took for competition in 2000. The selection raised a few eyebrows. Sure, it wasn’t the most technically polished film, but Helen has made this raw, real and moving tribute to her grandfather (who had just passed away). It was one of the most down to earth, moving and humane animation films I’ve come across. Like Helen, it was absolutely genuine. She didn’t care about polish, she just had something to say and said it. It remains one of my favourite Canadian animation films (she made it in Halifax) and one of the few animation films that makes me cry (in a good way).

After the New Orleans flood, I was very worried about Helen and Paul and tracked them down to make sure they were okay. Helen eventually replied to say they were fine and had gotten out of town before the flood. She asked if I still had a beta copy of Mouseholes. Apparently, their home had been damaged by the flood and they’d lost a lot of stuff. Fortunately, I still had the tape. In fact, I believe I still have it cause I was waiting for Helen to get settled again before sending it off.

Time passed. Life moved on. I got another email from Helen saying they were going back to New Orleans. They wanted to get their life underway again and, typically, Paul wanted to go back and help the many who needed help. Helen was excited too. She got funding to make a new film. All was well.

One of my most vivid memories of Paul and Helen came at Ottawa 2000 or 2002 (can’t totally recall). I remember talking with them at the Chez Ani at Ottawa 2000 or 2002 and I was stunned at how innocent, how just utterly joyous these two were. It alarmed me. I was cynical about it and thought maybe they were a bit freaky. But in truth, I guess it scared me. Their joy was absolutely genuine. IT wasn’t some faux stance. These two clearly loved life and each other. I guess it scared me because it takes a real commitment to be like that in this world…to just let go of all the doubt and anger and embrace, believe and love life. That takes a lot more courage than cloaking yourself in cynicism and hatred—as so many of us are prone to do.

Helen was murdered on January 4th, 2007. Paul was wounded. Francis, their son, was unharmed. I’m writing this cause I need to find words, I need to uncover the brief memories, I need to understand why these two people were punished for being good. I have no idea what unfolded. I just have this image of a bloodied, stunned Paul on his knees, cradling their young son as police arrived. Did someone break in? Did someone knock at their door? It’s just so incomprehensible to me. Apparently, Helen’s murder is one of a string of murders happening in New Orleans recently. This one is particularly painful because of who these people were…. how egoless, how generous, how good they were. They were giving so much to New Orleans to help those in need, those who could not help themselves.

This tragedy simply reinforces my own cynicism towards the world. It makes it easier too. That way I can just brush off this incomprehensible act as typical of the world we live in. But, at the same time, however brief our contact, Helen touched me through that one film and memories of her will always make me smile. I’ll think of her bursting energy, smile without end, Helen and Paul dancing Chez Ani. I’ll think of the pig.

If anyone can overcome this act of hell, it’s Paul. And he won’t be alone. Yes, there are friends and family…but Helen will be there too. In life or death, I know that Helen Hill remains an angel among us. That much I believe.

Chris Robinson is the artistic director of the Ottawa International Animation Festival and a noted author/critic/historian whose books include Between Genius and Utter Illiteracy: A Story of Estonian Animation, Ottawa Senators: Great Stories from the NHL’s First Dynasty, Unsung Heroes of Animation, and Great Left Wingers and Stole This From a Hockey Card: A Philosophy of Hockey, Doug Harvey, Identity & Booze. He lives in Ottawa with his wife, Kelly, and sons Jarvis and Harrison.

Last Saturday, the topic of Bill Griffith’s ZIPPY comic strip was computer animation. Click on the strip below for the full-size version.

(Thanks, Apelad)

Who knew Frank Tashlin was still doing commercial art in 1948? I didn’t. This is currently for sale on eBay.

Allan Holtz, on his indespensible comic strip blog Stripper’s Guide, has posted an intriguing 1925 article (from Cartoons and Movies magazine) entitled Making Cartoon Movies: The Low Down on How It’s Actually Done by Paul H. Terry, “with illustrations by the author”.

Here is it. The whole thing, by one of the true pioneers of the industry. Terry was actually one of the field’s leading lights during the silent era. It’s been said Disney studied Terry’s Aesop’s Fables, back then, for their craftsmanship. His drawings accompanying the article are teriffic.

Caricatures of Hollywood celebrities have been common practice in animated cartoons since the silent era. And comedians authorizing their personas for animation go back just as far (Otto Messmer’s series of Charlie Chaplin cartoons may have been the first). Since then, the essence of Laurel and Hardy, Abbott and Costello, The Three Stooges, et al.—all the way through Rodney (Rover) Dangerfield and coming up next fall, Jerry Seinfeld (Bee Movie)—live on in animated form. The cartoon counterpart for Mexican comedian Cantinflas continues today in animated shorts south of the border.

Comedy writer/actor/comedian Bill Dana created a Hispanic personality, Jose Jiminez, as a character for THE STEVE ALLEN SHOW in 1959. As Jiminez, Dana appeared on all the top variety shows, nightclubs, made record albums and even had his own TV series (although titled The Bill Dana Show, the 1963 NBC series starred Jose).

Mark Evanier has posted several times recently about Dana and what a fine comedian and writer he was. In the mid 1960s, Dana apparently explored the possibility of adapting Jose Jiminez to animation. Jose appeared briefly in the 1966 Hanna Barbera TV special (which he wrote) Alice in Wonderland or What’s a Nice Kid Like You Doing in a Place Like This? (which is being rerun on Boomerang Sunday Feb. 25). He also made a deal with Paramount to make an animated short, that was probably created as a pilot for a series.

But Jose Jiminez just didn’t cut it as an animated character. The Paramount short, posted below, is pretty darn poor. I WANT MY MUMMY was released in March 1966 and hasn’t been seen since. It wasn’t even shown on Nickelodeon when they had the package of Paramount theatricals they used to run on Cartoon Kablooey and Weinerville, perhaps not wanting to take a chance that Jose might offend Hispanic people. It was co-written by Dana and cartoonist Howard Post, who was running the studio at the time. Post started production on the film when he was abruptly replaced by veteran animator Shamus Culhane. That might explain some of the films crudeness. Or maybe not. This was Culhane’s first credit for Paramount as director—not a good start—in a job he’d hold for a year and a half before being replaced himself by Ralph Bakshi. That’s Bob McFadden doing all the other character voices.

Submitted for you approval, Jose Jiminez—Cartoon Brew’s Forgotten Cartoon Legend of the week.

(Thanks Mark Evanier for the Jose album cover at top)

Previously on the BREW:

• Forgotten Cartoon Legend #2 – MUGGY-DOO BOY CAT
• Forgotten Cartoon Legend #1 – SUPERKATT