Where Do You Like To Work?

Every artist has their favorite place to work, but it’s unlikely that any of those places offer the amusing view that animation filmmaker Chris Harding finds in Kansas City. He writes about his inspiring scenery in this blog entry.

More Backgrounds

We’ve plugged the blogs of both Hans Bacher and Rob Richards numerous times recently. Both are putting a spotlight on the unsung work of background painters in animated cartoons. Today, Richards posts a composite of the pan shot showing the three dimensional cave (actually an intricate miniature live action set) in Popeye the Sailor Meets Sindbad The Sailor. Fleischer artisans clearly put a lot of thought, hard work and artistic know how into these Stereo-Optical “set-backs”. Considering how some of these elaborate shots only appear on screen for several seconds, I encourage Rob to create more composites of these. They certainly deserve a closer look.

Get Well, Mel?

Above and below are two parts of one interesting piece of WB ephemera that that one of our readers (who wishes to remain anonymous) acquired recently. We believe it may have been a first, more informal get well card to Mel Blanc very shortly after his catastrophic auto wreck on Jan. 24, 1961. This would have been before Chuck Jones did his Magnum Opus card - almost 4 feet long that showed all 14 WB characters lying side-by-side in bed with thermometers in their mouths being attended by a doctor and a nurse with the Doc saying “I don’t know what is wrong with them, they have all lost their voice.” The names seem roughly right for 1961. But were Maltese and Scribner there at that point? Perhaps it was created for another?
Can any of our readers, researchers and historians attribute who it was done for, and who drew it???

Music Vids by Shoji Goto and Jamie Mason

These two recent music vid discoveries make me very happy.
• “Umo” is a primarily stop motion video directed by Shoji Goto for the all-female Japanese group OOIOO. The energetic uninhibited filmmaking in this piece is a true delight. Peep it here or download a better quality Quicktime version here (28mb).
• “Frog Dance” is an inspired bit of Flash animation by Jamie Mason (aka Hobo Divine) produced for the Nick Jr. series Yo Gabba Gabba. It’s mighty rare to see anybody today pull off this type of super-limited animation with such charm and vitality

The World Is Your Canvas

Who needs pencil and paper? Italian graffiti artist and painter Blu paints his animation onto the ground and walls. His latest piece, Fantoche (posted below), was created earlier this month during the Fantoche Animation Festival in Switzerland. It is a brilliant and inspiring creative accomplishment, not to mention an obviously staggering amount of work:
lu also creates hand-drawn animation and is the subject of a forthcoming documentary, the trailer for which can be viewed here.

Ottawa 2007 is here!

The 2007 edition of the Ottawa International Animation Festival kicks off today, and as always, Ottawa’s artistic director Chris Robinson has pulled together a solid lineup of programs. Sadly I can’t make it this year, but if I were going, here are some of the things I’d be checking out:
• The opening night feature: Persepolis.
• Masterclasses by Joanna Quinn and Tomasz Baginski
• The International Showcase screening which includes the world premiere of the Goofy short How to Hook Up Your Home Theater, the first film to come out of Disney Animation’s new shorts program.
• Panels about advertising in animation and blogging in animation. The blogging panel includes the other half of Cartoon Brew, Jerry Beck.
• A lot of design-oriented programs this year including a four-part UPA retrospective, a tribute to Zagreb Film director Dušan Vukotić, and a program showing animation influenced by New Yorker cartoonist Saul Steinberg.
• The competition screenings are always one of the strongest parts of Ottawa, and this year’s selections are no exception. All of this year’s major shorts are playing up there including Koji Yamamura’s A Country Doctor, Luis Cook’s Pearce Sisters, Chris Lavis and Maciek Szczerbowski’s Madame Tutli-Putli and Don Hertzfeldt’s Everything Will Be OK, but there’s always a lot of pleasant unexpected discoveries at Ottawa as well.

Amp XGames by Three Legged Legs

The young Santa Monica animation studio Three Legged Legs continues to impress with each new project they turn out. Reza Rasoli, one of the principals in the studio, wrote to give me a heads up on their latest campaign, “XGames” for Amp energy drink. The three Amp feature the most extensive traditional character animation that they’ve produced to date. They’ve also posted an excellent case study that showcases the artistic talent and concept artwork behind the Amp spots.