Here’s a little treat from OddBot, Inc. animation studio in Los Angeles. Directed by Crystal Stromer, this is the touching and tasty little story of a kernel of corn with a twinkle in his eye for a very lovely little piece of candy corn.
Category Archives: Animation
JibJab Does Halloween
Here’s a Halloween treat from JibJab based on one of their eCards.
Horror Movie: The Curse of Frankenstein
In keeping with our horrific new game, Frankenstein – The Creature Must Die!, here’s a 1957 Hammer Film called The Curse of Frankenstein. It stars Peter Cushing as Victor Frankenstein and Christopher Lee as the monster.
This version of the Frankenstein story caused critical outrage when it was released. It was ground-breaking in its level of gore and violence and it kicked off a long series of popular horror flicks from Britain’s Hammer Film Productions.
Animation: Dead All Along
Here’s a nice music video made by Giles Timms at the Animation Workshop at UCLA’s Department of Theater, Film and Television. It features the music of Ceri Frost and looks like cutout animation. It’s a nice little film to warm up for Halloween.
Animation: I Got Opinions
Collaborative animation from Watermark for the Greg Johnson single, ‘I Got Opinions.’ I don’t usually post music videos, but this was just kind of cute. Very colorful and full of imagination. It features the work of eight illustrators. I like the clever ways it finds to move from one illustration style to another.
I found this at Cartoon Brew.
Animation: The Forest
David Scharf made this lovely animated film called The Forest. A young girl uses her imagination in a world that doesn’t fit her well. She resists being drawn into the ordinary life she sees around her for as long as she can.
The animation is beautiful and the film has a dark, smokey look. It’s a story told simply and with a delicate touch.
I found this via my favorite film site, No fat clips!!!
Animator Nina Paley Releases Source Files for Sita Sings the Blues
Animator Nina Paley, who single-handedly made the feature film, Sita Sings the Blues, has released all of the Flash animation source files (.fla files) that make up the entire film. She’s giving away the building-blocks of the entire film! That’s like a traditional animator giving you all the drawings. Paley has given the files a Creative Commons License which means animators can use her art and animation techniques in full or in pieces for their own projects as long as she is credited.
Sita Sings the Blues is a musical, animated personal interpretation of the Indian epic the Ramayana.
Animation: Pigeon Pilfer
Animator Michael Stevenson of San Fransisco State University made this claymation cartoon. It’s short and sweet. Clay animation is very difficult to do well and this animator does it brilliantly. He gets a lot a character out of his clay and the film has a wonderful gentle humor that is very European in its flavor. The entire film was shot frame-by-frame with a digital SLR camera. There’s a behind-the-scenes web site where you can see photos of the film’s set.
Animation: Gumms
Anton Bogaty’s new film is Gumms. It’s not intended for young children – mature subject matter. A cartoonist works for a bubblegum manufacturer making those little comic-strips that go inside the wrapper. He’s looking for an idea. Bogaty uses interesting techniques in his films. He seems to edit them together almost as if he were just making a storyboard. The drawing is deceptively simple. The animation is minimal. But it all adds up to some of the most interesting films being drawn. Really nice troubling work. This Bogaty is an artist. I like him.
Dante’s Inferno: The Game
Improving upon the most boring character in the history of world literature, Electronic Arts is going to release an action game called Dante’s Inferno. From the looks of the preview, this version of the Dante character is much more interesting and capable than the literary original who is the main character in the Divine Comedy trilogy consisting of the epic poems called Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso. Author Dante Alighieri wrote himself into his epic poem as a rather stolid, questioning dullard who follows the ghost of Virgil around in hell. He whines about all the people who did him wrong in life and coincidentally runs into almost all of them during his sour-grapes tour of Satan’s domain. But this video version of Dante kicks some smokin’ butt. This is the Dante I’ve been waiting for and I am going to relish using my Xbox controller to stomp around and cut the heads off some nasty devils and repentant sinners.
It’s probably best to at least read Inferno before playing so that you can agree with me on how to improve the irritating main character. But I will credit Mr. Dante Alighieri with one major achievement: he seems to have invented multi-level game play. His version of hell is a series of rings that descend toward the most terrible of sins and punishments. That’s pretty much the definition of modern computer gaming.
Simon’s Cat: New Animated Episode
The new episode of Simon’s Cat is called Fly Guy. It’s by UK animator Simon Tofield. This hilarious cat absolutely must catch the fly. The cat is just unbelievably funny, especially the way it uses its paws. This cartoon is simply loaded with character-driven expressive humor.
Someone: CG Animation
DeK at No fat clips!!! pointed me to this CG film by Magali Barbe and Jean Constantial. It looks painted, like oil paint strokes and spatters. It’s mysterious and I like it. Lots of reflections and a lone figure trying to differentiate and perhaps become individual.
Animation: The Astronomer’s Dream
The Astronomer’s Dream is by Malcolm Sutherland. I can hardly make any sense out of it but I see endless repetition, making of the same mistakes over and over again, Buddhism, the serpent eating its own tail, ancient Mayan predictions and star observations, evolution, looking out equals looking in. That’s all I can make of it. It’s a strange piece of work. I like all the little lines and dashes in the weirdo drawings.
The Visit: Animation in Progress
Last night I posted the background image of the snowy landscape for the next shot in the animated movie, The Visit. If you’re interested, what I’ve done this evening is to take my background landscape and cut it in two pieces along the line of the little hill with the path on it. The line goes more or less horizontally across the middle of the image. That makes two images – one with the far away hills, sky and large trees on it, the other with the near ground and path on it. In Adobe Flash, I place the two pictures on different layers. The near ground image goes on the top layer so it stays in front of the background hills. So it looks like a single image again, but now I have my little foreground hill on a different layer than my distant background hills. Then I place an empty layer in my Flash program right between those two image layers. This is where I animate the father walking with little Oksana. So, when I’m finished, it looks as if they are coming up from just behind the little hill close to the viewer. Click the play button above to watch them.
On top of everything I add a few layers of snow. To give the illusion of depth, I make the top or near layers of snow move larger dots at higher speed than the lower layers which should look like snow that’s farther away. I also drew a few pine branches and layered them in just behind some of the snow. So there’s a quick little shot for our little movie. I’ll go in and add some shading and light effects tomorrow so that it all looks just a little bit better.
We’re making a fairy tale. What could be better than that?
The Visit: Animation in Progress
After quite a long break for coffee and ice-cream that’s lasted since November 2007, I am picking up the film right where I left off and this is my image for the evening. It’s a background for a shot of Oksana’s father leading her from home and into the forest. I’ll start working on the two characters tomorrow. They will come up over the little knoll and walk toward us. It’s amazing how difficult it is to start work on something like this again, but how pleasant the work is once begun.
Here is the latest version of the animation done so far:
The Make the Movie blog has all the posts from the beginning of this little production. You can see the pencil drawings, storyboard film, background paintings, and animation tests. You can also find the original story there.