News, links and stuff.
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Hmmm
[04-03-05] Oh dear. What's happened then? Where are the regular updates? Well, the truth is I don't have any very good excuses. We are currently in production on a new 2D series at A Productions and work seems to be constant and unending. Really this is a good thing. I'm lucky. There are many people out there in the animation industry who would love to be in constant work. However, I do tend to feel a bit numbed by it all. When I get home I just want to veg out in front of the TV. That's bad and I feel bad for doing it. However, it's just very easy to do.
On the plus side I've been asked to create the Animated Encounters Festival trailer again this year. I already have an idea of what I want to do. However, I'm leaving the actual animation to someone else. I'll be directing and compositing the piece. It's exciting because it is like being commissioned to make a little film. The only problem is that I have to fit it in around my other work. Once it's finished I'll put some stuff about its creation on the web site.
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Congratulations!
[04-03-05] A big congratulations to Tim Ruffle and Luis Cook who, along with the other members of their team, recently won the Interactive Media prize at the Design Week Awards 2005. They won the award for their work on the revamped Aardman web site. Design Week is a magazine that covers all aspects of design on a weekly basis, surprisingly. My brother got his picture in the very same magazine when he graduated from university. A bit of trivia there.
Tim has been working at A Productions recently and the award has hardly gone to his head at all. He's only mentioned that he should get a pay rise a few times.
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Book Recommendations
[04-03-05] It was Christmas recently... well... two months ago. Doesn't time fly. Anyway, I got some lovely books which I thought I would recommend to you, the viewing reader.
Animation Now!: This book gives an overview of the animation industry around the world. It profiles around 80 studios and artists. It contains loads of large colour pictures and is great to just flick through or spend some time reading. An added bonus is that you can learn French and German at the same time. Every bit of text is included in three languages.
The Art of The Incredibles: Basically it's pictures, lots of lovely development pictures from the huge Pixar/Brad Bird movie.
The Complete Far Side: I've wanted to get this for a while. Now I finally have it. It is actually two books, the size of encyclopedias, containing every Far Side cartoon ever published. It weighs a tonne and is still sitting on my bedroom floor because I can't find a shelf that can hold it. It's a joy to behold and makes your legs go numb as it slowly cuts off the blood whilst resting it on your lap. As well as the cartoons it also features the occasional letter of complaint or bemusement from newspaper readers who just don't get Gary Larson's weird genius. Excellent.
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Merry Christmas!
[19-12-04] I'm unlikely to update the web site over the next couple of weeks. That will make a change. However, in the new year I plan to start regular updates on the site. I will also be making a concerted effort to get on with my film.
At the moment I'm making Christmas Cards for friends and family. Here is one of my cards from last year.
Have a Happy New Year as well!
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Links of Interest
[3-11-04] Whilst looking for a suitable font for a project I came across this site. It is the web site of John Martz, an illustrator. I really like his illustration style. You can also visit his Blog site at www.robotjohnny.com
Aardman's new web site is finally online. It has been in development for at least a year but it looks fantastic.
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Suggestions Please!
[26-07-04]You may have noticed a lack of updates recently. I don't really have any good excuses for my shortage of activity on the site. I should be working on my films and projects and giving you updates on them. However, my films tend to develop very slowly. There is always some other idea to think about which is so much more attractive than actually sitting down and doing some proper work.
If you have any suggestions or things you would like me to expand upon then please send me an email. I'm not really sure who reads this web site other than a couple of bored work colleagues. (Hello Duncan). So if you're out there let me know.
Thanks.
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Link of Interest
[26-07-04] Small independent animation projects are all very well but sometimes it's easy to forget that there are some big animation and effect studios in the UK producing world class material. So here are some reminders.
Framestore CFC is the biggest effects house in Europe. Based in London they have worked on projects from TV to film. Recent movie work has included the HArry Potter films and the new Thunderbirds.
The Mill produced the Oscar winning effects for Ridley Scott's Gladiator. As well as work on TV commercials they have recently been awarded the contract to produce the effects for the new Doctor Who series.
Passion Pictures have produced a wealth of interesting and innovative commercials and music videos.
Aardman really don't need any introduction. They are the most famous animation studio in the UK. They do a lot more than just Wallace and Gromit.
I think I'm right in saying that Cosgrove Hall are the biggest animation studio in Europe. They have created many of the most loved children's animated series.
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E4 Sting Competition
[14-05-04] E4 and Creative Review Magazine are currently running a competition to design and produce stings (the little channel ident sequences shown before programmes) for E4. The winning stings will be shown on E4 as well as featured on the competition web site. The main winner will also receive £15,000 to develop more stings for the channel. Two runners up will each be given £1500 worth of equipment and ten more runners up will get free subscriptions to Creative Review.
They are looking for funny and unusual sequences which must feature the E4 logo. The logo and optional music can be downloaded from the web site. Apart from some imagination you will also need access to Mini DV, BetaSP or Digi Beta equipment as these are the only tape formats that they will accept.
The deadline for submissions is 14 September 2004.
Go and check out the competition web site for all the details and rules as well as examples of last year's entries.
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Link of Interest
[30-03-04] Tim Ruffle mentioned this site to me ages ago. It belongs to Jimmy Maidens, a CG artist. You'll find many examples of his strange creations on the site. What I find particularly interesting is the way that he has managed to get his computer generated models to look like Plasticine. They look soft and appealing.
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Bristol Animated Encounters Festival
[06-03-04] Just a little news on the next Animated Encounters festival. The festival will not be taking place this year due to the Watershed venue being refurbished with the addition of another screen. However, the festival will be back in 2005, to be more precise Thursday 21st to Sunday 24th April.
Although it is slightly disappointing not to have the event this year there are some positive aspects to this situation. The first being that it's back to being a four day event. Last year the whole thing was squeezed into just two days. This meant that it was actually impossible to see all the films presented as screenings inevitably overlapped with each other. The second good thing is that the organizers now have an extra year to make the festival the best ever. Thirdly, I now have more time to finish the film that was nowhere near ready to be submitted to the festival if it had taken place this year.
2004 will still have a little flavour of Animated Encounters. The annual Brief Encounters festival (Animated Encounters' big sister) will be taking place from 17th to 21st November and will host "a very special, star studded Animated Encounters launch event." Hmm sounds interesting. Keep an eye on the Brief Encounters web site for the latest news.
www.animated-encounters.org.uk/
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BBC Talent New Animation Awards... updated
Every year the BBC runs their New Talent scheme in search of new creative individuals. There are many different categories ranging from scriptwriters to weather presenters. As luck would have it this years animation winner and finalists have just been announced. Check them out here. The overall winner is given the opportunity to develop their idea for a BBC3 series.
This year's winner is a short film called Hobbies by Nick Mackie and Pete Avery. It features the voice recording of someone talking about their life and hobbies. Hmm, I'm sure I've seen something done by someone in a similar style somewhere else *cough* Aardman. Isn't it great seeing really original ideas such as this winning all the top prizes... sigh.
UPDATE
You know when you make a bitter and sarcastic comment on your web site and then a few days later receive a pleasant email from the person who you didn't expect to read the comment? No? Well, I do.
Here is an email I received from Nick Mackie, co creator of Hobbies, in which he straightens out a few things.
Hello There,
Thanks for the mention on your grand web site. Pete and me are really pleased and excited to have won BBC Talent. It has taken us many years to get to a position where we can do this.
We haven’t just watched an ‘Aardman’ film and thought “we can do that”. So here's a quick potted history…firstly I worked as a senior Animator at Aardman for six years. I also designed and animated the Creature Comforts titles. As you probably know Creature Comforts is unscripted voices of the public as are some other great Aardman Films. Hobbies is SCRIPTED! There is a big difference in this approach. Pete and me spend a lot of time writing and developing the characters. As a big fan of Aardman and Nick Park I take it as a huge compliment that you see similar styles with our Hobbies and past Aardman work. ( I attach an image of ‘Wolfie’ from Hobbies No.1 – I don’t really see an Aardman style here). As a freelancer I will be still working for Aardman and have a couple of projects in the pipeline with them.
Like your website by the way and really liked your animated encounters graphics,
All the best
Nick
Nick Mackie
Creative Director
Shufti
So there you have it. He could have said nasty things about me, but he didn't. That makes him a gent. Now go make him more happy and visit his web site www.shufti.co.uk
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Links of interest
A couple of web sites that are currently amusing us at work.
First up is Fensler Film. Eric Fensler was asked to provide some short sequences to appear during a film festival. He took the public service announcements from the end of the classic G. I. Joe series and then crafted them into something bizarre, strange and very funny. You'll either get them or you won't.
More bizarrer but funny stuff. If you've seen the recent Anchor butter commercials on TV and the side of buses then this is where it all started. However, it's not all egg shaped characters talking about pies. You'll also find the hypnotic badgers song that has been sweeping the internet.
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New Pixar Short
Ooh it's always exciting hearing about new films from Pixar. In this case it's a new short film called Boundin’. It's based on a song and features a singing and dancing lamb. Take a look at an article that discusses the making of the film here.
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Win Creature Comforts DVD
DVDanswers.com currently have a competition to win the new Creature Comforts DVD. You only have to answer one simple question (Here's a little clue. Pay close attention to the first line of text on the competition page)
Update: You're too late now. The competition has closed. Sorry.
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New Film
Finding Nemo, Pixar's latest CG extravaganza, finally gets released nationwide in UK cinemas on October 10th. It only took just over four months for it to reach us from the USA, thanks Disney.
If you like the film and have a multi-region DVD player you'll be able to get the Region 1 DVD less than a month later on November 4th! Don't expect the region 2 DVD until around Easter 2004.
This seems like a very odd release schedule especially when most studios are fiercely trying to combat piracy by releasing their movies worldwide as soon as possible. Warner Brothers are even going as far as releasing The Matrix Revolutions all over the world simultaneously. I don't just mean on the same day, I mean at the exactly same time!
Oh while your here take a look at the trailer for the next Pixar film, The Incredibles. Click here.
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New DVD
Disney's The Lion King finally gets released on DVD on 31/10/03. In my opinion this was the peak of the modern era of Disney traditional animated films, even with the songs. It slowly went down hill from here. The DVD itself is a special edition and comes with an extra disk. The box set includes the following special features...
Audio
commentary from the film's producer and directors Rob Minkoff & Roger
Allers
Deleted scenes
'Making Of' featurette
Abandoned concepts
Virtual safari
'Personality Profile' game
Interactive menu
Scene access
Gasp! "Interactive menu" and "scene access!" Surely not. Those really are special features. I wonder when they'll stop listing scene access as a special feature. It's like pointing out that you can skip tracks on a CD or fast forward through a video.
You'll also be glad to know that they've added in another song. Oooh great! Sigh.
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Links of interest
Rustboy is a short film being created by Brian Taylor singlehandedly bar a musician. He has also built this very professional Flash web site that chronicles the creation of the film. A very talented, and no doubt, busy man.
The Animwatch web site specifically features many talented individuals that are creating their own animated films. Where do these people find the time? The site also features a good selection or resources for people either making their own animated films or just interested in animated films.
StudioAKA are a studio in London that I greatly admire. Although, mostly working in the world of television commercials they have managed to produce some of the most visually interesting animated ads in recent years.
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