This is the Greatest Video Ever Made!

Video Refrence for Fantastic Mr Fox

Here's a interesting look at Wes Anderson doing video reference for Fantastic Mr Fox. I can understand how Wes Anderson wanted to make sure he got the performance that he needed for each take this was probably the best way for him to do that. I've seen video of Nick Park doing the same thing for Chicken Run, although he had his animators do the same thing. I wonder how much of the film Wes acted out, I wouldn't be surprised if he didn't cut the film together three or four times using live action and story boards. He probably felt more comfortable that way and it probably kept Wes off the set when they were shooting the film. Anyone know the budget for this one?

I'm looking forward to seeing this film. I don't care much for the character design but I've really enjoyed Wes Anderson's films up tell now.





If you haven't seen this, this is a great video about Bill Melendez, I include it in this post because it has a great comparison of Bill's work to Wes's work. It's really a must see.




See even more Making Of Stuff here, man I wish I could have worked on this one!

What I've been up to, and Insperation

On Wednesday I was invited by a good friend of mine and talk to some animation students from Los Angles and from Taiwan. Mike Nguyen was also there. He gave a talk about finding character in animation and story structure. It was a good chance to meet and talk with Mike, I've been following his website for quite some time. If you haven't seen it you should check it out, its one of the best animation blogs on the web.

Mike's talk was truly inspiring. I hope that Mark keeps doing these animation lunch ins and keeps inviting animators to speak at them (it sounds like he will). I'd also like to see him incorporate open life drawing into it.

I've decided to try harder to breath some life back into this blog. I used to be in the habit of writing pretty often, now I find it difficult to find the time.

What I've been up to: I finished up on Cloudy With A Chance of Meatballs. It was a ton of fun. It has a really solid story and I think it will do well when it's out. I know my daughter is excited to see it.

I have a few weeks at home to spend with the family, then it's up to Canada to enjoy a nice warm winter up there. I'll be working on an animation project that I'm not sure if I can talk about yet. I think it's OK to talk about but better safe then sorry. I'll be back in LA once the project wraps up. There's a lot of really great animation going on up north it'll be great to see it in person. I hope to catch Ottawa while I'm there.

Why I love Spike Jones

This is the into to a film called: Fully Flared directed by Spike Jone. It's a skateboarding fim made for a shoe company named Lakai. I haven't seen the entire film, but I love the intro.



Spike Jones is known for his award winning commercials and music videos, I love the way he uses "in camera" effects in most of his work. He lets things naturally play out instead of trying to control every element. The result is great. Check out the video and see for yourself.

You can see more of his work here:

Ikea video, this lamp has as much personality as Pixar's Luxo, but with no animation, fancy camera work and lighting:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TsQXQGaasUg

Such a simple idea, such a powerful image, a man on fire running down the street:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dPT7q825gwI&NR=1

This one is amazing, he filmed all the actors doing their actions backwards:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmNIvlVt40M

This is probably his most well known video, he won the MTV Music awards for it (that year he beat Madana's video, she spent millions on hers and reportedly was very pissed off when she didn't win):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqrDWKq9gGU

Wii Remote Hacks

I already use a Wii remote to help me with my Animation Mentor critiques, photoshop, and TVPaint, but I essentially just use it as a wireless keyboard replacement. I had no idea it could be used for so much more. Johnny Lee has turned the Wii remote into an interactive white board and a 3D Game display. If your interested in this kid of stuff, check out his talk on TED:




TED has turned into a kick ass place for people to present ideas. I really like the videos they publish.

Horten Comparison reel

Check out Jeff Gabor's comparison reel. It will blow your mind!

http://www.jaganimations.com/ComparisonReelHD.mov

Looks like the link doesn't work right now. Check back later hopefully it will be fixed then. Frankly I'm not surprised it's broken, I'm sure he's getting a lot of hits.

An argument for Barack Obama

I don't know which side you lean politically. But Lawrence Lessig (a man who's intelligence I respect) gives a 20 minute argument for Barack Obama. It's a damn good one Barack has had my vote scenes I saw his speech at the Democratic convention in 2004, and he still has it today.

Bananaz: Gorillaz documentary comming out!

It looks like they're making a documentary on my favorite fake band: Gorillaz

Really it's Jamie Hewlett that I'm a fan of. There's not many illustrators out there who I'll buy anything that they scribble on, he's the exception. I'm just blown away at his design sense. The music is ok but man those illustrations are something! I found myself buying all the CDs for the cover art more then the music.

http://www.bananazfilm.com/

Thanks

New Mechanical sculptures/pupets from François Delarozière and Pierre Oreficee

The artists who put on the puppet show in London: "The Sultan’s Elephant" have done it again. But this time they've creased an installation of gigantic mechanical animals in the Machines de l'Ile Nantes in Nantes France. I don't know if you'd call them puppets or machines, what ever they are they're certainly cool looking. In any case check it out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KzyWja6vg3I

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OuSoZKjPpGE

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1ylXR-iY8I

You can find more pictures here:

http://www.darkroastedblend.com/2008/01/machine-animals-of-nantes.html

Take a look, it's truly amazing work.

Quinn and Bill Peet

Here's my daughter Quinn seeing how her hands match up to the great Bill Peet's.

Pervasive Persuasion

Over the weekend I attended the Pervasive Persuasion panel. It was a panel where Gary Baseman, Simone Legno, and Tim Biskup talked about their work. It was cool hearing Tim Biskup talk about what he thought each of his paintings. My wife was able to capture a video of it, you can see that here:







Here's a picture of me and a graffiti artists that I like. Still don't know his name but, I've seen his stuff all over Culver City, (apparently he's not even from LA, or America for that matter.) His line quality is super sharp and clean it was amazing to see him work. Someone snagged that picture behind us just seconds after we moved away from it. Wish I was that fast.

Anyhoo it was a good time.

Prase for David O'Reily, (never thougth I'd post this)

Today I was watching Boing Boing TV this morning, like I do almost every morning. (I like me that Boing Boing TV:) The first half is more of Ape Lad's Hobo videos, I always find those entertaining. Then in the second half there's this great bit of graphic animation. Nice simple design, strong poses and timing, really cool looking. So I looked up who did it and to my surprise it was David O'Reily. I've seen a few of David O'Reily films on the web. I've found them entertaining and clever, in a weird kind of way. But today's Boing Boing TV has shown that he can actually animate with a strong design sense, which was a big surprise to me. I've known that his films were met to take the piss out of the CG animation industry but I never thought that he knew what he was doing. Anyhoo take a look and tell me what you think:



BTW, you can find a nice writeup about him here.

Ed Catmull Interview

This is a bit of old news, but if you haven't checked out Ed Catmull's interview on Spline Doctors, you really owe it to yourself to do so, it's really good, very inspiring.

Direct link.

Prase for Adam Koford's LOL Cats

Like most people I discovered Adam Koford's(aka Ape Lad) drawings and comics with his series 500 Hobos. At the time I thought it was nothing more then just a lot of fun, but since then Adam has moved on to doing more then that, proving to be a great cartoonist. I check out his blog regularly and I find he's constantly uploading great comics, he's has a great unique style and a strong sense of humor. Recently Boing Boing TV has crated a fake video highlighting his LOL Cats. If you haven't seen his LOL Cats, I highly recommend them. They're done in a great old style, far superior then anything being published in papers today. (Although I did really like last Sunday's Opus.)

Pidgon at the Con

Jeff Pidgon has some really nice photographs from SDCC:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/67896537@N00/976603489/in/photostream/

He especally has some nice pictures of the upcoming Cars Toys from Mattel.