keyleedaud (REAL ESTATE)

The Ottawa International Animation Festival has posted its selections for 2012.  Congratulations to everyone whose film will screen.

In the period between the discovery of the principle of persistence of vision and the invention of flexible film stock, animation was born.  It was made with a variety of toys, all given impressive Greek names like Thaumatrope, Phenakistoscope and Zootrope (see the comments for the derivations of these words courtesy of Daniel).  These toys combined drawn or painted images in ways to give the illusion of movement.  The technology behind animation has become a lot more sophisticated, but it's all built on on the same principles exploited by these toys. Richard Balzer is a collector of these toys and the images they used and he has a site where the images are animated via Flash.  This means that if you're browsing on an iPhone or iPad, you will not be able to see the motion.  He also has a blog that deals with these toys as well as other 19th century amusements such as the Magic Lantern. While the animation is necessarily cycled and limited in duration, we have ...

Readers of this blog will know how interested I am in creators' rights.  Some of the most famous characters of 20th century pop culture were created under dubious legal and financial conditions.  The copyright to Superman was transferred from Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, the writer and artist, to their publisher for the sum of $130.  That was $10 per page for their first 13 page Superman story.  In order to get paid for their work, they lost control of their creation. The latest U.S. copyright law allows for creators who sold their copyrights to regain them during specific time periods.  If the creators are deceased, their heirs have the right to pursue the copyright. Jerry Seigel's heirs have filed to regain their half of the Superman copyright.  Joe Shuster's heirs are eligible to file in the near future.  Both are represented by attorney Marc Toberoff. On the face of it, it's a nice, clear story.  Two little guys were taken advantage of, lost ...

...I'd like to point you to a post, now a year old, called "Growth, Maturity and Decline."   My impression is that Pixar is done.  That doesn't mean that they won't make the occasional film that is exceptional, but the initial energy that propelled the company creatively is gone.  It was inevitable;  they are now predictable.  In terms of the previous article, they are a mature company.  The question now is when does the studio enter its decline?  This is not a criticism of the company so much as it is a sad observation.

July6-8 was the first TAAFI festival.  TAAFI stands for Toronto Animation and Arts Festival International.  I suspect that the acronym was chosen before the full title was worked out, but that's okay.  TAAFI is catchy. Ben McAvoy and Barnabas Wornoff are the two guys who made it all happen.  They spent the better part of a year pulling everything together and I have to say it was a successful festival, especially for a first-time event.  The TIFF Bell Lightbox, located in downtown Toronto and easily accessible, was a good venue, keeping all the events under a single roof.  The fest was a good mix of screenings, workshops and presentations and there was more happening than any individual could take in. Some of the events included a screening of Rock and Rule with a reunion of some of the crew, the North American premiere of Ronal the Barbarian , a northern European 3D cgi feature that parodied sword and sorcery movies, workshops by Charlie Bonifacio on pos...

Here's an interview with Bill Plympton, where he gives advice to independent animators.  The piece includes video clips.  And there's a link at the bottom to "4 Lessons in Creativity from John Cleese" that's also worth reading.

Tony Fucile is an animator and visual development artist who has worked on The Little Mermaid , Aladdin , The Lion King , The Iron Giant , The Incredibles , Ratatouille , Up and other films.  He is also an illustrator of children's books, and that's what I'd like to focus on. I first became aware of his art in books in Jack-Jack Attack , a Golden Book that was part of merchandising for The Incredibles .  His drawings are spare, but spare shouldn't be confused with simple.  His characters are solidly constructed and his compositions are nailed down, but everything is delineated with very few lines.  While those lines are somewhat rough, they are very expressive.  Slickness is not high on Fucile's list, but his other qualities are so outstanding that it isn't missed. Fucile both wrote and drew Let's Do Nothing , a story of two boys desperate to come up with a way to fill time.  You can see from this example how strong Fucile's poses are, a result, no dou...