Variety has an in-depth feature on the art direction of 'The Dark Knight' and 'Iron Man', making the case for the leading men in both movies as outsiders in their respective worlds.
Chris Yost on HULK VS
Marvel Animation Age recently talked to fan-favorite writer Christopher Yost, best known for his work on a host of different Marvel cartoons and comic series, about his work on the upcoming Hulk Versus, the animated direct-to-video feature hitting shelves on January 27th, 2009, and much more.
World's Finest Talks with Will Friedle on "Batman Beyond" and "Brave and Bold"
The World's Finest Online has interviewed actor Will Friedle on his roles as Terry McGinnis on Batman Beyond and the Blue Beetle on Batman: The Brave and the Bold. Friedle discusses how he landed the role of McGinnis in Batman Beyond thanks to his work on Boy Meets World, and also digs into his newest role as an up-and-coming superhero and his other work on shows like The Secret Saturdays and other shows he can't reveal just yet.
iFMagazine Talks with Dave Filoni on "Star Wars: The Clone Wars"
iFMagazine.com has posted part 1 of an interview with Dave Filoni, supervising producer of the new Star Wars: The Clone Wars TV series. Filoni discusses the challenges the new series brings to the table, how this series is connected to the earlier "micro-series" by Genndy Tartakovsky, how he manages the vast army of animators needed to make the show, and whether he reacts to on-line fan criticism.
LA Times on DreamWorks' Expanding Franchises; "Panda" Producer Reacts to Globe Nom
The Los Angeles Times has taken a look at DreamWorks Animation SKG's many efforts to grow its revenue streams beyond CGI animated feature films and the ensuing DVD releases (free registration required). The many initiatives are intended to even out the up-and-down revenue caused by theatrical and DVD release schedules, and will include TV specials and series, theme parks in Dubai and Singapore, and a Broadway musical based on the Shrek movies. DreamWorks officials were also frank in acknowledging that the current economic recession was affecting home video sales, reducing home video projections of Kung Fu Panda to approximately 10 million unit sales from the expected 12 million. The article also notes CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg's statement that "the studio had developed a more consistent track record at the box office by spending more time developing story lines and by hiring experienced directors and producers."
Elsewhere, Kung Fu Panda producer Melissa Cobb spoke withAnimation Magazine about her reaction to the movie's Golden Globe nomination for Best Animated Feature. Cobb expresses gratitude for the recognition the movie has received so far, while also acknowledging the acclaim for competition such as WALL-E and Bolt, and also gives her opinion on why Kung Fu Panda was received as well as it was. She also notes that she is at work on the sequel, and how the addition of 3-D will be a "new frontier," adding that, "we’re really looking at the potential to use it to enhance the storytelling"
Siegfried trailer
This just in from France: 2D isn’t quite dead yet…
Based on Dargaud’s graphic novel Siegfried by Alex Alice. Animation by Pendragon Imageforge. UPDATE: Reader Tsuka says, “This is not a trailer but a pilot produced in 2004 for an aborted feature project. Subsequently the author, Alex Alice, turned the project into a comic book last year.”
Thank you Mark Evanier for pointing us towards a must-read L.A. Times article by former Chuck Jones/Bill Melendez/Richard Williams publicist-turned-animation producer Steven Paul Leiva (Space Jam), about his ill-fated attempts to bring Will Eisner’s The Spirit to the screen. The story tells how Brad Bird, John Lasseter, John Musker, Jerry Rees (and other Hollywood bigshots) tried to make a potentially ground-breaking animated feature over 20 years ago (Leiva is pictured above left, in 1981, with Brad Bird (center) and Will Eisner at right). Read it now!
Don Greenberg, director of Cornell University’s highly regarded computer graphics program, encouraged the audience at the inaugural edition of SIGGRAPH Asia in Singapore to expand the applications of the technology and to help build bridges between disciplines in the future. In his keynote speech today (December 11), Greenberg used colorful examples from his amazing scientific and academic career to illustrate how far the CG community has come in the span of four decades.
Greenberg, whose current research projects involve realistic image generation and parallel-processing algorithms for rendering new graphical user interfaces, discussed the various application of computer sciences which go beyond animation and gaming. He talked about how some of the innovations in CG led to advances in areas from automotive design to medical operations, and how IBM scientists studied the brain’s circulatory system to create new 3D chips that help cool computer systems. He shared some of the early virtual imaging work he and his team produced for Cornell University back in 1968. The opening day audience was also treated to footage of Greenberg’s CG recreation of the flight of a possibly extinct ivory-billed woodpecker, which led him to an extensive study of flight mechanisms in birds and its scientific application in the field of aviation.
“Have courage to take risks and don’t shy away from attacking the big problems,” he urged. “With our expanding universe of computer technologies, why are we so concentrated on gaming and animation? The algorithms that we’ve developed can help accelerate research in other fields [medical, environmental studies, architecture, etc.], but they aren’t applied because we don’t talk to each other…because we don’t cross disciplines. The domain of our focus at SIGGRAPH has become narrow. It’s time for us to expand our boundaries to make the results of all this superb research more relevant to other disciplines.”
One of Greenberg’s many distinguished students, Rob Cook, VP of advanced technology at Pixar, is scheduled to deliver Friday’s (Dec. 12) keynote speech at SIGGRAPH Asia. Cook was the co-architect and primary author of Pixar’s Oscar-winning RenderMan software. He was also the first to use Monte Carlo techniques in computer graphics, which were essential for simulation of complex, realistic lights and camera effects. He won the ACM SIGGRAPH Achievement Award in recognition of these contributions.
Madagascar 3 Set for 2012
Those wild and wooly zoo animals from the Madagascar movies will be back for another African adventure in 2012. Daily Variety reports that Jeffrey Katzenberg made the announcement Thursday during his 3-D pitch to Wall Street analysts. The DreamWorks Animation CEO also offered a sneak peek at scenes from Monsters vs. Aliens, which is scheduled to bow in theaters on March 27, marking the studio’s big dive into 3-D movie making.
Katzenberg and his team told attendees that the studio hit an all-time high this year with Kung Fu Panda and Madagascar: Escape 2 Africa earning a combined $1.2 billion at the box office worldwide, but asserted that stereoscopic 3-D presentation is a major factor in driving up film revenues amid slumping home video sales. The argument was made that Shrek the Third would have grossed approximately $80 million more had it been projected in three dimensions. Some of the additional dough would come from the $5 price hike for 3-D fare.
DreamWorks Animation chief operating officer Ann Daly chimed in to note that DVD sales of Kung Fu Panda are expected to fall shy of the projected 12 million units. She estimated that home video sales industrywide will be down 6% this year as the recession has consumers spending less.
Even though the number of theaters equipped for digital 3-D projection will only be about half of what Katzenberg thought it would be by the time Monsters vs. Aliens opens, he thinks roughly 40% of the film’s audience will plunk down the extra $5 to see it as it was meant to be seen. There should be roughly 2,500 venues set up for the 3-D bow in March.
Panda Producer Reacts to Globes Nom
Melissa Cobb, producer of DreamWorks Animation’s Kung Fu Panda, spoke with us this morning about her first feature film receiving a Golden Globe nomination. The Hollywood Foreign Press Association recognized the action-comedy today, along with Disney’s Bolt and Disney/Pixar’s WALL•E. See the nomination story here www.animationmagazine.net/article/9334.
“The biggest thing is the validation,” Cobb says of the nomination. “You know, hard as the artists work on these things and for how many years, they always do their best and when that gets recognized it makes a huge difference for everybody.”
Cobb is a former Disney and Fox exec who worked in live-action and produced a number of TV movies and documentaries before joining Team Panda at DreamWorks. As a fan of animation and the arduous process involved in bringing these stories to the screen, she wishes there were enough awards to go around, especially during such a competitive year.
“Obviously it's a great year for animation,” Cobb remarks. “Both [WALL•E and Bolt] have gotten incredible recognition all over the world, so it’s tough competition. We were really supported so well by the foreign press this year. They really embraced the movie, which was a great honor for us.”
Kung Fu Panda earned more than $630 million at the box office worldwide, and was also well liked by critics. Asked why the film had such wide appeal, Cobb responds, “We tried to create a character that we cared abut because we were going to spend four years looking at the guy. In the character of Po, we found some qualities that people can relate to on a very personal level. That idea of feeling out of place, feeling like an underdog or that you’re never going to realize your dreams are things that people can relate to throughout the world. Really early on, the crew fell in love with the character and what Jack Black brought to it, and it really kept people inspired over the years we spent making it. On top of that, we really tried to be true to the mystery and the beauty of China. A big piece for us was trying to honor the art and culture of China, and I think the look of the movie is obviously something that critics and audiences responded to as well as the story.”
In addition to raking in the dough and garnering favorable notices, Kung Fu Panda was recently recognized by the animation community, picking up a whopping 17 Annie Award nominations. Winners for that competition will be announced on Friday, Jan. 30 at UCLA's Royce Hall in Los Angeles, Calif. Another date the crew at DreamWorks Animation is looking forward to is Thursday, Jan. 22. That’s when the Oscar nominations come out. However, Cobb tells us an Oscar nod would just be icing on the cake after all the great things that have happened with the film so far.
At the moment, Cobb is working on the Kung Fu Panda sequel, which is slated to hit theaters on June 3, 2011. This time, the kicks and punches will be coming at us in 3-D, which Cobb says is a game changer. “It’s sort of like being given a new color to paint with all of a sudden,” she comments. “It's pretty exciting and we’re really looking at the potential to use it to enhance the storytelling. We have some really interesting approaches we’re playing with and testing for how we can best use that tool to best immerse you in the story. It's a very new frontier!”
Bugs' Death 2 - Solid Drawing - adding perspective
Solid drawings are made up partly of construction. Perspective and foreshortening help make the drawings even more convincing - and harder to do. They also afford you more creative choices to tell your stories with.
Note how Bugs' feet are in the same perspective (the same angle) as the grave pit.
Many characters in today's cartoons will be drawn in 3/4 angle, yet their feet are placed on a horizontal line that completely ignores the perspective or angle of the rest of the characters. It hurts my eyes to see that so much. It makes it look like the leg that is farther away from is is longer than the one that is close to us.
We are also looking down on Bugs so his head is much bigger than his feet and his body is foreshortened.
I love the hills and valleys in Bugs' ears. Very subtle and adds even more form.
The way Bugs drags Elmer floating through the air and into the grave is cheated. Even McKimson couldn't figure out how to make that look natural. I bet he was cursing Clampett for this scene. It's full of technical problems to solve - yet the result makes the cartoon even funnier. It's amazingly directed - as someone pointed out in the comments the other day, Elmer is crying to the music. As always, Clampett's actions and gags flow along melodic music like a cartoon ballet.
I can't imagine how they choreographed all these ideas and made them work together so smoothly - and funny. They must have been supermen in the 1940s.
Catch a Look at Mamoru Oshii's Upcoming Samurai Anime
Production I.G has launched a trailer and site for Musashi: The Dream of the Last Samurai. An movie animated by the people behind the Ghost in the Shell anime, written by the man who directed the Ghost in the Shell Movies, depicting a legendary figure of chabara lore, it should be something to interesting AICNers.
The Mamoru Oshii film will detail the life of "Sword Saint" duelist and Book of Five Rings author Miyamoto Musashi. The life of the historical/semi-historical samurai has previously been depicted in 36 films, including Hiroshi Inagaki's Samurai Trilogy, in which he was portrayed by Toshirô Mifune, and in Eiji Yoshikawa's novel "Musashi," which in turn inspired Takehiko Inoue's manga Vagabond.
From Production I.G's description of the film
Overview Maverick filmmaker Mamoru Oshii is the mastermind behind the original concept for this project, in collaboration with Production I.G - the team that brought you cutting edge anime such as Patlabor: The Movie (1989), Patlabor: The Movie 2 (1993), Ghost in the Shell (1995), Innocence (2004) and The Sky Crawlers (2008).
This new full-length feature film entitled, Musashi: The Dream of the Last Samurai (Japanese title: Miyamoto Musashi - Soken ni Haseru Yume) is slated in Japanese theaters for summer 2009.
Miyamoto Musashi (1584-1645) was an unrivalled swordsman in the days when internal wars in Japan had virtually ended. Nevertheless, he wrote a master treatise on military strategy, The Book of Five Rings and sought "the way"to enlighten his spirit and cultivate his mind. But could this image have been manufactured by the generations that followed...?
Mamoru Oshii will take on an unusual portrayal of this legendary and aloof warrior, between spectacular duels and a tragic life in pursuit of greatness. With The Book of Five Rings as his guide, Oshii will unsheathe the true vision of the greatest swordsman in Japanese history! Medieval chivalry, horsemanship, swordsmanship and the essence of The Book of Five Rings will be pure entertainment!
The impressive production staff includes director Mizuho Nishikubo (also known by his alias Toshihiko Nishikubo) who has worked on numerous Oshii films including Ghost in the Shell (1995), Innocence (2004) and The Sky Crawlers (2008). He also directed the TV series Otogi Zoshi and Legend of Heavenly Sphere Shurato. Kazuto Nakazawa, director of the mind-blowing animation segment in Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill Vol. 1 (2003) and creator of innovative characters as seen in Samurai Champloo (2004), will design the characters for Musashi. The animation is supervised by Kazuchika Kise, the chief animator in Ghost in the Shell, Innocence and Blood: The Last Vampire.
MAIN STAFF Original Concept / Screenplay: Mamoru Oshii (Ghost in the Shell, The Sky Crawlers) Director: Mizuho Nishikubo (Innocence, The Sky Crawlers, Legend of Heavenly Sphere Shurato, Otogi Zoshi ) Character Design: Kazuto Nakazawa (Kill Bill: Vol. 1, Samurai Champloo, Asience: Hairy Tale) Animation Director: Kazuchika Kise (Ghost in the Shell, Blood: The Last Vampire) Art Director: Shuichi Hirata (Innocence, xxxHOLiC - A Midsummer Night's Dream, Asience: Hairy Tale) CG Animation: Makoto Endo (Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex, Le Chevalier D'Eon) Animation Studio: Production I.G (Ghost in the Shell, Kill Bill: Vol. 1, The Sky Crawlers)
Ben studied animation under former Disney animator Milt Neil at the Joe Kubert School of Cartoon and Graphic Art. He has been in the animation industry since 1984. He started doing animation for small commercials, then years later moved on to J.J. Sedelmaier Productions working on the "Cluckin' Chicken" parody for Saturday Night Live, which led to MTV, where he worked on "Beavis and Butt-Head", doing storyboard revisions, character and prop design, layout. animation on the hallucination sequence on the feature "Beavis and Butt-head Do "America" and also MTV's "The Maxx", doing character layout. As a freelancer, he's worked for various companies including Disney TV, Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, HBO Family, Miramax, Warner Bros., Saatchi and Saatchi, General Mills and Comedy Central. Currently, he's still doing the freelancing thing, while developing some personal projects for pitching.
Don Greenberg, director of Cornell University’s highly regarded computer graphics program, encouraged the audience at the inaugural edition of SIGGRAPH Asia in Singapore to expand the applications of the technology and to help build bridges between disciplines in the future. In his keynote speech today (December 11), Greenberg used colorful examples from his amazing scientific and academic career to illustrate how far the CG community has come in the span of four decades.
Those wild and wooly zoo animals from the Madagascar movies will be back for another African adventure in 2012. Daily Variety reports that Jeffrey Katzenberg made the announcement Thursday during his 3-D pitch to Wall Street analysts. The DreamWorks Animation CEO also offered a sneak peek at scenes from Monsters vs. Aliens, which is scheduled to bow in theaters on March 27, marking the studio’s big dive into 3-D movie making.
Melissa Cobb, producer of DreamWorks Animation’s Kung Fu Panda, spoke with us this morning about her first feature film receiving a Golden Globe nomination. The Hollywood Foreign Press Association recognized the action-comedy today, along with Disney’s Bolt and Disney/Pixar’s WALL•E. See the nomination story here www.animationmagazine.net/article/9334.
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