Channel Frederator Blog

Winners. They come in all shapes and sizes. Some set records for eating fifty-seven hard-boiled eggs in two minutes. Some compete in an even more terrifying stunt. We call them “Channel Frederator Film Submitters” — and there were thousands of you this year. It would be cliché to say that you’re all winners for submitting your films, and even more cliché to say that everyone featured on Channel Frederator this year played a hugely important role in our success as a podcast network, so we’re not going to go there with the touchy-feely.

The few and the proud Channel Frederinos were selected to be put to the test by our viewers, competing in eleven categories. That’s more categories than a McDonald’s value meal menu, and, man, are we proud. And now we are ready to announce the winners of the First Annual Channel Frederator Awards. Dinner roll please…

Starting off with our winner for Best Flash Film is Jessica Borutski with I Like Pandas. Apparently our viewers liked pandas as much as Jessica, because they voted for her. If you don’t like pandas after watching this short film, you were most likely raised by armadillos, the panda bear’s only known enemy.

Q: Who digs a cartoon that looks cool and clever, nifty, and natty? A: Everybody, that’s who! An exemplar of those very adjectives, Zumbakamera’s Bendito Machine runs away with the honor of Best Design.

Next up is Best Foreign Film, Le Building, submitted by Olivier Staphylas. This film’s got it all. Shower singing, cat dying, naked ladying, and kids in a bus freaking. What’s not to loving, really?

Moving on-ing. The “So Cute It Hurts” Award was dedicated to all of our babies’ mommas, and it went to Amanda Spalinski’s Skippy. Her film definitely puts the ouch in “cute”, mainly because after we watched it, our faces were frozen in some sort of paralyzed smile, and it took a while to frown and go back to being the bastards we usually are.

On the opposite end of the spectrum was our Through a Podcast Darkly Award, which was dedicated to all of our illegitimate babies’ mommas, and acknowledges the bastard in us all. Just as cute as “Skippy”, but with a darker twist, Snow-Bo by Vera Brosgol swept the “Podcast Darkly” awards category — because nothing spells “winner” like an innocent child kidnapped and beaten in a knapsack by a hobo zombie.

If the Oscars were really “all that”, they’d be handing out an annual award for Best Voice Mail. You know, it’s for the best viewer phone call. You voted Sweet Love as this year’s top voice mail. Now, if we only knew how to find that gal and give her her award. And a kiss on the forehead.

In every joke lies a bit of truth. Poor Bernard Derriman. His Everyone Else Has Had More Sex Than Me earns top spot in the Funniest Film category. We reckon you Channel Frederator voters chose EEHHMSTM out of pity, out of empathy, or because it’s truly a funny film. Or all three.

Yo! Fred & Ginger, Gene, Rudy N! We bet that if you were with us today, you’d literally be with us, congratulating the winner of this year’s Best Dance Sequence, Dance Like a Monkey, submitted by Collection Agency Films. Hey, we feel like dancing to The New York Dolls right now!

No short competition would be complete without an award for Best Music Video. When we first aired this Viking video at the beginning of last year, the commentary it got on our site could be likened to the shrill tears of joy an eleven-year-old girl would make at a boy-band concert. War Photographer, by Joel Trussell, animated to Jason Forrest’s song, took the category by storm. After we were done dabbing the mist from our eyes as we watched Trussell’s short film a few thousand times, we decided that War Photographer needed to win the juried Producers’ Choice Award as well. Why? Because we said so. And Joel sent us a monkey.

Tim Farrell had two films on our podcast this year, but only one of which, WTF?!, was deemed worthy enough to be voted Most Likely To Be Censored By The FCC. Just when we thought there weren’t enough toys in the world, Tim invented some more that our brains sense make of can’t. Anyone with developing grey matter probably shouldn’t watch this film, but we thoroughly enjoyed it.

And what would the first year of Channel Frederator have been without Blur Studios? Well, for starters, four films shorter. Further, there’d be three Freddy Awards with different filmmakers names on them. The Santa Monica studio’s Rockfish was not only voted as the year’s Best CG Film, but it also ranks as the highest-rated film by Channel Frederator viewers in our inaugural year (yeah! Cartoon of the Year!). And as if those two accolades aren’t enough, Rockfish also earns the prize for the film this year submitted in the Largest File Size. Blur, you should be proud.

Now, there are also a coupla juried awards in this year’s Channel Frederator Awards. This means a bunch of us at Channel Frederator put our heads together and figured a few folks and films deserved special recognition.

First, if there’s one thing we love at Channel Frederator, it’s robots. And it looks as though cartoonists like them, too. Several shorts this year featured robots, but none as effectively as The New Guy by Ed Skudder. So, to Ed, we award the first-ever Joe Robot Award for the best use of a robot.

As sort of self-congratulatory pat on the back, we deemed it was only fitting to hand out an award to one of our own. We thought it would be hilarious to bestow the Channel Frederator Vanguard Award to someone actually named Van Guard, but we couldn’t track down anyone by that name. Instead, we had to settle honoring the man guy who imagined Channel Frederator in the first place, David Karp. Thanks, David. Your idea from the fall of 2005 has kept us all very, very busy.

But before there was David Karp, there was Apple, Inc. That’s right, the computer people. We felt it was necessary to honor the Steves and their organization for the revolution they began more than thirty years ago. Apple, your first-ever Instigator Award is in the mail. It may be sheer hubris, but we sorta feel all that technology and innovation was leading up to Channel Frederator. We mean, what else can they come up with? Right?

It’s safe to say that a man whose films have made (move pinky finger to side of mouth) over one billion dollars, and who is inspiring and leading a generation of filmmakers to make inspiring films as we type this, deserved some sort of award this year. Our first recipient of our Cartoonist of the Year award is none other than Pixar’s main homeboy, John Lasseter. John, if you’re reading this, we want to extend our sincerest thanks for all you have done for the animation industry thus far. We’re not usually very serious, but gosh darn it, you’re so great you make us want to commit.

So, that’s it. Whew! Lots of awards. Lots of filmmakers. Lots of inspiration. Thanks to all. Now, if you’ll excuse us, we’re off to plan the premiere event of 2008 – The Second Annual Channel Frederator Awards.

Channel Frederator Loves You

* Best Flash Film – I Like Pandas – Jessica Borutski
* Best Design – Bendito Machine – Zumbakamera
* Best Foreign Film – Le Building – Olivier Staphylas
* The “So Cute It Hurts” Award – Skippy – Amanda Spalinski
* The “Through a Podcast Darkly” Award – Snow-Bo – Vera Brosgol
* Best Voice Mail – Sweet Love
* Funniest Film – Everyone Else Has Had More Sex Than Me – Bernard Derriman
* Best Dance Sequence – Dance Like a Monkey – Collection Agency Films
* Best Music Video – War Photographer – Joel Trussell
* Most Likely To Be Censored By The FCC – WTF?! – Tim Farrell
* Cartoon of the Year – Rockfish – Blur Studios
* Best CG Film – Rockfish – Blur Studios
* Largest File Size – Rockfish – Blur Studios
* The Joe Robot Award – The New Guy – Ed Skudder
* Producers’ Choice Award – War Photographer – Joel Trussell
* Vanguard Award – David Karp
* Instigator Award – Apple, Inc.
* Cartoonist of the Year – John Lasseter