Channel Frederator Blog

The National Film Board of Canada is one of the most influential organizations in the world for animators. It has funded literally hundreds of films by Canadian animators over the years. Now the NFBC has compiled all of it’s greatest films for your viewing pleasure. Click here to view greatness.
One of my favorite films is Anansi
animated by Jamie Mason. I love it for it’s classic feel and yet it has that modern John K influence as well. the poses are pushed just enough, the acting is superb and the colors are vibrant. It’s a beautiful film in my opinion, evoking a true sense of modern design. Pure eye candy. Plus if you slow the section where Anansi is thinking about which animal to talk to first you can see a host of great animal designs that are just throw aways. Some of the designs remind of Miles Thompson’s genius design work.
Enough [Read more…]

Next time you’re by the Golden Gates, look up the Cartoon Art Museum.

Current exhibits: Worlds of Wonder [fantasy and sci fi], The Rejection Collection: Not in the New Yorker cartoons, Peanuts Holiday Parade

Enjoy!
-Jake

Episode 69

Ahh, the classic conundrum. Bring a condom, and risk looking over eager. Don’t bring one, and risk being someone’s Baby Daddy. We’re guessing K-Fed picked the latter option.

The Girls and Sports crew had another short featured on Channel Frederator in Episode 57. Girls and Sports co-founder Andrew Feinstein had this to say about their latest episode:

MELISSA: How did you come up with the idea for this?

ANDREW: This incident actually happened to me on several
occasions.

MELISSA: Interesting…very interesting. What is next for Girls and Sports?

ANDREW: With both of our animated pilots being greeted with
tremendous popularity, we’re looking for opportunities to produce a slew of these “Girls & Sports Playbook” episodes.

MELISSA: Do you animate all of this yourself, or do you work with other people?

ANDREW: I co-write the episodes with my writing partner, Justin Borus, and then provide models of our characters to a storyboard artist and animator.

MELISSA: Do you have another “Girl [Read more…]

I first became aware of Stephen DeStefano (and his work), at a young age, through a comic book of his called ‘Mazing Man, and I have been following his career ever since. And what a career it has been! How cool would it be to say, “Yea, I worked on Ren & Stimpy AND I also have a comic strip in the Weekly World News!!!” It would be pretty darn cool.

CH.Fred: How long have you been animating or drawing?
SD:I’ve been drawing professionally for about 25 years now, since I was
15. Really, I’ve been drawing ever since I can remember, since I was about 3 years old.
[Read more…]

AnimWatch has a great interview with Michel Gagné. Some of the best effects animation in the last ten years has come from the mind, and art, of Michel.

-Floyd Bishop

[Read more…]

Broadway’s “The Little Mermaid” is on its way!

Thomas Schumacher said “We are delighted to announce Sierra Boggess is our Ariel. She is a thrilling young talent and I am certain audiences will discover that she was destined to play the beautiful young mermaid.”

I don’t know about you, but unless the actress has eyes the size of dinner plates, it just isn’t Ariel.

Read more on Broadway World.com.

Jake

…their top priority is reviving Disney Animation Studios. From new offices to new talent, a new development process…

From Variety via The Animation Guild Blog:

Walking up the stairs of the Disney Animation Studios building, Ed Catmull talks about change.

“We took down as many walls as we could,” he says, showing off a bright and open second floor — a stark contrast to the narrow hallways and separate rooms on other floors.

Entering his modest office in a structure that only opened in 1994, he adds: “We are planning to build an entirely new building.”

There’s no hiding that the new president of Walt Disney Feature Animation thinks a radical shift is needed both physically and psychologically at the venerable toon unit, which has been struggling since the late ’90s.

(More here.)

–Fred

Set yer orbs upon this beautiful piece of animation commissioned by the BBC and animated by a company who goes by the name of Rufflebrothers. Some really nice designs and smooth animation to boot! It seems it was done as publicity for their ongoing Dickens series. There’s even a Scenes menu where you can jump around from scene to scene and learn more about the characters in the cartoon. Dickens has never been so much fun! Yay!

-Mike Milo

Episode 69

“The key to being a successful recording artist is…the smell…” This is a great short about a strange musician named Earl Boone. I asked Tom DesLongchamp about his process making this film, and some other questions that I thought were fun. If you don’t think they’re fun questions, well…then they don’t think you’re fun either.

MELISSA: Earl Boone is definitely a strange character, Tom. Explain how you came up with this idea.

TOM: Several years ago, my older brother gave me a Yamaha keyboard that he had lost interest in. I took it in and named it Abraham. It was loaded with over one hundred melodies that you could play along with, so I called up my friend Josh to assist me with a test drive. That was the evening that Earl Boone was born. The soul, funk, and R&B song presets transformed Josh‘s vocal cords into that of a 50 year [Read more…]

Feast your sockets on this occular candy!

In 1989, Beavis and Butthead brought in a new generation of cartoonists, a new style and voice for film makers. It was the coolest show I had ever seen.

Sure, it was drawn terribly but it was funny as hell and I watched it incessantly. I confess sometimes, I still laugh like Butthead, just because it makes my still makes my wife laugh after all these years! I know I’ve seen every episode and it’s still as fresh and irreverent as it was when I last saw it back int he early 90’s.

It also made me realize that film was more about character than it was about the design. Yes, it’s important to have a well designed character (and some have extremely strong feelings about this) but if they have the personality of a wet soap dish then it’s not compelling enough to [Read more…]