Channel Frederator Blog

As the hoards converge on Comicon this weekend (and I sit in sticky, hot Brooklyn, recalling the days when the Gaslamp District was still scuzzy and you didn’t have to book your hotel room two years in advance) let me tell you about an upcoming, far more intimate event that promises to be fascinating: Pictoplasma NYC: Conference on Contemporary Character Design and Art at New York University’s Skirball Center, from September 5-6.

Described as a “character design Mecca”, Pictoplasm will spotlight “the importance of character design in contemporary visual culture.” Today’s popular graphic personalities cross cultural and commercial borders and it’s becoming commonplace to see the same character on both museum walls and pencil sets. This is an opportunity to learn, talk, and schmooze with some of today’s most innovative icon creators.

Guests include Tim Biskup, Gangpol Und Mit, and Friends With You. Saturday has the bulk of the animation talk with Akinori Oishi (Japan) and Studio AKA (UK) appearing.

Registration info and more after the jump. [Read more…]

Thanks to Boing Boing for bringing this Russian version of Winnie the Pooh, called Vinni Puh, to my attention. The state sponsored animation house Soyuzmultfilm crafted its own version of the Pooh tales back in the 1970s. They have their own distinctive style (I love the scribbly backgrounds) and the overall feeling is less delicate and more goofy than the E.H. Shepard interpretation we all know so well.

(By the way, it seems that Shepard ended up hating Pooh. Silly old bear!)

Thinking Pictures goes into detail about Russian interpretations of Pooh here. (Warning: It’s a brainy essay and uses words like Gemütlichkeit and Gemeinschaft. Mickey Mouse is apparently Gemeinschaft.)

And if you are hankering for more Soviet silliness, enjoy these additional Vinni Puh adventures:

Chapter Two (with subtitles)

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

—Anne D. Bernstein

This past Wednesday I attended a panel discussion entitled, Cross Cultural Traffic: Toying with Brands, Borders and Bootlegs.

It was hosted by The Korea Society and was a lively talk on and about Korean Toys, their origins, how they interrelate with Japanese, American, and their own Korean Pop Cultures.

The panel consisted of Eric Nakamura (publisher of Giant Robot Magazine), Joshua Bernard (editor of CollectionDX.com), and The Korea Society’s Seho Kim (creative director).

I think Eric summed it up best on his GR blog:

“The robots and such brought out a generation of creatives. Imagine a filmmaker like Joon Ho Bong, who made the Host. Did he watch monster films as a kid? Did he play with toys? Of course he must have. The geeks who collected toys are now in power at creative places, and look at what they’ve brought forward? A new world of creative minds.”

Of course, I eagerly took down notes and snapped a few pics. Enjoy!

[Read more…]