Channel Frederator Blog

I heard today that one of our favorite CF contributors, Joel Trussell is doing his first solo gallery show. Congrats Joel! The show starts December 4th at the Grassy Knoll Gallery in Portland, OR. I so wish I had plans to visit Portland over the next few weeks, but alas, I do not. I hope that any of you Portland-based CF-ers that might attend will comment about the show.
If, like me, you can’t get to Portland make sure you stroll on over to “Joel Trussell’s Scribble Dumpster” where Joel blogs about the many things keeping this Tennessee-based artist busy. Joel goes way back with Channel Frederator. His cartoon, War Photographer was the fifth cartoon to ever air on Channel Frederator and since then we’ve shown a number of his films. He’s also a two-time Channel Frederator Award recipient.
Good luck Joel!- Carrie

So I’m a bit late on posting the October Cartoon of the Month winner, but this one is worth the wait. We had 5 episodes that ran in September, making them eligible for the October prize.
The October Cartoon of the Month prize comes from episode 145 and goes to the cartoon Hot Town by Fabian Dores Pais! Hot Town is a fabulous example of how simple, yet creative and well executed animation can take the cake. I had the chance to ask Fab a few questions about his cartoon and animation in general. Check out his answers below!

What inspired you to create “Hot Town”?

I was inspired by the music  called “Hot Town” by Fess Williams and his Royal Flush Orchestra. I wanted to work in the same way as the old cartoons based on the rhythm. I only listened to the music and some ideas appears in my mind.What techniques did you use to create it, and about how long did it take? [Read more…]

Guess what! It’s time to award September’s Cartoon of the Month prize! As a reminder, the Cartoon of the Month prize goes to the highest viewer-rated film. This means that you, our viewers, choose your favorite films. The winner of the Cartoon of the Month prize gets a $100 extra-special pack of Channel Frederator goodies.

This month, episodes 139, 140, 141 and 142 were eligible. The winner is A Little Sunshine, submitted by Jason Jones, from episode 139.

I’m so excited that A Little Sunshine is our winner. I have such a soft spot in my heart for happy little pencil animations, and this one was particularly cute. I took the time to ask Jason a few questions about his film. Check out his answers below! [Read more…]

I’m really excited to announce this month’s winner of the Cartoon of the Month prize! We had 8 films from episodes 136, 137 and 138 in the running this time - a bit low because of the Channel Frederator Awards, but nonetheless stiff competition! In the end, Pushkin took home the prize!
Pushkin is a great stop motion film brought to us by Trevor Hardy of Fool Hardy Films. I took a few minutes to do a mini-interview with Trevor below. Check it out and then, if you haven’t had the chance to watch it, or haven’t seen it in a while, go watch Pushkin again in Channel Frederator episode 136.

CF: What inspired you to create Pushkin?

I came up for the story line for Pushkin after losing my own cat who thank fully returned a while later but with bent whiskers??? (Don’t ask me?), whilst writing pushkin I watched Sylvain Chomet’s brilliant film, ‘The Triplets of Belleville’ and of course his sets and atmosphere totally inspired me and helped carve the look of the world Pushkin would live in.

[Read more…]

Channel Frederator is giving away a Cintiq for its Cartoon of the Quarter prize - submit your animation to channelfrederator.com get the most viewer votes and you could win your own Cintiq!

In this video animator Gabe Swarr demonstrates how to use a Wacom Cintiq with 21 inch LCD screen. Gabe Swarr is one of the many animators who submitted to Channel Frederator and recently won our Cartoon of the Month prize. You can check out his work at dummcomics.com and at iam8bit.net

Video by Dave Seger.
Thanks guys!

-Jeaux Janovsky

I can feel it from here, you guys are EXCITED about the cartoon of the month. Particularly exciting is the fact that, because of the Channel Frederator Awards, we have only ONE episode of new content that aired in June! That means only three cartoons - stiff competition.
Episode 135 aired on Channel Frederator on June 3rd and had three awfully creative cartoons, so voting was SUPER close! Lenny Boudreau, our tireless Drinking & Drawing Boston host brought us the latest in drunken cartoon tomfoolery. From filmmaker, Tomagibo, comes Save the Princess. This creative and hysterical claymation will keep you on the edge of your seat!
Last, but certainly not least, Paul Shih brings us Rainbow Monster - our winner!! This super-cute cartoon has two lessons: 1) You are what you eat. 2) How to poop rainbows. A long-time resident of New Zealand, Paul is famous for his cute characters and his very cool paper cutouts [Read more…]

The Channel Frederator Awards are Here!!! It was a hot, feverish, and fierce competition!!!

Find out if your favorite cartoons claimed the Big, Red, Hunk of Burning Fred!!!

This episode is the last one?!? The Ninth one? Really? Say it ain’t so Fred! It is?

oh.

Well, not to fear! You, and I, dear viewers, have collected ALL Magical Nine Videos!!! What now?
I guess we can watch them all over again… Out of order!!!

This episode presents us with the film that was awarded the Producers’ Choice award. It might also make you hungry.

Check out which cartoon made us slightly hungry and won a Freddie!

Watch all the nominees at channelfrederator.com

-Jeaux Janovsky

It is with much sniffling and sorrow that the Channel Frederator Awards bid you adieu. We leave you with one of our top awards - the Producers’ choice award. This year, we had so many wonderful films eligible and our producer’s top choice was hotly debated. Eventually the CF team managed to narrow it down to Sub! by Jesse Schmal!
I’ll leave you with the thoughts that the great and powerful Eric Homan, President of Programming for Channel Frederator, had to say about both Jesse and his film.

Back when Jesse Schmal’s epic Rhode Island School of Design film, “Sub!’, picked up Channel Frederator Cartoon of the Month honors, we asked the filmmaker about the genesis of the piece:

“The idea was made from lifting several characters and props from the sketchbooks I made during a year in Rome for school. I’m very insecure and inexperienced when it comes to writing anything [Read more…]

The Channel Frederator Awards are Here!!! It was a hot, feverish, and fierce competition!!!

Find out if your favorite cartoons claimed the Big, Red, Hunk of Burning Fred!!!

This episode we’re showing you one heck of a funny cartoon. But don’t worry…

This film is mighty.

This film is epic.

This film is really, really, really funny.

Check out which cartoon made us squirt milk outta our noses and won a dang Freddie for our Funniest Film Award.

Watch all the nominees at channelfrederator.com

-Jeaux Janovsky 

Today’s Channel Frederator Awards episode features the film that you voted as “Funniest Film”. We had some serious side-splitters in this category.
Mike Bell’s Super Santa in ‘Vegetation’ comes to us from the “Oh Yeah! Cartoons” archives. Just the concept of this buff bearded Santa and his buxom wife are enough to get you chuckling, but when you see Santa duke it out with a room full of vegetables, it’s tough not to loose it.
Mortimer Pigmun and His Time Traveling Chums is both unique and hysterical. The story of a smart little pig, Mortimer, turns hysterical when his nemesis steals his secret to time-travel. It’s hard to summarize such a unique plot, but Matt Witham and Jeff Wallenhorst, the twisted minds behind this film, must have licked a lot of frogs in preparation…

In the end, the prize went to Doug Bresler of Doogtoons for his animated music video for Wierd Al’s “Trapped in the [Read more…]