Channel Frederator Blog

The current economic crisis may be a bit tough to figure out. ABC News showed a great cartoon, created by Odd Todd, to illustrate the crisis in simple terms. You may remember Odd Todd from his very popular “Laid Off” cartoon.

While the economy has been better, and the stock market hasn’t had a great couple of days, at least an independent animator is making some money, and helping the rest of us put things in perspective at the same time.

-Floyd Bishop 

Former Poet Laureate Billy Collins loves cartoons!

Back in June, Collins wrote an article for The Wall Street Journal called “Inspired by a Bunny Wabbit” which explained how his poetry has been influenced by cartoons.

“…my own poetry would have not developed in the direction it did, for better or worse, were it not for the spell that was cast over me as a boy by Warner Bros. cartoons. The very first time I heard the pulse-quickening blast of the zany theme music by Carl Stalling–enough to bring any American boy to attention–and saw the colorful bull’s-eye emblazoned on the big screen, I was hooked.”

The article includes the poems “Bugs”, “Porky”, “Elmer”, and “Daffy” (from his first collection, Pokerface).

Porky
Happy only
when he is gardening alone
far from conversation
and the terrible stammering
far from Petunia, nag and tease
just resting on a hoe
unembarrassed
as he contemplates
the blue background of his flat world –
a Zen pig.

So, I was going to post [Read more…]

I really enjoyed this piece, by Corrina. According to her website, she is only 16, but she has a great film here, creating portraits of all the Presidents, from George to George. The animation is set to Sufjan Stevens’ “The Tallest Man, The Broadest Shoulders”. The whole piece feels like something you might see on Sesame Street or the Electric Company in the late 70’s. 

It’s a very nice film, and I hope we see many more from Corrina.

-Floyd Bishop 

There’s no way to describe this animated short without using the word adorable. If you are in a down mood, the lively song is sure to cheer you up. “Galinha Pintadinha” was made by Brazilians Marcos Luporini, Juliano Prado and Alex Leão. And in case you are wondering what the birds are going on about:

“It’s about a hen and her mate. She wears a skirt, he wears a jacket. She got sick and he didn’t even notice/pay attention. So the little chicks ran to tell the doctor, who is a turkey, and his nurse, who is some kind of bird I never heard of (an urubu), and the needle of the injection they gave was a feather of a peacock.”

(Translation by Carmen Morais. Thanks!)

I did some googling and you can find out what an urubu is after the jump. [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

Click on the pic to watch the episode in question.

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!!!

Watch which film took home a Freddie for Best Flash Video! Was your pick even close? Our favorite Flash film Flashes so bright, you just might need some Frederator Branded shades!

Kiwi fruit is good. But Kiwi animators are better. Find out which animating New Zealanders won in our Kiwi Award!

And finally, our Cartoonist of the Year Award went to Marjane Satrapi for her work and her film, Persepolis! She is Awesome. We wholeheartedly think you will all agree!!!

Watch all the nominees at channelfrederator.com
-Jeaux Janovsky

Earlier this month, I blogged about Alex Budovsky’s music video for “Last Time at Clerkenwell” by The Real Tuesday Weld. At the time, I didn’t realize that Stephen Coates (the guy behind TRTW) was such a heavy duty fan of animation. The music video above is “The Show Must Go On” which was made by the small Brooklyn animation house Giant Squid Eye Productions. Giant Squid Eye is George Fort (director) and Monica Smith (producer). (Recently, George worked on backgrounds for over-the-top action fest Superjail—coming to Adult Swim this fall. And Monica was color key designer for Supernormal on CITV. A super coincidence?)

Of interest to animation history buffs is the new score Coates composed for Winsor McCay’s The Centaurs. The Centaurs was an unfinished animated film that only survives in fragments. McCay worked on it between 1918 and 1921. Most of the completed footage deteriorated due to poor storage. I think it’s really, really [Read more…]

As there’s been some bunny talk around here today, I just wanted to link to an impressive short 3-D film, “Bunny Situation”, made by Michael Sormann. Sormann isn’t bankrolled by Pixar, or some other company with deep pockets; he does his animation independently (with Maya software). Pretty impressive, I’d say!

He developed as an artist in the videogame industry and is an alum of Rockstar Vienna. Now he’s a freelance 3D artist. He’s been working on his pet project, Theme Planet, for many years. He’s posted some beautiful finished artwork, as well as preliminary drawings, in the Gallery Section.

If you want to learn more, you can read these interviews: one from 3D Valley, another from It’s Art Magazine, and a third from Render Node.

—Anne D. Bernstein

(All images copyright Michael Sormann)

[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!!!

In this episode, watch which Bunnies duked it out and prevailed in a battle of Epic Bad ASS Bunny-ness!!!

Also, meet Animator Stephen M. Levinson, winner of Channel Frederator’s Youngest Filmmaker Award, and watch his cartoon, Ace & Aqua!
You’ll forget that this 17 year old animation whiz kid is barely out of diapers.

Watch all the nominees at channelfrederator.com

-Jeaux Janovsky

Floyd’s recent post on the fredblogs reminded me of a great video of Daniel Johnston’s Monster Inside Of Me by Eric Fensler, of GI Joe PSA fame.

Here’s some fanart I created for Daniel a few years ago. 

-Jeaux Janovsky