High Holidays part 2: “Shofar Idol”
Continuing this week’s theme of old freelance Jew-toons, I present to you 2005’s “Shofar Idol”. I honestly don’t know how this one got to be so popular. I had about 48 hours to do it from start to finish before I left the country for a much-anticipated backpacking trip in Europe. I animated it at warp-speed, sent it to the client, and then headed to Newark International Airport. I didn’t give it much thought after that; “Just another hastily-animated client holiday card”
A couple days later I stopped in a Portugese internet cafe to check in back home. I found my inbox crammed with dozens of emails from people who saw “Shofar Idol”; media people, potential clients, regular people who just wanted to say ‘nice work’, and a large number of rabbis. In retrospect, the most signifigant email started out “Hey Dan, I’m Fred Seibert of Frederator Studios.”
I guess the lesson learned is that sometimes it doesn’t matter if the animation is “primitive” as long as the audience connects with the humor of the story.
***Oh yeah; for those of you who may not understand what all this “Shofar” stuff is about:
“A shofar is a ram’s horn that is used as a musical instrument for religious purposes. It is used on Judaism’s high holy days of Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. The shofar originated in Israel for Jewish callings.” - Wikipedia.
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On September 19th, 2006 at 12:00 am
While I can see that the creator of Shofar Idol was trying to capitalize on the popularity of the well-known concept and tv show, American Idol, in the context of Judaism I find it highly inappropriate and offensive. In particular, I take issue with the use of the word “idol” or the notion of idol worhsip being connected with anything Jewish or with the skilled and religious Jews who share their talents with us in shuls around the world during the High Holy Days.
On September 19th, 2006 at 12:00 am
Cool stuff man! Yeah it was limited animation but as you said it got the point across! Thanks for sharing it!
On September 23rd, 2006 at 12:00 am
My future grandmother-in-law sent this to my fiancee (who’s half Jewish) a couple of days ago!!