In keeping with its theme, the animations in “Laugh” did just that. Peter Lepeniotis of Pantaloons Prods./DKP Studios presented the madcap misadventures of the Surly Squirrel, a film that exemplifies the moral that “crime does not pay,” at least not for sneaky, plotting squirrels (my dogs would have barked out loud at this one). Films about clever crabs, Venice Beach, by Jung-Ho Kim (Dongseo University); hungry monsters, Food for Thought, by Ian Yonika (Ringling School of Art and Design); a clever little boy with a plan for piranhas, Lionel, by Gabriel Gelade, Medhi Leffad, Anthony Menard and Matthieu Poirey (L’ecole de L’image); imaginary inebriation, Awkward, by Cesar Kuriyama (Pratt Institute/Embrionyc Prods.); and a play on words, Street Stories - Episode 14: To Air is Human, by Christopher Bancroft (Ringling School of Art and Design), proved that the current class of students is not only technically talented, but also has a sense of humor.

From festival buzz, Piñata could do for Mike Hollands’ Act3animation what Gopher Broke did for Blur. © Act3animation.

“Play” was as much fun as “Laugh.” If I had to choose a personal favorite among the numerous funnies, it would be Piñata by Mike Hollands of Act3animation. Hollands’ command of what to include and what not to include in the frame is part of what made this animation so enjoyable. When the donkey piñata manages to evade the small sticks poking up above the small sombreros occupying the bottom of the frame, I wanted to cheer, but then when the big sombrero with the big stick enters…well, you get the picture. Hernando is a witty musical romp reminiscent of classic Hollywood musicals by Supinfocom Valenciennes students Thomas Bernos, Nicolas Lesaffre and Jerome Haupert. Mike Blum of Pipsqueak Films reminds us of our teenage years when we were faced with the horror of The Zit. Andrew Makesky of Ringling School of Art and Design humorously takes on old age with the hot-rodding, powerchair driving Sal and the Great Frustration. Sealed Lips from L’ecole de L’image and Coline Veith of L’ecole de L’image takes a new twist on ventriloquism. Hopeless Romantic by Bill Burg of the Pratt Institute and Love Letters by Jeff Paul of the Art Institute of California, San Francisco both give their comedic takes on how to get the girl.

“Teach” presents visualizations used by various fields that make the explanation of scientific and medical concepts accessible even to non-professionals. These included Surgical Planning in Congenital Heart Disease by Means of Real-Time Medical Visualization and Simulation (Thomas Sangild Sorensen Centre for Advanced Visualization and Interaction, University of Aarhus), an aid for surgeons planning heart surgery; The Elbe Flood (Nils Sparwasser and Robert Meisner, German Aerospace Center), a life-saving system to track flooding; Tick Animation (Sven Dreesbach and Matthias Zeller, Filmakademie Baden-Wurttemberg), an animated depiction of the blood-sucking parasites (ugh!); Cell Invasions: Visual Computing, Health and Cancer (Charles Lumsden Department of Medicine, University of Toronto), a study of how cancer cells invade the body; Manufacturing Proteins with Biomolecular Machines (Rick Hankins, Computer Visualization Center), how proteins are synthesized and Image-Based Material Editing (Erik Reinhard, University of Central Florida), dealing with recovered shapes, transparency and translucency.

The immersive experience of seeing so much talent and creativity as well as so many technical achievements in such a short space of time was truly an awe-inspiring assignment, one that I hope to repeat at SIGGRAPH 2006. If you were unfortunate enough to miss this extraordinary experience, the full program, including both the Electronic Theater and Animation Festival selections, is available on three DVD’s that can be purchased as a set or individually from www.siggraph.org/publications/video-review/SVR.html.

Mary Ann Skweres is a filmmaker and freelance writer. She has worked extensively in feature film and documentary post-production with credits as a picture editor and visual effects assistant. She is a member of the Motion Picture Editors Guild.