All of the master classes were held in English except Jonathan Amitay's presentation. He was born in Israel and began working in animation in Canada in 1968. He was with CBC as a graphic designer doing animation and titles for television from 1978 until recently when he moved back to Israel. In his presentation he demonstrated numerous techniques like: how backlit graphics are done, how he animates with sand, and how he uses a chain with very small links as a flexible line.

Zack Schwartz and festival director, Tsvika Oren.

Staff and Facility
Tsvika Oren, the festival's creative director, picked works that would stimulate people's imagination. Oren is a remarkable festival director. He is also quite popular with his animation students at the Cinematheque and at Camera Obscura. While most of what he selected to show was animated, he also included Rod Serling: Submitted For Your Approval, a program of classic documentaries from Holland and several films that have won Golden Eagle Cine Awards in the USA. The festival's small staff also included producer Shoshy Frankel, a charming person who did a great job taking care of 1001 details.

The festival was held in a modern theater complex that has two large well equipped halls with excellent video, 35mm and 16mm projection systems. Tsvika Fiksel, the head projectionist, was a delightful gentleman who has worked in projection booths for over 50 years. Considering his love of film and the fondness of the medium by others who work there, it came as no surprise that the food service in the lobby is called Cafe Paradisio. The cafe was well run and provided an excellent assortment of salads, pasta dishes, smoked salmon sandwiches, beer, wine and other treats.

The Cinematheque building has a large room used for animation workshops. It has both 16mm cameras and single frame video/computer equipment. Most students in Israel are forced to use video and computers today as the last 16mm film lab in the country has closed. Film has to be sent to Italy or England for processing.

The Cinematheque, home to the Creative Filmmaking Festival.

My Extra Activities!
Tel-Aviv has several schools teaching computer animation including Tel-Aviv University and Camera Obscura. I met with students at both schools and showed them the latest computer animation from San Francisco. They were enthusiastic about what they saw and many would love to work for ILM, Pixar or PDI someday.

Another highlight of the trip was a visit with Noam Meshulam who runs Pitchi Poy Animation Studio, a well equipped facility in historic Jaffa at the southern end of Tel-Aviv. The studio is in a one-hundred-year-old Turkish style house with 30 foot ceilings. Some of their work is animated on paper and then inked and painted in-house on computers, while other projects have been done using magic markers on paper or in other techniques. They have animated part of the Sniz and Fondue series on Nickelodeon, multimedia projects for Fisher Price and other producers as well as a lot of television commercials. Many of their artists have moved to Israel from Russia.

Life in Israel seems relaxed and friendly. I made several friends in the two weeks I was there. I also visited Zack Schwartz and his family in their home. We talked about his career at Disney (backgrounds on Snow White and art direction on Bambi and Fantasia), his being a founder of UPA, and his new book on storytelling in animation that is published by Sheridan College Press in Canada.