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CELEBRATE ANIMATION AS A GREAT ART AT OUR NEXT ASIFA MEETING, THURSDAY, JULY 20 at 7:30 PM at the Exploratorium. We are presenting 18 outstanding classics that date from the 1930s to the present. All are the work of individuals with a high regard for animation as a great visual medium. Many of the films are already mentioned in animation history books including Cartoons by Bendazzi.
The program includes work by the great pioneers Oskar Fischenger, Len Lye and Norman McLaren. There are early computer works by John Whitney and Larry Cuba. Films like Gasparovic's Satemania, Sara Petty's Furies and John Canemaker's Bottoms Dream celebrate life while Ishu Patel's Oscar nominated Bead Game hint at life's dangers. People who were at the show of festival winners from ASIFA-East can compare the Oscar winning Frank Film in this show to Frank's latest work. We showed it in June.
We are showing 16mm prints of these films. The program will run about 90 minutes.
LUCILLE BLISS IS TWICE MORE HONORED Bliss, who lives in SF and LA, was given a Lifetime Achievement Award in Voice-Over Work by the Young Artists in LA. The World Animation Celebration gave similar awards to Bliss, June Foray and Chuck McCann.
Bliss was recently given a regular role on a show being produced for Nickelodeon. She will be Miss Bitters in the upcoming Invader Zim series. Also, she has recently been hired to do voice work for 2 shows on the Internet .
GORDON THOMAS TO TEACH AN INTENSIVE HANDS-ON STOP-MOTION CLASS JULY 10 - AUG. 20 on Mondays and Wednesdays, 1 - 4:30 pm, at San Francisco State University. He will teach "core animation and advanced techniques" in this six week program. Thomas' award winning work has appeared on PBS and the Sci-Fi Channel. Tuition is $450. To enroll contact SFSU College of Extended Learning (415) 405-7700 or by touch tone at 405-4321. www.cel.sfsu.edu to see the class schedule. E mail gordon thomas at deebo@sfsu.edu
OUR AUDIENCE SELECTED JOHN R. DILWORTH'S 'CATCH OF THE DAY' AS THE BEST FILM in this year's screening of the 31st Annual ASIFA-East Animation Competition. The 2nd place winner was Frankly Caroline by
Frank Mouris. Hello, Dolly! by Mariko Hoshi came in 3rd. Honorable mentions went to Mister Smile by Fran Krause and Nothing At All by Buzzco. Other films getting a fair numbers of votes included Zoey's Zoo from Nickelodeon and Life, a jam film by Mo Willems and friends.
When people voted in New York Frankly Caroline was chosen Best in Show. Life was 1st place in the independent film category, Catch of the Day came in 2nd and Nothing at All came in 3rd in that division. In the student film category Atlas Gets Drunk by Michael Overbeck came in 1st, Hello Dolly! came in 2nd and Mr. Smile won an honorable mention. Zoey's Zoo won 1st place in the sponsored film category. Some people attribute the differences of opinion on people in New York voting for their friends which might explain why Life, by 15 or 20 East coast animators, did better in NY than in SF. I doubt if that explains the other differences.
PATRICIA AMLIN HAS ASKED US TO SEND EVERYONE HER BEST WISHES AND TO ANNOUNCE SHE IS RETIRING FROM TEACHING AT SF STATE She was in a car accident late last year (her car went off a mountain road) and she is still recovering. She resigned as chair of the cinema department a few months ago. More recently she decided to retire to her home in Colorado where she plans to do creative projects and regain her health. When I last spoke with her she said that if her health permits it, she might teach at State next year in the spring semester.
People who want to contact her can send notes to 34517 US Highway 50, Gunnison, Colorado 81230-9745
"SHRECK" WILL BE SHOWN AS A STEREO 3D IMAX FILM 6 MONTHS AFTER IT OPENS IN THEATERS The feature from PDI/Dreamworks will open in 35mm theatres next May or June. IMAX says they will spend $10 million to convert the image to stereo 3D and to blow it up to 70mm. They have 150 IMAX halls that can show stereo films. They plan to open it in December, 2001.
ILM HAS A NEW DIVISION CREATING 3D COMPUTER GAME IMAGES FOR CLIENTS ALONG WITH IMAGES FOR TV SHOWS Patty Blau, a senior vice president of ILM, is heading the division. She had worked on the Universal/ILM Frankenstein project that was never finished. It would have been an all cgi feature.
MONDO MEDIA ANNOUNCES THEIR NEXT SIX SERIES They are Piki and Poko, Happy Tree Friends, Trailer Court, Daddi, Julius and Friend (Julius is a monkey) and Bulbo. Bulbo is a great looking show that was in the ASIFA-East program of winners
from their annual competition. It won an award for excellence in writing. It is the creation of Xeth Feinburg and is currently on Lycos TV.
STANFORD OFFERS A TRADIONAL ANIMATION PRODUCTION CLASS AND UC BERKELEY OFFERS ANIMATION HISTORY FOR THE FIRST TIME At UC Berkeley Russell Merritt, co-author of Walt in Wonderland, an excellent book on Disney's career before Mickey, is teaching animation history in the rhetoric department. At Stanford Lorie Loeb is teaching "Motion Study, An Introduction to Animation, Cartoon Physics and Funny Walks."
Loeb's class was offered for the first time last fall. The first day of class she had 115 people wanting to get into a studio class designed for 15. She told the crowd that she wanted 15 people who wanted to draw and work hard. She also told them no computers would be used in her class. Despite her warning almost everyone wrote her a note as to why they should be chosen to be in the class. Eventually she selected 18 people for the first class. Another crowd showed up when the class was offered this past spring.
Loeb's class is being offered by the art department in connection with the school's computer animation program. Stanford has been teaching computer animation, but they knew students also need to learn the basics of traditional animation. This is a common problem today as many schools offer computer animation classes, but no traditional animation classes or animation history.
RECENT BAY AREA JOB OPENINGS ON THE INTERNET include PDI looking for effects animators, Mondo Media looking for a graphic designer and animator and Communities.com in Cupertino looking for a lead animator. These postings were from mid-June.
LARGE SAN FRANCISCO BASED MULTIMEDIA AND WEB DEVELOPMENT TOOLS COMPANY MAY STILL HAVE THE FOLLOWING FULL TIME POSITIONS AVAILABLE: WEB PRODUCERS, SENIOR MULTIMEDIA DESIGNER, MULTIMEDIA DESIGNER, PRINT DESIGNER & PRODUCTION ARTIST The unnamed company has "more than 1,000 employees worldwide. Its stock is publicly traded on NASDAQ." The announcement was handed out at the Animation Celebration in LA For details contact Pamela Thompson, recruiter. (818) 504-2690 or e mail PamRecruit@aol.com
RADIUM MORPHED A BOY INTO A LIQUID METAL CG MACHINE for a Kraft Capri Sun commercial. Mark Homes was the digital artist. Mark Malmberg and Andrew Sinagra were the animators.
STUDIO FX IN SAN JOSE, CREATOR OF "GUMBY WORLD" AND WEB SITES FOR UNDERDOG, HOWDY DOODY AND OTHERS, HAS CLOSED THEIR DOORS The staff has been laid off as their wonderful ideas were not producing enough income. It isn't clear what will happen to the sites they created, but as this was being written they were still up and running. Check them out if it isn't too late. Their concepts for a virtual playground are well designed and a lot of fun.
If you go to www.gumbyworld.com be warned that it contains a little misinformation. Art Clokey and/or the writer of the web site forget to mention little things including Gumby aired for several months on the Howdy Doody Show before NBC decided to give Gumby his own show. For some reason Clokey doesn't wish to acknowledge this and refused to talk with me about it when I wrote articles about Gumby 10 or 15 years ago. I talked with Buffalo Bob Smith about it and saw Gumby listed in old TV Guides as being on the Howdy Doody Show, but Clokey pretends it never happened.
The site also claims Clokey's Gumbasia was the first film to combine abstract images with music, making it the first "music video"... Whomever made that claim was unaware of the work of Oskar Fischinger, Norman McLaren, Len Lye, Mary Ellen Bute, San Francisco's Harry Smith and a lot of other artists who made abstract films set to music long before Clokey made Gumbasia.
Other recent web site closures include Digital Entertainment Network, Viacom's Red Rocket.com and Disney's Toysmart.
MAURICE NOBLE TO PRESENT A SEMINAR AT DeANZA, SATURDAY, AUGUST 5 He had a long career as a background and layout artist at Warner Bros. with Chuck Jones; as a background artist at Disney in the 1930s and as a creative force at other studios. Noble is responsible for the amazing landscapes in numerous classics including What's Opera Doc, Duck Amuck, The Phantom Tollbooth and your favorite Road Runner cartoons. He is still active at 90 (see www.nobletales.com) and is still full of energy and enthusiasm. Last year he presented a 2 hour program at the Grand Lake Theatre.
The class will be from 11 to 5 on Aug. 5th. Seating limited to 100. The fee for the class is $350. For further information contact Michael Gray at brermike@yahoo.com. To reserve a seat send a check or money order to Michael Gray Presents, PO Box 876, Mountain View, CA 94042-0876
CARTOON ART MUSEUM IS PRESENTING A TRIBUTE TO CHARLES SCHULZ THAT CELEBRATES 50 YEARS OF PEANUTS It has over 50 original works on display. It presents a comprehensive survey of major themes in his pluss other cartoonists' tributes to Schulz. Through October 15. 814 Mission St., 2nd floor (415) CARTOON www.cartoonart.org
A PSA BY DAVE THOMAS WAS VOTED THE BEST COMMERCIAL AT ANNECY. IT ALSO WON 2ND PLACE FOR A PSA AT THE WORLD ANIMATION CELEBRATION "Not So Clever Trevor" is an anti-smoking public service announcement made by Wild Brain for the Los Angeles County Department of Health. The spot has a colorful carnival setting. It was the first psa directed by Thomas.
Thomas joined Wild Brain in 1996, after he graduated from SF State's animation program. Wild Brain polished up a film he began at SF State and A Dog Cartoon went on to become a prize winner at festivals. It also led to his developing a TV series based on his short. That series is now called Poochini, a 26 episode show being co-produced by EM-TV of Germany. It is being shown on TV in several countries around the world.
Recently Thomas served as animation director for The New Guy, a 22 minute pilot for the Microsoft Network. Thomas is presently writing Mantelope with Ted Polson for Cartoon Network Online. The web show will be broadcast by cartoonnetwork.com and by wildbrain.com. Thomas' project is one of 15 "Web-toons" that Wild Brain is creating for the Cartoon Network site. Each will be about 2 minutes long and each will star different characters and be by different directors.
ROQUE BALLESTEROS' "JOE PARADISE" WINS 1ST PLACE IN THE INTERNET ACTION-ADVENTURE CATAGORY, CHRIS LANIER'S "ROMANOV" WINS 2ND PLACE IN THE INTERNET GRAPHICS CATEGORY Both shows appear on www.wildbrain.com. Romanov is now in its second season at Wild Brain. The awards were given at the World Animation Celebration.
WILD BRAIN ART DIRECTOR TOD POLSON WINS STUDENT ACADEMY AWARD IN ANIMATION His film Al Tudi Tuhak (Long, Long Ago) was made at CAL Arts where he studied character animation. Animation legend Maurice Noble provided the narration. He joined Wild Brain directly after graduating and is presently art director and overseas supervisor on Poochini, a 26 episode TV series being co-produced with EM.TV, a German company. He is also working on his own production The Magic Hat. It is being co-directed by Maurice Noble.
The student award was presented June 11. Polson was given a First Place Gold Metal and $2,000. The award ceremony for the 27th annual event was held at the Academy's Samuel Goldwyn Theater in Beverly Hills. His film is based on the mythology of the Lashootseed, a NW Coast Indian group from the Upper Skagit area. It was made using cel and cutout animation.
WILD BRAIN HAS ANOTHER $20 MILLION IN FUNDING FOR THEIR INTERNET SITE The money is coming from Interfase Capital Partners and other investors in the US and Germany.
PHIL ROBINSON HAS DIRECTED 11 MINUTES OF TRADITIONAL LOOKING 2D ANIMATION FOR "THE ADVENTURES OF ROCKY AND BULLWINKLE" Wild Brain created a 4 minute opening sequence for the feature, 3 minutes of animation for the end credits and did sequences interspersed throughout the film.
Robinson worked 18 months on the project. Early in his career he worked in limited animation for TV. While his new work for the feature is in that style, it is smoother and more polished than the original show. The original show was animated in Mexico and was famous for crude movements and blatant errors. It had the dubious distinction of being the first series animated abroad (to cut production costs by using non-union labor). Robinson says "I had to find a style that echoed the original look but would please today's audiences who are more used to seeing fluid animation." His characters in the feature are more elastic and buoyant. That was accomplished by using more drawings per second. One technique Robinson kept from the original show was the use of static poses with only lips moving.
Wild Brain worked with ILM on sequences where 2D characters are combined with live action images. ILM provided Wild Brain background plates of each frame that would be combined with 2D art. All the 3D images of the characters were done at ILM.
Robinson created the snappy 2D "Weasel" character for the film. He also directed a sequence where a live action camera zooms into Fearless Leader's eye. The eyeball morphs into a rotating earth and then into a series of other animated images before dissolving back into Fearless Leader's eye.
Working with Robinson on the project were assistant animation directors Charlie Canfield and Roger Dondis. Jeff Fino was the executive producer. Cindy Ng was the art director.
WILD BRAIN SIGNS DIRECTORS ROBERT VALLEY AND CHARLIE CANFIELD Both are familiar names in San Francisco having worked here for many years at Colossal and other studios. Valley is known for his ability to animate the female form. He was an animator and storyboard artist on the Aeon Flux series for MTV. He is presently directing 3 spots for Sony Entertainment Music and directing the Anita Bomba series for www.wildbrain.com.
Canfield began his career in Seattle designing, directing and animating commercials and title sequences. In 1989 he joined ILM and worked on Ghosts, The Rocketeer, Kurosawa's Dreams, The Doors, Hunt for Red October and Back to the Future II and III. At Colossal he developed an award winning whimsical style over a 9 year period. His most recent work at Wild Brain includes assistant director and animator on The Adventures of Rocky and Bullwinkle and directing a new corporate "Searchlight" logo for Century Theatres. The latter opens shows in their 700 theatres spread over 11 states.
Tuesday, July 18, 7:30 pm, BLUE BEARD, a rare 13 minute clay animated short from 1938 by Jean Painleve in a program of shorts by the French pioneer. Pacific Film Archive. It will also be shown on Tues. Aug. 8 at 7:30 at the PFA in a program of early experimental films from Europe.
Fri. & Sat. July 28 & 29 10:30 pm, also Aug. 4, BRAINWASH MOVIE FESTIVAL (shows some new animation) at the Werepad, 2430 3rd St., SF
Sunday, August 6, 3 pm, DR. SEUSS ON THE LOOSE, with Horton the Elephant, Green Eggs and Ham, Gerald McBoing Boing, and other classics. At the PFA.
Tuesday, August 15, 7:30 pm. Pat O'Neil's TROUBLE IN THE IMAGE (1996, 38 min. 35mm) "Delightful animations, multiple images, and drawings on top of film footage are just some of the intricate elements that interact in this beautiful, tightly edited film." O'Neil has been making amazing optically printed films in Los Angeles for over 30 years. With Richard Reeves' scratch film Linear Dreams (1997), Stacey Steers' Totem (1999, 35mm, animated) and Stephanie Barber's Shipfilm (1998, animated) and These Horizon (1997). At the PFA.
Tuesday, August 22, 7:30 pm, MOVING STRANGELY: EXPERIMENTAL ANIMATION by Martha Colburn, Stephanie Ingram, Narangkar Khalsa, Emily Breer, Jennifer Reeves, Richard Reeves, James Otis, Steven Dye, and other artists. At the PFA.
Tuesday, August 29, 7:30 pm, MOVING STRANGELY: EXPERIMENTAL ANIMATION by Lewis Klahr, Emily Hubley, Lise Hanson, Stephanie Barber, Amy Kravitz, Stan Brakhage, Scott Stark and other artists. At the PFA.
"OLD MAN AND THE SEA" WINS THE GRAND PRIZE AT ANNECY It also won the audience award (favorite film). Another film seen at a recent ASIFA-SF event, Village of Idiots, won the special jury prize.
LINDA SIMENSKY BECOMES PRESIDENT EMERITUS OF ASIFA-EAST She will continue to be a board member. She has lived in Atlanta since 1995 and travels the world over for her bosses at the Cartoon Network. She has picked David Levy to be their new president and Barbara Jean Kearney to be vice president.
"WHEN THE DAY BREAKS" WINS THE GRAND PRIZE AT WORLD ANIMATION CELEBRATION Old Man and the Sea came in second in the 15 to 30 minute film category and Priit Parn's Night of the Carrots came in first in that category.
BILL PLYMPTON HAS A NEW ANIMATED FLASH SERIES ON THE WEB, HAS BEEN BUSY SIGNING BOOKS AND SOMEHOW IS FINDING TIME TO COMPLETE HIS FEATURE He is doing a weekly 30 second Flash cartoon for Atom Films plus a weekly progress reports on his upcoming Mutant Aliens feature. He hopes to finish it by August or September so he can enter it in the next Sundance Festival. The progress reports include diary notes, pencil test footage, interviews and dailies.
Plympton's storyboards for Mutant Aliens, published by NBM, is selling well at Virgin Mega Stores. It retails at $10.95 and is about 200 pages long.
NORTHWEST FILM CENTER IN PORTLAND WILL PRESENT AN EVENING WITH CHEL WHITE JULY 27 AND A NIGHT OF LOCAL ANIMATION ON AUGUST 21 White has completed Soulmates, "a complex study of alienated and sexual obsessions told from the perspective of a 55 year old woman." Shorts by Jay Rosenblatt and others round out the program. White also teaches at the NW Film Center's school and does commercial work..
The program in August will feature the work of Joanna Priestly, Jim Blashfield, Joan Gratz, Chel White, and Will Vinton.
THE SUMMER BOX OFFICE WATCH HAS BEGUN By mid-June Dinosaur had grossed $120,508,781 (5 week total with a gross of $38.85 million the opening week). Titan A.E. did $9,376,845 in its first week. Fantasia 2000 did only $2.8 million for the first week in 35mm and it was on 1,313 screens. When it opened in 54 IMAX halls it grossed $2.6 million in the 1st week. So far the total gross for the feature has been $52,461,576. Toy Story 2 is still playing in the US. The domestic gross was $245,586,752 after 31 weeks on the charts. Road to El Dorado has made $50,637,368 in 12 weeks. Flintstones in Rock Vegas has grossed $32,763,265 in 8 weeks. Mission Impossible has made $176,581,244 in 4 weeks.
FRANK MOURIS TALKED ABOUT "FRANKLY CAROLINE" IN THE ASIFA-EAST NEWSLETTER He said, "For years we said that we were not interested in repeating Frank Film, choosing to explore abstract animation (Impass), pixillation (Coney, Screen Test), documentary (LA LA, Making it in LA) and live action features (Beginners Luck) for a decade. Then, we spent the next decade doing sponsored collage animation for Sesame Street, 3-2-1-Contact, MTV, Nickelodeon, VH1, Cartoon Network, HBO, and Nighttime Entertainment, among others. But all the while, I kept pestering Caroline to let me help her animate her autobiography. Slowly I put bits and pieces together, and finally she came on board as producer/editor/writer, just as she'd done with Frank Film. The only stumbling block was that she didn't want to talk about herself. At home, we made a first attempt at an "interactive track" and tried it out on Sheldon Cohen and his Harvard animation class, George Griffin and the Buzzco gang in New York City and Paul Glabicki in Pittsburgh, plus some other artists and writers who were not filmmakers. We went into a studio and recorded a second attempt, sending it around to most of the same people. Most seemed to like the general idea, but felt that our "performance" wasn't as strong as our visuals. Some even suggested that we hire actors to read our voice over script, but we stubbornly felt that it would not be our film that way. The third time was the charm, with a little help from a devious mind. I made extra strong coffee for breakfast, and brought a six pack of diet cola and two bottles of good champagne to a 9 a.m. studio session. Caroline and I were finally able to relax enough to get through our script more spontaneously, editing freely on the fly. The film has been well-received on the international festival circuit, but because it is so language driven, it gets its best reception with English speaking audiences. We've begun Franker Film (so it's at least trilogy), and we're trying to see if we can tell a story more visually than verbally. We'll see!"
COMING SOON TO A THEATRE NEAR YOU Chicken Run jus opened and I suspect it will be the big animated hit of 2000. The Rocky and Bullwinkle feature opens June 30, X-Men July 14, Pokemon 2 on July 21 and Thomas and the Magic Railroad July 26. Hollow Man, directed by Paul Vanderhoven, opens July 28 and Space Cowboy, directed by Clint Eastwood and effects by ILM, opens Aug. 4.
WALT DISNEY TO BE INDUCTED INTO THE INVENTORS HALL OF FAME for his work developing the multiplane camera (I assume they mean the camera stand/system and not just the camera). Steve Wozniak is another inventor being honored by them this year. The Hall of Fame is in Akron, Ohio.
JOE ROTH, FORMER DISNEY CHAIRMAN OF THE BOARD, HAS $3 BILLION BACKING HIS NEW VENTURE He launched Revolution 5 months ago. They will produce features and have purchased Media Trip.com. Julia Roberts has signed a 3 picture deal with them. Fox and Sony are among the companies backing Roth. Yes, there is life after Disney.
JERRY BECK WILL PRESENT "MONDO CARTOONS - THE STRANGEST CARTOONS EVER MADE" IN LA ON JULY 26 None are named on the flyer for the show, but the illustrations show images from Willoughby's Magic Hat, 1943 (Columbia); Tex Avery's Cat that Hated People, 1948 (MGM); Flebus; Fleischer's Bimbo's Initiation (1931 with Betty Boop) and Betty Boop in Minnie the Moocher (1932 with Cab Calloway).
JOHN KRICFALUSI SIGNED A 3 YEAR CONTRACT WITH ICEBOX.COM The news story didn't name the show he will do for them, but said it was "raunchy."
A 3 PART OSKAR FISCHINGER TRIBUTE IS TRAVELING TO 3 MAJOR MUSEUMS It plays July 6-7 at the Museum of Modern Art in New York and July 28-29 at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. It will be shown in Washington, DC in October.
CINAR CONTINUES TO MAKE NEWS The Canadian animation house is now being investigated by their insurance company for fraud according to one article. Other articles are reporting various people and companies (including High Reach) trying to sue them. One former executive is mad because he cant cash in his stock options. Trading Cinar's stock was "frozen" when the scandal broke. It is about to be "delisted" from the Canadian stock exchange.
DVD NEWS Masters of Russian Animation, volumes 1 and 2 ($25 each), from Jove Film Image Entertainment were reviewed in the June issue of the DVD-Laser Disc Newsletter. The reviewer gushed over the best of the amazing works and was honest about what he found dull. Vol. 2 includes 3 works by Yuri Norstein, Heron and Crane, Hedgehog and Frog and Fox and Rabbit, plus a work that he collaborated on with Ivan Ivanov-Vano Battle at Kerzhenets that he describes as "a magnificent stop-motion cut-out piece using figures from Russian icon art." He calls a second Ivanov-Vano piece "evocative." Crane Feathers, another film on this DVD, is described as "the blend of materials is fantastic and the piece is incredible."
The issue also reviewed 3 DVDs that may be of interest to somebody, but not me. Eat-Man 98 is a TV series from Japan (2 platters, Bandai Entertainment, $40). It is reviewed without much critical comment. My favorite comments were "the animation is stiff, but at other times, it is more fluid and the artwork is always quite stimulating. The stereo surround sound is reasonably strong and has some good seperation effects."
Scooby-Doo's Original Mysteries (Warner Home Video, $25) got a dubious review. "The monophonic sound is tolerable if held to a modest volume. The laugh track... We found ourselves enjoying the alternative Spanish track immensely, though the alternate French track was nowhere near as satisfying." Sounds like the reviewer was trying hard to find something interesting to say.
The final DVD is The Dog of Flanders, (Pioneer, $30) a children's film that left the reviewer "fully satisfied." Nothing was said about who created the film, who did the voices, etc.
Disney fans who collect DVDs may want to know that Costco has a coupon sale coming up with 9 films for $149.99. (Thanks Diane Heller for that news item.) Jerry Beck dislikes (see his web site) Disney doctoring their DVDs and videos. The latest release of Make Mine Music has the "Martin and the Coys" number removed because parents object to their fighting with guns. Cant parents accept history? Disney even erased all references to the sequence in the credits. In Melody Time a sequence of a female with cleavage was cut and a cigarette was air brushed out of one scene in the "Pecos Bill" number. (Disney fans will like to know that Frank and Ollie are working on a web site that will contain their teaching materials and that Disney's daughter is producing a film about her father.)
Laser Disc fans report that there are some great cut-rate sales available on the Internet. Evolution AV was reported to be selling the out of print Pioneer series of animated artists (Whitney, Fischinger, etc.) for $5 each. I was told that if they are sold out try Laser Direct on the Internet.
THE WORLD ANIMATION CELEBRATION WAS A POSITIVE EXPERIENCE FOR MOST PEOPLE KC The following opinions come from over a dozen animators and business people who either presented talks or films there or who had booths at the trade show. The impression I got is that it was a vast improvement from the last celebration (the last event was called a disaster by many who went). A couple of people said it still has a long way to go before it can be considered an important world class event. People liked the fact that the event did not have as much show biz hype about it this year. One person said he didn't considered it as overdone.
The Internet provided much of the excitement for this year's attendees. One person said "It pumped life into the event. It had a gold rush mentality to it."
Nobody singled out a specific booth at the trade show as being something that they had to tell me about. Instead everybody commented that they liked having booths set up around a hotel swimming pool. They said the location was a nice place to meet old friends. Meeting old friend is one of the pleasures of this kind of event.
Nobody talked about the films in competition. I had to go to AWN to find out what won. Several people said the highlights of the festival were the 3 events where Matt Groening, Brad Bird and Don Bluth spoke about their work. There was also a fine show from the Disney archive.
People commented that none of the events sold out and that some of the shows were poorly attended. Several speculated that people stayed away because they assumed everything good would be sold out by the time they found a parking space. Tickets to individual shows were not available in advance. They cost about the same as a first run feature, but some people may have thought they would be more expensive due to advance publicity. Flyers tried to get people to buy expensive series tickets.
Almost everybody commented that the worst aspect of the event was having stand-up comics do 15 minute sets before film shows. Some people were insulted that the event's producers felt comics were needed to sell tickets or to keep animation professionals entertained. "Doesn't the director of the festival believe animation is entertaining enough?"
There were some individual complaints that ranged from the poor programming of competition shorts to the presence of people there trying to make a buck who had no real appreciation of animation. One person said, "it was just an industry trade show with a festival as part of it." Another was surprised that the producers would hold it within a few days of Annecy. The international animation crowd normally goes to Annecy, so putting LA at the same time makes it harder for LA to attract people from outside of the US.
More serious complaints concerned the spirit of the event. One industry executive said "there was no joy in it" and another called it "lame."
The most negative criticism was a controversial statement from an ASIFA-International member who didn't attend. He felt ASIFA should boycott it because the event exploits animators who enter the competition. There is no entry fee for Ottawa, Zagreb, Hiroshima and other major international animation festivals. If your work is shown you are offered a free festival pass and a hotel room. The LA event is expensive to enter, does not offer free rooms and does not even help filmmakers find accommodations. He also noted a clause in their entry rules that says the World Animation Celebration is not obliged to show all films accepted for the competition by the pre-screening jury.
Should ASIFA boycott commercial festivals? I feel that to enter a commercially run event is an individual decision. WAC is not run by a non-profit association and has to make a buck to survive. Ticket sales, selling ads in the program and booth sales may not cover every expense. How much should artists have to pay to have to have their work screened?
THE "HOLLYWOOD REPORTER" AND "DAILY VARIETY" HAD SPECIAL ANIMATION ISSUES TO HELP HONOR THE WORLD ANIMATION CELEBRATION The content of the issues were rather predictable. There are articles on the animated features coming out this year, the new crop of TV series coming in the fall and what is happening on the Internet. The only surprise was a somewhat negative story by Harvey Deneroff in the Hollywood Reporter. His article "Animation Tooning Out?" began with the line "High costs, low ratings and the Internet threat have thrown the future of primetime animation into question." He failed to take into account poor scripts by writers who don't know how to create a good _ hour show and executives who simply do not understand the medium. NBC's Clerks lasted 2 shows before they canned it due to low ratings. Don't they realize the fault begins at the top with executives who contributed to the project and/or approved it.
NEW CREATIVE MANAGEMENT PUBLISHES AN INTERNET ANIMATION NEWSLETTER It lists new sites, competitions, business deals, awards, etc. It looks like a useful publication, but no subscription information was in the issue given to me by my friend who picked it up at the World Animation Celebration. I could not find them on the Internet. Anybody know how to contact them so we can share that information with our members?
VINTON STUDIO TO DO A THIRD SEASON OF "THE PJS" They are back on Fox now and move over to Warner Bros. in the fall. 13 new episodes have been ordered. They are also doing more Gary and Mike show for UPN.
ASIFA-HOLLYWOOD'S ANNIE AWARDS DEADLINE IS AUG. 4 This is an excellent festival for work intended for television broadcast. There are categories for directing, music, voice talent, etc. There are similar categories for feature productions. ASIFA-Hollywood, 725 S. Victory Blvd., Burbank, CA 91502 (818) 842-8330
TELLURIDE deadline July 15 (603) 433-9202 for info.
ASIFA-SAN FRANCISCO
P.O. Box 14616
San Francisco, CA 94114
LATE CALENDAR EVENT: SPROCKETS WILL PRESENT on Sunday, July 23, 10:30 pm, a selection of animated shorts with live music by Nik Phelps & the Sprocket Ensemble at the Werepad, 2430 Third St. SF Presented by Brainwash Movie Festival. Advance tickets $15 ea. at (510) 601-8932 ($20 at the door). Info. (415) 824-7334
FRANK FILM by Frank Mouris. See it at our July 20th event.
TELLURIDE INDEFEST deadline Aug. 1(770) 728-2629
THE TUBE 2000 FILM FESTIVAL IS STILL LOOKING FOR ANIMATED WORKS THAT MIGHT FIT INTO AN ACTION SPORTS FILM FESTIVAL The event is part of the X Games in San Francisco August 20 & 21. Contact Gary Meyer at (510) 644-9131 or 2600 10th St. Suite 405, Berkeley, CA 94710 www.expn.com
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DON'T WORRY IF YOU DO NOT GET A NEWSLETTER IN AUGUST - WE NEVER PUBLISH ONE This is a slow period for news and it gives us a needed break from all the work that goes into research, writing, stuffing envelops, etc. If all goes well our Sept. event will be Robin Allen, a British Disney scholar, talking about European influences on the studio's art and signing copies of his book on European influences on Disney.
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ASIFA-SF NEEDS YOUR HELP TO KEEP OUR MEMBERSHIP MAILING LABLES COMPILED AND PRINTED OUT It shouldn't take much of your time each month, but you have to be accurate so copies of the newsletter get delivered to everybody. If you have a computer, printer and can help, contact Karl Cohen (415) 386-1004.
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This issue was written by Karl Cohen. Newsletter production lwas by Shirley Smith, Ron Seawright and Tara Packard. Copies are free to ASIFA-SF members |
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Membership/subscription is $18 a year or $40 for both local and international membership. |
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