December, 2001 Newsletter
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CONGRATULATIONS TO PDI FOR WINNING 8 ANNIE AWARDS FOR "SHREK" INCLUDING BEST FEATURE, AND TO WILD BRAIN FOR WINNING 3 ANNIE AWARDS INCLUDING THE BEST THEATRICAL SHORT AND THE BEST INTERNET SHORT The 29th Annual Annie Award nominees were chosen from eligible entries by nominating committees appointed by the Board of Directors of ASIFA-Hollywood. Nominations were announced on September 10, 2001 and were mentioned in our October newsletter. Members of ASIFA-Hollywood voted on the nominations and the winners were announced November 10, 2001. The Bay Area won over 1/3 of the awards presented this year. The local winners are: OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT IN AN ANIMATED THEATRICAL FEATURE,Shrek - PDI/DreamWorks OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT FOR AN ANIMATED PRODUCTION PRODUCED FOR THE INTERNET,Groove Monkee - Wild Brain, Inc. OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT IN AN ANIMATED SHORT SUBJECT,Hubert's Brain - Wild Brain, Inc. OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT IN AN ANIMATED SPECIAL PROJECT,The Chuck Jones Show: Open/ Close/Packaging - Wild Brain, Inc. for Cartoon Network OUTSTANDING INDIVIDUAL ACHIEVEMENT FOR EFFECTS ANIMATION, Arnauld Lamorlette -Shrek OUTSTANDING INDIVIDUAL ACHIEVEMENT FOR DIRECTING IN AN ANIMATED FEATURE PRODUCTION, Andrew Adamson, Vicky Jenson-Shrek OUTSTANDING INDIVIDUAL ACHIEVEMENT FOR MUSIC SCORE IN AN ANIMATED FEATURE PRODUCTION. John Powell, Harry Gregson-Williams,Shrek OUTSTANDING INDIVIDUAL ACHIEVEMENT FOR PRODUCTION DESIGN IN AN ANIMATED FEATURE PRODUCTION, Guillaume Aretos,Shrek OUTSTANDING INDIVIDUAL ACHIEVEMENT FOR STORYBOARDING IN AN ANIMATED FEATURE PRODUCTION, Robert Koo,Shrek OUTSTANDING INDIVIDUAL ACHIEVEMENT FOR WRITING IN AN ANIMATED FEATURE PRODUCTION, Ted Elliott, Terry Rossio, Joe Stillman, Roger S.H. Schulman,Shrek OUTSTANDING INDIVIDUAL ACHIEVEMENT FOR VOICE ACTING BY A MALE PERFORMER IN AN ANIMATED FEATURE PRODUCTION Eddie Murphy as the voice of Donkey,Shrek SPROCKET ENSEMBLE IS PERFORMING WITH A LOT OF ANIMATION NOT PREVIOUSLY SEEN IN THE BAY AREA - MORE NEW WORK WILL BE SHOWN ON DECEMBER 18 Their November show at the Red Vic featured 13 works that had not been shown in our city before. They came from Russia, Ukraine, Sweden, Portugal and the US. Many were acquired on Nik and Nancy Phelp's recent trip to Europe and the Krok festival. Nancy says the December program will feature a Christmas message from the Ukraine that is not to be missed, plus a sneak preview of a work-in-progress about a lost sock by ASIFA-SF's Shirley Smith. Shows at 7:30 and 9:30 pm. ANIMATOR GREG BIRGFELD CELEBRATED THE COMPLETION OF "THE BOY WHO DREW CATS" IN NOVEMBER Dinghy Productions and Velvendo Films held a party in honor of Birgfeld at Laszlo on Mission (next door to Foreign Cinema). They showed his new film based on a folktale plus "a smorgasbord of animated films by local artists." Ken Kearny created the music, Andrea Gard designed the sound and Anna Marie Vavloukis was the producer. NEWS OF BILLY GREENE'S MURDER CONTINUES TO BE COVERED BY ANIMATION PUBLICATIONS The murder of this very talented young animator must have meaning to a lot of people who never knew him. Obituaries have recently appeared in Film Art Foundation's Release Print, in the animation union's newsletter, on-line at AWN.COM and I assume in other publications. When I reflect on what happened to Billy I'm motivated to try and complete my objectives and to live life as fully as possible as I know time runs out... KC ...AND BILLY GREENE'S FILM WINS ANOTHER MAJOR FESTIVAL PRIZE Jean Thomas, the director of photography of Billy Greene's last film writes, "Thought Bubble won the Animation Award in NYC at the Shorts International Film Festival and is now eligible for the Academy. Exciting! We added an ending about Billy, so audiences know about what happened and can get more information from his website." www.blackvan.net BARBARA KLUTINIS, who headed the Rooftop Elementary Middle School animation program and teaches film at Skyline College, has a 16mm, optically printed experimental film that is getting into several festivals and winning a few prizes. Journey, Swiftly Passing won Second Place in the Athens Film and Video Festival and honorable mentions at the Marin County Fair Film and Video Festival and the New Jersey International Film Festival. It has been shown in the Exploratorium's Electric Shadows series and by the S.F. Cinematheque at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts. THE PRESS IS DISCOVERING NINA PALEY The September issue of Millimeter has a half page article about her using Flash to make Fetch and why the piece could be turned into a sharp looking 35mm film. The November issue of Release Print has her work on their cover and an article about her inside. The November issue of Animation World Magazine (at awn.com) has an article on innovative animation techniques. The entire first page of that article is about Paley's work! Kristinna McCort in Millimeter calls her work "Escheresque." She interviewed Paley about why she used Flash to make Fetch. She also quoted Haunt Rama of Monaco Labs about why Flash animation looks so good in 35mm. Flash is a vector graphic system and since it doesn't use pixels it is easy to blow up straight or curved lines and get great results. Nina told us she had plans to transfer her Flash work to 35mm when she made Fetch so she did one more thing that the article left out. She created it at 24 images a second on the computer. Most Flash animation is intended to be seen on computer screens, so it is made at 8, 10 or 12 frames a second. Also, the simplicity of most Internet animation will look clumsy if it were blown up and projected in 35mm on a big screen. Fetch had more refined images. I had the pleasure of seeing Fetch at the Castro on their giant screen and it looked great. The images were sharp and crisp. There was nothing that suggested to me that it was made using Flash. Nina told Joan Kim from awn.com "I love trying new techniques. I'm strictly limited by budget constraints, which is a drag, but it also drives me to find creative production methods. If I had to make my films the 'correct' way, they'd never get done." The article mentions her 70mm film Pandorama as well as her works Fetch and Cancer. Nina continues to produce strong personal work. In November she premiered The Stork and Fertility Goddess at the Red Vic (Sprocket Ensemble show). Both are good looking 3 minute works with strong messages. Her Goddess demonstrates her powers, but unfortunately she is too skilled with them and the results are disastrous. The Stork uses a lot of humor to make its point. Nina is presently working on an ambitious project that is part animation and part live action documentary footage. Liz Canning's excellent 3 page story on her career in Film Art's Release Print says Thank You For Not Breeding will be a documentary about overpopulation and the environment. It will include at least 10 minutes of various kinds of animation, plus time lapse photography and talking heads. ASIFA NEEDS A VOLUNTEER WHO CAN BACK-UP PHILIP MALKIN WHO PRINTS OUT OUR MAILING LABELS Malkin is enjoying "extended travels in the Mediteranian." His trip began in early November and he will be back in mid-December. ASIFA will need somebody to help out if he continues his travels next year. He might have to leave late this month or in January. To ensure there is no interruption in the delivery of newsletters, ASIFA-SF needs to plan ahead "just in case." At present our database is kept in File Maker Pro, but Malkin can export our database to another program. The mailing list/label tasks do not require a lot of time each month (mainly adding new members, changes of address and printing out labels) but they do require accuracy and being able to get the labels to us in time for our mailing crew to do their job. If you can be of help, please contact Karl Cohen (415) 386-1004 karlcohen@earthlink.net Please contact us right away. TARA PACKARD'S ART FEATURED IN "PC GAME NEWS" an online publication. In October they ran an advanced mention of a new product from Maxis. The article about Sim's Hot Date featured 4 frames from the game that were animated by Packard. The animated segment showed a couple getting ready to snuggle on a red couch. LUCAS HAS GIVEN THE WORLD BRIEF LOOKS AT "STAR WARS: EPISODE II - ATTACK OF THE CLONES" WITH TRAILERS PACKAGED WITH PRINTS OF "MONSTERS, INC." AND "HARRY POTTER" Lucasfilm Ltd. created a "teaser" trailer for Star Wars: Episode II -- Attack of the Clones that is packaged with prints of Monsters, Inc. and a 2-minute preview packaged with Harry Potter. There is also a promo in Quick Time on the Internet. George Lucas commented in October, "I have great respect for Pixar and deep admiration for John Lasseter and his team. I'm thrilled to be able to show audiences their first glimpse of Episode II with Monsters, Inc. It gives me an immense sense of pride to see our companies working together." A VOICE FROM THE PAST "There may be a lot coming up that could affect the way special effects are done. I just don't know what they're going to call it---maybe a 'video-graphic' computer. You will be able to do a computer-created, entirely synthetic image and animate with that image." Dennis Muren of ILM, Millimeter, September, 1980. THE NOVEMBER-DECEMBER ISSUE OF FILM ARTS' "RELEASE PRINT" HAS SEVERAL FINE ANIMATION ARTICLES IN IT The cover story is on Nina Paley. There is an informative article on doing effects with Adobe After Effects, interviews with Danny Plotnick, Lena Podesta, Samara Halperin and Amy Hicks and a review of RESFest 2001. Their new editor is animation friendly. The issue uses more images from films and cool graphics and fewer cocktail party photos. DO YOU HAVE AN ANIMATED WORK TO SHOW AT OUR JANUARY OPEN SCREENING FOR STUDENTS AND INDEPENDENT ANIMATORS? If so, let Karl Cohen know about the work ASAP and your name and the work's title will be on our flyer for the Wed., Jan. 16 event. (415) 386-1004 Our open screening for animation companies will be on Feb. 20 PIXAR'S "MONSTERS" BREAKS A RECORD It opened in the number one spot with a weekend gross of $63.5 million, the biggest opening ever for an animated film. By the end of its 2nd weekend it had grossed $123 million. By the end of 3 weekends the gross was $156 million (excellent, even though Harry Potter, with effects by ILM, had become "the film" to see). On 11/25 the gross was almost $193 million. Considering it will probably be on the top 10 charts until after the 1st of the new year, I wonder how long it will take it to gross $300 million? PDI/DREAMWORK'S "SHREK" IS BREAKING SALES RECORDS TOO "Shrek" is the top grossing theatrical movie of the year ($267.5 million domestic). It has also broken the DVD sales record by selling 2.2 million copies in one week. (Star Wars: Episode 1 sold 2 million the first week). Shrek sold over 7 million VHS and DVD units in just three days of its release (about $110 million). This will be a big year for DVD. The DVD releases of Star Wars: Episode 1, Snow White and Mummy Returns set sales records that Shrek broke. Big box office films coming out in DVD before Christmas include Pearl Harbor, Planet of the Apes, Tomb Raider, Jurassic Park III and Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas. DREAMWORKS ANNOUNCES ANDREW ADAMSON, CO-DIRECTOR OF "SHREK" WILL DIRECT "TRUCKERS" AWN.COM reports this will be a part-live action, part-animated feature based on a young adult novel by Terry Pratchett. The story is about alien creatures who live in a department store. Adamson is writing the film's script with Joe Stillman, a co-author of Shrek. Adamson is also expected to be involved in some way with the Shrek sequel. Vicky Jenson, who co-directed Shrek with Adamson, will not work on the sequel. She is slated to direct an upcoming DreamWorks CG project that has yet to be announced. It isn't clear if either or both films will be animated in Palo Alto by PDI as Dreamworks also produces animation in LA (and in England with Aardman). PDI is known to be working on Tusker (2002 release), Madagascar and Shrek 2. THE IMAX VERSION OF DISNEY'S "BEAUTY AND THE BEAST" LOOKS AND SOUNDS FANTASTIC It opens January 1 at Lowes' IMAX at Metreon in SF. Seeing the new print created for the 70mm format at a preview demonstrated how wonderful film's magic can be. OK, I'm both an animation and a 70mm junkie. For me, seeing a sharp, brilliant image that big and colors that rich and pure was a remarkable experience. The animation moved smoothly 99.9% of the time and the digital ink and paint showed no trace of imperfections despite it being blown up on a screen 70 or 80' high. If you enjoy the IMAX experience, make sure you see this presentation when it opens, even if you are not a big fan of this film. An aside: After Tom Sito's talk people asked me what his job was on this film. He was one of 6 animators given credit for creating the beast. Numerous essays can be written about the merits and faults of Disney features. Many people dislike them and their reasons generally make a lot of sense. I much prefer Jean Cocteau's 1948 black and white version of Beauty and the Beast, and love showing my 16mm print of it to friends. Even so, I believe that if you can put aside any negative feelings you might have about Disney for 85 minutes, you will have a magical experience. I hope you leave totally charmed and delighted with the presentation. Sure I was being manipulated, I disagreed with some elements of the story and I am not a fan of the soundtrack, but I still marveled at the art and labor the studio put into the production. While some of us might have been happier if it was Shrek, a different Disney feature, a Svankmajer film or Nina Paley's IMAX short Pandorama that will be opening in IMAX on January 1, the reality is this is the best animated IMAX experience we are going to get for some time, so enjoy it. LOCAL SCREENINGSThurs. Nov. 29 through Monday, December 3, at the Red Vic, SF Premiere of SPRIGGAN, from Japan, dubbed, 90 minutes. "The action scenes absolutely rule" Ain't It Cool News; "Visionary" London Film Festival. Wednesday, December 19, 7:30 pm, ASIFA-SF PRESENTS A SCREENING OF RARELY SEEN ANIMATED CLASSICS, 16mm program of artistic triumphs including Mindscape, a pinscreen film by Jacques Drouin, Canada; Hoppin and Gross, Le Joie de Vivre (The Joy of Living/Life), a celebration of life in modern France, 1934; Ub Iwerks' Merry Manequins, an Art Deco masterpiece, 1937, work by Raoul Servais, Paul Driessen and much more. At the Exploratorium December 26-30. Wed. - Sunday, at noon, 2 and 4 pm, HOLIDAY ANIMATION PROGRAM at the Exploratorium. IncludesBunny by Chris Wedge,Tin Toy by John Lasseter,Infinite Escher by Mary Perillo and John Sanborn andTops by Charles and Ray Eames. Opening January 1 at the Lowes/Sony Metreon IMAX, Disney's BEAUTY AND THE BEAST. NATIONAL NEWSWALT WOULD HAVE BEEN 100 ON DECEMBER 5, SO ROBIN ALLEN HAS ORGANIZED A WORLD WIDE TOAST TO HONOR HIS MEMORY He e-mailed a long list of friends, scholars, retired Disney artists, etc. "to raise a glass and toast the memory of Walt Disney at 8pm British time (9pm European time, 12 noon US Pacific time)." Other events on Dec. 5 include The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Science in LA presenting a tribute to Walt at 8 pm. BILL PLYMPTON HAS CREATED A 22 MINUTE LONG CHRISTMAS SPECIAL FOR THE CARTOON NETWORK! 12 Tiny Christmas Tales premieres on Cartoon Network, Friday, December 7th at 8:30 pm. It will also run on Friday, December 21 at 9:30 pm. The tales are based on Christmas cards that Bill has made over the years. Bill told us working with Linda Simensky of the network "was a dream. The only restriction was make it funny." ASIFA-East is holding a preview party featuring a band and a screening of this work. Clips of Bill's work and an interview with him were seen on PBS in The Egg, an experimental series. There was a 4 or 5 min. segment on his work in the "Body Parts" show. "THE DON AND BILL SHOW: SLIGHTLY BENT" COULD BECOME AN UNDERGROUND HIT It features 10 animated shorts by two Oscar nominated artists who are the backbone of recent Spike and Mike shows. Apollo Cinema in the San Diego area has packaged 5 shorts by Bill Plympton with 5 by Don Hertzfeldt. Films include Plympton's Your Face, Eat, Surprise Cinema, 25 Ways to Quit Smoking and More Sex and Violence. Hertzfeldt's five are Rejected, Ah L'Amour, Lilly and Jim, Billy's Balloon and Genre. The package opened for a 4 day midnight run in September in LA ("a terrific program of 10 provocative works" LA Times) and was back in another LA theater in November. Bill was flown to the Austin, Texas premiere in November at the Alamo Drafthouse and said they not only packed the place, they had to turn over 200 people away. One person told him it was the best show he had ever seen! Another friend who just happened to be there confirms it was a cool event and you can drink beer and eat pizza while watching the films. Apollo's web says the show is booked into the Charles in Baltimore, Md.; the St. Louis Film Festival and Coolidge Corner near Bostin. . apollocinema.com MILESTONE RELEASES A VIDEOTAPE OF JOHN CANEMAKER'S WORK The NY Times reports "John Canemaker: Marching to a Different Toon is a compendium of shorts by this animator, writer and educator. Mr. Canemaker's quirky, highly transformative figures go well with humorous riffs by actors and comedians, and they are effective in shorts and in longer films about child abuse, AIDS and other serious subjects." For info. (800) 603-1104. VISIT OUR WEB SITE, WWW.ASIFA-SF.ORG THE FIRST OSCAR FOR AN ANIMATED FEATURE HAS 13 HOPEFULS IN THE RACE In late October it looked like there wouldn't be enough entries entered to have an animated category, but as the November entry deadline neared 13 films were entered. AWN writes, "The submitted films will be reviewed by the executive committee of the Short Films and Feature Animation branch, which will make its recommendations to the Board of Governors who will ultimately determine whether or not an award will be handed out in the Animated Feature film category. The Board will meet on December 11th to make the decision." The Academy defines an animated feature as "a motion picture of at least 70 minutes in running time where a significant number of the major characters in the film are animated (stop-motion, CGI or traditional), and animation figures in no less than 75% of the picture's running time." AWN reports "This definition seems to have foiled at least one potential contender, Blood: The Last Vampire. It is only 50 minutes long, but it has played theatrically in Japan and the U.S. and Manga feels it should qualify as an animated feature. It is the first all digital feature from Japan. ONE OF DISNEY'S SUPRESSED WWII FILMS CAN BE SEEN ON THE INTERNET Education for Death was made for our government during WWII. I recall it being a rather nasty film about Hitler brainwashing the youth of Germany. See it at ifilm.com (I tried, but I didn't have all the required software in my computer. I downloaded one program and was then told I needed another, so I turned it off.) RUMOR OF THE MONTH Disney refused to confirm that they were adopting Beauty and The Beast for IMAX theaters until the last moment. Now, the same people who told me that was happening before Disney confirmed that rumor, are saying The Lion King will be the next 70mm Disney release. WHY DISNEY IS RELEASING FILMS IN 70MM IMAX I just found a list of IMAX movie box office statistics for the US which explain why Disney and IMAX are interested in working together. The top grossing film in IMAX is Everest (1998) at $76.5 million. Number 2 on the list is Fantasia 2000 at $51.3 million. Mysteries of Egypt is #3 at $40.8 million and T-Rex is #4 at $37.9 million. Then the numbers drop to Michael Jordan in #5 at $18.5 million. Only 14 films on the list are above $10 million and only 24 films have grossed over 1 million. The films are generally made for less than $5 million so they have to gross over $10 or $15 million to break even since the film's producers only get a small percentage of the gross income. What this suggests is IMAX really needs Disney. IMAX stock, which once sold around $50 a share, is presently selling around $1.25 a share. (Disney stock was selling at $21 after Thanksgiving). IMAX is of interest to Disney if rumors are correct that Disney has little interest in projects that gross under $50 million. An aside: Cyberworld, a compilation of computer generated films that had little in common (I disliked it), is #14 on the chart at $10.3 million; Siegfried & Roy (a film I hated, but sat through to see Nina Paley's 70mm short) is #17 at $5.2 million and Haunted Castle, a ride film I enjoyed, isn't on the chart. Information from www.the-numbers.com A list at The Movie Times.Com says Haunted Castle has grossed $3.2 million. SOCIETY FOR ANIMATION STUDIES (SAS) has updated their website with a list of papers presented at previous conferences. The 13th Annual SAS Conference was at Concordia College, Montreal, Canada in October.. Marty McNamara presented a paper on "Reverse Chronology in Animation Narrative" (for example T.R.A.N.S.I.T. by Piet Kroon). ww.awn.com/sas CHUCK JONES EXHIBIT? This vague note came from ASIFA Hollywood. "Art Institute of Southern California hosts the Chuck Jones Foundation inaugural exhibition. Chuck Jones is the professor emeritus of the Feature Animation program. The Art Institute of Southern California, 2222 Laguna Canyon Road, Laguna Beach." ANIMATION FANS ARE DISCOVERING CHUCK JONES' "TIMBER WOLF" ON THE INTERNET It is Jones' first original animated character created for Warner Bros. in more than 40 years. The Flash cartoon premiered on October 24, 2001 on warnerbros.com and over a million visitors will have seen part of the 13 week series by the time you read this. A new "websode" appears weekly. The one I saw had little action. It was mainly talking heads and wasn't very funny. I tried to see a 2nd episode, but after waiting 8 to 10 minutes for it to load, I only saw a 15 second clip of the wolf talking and then a "play again" button appeared. I clicked on it, but only the same clip was shown. ICEBOX.COM IS NOW A PAY-PER-VIEW SITE They charge 25 cents (regular price will be 40 cents) for each episode you watch. You can watch it as many times as you wish in a 24 hour period. Offerings include Garbage Island, Hard Drinkin' Lincoln, Jesus and his Brothers, Hidden Celebrity Webcam, and the racially offensive Mr. Wong. RHINO HOME VIDEO TO RELEASE GUMBY ON TAPE The deal includes 214 episodes of The Gumby Show and The All-New Gumby (1956 - 1988). This is the first time the full Gumby library will be available for purchase. Rhino plans to release DVD boxed sets of the complete library and individual DVDs and VHS tapes. You can also expect to see new Gumby products in stores. "THE ADVENTURES OF PRINCE ACHMED" IS AVAILABLE FROM MILESTONE Lotte Reiniger's Adventures of Prince Achmed, 1926, 72 min. animated, drawn from The Arabian Nights. The NY Times reports, "remarkably, the film is done entirely in silhouette, which was Reiniger's medium. As she explained the process in a 1936 article, silhouette films were photographed movement by movement, as were cartoon drawings. But instead of drawings, minutely hinged marionettes made of black cardboard and thin lead were used. These were laid out on a glass table, lighted from underneath and photographed from above. A battle between witches who change from scorpions to serpents to vultures to lions to a half-dozen other creatures must have been a challenge." For info. (800) 603-1104 ASIFA-EAST HELD AN ANIMATION ART AUCTION AND BBQ (without serving any food!) in November. But they did serve up a mighty tasty selection of films for people to watch courtesy of the Cartoon Network. Art was donated by Nickelodeon, Blue Sky, Bill Plympton and other studios. TOM SITO HAS RETIRED FROM BEING PRESIDENT OF HOLLYWOOD'S ANIMATION UNION On September 25, The Motion Picture Screen Cartoonists Local 839 of IATSE held an election. Kevin Koch ran without opposition for president, George Sukara ran for vice president, Jeff Massie ran for recording secretary and Jan Browning ran for sergeant-at-arms. All ran without opposition. Steve Hulett was reelected as the business agent. His job was challenged by Karan Storr. The new and returning officers were sworn in Nov. 6. On Nov. 7 Sito presented a talk about his career to members of ASIFA-SF. He took us behind the scenes at Disney and other studios and mentioned studio politics, details about story development and directing and other fascinating things. He told wonderful stories about working with the great animators of the past in LA, NY and London, plus a few tales about some of the worst people in the industry. Sito is a charming as well as informative presenter and judging by the audience reaction, including a few calls and e-mails the next day, this was our most popular program of the year for many of the people in the audience. Sito didn't say much about the union, but he left me some union literature explaining the benefits of joining. It listed some obvious benefits like protecting members from being fired with no warning (even for having health problems like AIDS) and their helping members being harassed or discriminated against. Among union benefits are an excellent health insurance plan (including benefits for same sex couples), a credit union, and a retirement plan (it is hard for some non-union animators to maintain health insurance if they switch jobs a lot). There is an employment board (e-mail notices are sent to people requesting them) and other benefits. QUOTE OF THE MONTH (from ASIFA-Hollywood's latest newsletter - after reading it, read the news items that follow) "What a lot of artists don't understand is that film is an investment. Investors are staking a bunch of money on a project, and they want more money back. They don't give out money for the sake of art - this is not a donation industry. Artists have got to be better prepared for these dry spells in the industry. Even a 5 year contract ends eventually. A guaranteed job is a myth... Commercial artists are not fine artists. Commercial art is for one reason - money... This is a lesson that most animation artists have not yet learned - they still think they're fine artists. We have to start educating ourselves and stop being helpless." By James Parris, now a computer animator in LA and a former president of the animators' union local in Orlando, Florida when he worked for Disney. Editor's note: ASIFA was organized to celebrate and honor animation and to get people to recognize it as a great art form. None-the-less it is also important to be aware of economic realities. Although several local companies are doing well, having worked on a number of projects that have been extremely successful, other segments of the industry have been "downsizing." With that in mind I printed the above quote and the following disturbing news items. MTV LAYS OFF HUNDREDS OF EMPLOYEES AND CLOSES THEIR ANIMATION STUDIO IN NYC. MTV announced a worldwide restructuring plan that includes laying off 450 people (8% to 9% of their staff). Departments seriously affected include online divisions and ending their commercial production and animation units. Tom Freston, CEO of MTV Networks said in a company memo that MTV will now rely on outside/independent animation producers. Back in the 1980's MTV relied on outside producers, including Colossal Pictures, for their animation. When they opened their MTV Animation Studio there were all kinds of claims about needing more control over productions, the need to cut costs, etc. to justify that move. Abby Terkuhle is stepping down as president of MTV Animation. He may continue his relationship with the company as an outside producer. Years ago Terkuhle developed a competition for MTV that prompted me to write a scathing article at that time about their exploiting animators. They got about 300 people to make completed 15 second MTV station ids for free (often at great expense)! The lucky winners (10 of them) were given cash prizes that were less than what MTV was paying Colossal for an id. The winners got shown at the Animation Celebration in LA and on MTV. Was this a colossal rip-off? MTV's parent company, Viacom, had previously announced their revenues have dropped and costs have increased due to lower ad revenues since September 11. Also Blockbuster, owned by Viacom, is writing off about $353 million worth of video tapes. They are "less productive" VHS tapes being dropped as they shift their inventory over to the growing DVD rental market. ELECTRONIC ARTS TO LAY OFF 1/3RD OF ONLINE GAMING DIVISION They will cut about 250 jobs as the online division isn't meeting their projected growth expectations. The company has about 3600 employees worldwide. They have employed a lot of animators in the Bay Area, but recently there was a 10% cut-back and several animators were laid-off. DISNEY'S SECRET LAB TO CLOSE Disney will close The Secret Lab, their visual effects department that provides images for Disney features and images for other studios. It was formed after Disney acquired Dream Quest Images in 1996. The division is working on CGI effects for Reign of Fire, scheduled to be released in June, 2002. The unit will be absorbed into Disney's animated features division. They will no longer seek contracts to do special effects work for other studios. (Earlier this year we reported that Disney was going to lay off about 350 of their 1700 employees in their animated features division.) Disney watchers are concerned the studio lacks solid leadership in their feature animation division. TV animation seems to be doing well, turning out lots of shows and direct-to-video sequels. When Secret Lab opened and created the feature Dinosaurs, there was great optimism about the company's future as a producer of great cg features. For the moment the company's best products are produced by their partner Pixar. Many people believe that if Disney doesn't produce a hit every time something is wrong. They are being unrealistic about the film business. While Pixar has only produced hits, that is a rare phenomenon. Tom Sito told me that Warner Bros. expects 1 out of 8 features they produce to be a box office hit. KC BLUE SKY LAYS OFF ABOUT 100 PEOPLE IN THEIR ANIMATION DEPARTMENT. Blue Sky Studios is nearing completion of Ice Age, a computer animated feature for Fox. It opens on March 15, 2002 and is being directed by Chris Wedge (Oscar for his short Bunny). The company's credits include effects animation for Joe's Apartment, Fight Club and for the TV series The Sopranos. The trades say they are already "in development" on their next feature. CINAR, THE CANADIAN ANIMATION COMPANY HIT WITH A FINANCIAL SCANDAL, HAS REPAID A LOT OF THEIR DEBT AND MAY LIQUIDATE WHAT IS LEFT The Cinar Corporation has now repaid $26 million in loans. Beginning in late 1999, they were in the news several times with numerous reports of financial problems and lawsuits regarding illegally obtained Canadian tax credits, dubious investments in offshore accounts and misappropriation of funds by senior executives. The firms founders were fired in August, 2000, and were subsequently sued by Cinar. The company is searching for a buyer (they are represented by Merrill Lynch). They were once a major producer of TV animation for kids and they still own rights to several shows. They are still working on several series in connection with overseas production houses and foreign backers. They include The Little Lulu Show and Mona the Vampire. A recently developed line of toys and games based on their series Caillou is being sold in the US by FAO Schwartz. NEWS FROM ASIFA ISRAEL by Tsvika Oren A light rain on Oct 15 supposedly marked the end of Summer in Israel. It was a very exciting summer as far as animation was concerned as three international film festivals presented excellent selections of animated films. The Jerusalem Festival in July presentedShrek as their opening night feature. This was the first time in their 18 years of existence that they chose to celebrate their official opening program with an animated film. Shrek was received with wild enthusiasm. Included in the festival's 150 programs was a "world's best" animation show compiled by festival programmer Avinoam Harpak. The program of 13 shorts included The Boy Who Saw the Iceberg by Paul Driessen, Bully Dance by Janet Perlman, Village of Idiots by Fedorenko/Newlove, Bill Plympton's Eat and Sapegin's Snails. All 3 screenings were sold out and a lot of people were disappointed about not being able to get tickets. The 1st CoCarAn Festival in Tel Aviv in August combined COmics, CARicature and ANimation arts for the first time. The festival included 108 shorts in 15 animation programs. They were curated by Tsvika Oren. Also, the festival's sponsor, The Cartoon Network, presented selections of recent works and of classics from their vast library (Tex Avery, Chuck Jones, Bob Clampett, etc). The British Council presented a tribute to BAA (British Animation Awards) with Jayne Pilling in person, and to TVC London's TV specials with TVC's top exec. Norman D. Kauffman in person. Ms. Pilling also conducted a stimulating meeting with ASIFA members and another with festival and film events directors. Another exciting meeting was with Pixar artist Alex Orrelle. There were also special programs paying homage to Astley-Baker films and to Bolex Brothers. Nearly 3000 people crowded the animation programs. The 17th Haifa Festival in October included among its 130 programs a 'Kids festival' curated by Alit Karp. The animated films included Petit Potam by Deyries/Choquet, a 75 min. feature from Luxembourg and France, 2001, Jannik Hastrup 2nd feature Mice and Romance, 60 min., Denmark, 2000 and Richard Goleszowski 29 min. Hooves of Fire for BBC Animation, 2000. There was a "World's Best" selection for adults, curated by Tsvika Oren. It included the world premiere of King Solomon and the Bee from Pitchi-Poy Studio in Jaffa (an international production made for S4C/BBC/HBO, directed by Noam Meshulam), a selection of ads from Wild Brain Studio, SF, CA and Will Vinton's Studio, Portland, OR; Jose Miguel Ribeiro's suspenseful The Suspect, 1999, Portugal; Bruno Bozzetto's Europe & Italy, 1999, (our audience identified with the Italian sense of (dis)order and found this work to be hilarious) and Premiers Jours from the NFB of Canada, 1980, a wonderfully poetic 9 minute classic by the late Clorinda Warny. ASIFA Israel holds at least one meeting-screening every month. This summer we showed new work by Avi Ofer, Gur Moshe's SIGGRAPH '99 Hon. Mention winner Scoops (on Maya); Yael Shahmon's Tennis, Hon. mention winner at Tricky Women Festival, Austria; Hanan Kaminski's Silver Pulcinella (Italy) winner Pettson & Findus; Alon Bentov 27 min. 3D-Studio-Max Deathtiny; Omer Makober's Bees Song and Kats the Cat, Flash films; Tal Schwartzman's Lunch Time; Roni Oren's Bezeq-Internet Parrot commercial; Sharon Gazit's Logi TV spots and several commercials and other commissioned works by the leading Tel Aviv studios: Broadcast Postproductions, Pil Animation, Pitchi-poy, Zeppelin, Disk-in and Multiview. CREATING A DVD: A NEW OPPORTUNITY FOR PRESENTING EXPERIMENTAL ANIMATIONby Deanna Morse The following are excerpts from a long article Morse wrote about creating a DVD of her work. The project took over 2 years to complete. I am a film artist: an animator and experimental filmmaker. I have been making short films and videos regularly for the past thirty years or so. I was approached by Ed Anderson from Trillion Digital in Grand Rapids, Michigan www.trilliondigital.com, who offered to compile and publish a retrospective of my work on a DVD... The first steps were compiling the retrospective. I found the best copies of my films and videos, and arranged for transfer to Beta SP. For two early films where I had used copyright protected music, I replaced the tracks with cleared and legal music... We ended up including 36 short films, organized into eight categories. The total video running time is over 2.5 hours. In addition, the disc includes over two hundred production stills with captions, five storyboard to film comparisons, and interactive and animated motion menus... The DVD includes five films with "angles," a technical possibility unique to DVDs. In these five films, the viewer can press the angle button on their DVD remote controller to toggle between the original storyboard and the finished animation.... The basic steps of this DVD included: Generating the original video/film materials Technical fixes: cleaning up that material as needed Transferring to high quality video for encoding into the computer Organizing the material into sections: determining all elements of the final project Developing a 'bit budget' for the project (how much material, what size disc is required) Encoding the video from analog to digital (tape to computer) Scanning slides and graphics for the production stills Scanning storyboards for the 'angles' Laying storyboards to video, matching timing with finished production Designing the user interface Generating the visual elements of the interface: scanning and cleaning up those elements Production of the graphic interface (including layout, resizing, adding shadows) Grant writing to cover the cost of commercial replication Writing captions for the production stills Testing captions, and production stills Determining the 'active screen areas' for interactivity Programming the interactivity Programming other elements; such as angles, captions, chapter stops Testing the discs for bugs and errors Transferring all materials to DLT tape for replication Designing the label for the DVD disc Writing and designing the booklet for insert Writing and designing the cover of the disc package Planning for the Premiere Celebration Party Deanna Morse is an artist/animator and a Professor in the School of Communications at Grand Valley State University in Allendale, Michigan. Her work has been selected for international festivals, and screened on commercial and public television. Her films are represented in permanent collections including the Metropolitan Museum of Art. For more information: website: faculty.gvsu.edu/morsed or morsed@gvsu.edu TO PURCHASE MORSE'S "MOVE.CLICK.MOVE" ON DVD send $25 (make check payable to Grand Valley State University) to Professor Deanna Morse, School of Communication, 268 LHS, Grand Valley State University, Allendale, MI 49401 TELL PEOPLE YOU RESPECT THAT THEY SHOULD PROBABLY AVOID THE NEW SICK AND TWISTED SHOW by Karl Cohen The program might be entertaining to someone who has never seen one of these shows, but quite frankly this is a really dull edition. The only great shorts in the program are Betty Boop in Snow White, 1933 (why was it included?) and Bill Plympton's Eat, 2001. There isn't a film in it that is so bad, gross or disgusting that it becomes "good." The rest of the show is just mediocre stuff intended to amuse 12 year olds who are just discovering sex, dirty words, etc. I listened to the audience response at the Castro and rarely was there much laughter. Six No Neck Joe shorts were added to the program, but only one or two got much laughter and two or three got none. The only solid applause was for Eat and Snow White. People also liked the two Don Hertzfeldt shorts that were added (I still dislike them). Harry Pothead, the token drug film, got one person applauding loudly, but nobody else joined in. Animation is almost non-existent in several of the shorts. A paper jaw sliding up and down is about as good as it gets in two or three works. Poorly designed and executed artwork is the norm for this show. I was disappointed that a new work by the Bolex Brothers wasn't shown, nor was Thank You Mask Man. I was also disappointed that the show opened with a stupid live action "comedy" starring Spike, the producer of the show. It was as close as the program got to being really awful. FESTIVALSART IN MOTION, Jan. 15 deadline for works that can be exhibited on the Internet. Online exhibit and international tour. Cah grand prize. USC School of Fine Art, Wall Hall room 103, University Park, LA 90089-0292 www.usc/aim aim@usc.edu BIG MUDDY, Jan. 14 deadline. Cash prizes, entry fee. For film and video. Dept. of Cinema, Mailcode 6610, Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, Illinois 62901 www.bigmuddyfilm.com HUMBOLDT deadline Jan. 31/Feb. 15. $10-30 fee, cash and non-cash prizes, no video, www.humboldt.edu/~filmfest (707) 826-4113 MEDIAWAVE IN HUNGARY, no entry fee, but $55 to get submission sent back! (only send vhs ?" video) Jan. 20 deadline. Go to www.mediawave.com for details. BAD FESTIVALSHAS A FESTIVAL RIPPED YOU OFF? A member recently informed us a festival wanted to screen a work on short notice. She reluctantly agreed to sent them her only Beta SP copy, the format they screen. She e-mailed me, "I was given explicit understanding that it would be returned immediately after the screening. Two months have passed, and they still haven't returned it, in spite of my frequent calls and emails. Thanks to them, I have to make a new master. I regret ever having responded to her, and I have no idea why she is doing this." The animator was about to make a new Beta SP master when I was told about the problem. I sent 2 or 3 e-mails to the festival letting them know I was going to write about the artists' problem. About 36 hours before the master was to be made the animator was contacted and told the missing tape was being returned. A messenger delivered it the next day. If you had a rotten experience in the past or are messed with by dubious festivals in the future, let ASIFA-SF know. We can try to resolve the new situation. If they don't resolve the problem, we can at least warn others about them. We can also tell our members about those who have created problems in the past. Our newsletter is read by a lot of people and festivals can not afford bad press. ASIFA is here to help you. KC AN INTERVIEW WITH PETE DOCTER, DIRECTOR OF "MONSTERS, INC."by Karl Cohen Monsters, Inc.from Pixar/Disney is the first feature directed by Pete Docter. When I was invited to interview him I thought he might talk about new technology and artistic advances in the film. When we spoke it became clear that the important story he wanted to share with us was how the studio shepherded him through the process of developing and directing his first animated feature. They brought together people with different talents who could work together as a team. The film was created through sharing and cooperation rather than by having a strong dictatorial director. Although Docter is given credit for creating the original idea for Monsters, Inc., one of the first things he said was, "It is misleading to say the film was my idea because there are so many other people involved. It was a group effort. " At first he developed ideas with story artist Jeff Pidgeon and production designer Harley Jessup. Andrew Stanton (Oscar nomination for Toy Story) wrote the first script and he became the film's executive producer. As they developed their ideas they would take them to John Lasseter (director of Toy Story, 1995; A Bugs Life, 1998 and Toy Story 2, 1999) who would advise them on how to make the script stronger. Docter said, "John is so amazing, his input was invaluable throughout the whole process. He's already done 3 films and he has a great mind... he has a terrific grasp about how an audience views a film." Co-director Lee Unkrich said "One of the great things about working at Pixar is that you can assemble a great talent pool and just be a bunch of guys hashing this stuff out. John (Lasseter) is as quick to get in the trenches with us as anybody. In the end everybody contributes and they don't keep tabs of what each person contributed as the end product is what counts. It is Pete's film and John was there to guide him as he hadn't directed a film before. Pete is an amazing animator, but since this was his first feature John was there to help." As the script progressed more people became involved, but the story development process remained essentially the same for five years. Docter said, "We would take it to a point where we were comfortable with it and we would pitch it to those guys and they would punch holes in it in a friendly way. We'd make it stronger and then when we were all comfortable with it, we would take it down to Disney and present it to Tom Schumacher (president of Walt Disney Feature Animation) and Peter Schnider and they would knock holes in it. We would go back and fix it again and the whole process repeats and repeats for 5 years, and now we are done. You build up thick skin as you tend to take it fairly personally. Nobody means it personally as you're talking about the film, but you really invest a lot of yourself in the film. Its a tough process." Lee Unkrich said that one of the great things about their relationship with Disney (Disney and Pixar have a 50% partnership) is Disney didn't work on the project on a daily basis so when they were consulted they offered fresh criticism. "We sometimes are too close to our material and we can't see some of the problems. Tom Schumacher is very good at stepping in and giving very good broad stroke notes about things that are and are not working. Another great thing about Disney is that they never tell us how to solve a problem. They just point things out and have trusted us to come up with creative solutions." The biggest challenge throughout the production was the story according to Docter. "I think that will always be the case. At Pixar we place a great deal of emphasis on story and the characters. You can have some really stunning imagery and technical innovation, but after about 5 minutes the audience is bored and they want something more interesting - story. You're asking people to commit an hour and a half of their life and it better be something worthwhile." Docter oversaw every facet of the production. One area he found "rather exciting and somewhat nerve racking" was voice recording sessions. He had gone to a couple of recording sessions on Toy Story, to observe Lasseter working with actors. "What I learned is that my job is to set up as much of the situation as I can, give them all the information that they need and then stand back and watch them go." There is a lot of improvisation on Pixar soundtracks. Also, a lot of script changes. One week Docter would tell John Goodman "so Sullivan is a janitor now" and the next month "now he's the best scarer on the floor." He said Goodman "was very patient with us. He rolls with the punches." He was delighted to work with Bill Crystal whom he describes as an amazing actor, very clever and really funny on and off screen. "He is like having a team of writers along." He was glad Crystal was recorded in a soundproof studio as Docter would have ruined a lot of takes with his laughter had he not been in a control room. Crystal was the voice of Mike, Sulley's best friend. Mike is a little one-eyed round green monster. It is common in the industry to make videotapes of the recording sessions so animators can study how voice actors move when they say their lines. Animators didn't use as much of this type of reference material on Monsters, Inc. as the film's characters are so unusual. The one person they did watch a lot was Marry Gibbs, the girl who did the voice of Boo, the little girl who enters the world of the monsters. She is the only human in the film. Boo was the character they were most concerned with as her success on the screen depended on how well they captured the movements of a real three-year old child. Boo is not a photo realistic child. Docter says she is an abstracted human like Al in Toy Story 2 or Geri in Geri's Game (1998 Oscar winner, by Jan Pinkava, Pixar). She was designed to fit into the world created for this film. Docter didn't want her to stand out from the other characters. Docter is a fan of the strong modern looking 2D animation of the 1950's. He is glad that the title sequence and end credits are a nod to that look. It was designed by Geefwee Boedoe (his nickname as he couldn't pronounce his real name when he was very young) and it recalls the work of Saul Bass. Work at Pixar often began about 8 in the morning for Docter and he usually went home around 8 or 9 at night. He usually had his weekends free as the producers at Pixar "are getting better and better about that so people don't kill themselves." He is looking forward to a vacation before going back to begin development of his ideas for future features. As he looks back over his 5 years of work on the film he says, "I wouldn't say this film went very smoothly, but in the end I'm very pleasedj with what we have." COMING NEXT ISSUE: MORE ON THE MAKING OF "MONSTERS, INC." |
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This issue was written by Karl Cohen, Tsvika Oren and Deanna Morse. Pete Davis proofread and Laura Tulloss assisted with the production. Mailing crew included Shirley Smith, Tara Packard, Nancy Phelps and Ron Seawright. |
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