Bruce Bickford doing Q & A

The 17th edition of the International Trickfilm Festival of Animated Film, May 4 through 9 in Stuttgart, Germany was definitely bigger and better than ever.  The only problem I had was that there was so much to see and do that I had to make some difficult choices.

In addition to the five short film competition screenings there were four Tricks For Kids programs, four Young Animation presentations, four Panorama screenings, feature films, and a bevy of guests.

A rare appearance by the legendary Bruce Bickford was a special treat.  Bruce, an animation veteran of 40 years, introduced two of his films, the 45 minute Cas’l and Prometheus’ Garden.  He also answered numerous questions from the sold out audience.  In a separate program Monster Road, Brett Ingram’s 2004 film about the life and work of Bickford gave an intimate glimpse into the life and work of the self taught Claymation master who spent 6½ years working with Frank Zappa to create such films as Baby Snakes and Dub Room Special.

Catch all the razzle dazzle from FMX!

AWNtv has posted sneak peeks of the interviews and attractions of day one through four of FMX 2010. Hear words of wisdom and impressions of the event from industry superstars like Marc Weigert, Volker Engel, Tim Sarnoff, Bruno Velazquez, David Schaub, Bruce W. Smith, Hendrickson, John Bruno, Stuart Sumida, Ben Grossman, David Sproxton, Mohen Leo, Victoria Alonso and Ed Hooks.

View them all at the FMX Channel on AWNtv!

FMX opens at the Haus der Wirtschaft Center of Commerce.

Here we go again! It's May again, so time to travel to Stuttgart, Germany to meet, to listen, to open the eyes and the minds, to feel the sense of wonder, the pulse of the future and to be amazed by the achievements of the many professionals, as well as those of the bold young students, who present their work. For the 15^th time the Conference on Animation, Effects, Games & Interactive Media starts today and — business as usual — this year's program let your mouth drool, if you are a big fan of those wondrous worlds.

Fifteen editions ago, in 1994, the small and tiny “Film and Medienbörse Stuttgart” was held for the very first time – Prof. Thomas Haegele and his team decided to translate the German term into English and the “Film and Media eXchange” in short FMX was born.

Autodesk University is primarily a training conference.  There are over 500 classes that fill four floors of the convention center for almost a week.  Seeing the list of classes demonstrates just how broad and deep Autodesk’s design software reaches.  Everyone from architects to product designers to engineers to animators had something to attend.  In addition to classes, Autodesk used the show as a way to introduce products and reveal future directions for the company.

James Cameron's Avatar

Tuesday night proved to be a big highlight of Autodesk University.  The Media and Entertainment keynote featured the first public screening of footage from James Cameron’s highly anticipated 3D feature “Avatar.”  

Simply put, “Avatar” was as stunning as it was rumored.  The 3D works incredibly well, but what impressed this animator more was the level of realism in the virtual characters.  The facial animation/capture was impeccable, the faces no longer looked like rubber masks as they have in so many movies that use facial capture.  In Avatar, the characters truly came to life and were believable in every way.  The audience identified with the characters and that made the story work on a much deeper lever.  The characters inhabited a world that was just as believable.  Much of it was lush jungle with fantastic creatures.  Some of the little details I noticed were highly realistic water, mud, and other subtle effects that helped to make the world that much more engaging.

Autodesk is taking over Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas for the week to stage Autodesk University.  The event is mostly dedicated to training Autodesk’s customers in their wide array of products, particularly people interested in AutoCAD, Revit, and Inventor.  In addition, there’s a trade show as well as keynote addresses and other special events that makes this more like a yearly Autodesk conference than just a week of training. 

Over 5500 people found their way to Las Vegas this week for over 500 classes.  An additional 20,000 will attend virtually.  People started arriving on Monday for various related events, such as the developers conference, but the main conference started on Tuesday with the main keynote.  Being Las Vegas, the keynote started with none other than Elvis Presley (or a reasonable facsimile) singing the disclaimers to the tune of “Glory Glory Hallelujah.”  After that, Autodesk CEO Carl Bass took the stage and talked a bit about Autodesk’s future direction.  A lot of this centered on the idea of the computing cloud, centralized high powered banks of servers controlled by remote workstations.  Users would interface to this computing power by Autodesk software running not only on high-end workstations, but also net-enabled devices such as netbooks and iPhones.

Grand Prize winners Pritt and Olga Parn

The grand prize went to "Life Without Gabriella Ferri" by Pritt and Olga Parn. This is a complex, sensual, poetic film. "Wallace & Gromit: A Matter Of Loaf And Death" by Nick Park took the special jury prize. Even though they are masters of the art, these filmmakers were pleased and genuinely touched by the recognition. (For the rest of the award winners see I Castelli Animati's website.)

So what about the films?

... after all this is a film festival.

First of all I want to say that it's really hard to make an excellent film.

I'm just completing my fifth film, and believe me it's very easy to fall in love with your work, not so easy to see it with some objectivity.

All the films that made it into competition are here for a reason - there is something about them that is excellent. It could be the story, or the animation, or a unique voice and style, perhaps it's the way the story and music interplay, it could be an unusual technique, or a particularly superb sense of timing.

So what is it about I Castelli Animati that makes it one of the most loved animation festivals in the world?

The answer is simple... and evident from the first moments of arrival. It's the people.

Luca Raffaelli, the artistic director, is a warm, intelligent man who is captivated by animation. The author of two books on the subject, his delight in cartoons and animation shapes the overall feel of this festival.

Emanuela Marrocco is the operations director. Thanks to her and her hardworking team of Liz Fairs, Sabrina Perucca, Maurizio Quattrini, and Vincenzo Silvestri, the festival runs smoothly.

I Castelli Animati takes place about an hours drive from Rome, in the large and bustling ancient Roman town of Genzano on Lake Nemi. Narrow cobbled streets, ancient stucco buildings with red tile roofs, black iron gates, shuttered windows... in other words the original Mediterannean (sic?) style. This area has been a busy center since before the birth of Jesus.

But there is a vibrant modern overlay to the town... banks, schools, chic shopping, all housed in ancient buildings but the goods and services as current as the cutting edge. (Well, almost ... the hotel has no wireless internet support for Apple computers.)