Before “The Head,” “Celebrity Deathmatch” or “Glenn Martin, DDS” I had no idea I would grow up to become a working animator.  But I knew animation was something I had to try.  Growing up, I was a latch key kid, often coming home to an empty house after school.  My babysitters’ names were Popeye, Tom, Jerry, Bugs and Daffy. I was literally raised on those old school cartoons with their over the top slapstick violence and impeccable timing.   They would leave an indelible mark on me.

Have you ever wondered what it’s like to speak to the dead? Norman Babcock, a misunderstood child with spiky hair and the strange gift to speak to ghosts, is constantly teased, bullied, and shunned by the people of his town. One bully named Alvin in particular, constantly calls him a freak. Only Neil Downe, a kid teased about his obesity, can understand Norman. Norman’s father, Perry, thinks that there is something wrong with Norman when he tells him that the spirit of Norman’s grandma lives in their house. But Norman realizes that something seems eerie after his uncle, Mr. Prenderghast, suddenly dies. His uncle’s ghost reveals to him about a centuries-old witch’s curse that raises the dead to attack the townsfolk. Norman is the only person with the power to end the witch’s curse, but will he have the intellect and the courage to save the town?

I really enjoyed this film, and can relate to Norman because I have been bullied before, like most people, for being different. The film is very emotional and about proving one’s inner power. I am really impressed by how the animators created the film out of stop motion! I marveled at the intricate metal skeleton design of the assembly for the puppets used for the making of the film.

By Tim Kridel

By next year, annual sales of smartphones that support HTML5 should hit 1 billion worldwide, says the research firm Strategy Analytics. Even today, there’s a healthy installed base of HTML5 phones: at least 336 million, based on 2011 sales.

That market momentum is one reason why HTML5 skills are increasingly important. We recently spoke with Mike Richmond, a technologist in Intel’s Open Source Technology Center who focuses on HTML5, about what to keep in mind when working with the language. [Disclosure: Intel is the sponsor of this content.]

Why should mobile app developers begin mastering HTML5 if they aren’t already proficient? Does HTML5 enable them to develop app features that they otherwise couldn’t, or target certain segments such as browser-based Web apps?

Mike Richmond: Applications developed in HTML5 are easier to move between target environments. And because HTML5 and CSS are so visual, it can be much easier to do user interfaces that are scalable between platforms rather than doing the same UI in native code. Web apps can also be delivered outside of an application store.

“Build it and they will come” seemingly reflects the mantra of many Asian cities and countries that feel by merely building a large infrastructure designed to house animation production, it will attract both foreign investment and foreign projects designated for the international marketplace which will, in turn, allow such city to become an “international animation destination hub.”  But who will use such facilities and how are governments going about the business of recruiting and bringing in new projects?

 

 

 

Theme is the most important element of any screenplay. It aligns and focuses the plot, subplots, characters and dialogue. It is the Rosetta stone which allows you to translate that great concept you have into a great screenplay. But that’s not all it does...

By Tim Kridel

One step forward, two steps back. That’s how Don Norman describes today’s gesture-based user interfaces (UIs) for smartphones, tablets and a growing assortment of other devices.

Named one of the world’s 27 most influential designers by Business Week, Norman laments the lack of standards, which have created a world where a finger-swipe on one device often doesn’t have the same effect on another. That inconsistency often makes using gesture-based UIs as much fun as folding a fitted sheet. Norman spoke to me about this and more from South Korea, where he was a distinguished visiting professor in the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology’s Department of Industrial Design.

A somewhat sad but true fact is that nepotism does rain rampant in the world of make believe and it’s better to know what you are up against when you apply for your next job or internship.  It’s not enough to have the right skill set but it’s even more important to have the right connections.  Finding a job is not as easy as it looks and you would think with the advances of technology, it might have gotten easier.  Not so.  The tried and true, “good old fashioned way” still holds court and finding your next gig is really about being “All In The Family.”

 

By Tim Kridel

FourBros Studio created a buzz back in April when it blogged about its success with Windows Phone 7. Part of what made the post so interesting was the amount of metrics -- such as ad impressions and revenue -- that FourBros provided to illustrate their accomplishment. I recently spoke with Nathan Furtwangler, FourBros Studio member and developer, about what other developers can learn from their team and how their strategies might be applied to Windows Phone 8.

 

Convincing an MTV exec to greenlight a couple of Celebrity Deathmatch shorts seemed like a herculean task.  Turns out that would become the first of many battles to get “Celebrity Deathmatch: The Series” on the air.

It was the Fall of 1997 and we were hard at work on the third of three Deathmatch shorts – Howard stern Vs. Kathy Lee Gifford.  By “we” I’m talking about myself and one other animator, Greg Pair, handling the all of the stop motion duties.  We worked out of 1633 Broadway, home of MTV Animation and puppets were being fabricated up the street by Karl Paolino Studios.   To say that the puppets were of an inferior quality would be an understatement.  They were fabricated using cheap foam latex that was filled with air bubbles and wire armatures that broke constantly.  In addition, the puppets had unusually long “gorilla” arms that were off model and looked nothing short of ridiculous.  But we made do with what we had, happy to finally bring our “clay boxing show” to life and often working late into the night to make our deadlines. 

 

Learning animation on your own is very doable. This third of the four part series on the tools of the trade looks at vector based softwares for animation.