Fresh from the Festivals: April 2000's Film Reviews

Fresh from the Festivals: April 2000's Film Reviews
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Second Place: Hollow
Although Hollow runs just over a minute in length, of all the award winners, this short is the most adept in its storytelling. Director Jason Shulman, who majored in computer animation at Ringling School of Art, says he does not consider himself to be a ‘writer,’ but found a sure way to perfect the storyline: he kept trying new endings until he found one that people thought was clear. Clearly, audience testing works at every level! Shulman’s film tells the tale of a pumpkin-headed being who creates another in her image -- but only at the end of the work do we understand why. He says he created the work mainly with the hope of getting a good grade and never thought that it would garner the kind of attention it has. Undoubtedly, the short length of the work, succinct storytelling and well-executed visuals have contributed to its success. In this experience there are good lessons for students everywhere: first, that a story need not be long or narratively complicated to demonstrate your skill, and second, that every project should be viewed as an opportunity to enhance your reel.

Throughout most of the film, visuals are not elaborate in terms of its background, though care is given to character design, color and lighting. Shulman also shows an awareness of cinematic principals of editing and timing. He says he was influenced by a broad array of filmmakers, including Tim Burton and Orson Welles. Hollow took one and a half years to complete, using Photoshop as well as Alias Power Animator 8.5. Shulman now works for Foundation Imaging in Valencia, California.

Third Place: Rip Dash, Galactic Hero
Because I am a professor at Chapman University, where Hugh Elesh, director of Rip Dash, Galactic Hero, earned his degree, I feel I know this 9-minute work and its creator fairly well. This animated production, which served as his graduation film, tells the story of two inept space patrollers who muddle their way through their pursuit of a tagger (that is, someone who spraypaints his name on things). Although the film has a fairly strong script, it is hampered somewhat by slow timing in its action and its audio recording, which lacks dimension in comparison with the elaborate visuals.

The animation for this work was done using Lightwave 5.6, while Discreet's Edit system was used for editing and SawPlus 32 for sound. Elesh worked with character and set designer Josh Judd for about two and a half months, creating these components with a group of other modelers. Elesh then spent another five months doing the animation itself, usually working eight hours a day (or should I say ‘a night’), seven days a week. A film production major at Chapman, Elesh now works as an animator at Netter Digital, where he has contributed to the series "Max Steel" and "Dan Dare, Pilot of the Future." Eventually, he hopes to create special effects for live-action films.

Maureen Furniss, Ph.D., is Assistant Professor and Program Director of Film Studies at Chapman University in Orange, California. She is the founding editor of Animation Journal and the author of Art in Motion: Animation Aesthetics (John Libbey, 1998).