A five day Animation, Comics, and Technology Exhibition held in conjunction with the 7th Xiamen International Cyber Sousa Animation Festival, August 15 - 19.
I was invited to Xiamen, China to participate in the two day Animation Pulpit and spend time at the five day Animation, Comics, and Technology Exhibition which were held in conjunction with the 7th Xiamen International Cyber Sousa Animation Festival. Professionals from around the world were brought together to lecture on “The Development of the Animation and Game Industry” with an emphasis on new media applications at the Animation Pulpit.
Unfortunately the simultaneous translation was not working for the first session when most of the half hour presentations were in Chinese. I did learn a great deal from Michael Coldeway, executive producer and co-founder of Trixter. The company specializes in visual effects and digital character animation for feature films, television, and commercials. With offices in Munich and Berlin as well as Los Angeles, Trixter is credited with work on such international projects as Iron Man 3, The Avengers, Captain America, X-Men: First Class, and Journey 2. The company received a 2014 Academy Award nomination for visual effects that they created for Iron Man 3. Michael’s talk was titled “A German’s Animation Trip: From Being a Traditional Animator to Making Iron Man”.
I am a big fan of Manga Comics but I wasn’t familiar with Tomotune until I listened to Ken Tsumura’s presentation. Tomotune (tomo stands for tomorrow and tune represents cartoons was developed by Next Media to fuse Manga Comics and 3D Animation so that without turning comic book pages the story continues through 3D animation with the original Manga comic frames. The content is published across multiple media formats daily. Ken took his audience through the layout, dialogue, and artwork process that Next Media uses to transform Manga comics into 3D animation.
Before joining the animation branch of Next Media in Taiwan, Ken worked as a producer on The Simpsons as well as at Dreamworks and Disney. He was also executive producer of the popular Astro Boy movie.
The festival and conference in Xiamen is co-organized by ASIFA China and the city of Xiamen, so besides myself, two other ASIFA International Board Members were invited. Anastasia Dimitra of ASIFA Greece and Ricardo Arce Lopez from ASIFA Columbia spoke on the second day of the conference. Anastasia is an animation professor at the University of Agean as well as a producer, animator, and author of books about teaching animation to children. She spoke about the Animation Work Group (AWG) which she heads. The workshop is affiliated with ASIFA and is composed of artists and teachers who believe that animation can help children to express their creativity and tell their own stories. Each year the group produces an animated film created by children from around the world based on a common theme. Anastasia screened short films created by the different AWG workshops and talked about the work that the group does worldwide.
Ricardo Arce Lopez is a professor at the University of Bogota where he co-ordinates animation, graphic design, and technology for multi-media. He talked about cross media animation content in South America. As a Vice-President of ASIFA International he also explained the importance of the ASIFA Prize which has been awarded annually since 1985 to an individual or organization for outstanding achievement in the art of animation. The list of winners covers all areas of animation from film makers to animation historians. A list of award winners can be found on the ASIFA International Website: asifa.net
Colombia has a tradition of animation and has grown in importance since the 1970’s. Ricardo gave me a copy of Cuadernos de Cine Colombiano (Notes on Colombian Cinema) an excellent book that he and twelve other Colombian professors, animators and film makers contributed articles to. The book gives a very in depth look at all facets of Colombian animation beginning with a history of 20th century animation in the country to PG 13 rated films. It includes a comprehensive list of all animation produced in the country from 1990 to 2013. Each listing contains the name of the director, the length, a synopsis of the film, and a listing of all of the festivals where the film was screened. The book concludes with short biographies of the contributors and an excellent bibliography for further exploration of the subject. Unfortunately the book is only in Spanish and even though it has been very popular in Latin and South America the publisher is not interested in printing an English language edition although the authors are anxious to do it. You can download a pdf copy of Cuadernos de Cine Colombiano at:
Ricardo told me that there are several animation festivals in Colombia. The primary two are LOOP in Bogota which is for video games and animation. The last festival was in 2009 but it returned this year and will hopefully remain a mainstay of Columbian animation festivals. You can find information about it at: http://www.loop.la
The other major festival is La Truca which translates as “animation stand” or “rostrum camera”. La Truca is held in Cali, a city with a large film history. Animation production is relatively new to the city but is becoming increasingly popular. Their web site is: http://www.latrucafestival.com
Thepresentation by Xiaoan Zhang was most entertaining and humorous. During the several years that he and his family lived in Connecticut, where he was chief of the United States office of TIC Integrated Marketing Services, he became an acute observer of American culture. His conference topic “Animation Cultural Enlightenment in American Preschool Education” was a very funny take on American culture as seen through Chinese eyes. I’m not sure if it was as funny to everyone else as it was to me but having lived in America for most of my life I found Xiaoan Zhang’s observations to be very accurate.
The Animation Pulpit was organized by Johnchill Lee who is a well-know animation educator and Secretary General of ASIFA China. Johnchill is a leading expert in the field of technology for media and is often invited to lecture on the subject worldwide. It is thanks to his knowledge and expertise that the Animated Pulpit was able to bring such a diverse and knowledgeable group of speakers together.
The primary part of the festival is the Animation, Comics, Game and Technology Exhibition, which completely fills the massive International Conference and Exhibition Center. As I entered the largest of the four halls from the outside I was met with a wall of sound from the 250 exhibitors selling everything from DVD’s to Cosplay accessories.
Cosplay (costume play) originated in Japan and is very popular in China. One entire hall was devoted entirely to Cosplay all day every day of the exhibition, where a vast array of performers of all ages dressed as their favorite manga, comic book and video game characters took to the stage in groups to pose, fight, or recreate a scene. One group that I saw perform was made up of children no older than ten years old with a five year old girl in full costume who stole the show. The Cosplay Award ceremony was held on the last day of the exhibition on the Cosplay stage.
The exhibition hosted numerous meetings for specialized groups such as the Comic Boutique Conference organized by China Mobil, the three and a half hour Fujian Animation and Game Industry Talent Training Seminar, and the Asia-Chinese Animation Summit with a panel comprised of well-known cartoonists from Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Macao, and Taiwan. There were autograph sessions with famous cartoonists and competitions and classes in all areas of the animation industry. This year the first Cyber Sousa Summer Camp was held, where children could work with professionals to learn about animation techniques and make a short film much like the Animation Work Group Project. There was an awards ceremony on the main stage to honor their achievements.
China is the one place I go to an animation festival and see little or no animation. I was given a very thick catalogue of films that were in competition. There were pictures of twelve people who were on the Primary Evaluation Committee which I assume is a pre-selection committee and another twelve members of the Final Evaluation Committee so I assume some people somewhere see the films but I saw no animation.
The ceremony for the presentation of the Cyber Sousa Awards was extremely elaborate with acrobats, singers, dancers, and traditional Chinese artists performing between the ten award presentations. There were also numerous dignitaries present. I was told that the ceremony was being broadcast throughout China. This year the festival received over 3,000 submissions with 240 films selected for the final selection committee to view. One film in each category was chosen to receive the Gold Prize in each of the ten categories with two runner ups to receive the Silver Prize. The three winners received a trophy, a certificate of honor, and a cash award. This year the combined cash prizes totalled 2.94 million yuan (approximately $481,656.00 US dollars).
Short clips from the three nominated films in each category were shown. From what little I got to see from the awards ceremony clips, the quality of the work has improved a great deal, but I wish that I could have seen the films in their entirety. I was asked to present the trophies for the Best Short Animated Film – International Category.
I saw many positive improvements at the festival this year, such as simultaneous translation at the closing ceremony and excellent organization of the Animation Pulpit Forum, but my big complaint with the festival is that when the winners of the foreign categories are announced the “stand-ins” on stage act as if they were the real winners of the awards waving to the audience and holding up “their” trophy proudly when the announcer says the real winners names. At least this year non-Asian people living in Xiamen were recruited to accept the foreign awards. I realize that the festival can’t invite all of the winners to be present but the Cyber Sousa Festival web site states that some winners will be invited but they must pay their own travel expenses. So far I have only seen one actual winner present and she was from somewhere relatively near, such as Beijing.
I have no problem with someone accepting an award for someone else as long it is announced that they are accepting it for the real winner. Since Xiamen now has an ASIFA chapter and the festival is co-sponsored by ASIFA China it is imperative that the festival follow ASIFA regulations. Ethical treatment of animators and their work is one of ASIFA’s most important principals. I hope that the 2015 edition of the festival will simply add “accepting in the name of “when the animator is not present.
Xiamen is the loveliest city I have visited in China. The vegetation is tropical. Bougainvillea is the city flower, and the fragrant plumaria, which is my favorite flower, grow throughout the city. There is relatively little pollution, and no cars have ever been allowed on the beautiful Gulangyu Island which lays a short ferry ride off the mainland.
This year I was lucky enough to have a lovely translator named Claire. She not only speaks excellent English but she is well read and has a fantastic sense of humor. I appreciate her translating for me and really enjoyed her company when we weren’t at official functions.
One day a group of five of the foreign guests and our translators took the ferry to historic Gulangyn Island. Although it only covers twenty thousand square meters, the island abounds in natural beauty and has a swimming beach. There is also a piano museum, the Arts and Crafts College of Fuzhow University and a traditional Chinese puppet theatre. The top of the high hill offers an excellent view of the island and the mainland and an observatory is located there. There is also an aviary with more than 1,000 birds from over 100 different countries.
The island’s history is as colourful as its vegetation. In 1843 the first foreign consulate office in Xiamen history was built on Gulangyn. It subsequently became a “colonial nation” where fifteen countries built consulates. Although the consulates are no longer there, the magnificent colonial style buildings are still standing and reflect the variety of cultures that once populated the island.
The island has numerous restaurants, some of which feature tradition local dishes and fresh fish. Our interpreters selected a small restaurant for lunch that had tubs of swimming fish on the porch. They ordered a wonderful array of local dishes and, accompanied with cold local beer, it was a fantastic feast after a long walk around the island on a very hot day.
On another day we took a walk around the lake in the city center and visited a five story book store with a floor devoted to Chinese art and another to CD’s and DVD’s. Another floor was crammed full of English language books with an entire area of classics from Homer and Ovid, Shakespeare, Dickens and Jane Austin to modern classics such as Hemingway and F. Scott Fitzgerald. It was a book lover’s paradise and I had a terrible time selecting one book but my luggage was already so heavy that I didn’t dare buy more.
I can’t thank Johnchill and the festival organizing committee enough for inviting me. As always the hospitality was wonderful. I also owe a big thank you to Yuehua Piao, or Lunar as she asked us to call her, for handling my travel arrangement and the schedule for my visit. I am very grateful to Claire for her hard work translating for me and her infinite patience answering my endless questions but most of all for her sense of humor. I hope I will be invited back to Xiamen for the Cyber Sousa Animation Festival so that I can watch the continued success and improvements of the festival.
After I left Xiamen my adventures continued when my return home was delayed. I was scheduled to fly from Xiamen to Hong Kong where I would catch a flight to Istanbul and then to Belgium, but it wasn’t to be. My flight from Xiamen was delayed due to bad weather. I finally arrived in Hong Kong just in time to watch my flight to Istanbul taking off. I was informed that the flight from Hong Kong on Turkish Airlines was only every other day, so I had two days and nights to spend in Hong Kong. There are certainly worse fates than two days in Hong Kong. The airline put me up in a lovely apartment hotel with a balcony overlooking the harbour and I visited the fabulous Hong Kong Night Market which is an amazing delight to the eyes and nose and the perfect place to eat delicious food. I certainly couldn’t complain about two days in Hong Kong, but after three weeks away it was nice to be in Gent and have some time at home before my next trip to Russia for KROK.
If you want more information about the Xiamen Cyber Sousa Animation Festival visit their web site:
