Animateducated Blogcast 002

Animated Educated is a great channel. It gives animation students and fans access to great experience, and the backgrounds and insights of very talented guests. I've been lucky to work with Jim Richardson back during my time at Woodbury University's animation department.https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPETaABtv6Un8YMQ4d0Y57w

Innovations in Animation - Part 1 - "Twice upon a Time"

With 2020 coming to a close, and to deal with the stress of being shut in, I've started on my list of the most innovative animated films through time.  I'm tired of the year end "top ten" countdowns, so this list will be in no particular order, and having no ranking as far as popularity, but as landmarks that influenced the animation business in regard to new techniques and execution. 

The problems of 2020 will carry over well into 2021, and probably longer, so I want to focus on the achievements of the past, and discuss how technology, business, and the Covid pandemic will shape animation as time goes on. The game has certainly changed with Disney+, Hulu, and Amazon streaming entertainment over the internet.

(copyright Warner Archives)

 My first pick is John Korty's quirky but subtle "Twice upon a Time". I finally broke down, and bought the DVD after watching the film for years on a bleary, old VHS tape.

Where executive producer George Lucas stumbled on the "Howard the Duck" and "Willow" features, Twice upon a Time is definitely a unique film. Directed by Korty in a painstakingly difficult backlit, cut-out style called Lumage, I can see why Twice Upon A Time had trouble finding an audience. Even though it's not a blu-ray, the DVD is a cut above my old VHS copy. Korty was assisted by Charles Swenson and stop motion genius, Henry Selick. (Coraline, Nightmare Before Christmas, James and the Giant Peach).

Twice upon a Time is a fun, underdog story of misfits becoming heroes with Ralph, the shape-changing "All Purpose Animal" and his friend Mumford, a flighty, distractable mime. Lorenzo Music, voice of Garfield the Cat, stars as Ralph, while Mumford is "voiced" only by some original, interesting sound effects. Twice Upon A Time is also chock full of some eye opening visual designs that became obscured on my old tape over time, some of which are not suited for younger children. 

The film had trouble finding its niche. College age test audiences were put off by the cute, frilly layouts of the good guys' world, "Frivoli", where sweet dreams are created for regular human beings rushing about in a black and white world called Din. The villain, "Synonamess Botch", lives in a dark, twisted Hollywood-type dimension called "The Murkworks" where nightmares are created from the screams of Botch's victims. 

The background artists make the villain's world much more engaging with backlit art and some diabolical collages from photographs both mundane and suggestive. The heroes are tricked into helping Botch take control of the Cosmic Clock, by which the villain hopes to control time itself, and subject the "Rushers of Din" to endless, eternal nightmares. Ralph and Mumford get "help" from some whimsical comrades they meet along the way, including a cynical, smart-mouthed Fairy Godmother ("FGM") who guides the heroes with her version of "tough love".

The commentary with Director John Korty and company is a nice recounting of their battle to create this unusual film, and their stories behind the subtle technical achievements they devised to pull off some remarkable effects. Korty and his team used original cut-out art, black and white photography, and water tank effects to create a surreal world where we normal humans are oblivious to the magic going on all around us.

The choice of audio tracks is also a nice feature, although I still prefer John Korty's original witty dialogue over the cruder, profane tracks that were snuck in the last minute. Overall, Twice Upon A Time is nice little gem for animation fans seeking something besides the usual Disney/Pixar releases.  

Twice upon a Time, definitely worth checking out!

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0086489/fullcredits?ref_=tt_cl_sm#cast

Bernie Sanders Favors Unionization of the Video Game Industry

 Courtesy of Digital Village on KPFK and Gamerant.com

https://gamerant.com/bernie-sanders-video-games-unionize/?fbclid=IwAR2Om5y5D8zpZVmLHc25VKNvO6k-GL8NwZUbUWhVVIZmH3dVorLJfp0pgLM

https://www.ign.com/articles/2019/06/19/bernie-sanders-calls-for-video-game-industry-unionization

 

SIGGRAPH 2019 Keynote Speaker Victoria Alonso from Marvel Studios

First rumblings of Siggraph, which will be in L.A. this summer.

Being a comic book geek, I'm kind of anxious to hear one of the keynote speakers, Victoria Alonso, Executive Vice President of Production for Marvel Studios.

 

(photo copyright Siggraph)

From her bio in the first link below, Alonso started at Digital Domain, then joined Marvel as Executive Vice President of Visual Effects. She has won awards from the Visual Effects Society (VES), and the Harold Lloyd Award from the Advanced Imaging Society.

No info yet on the time or date of her talk.

The main dates for Siggraph I've found are from Sun, Jul 28, 2019 to Thu, Aug 1, 2019.

Will try to update more asap.
 

UPDATE: Victoria Alonso is scheduled to speak Monday, July 29, 2:00 - 3:15 PM.

Special thanks to Ginger Alford for the info!

https://s2019.siggraph.org/conference/programs-events/keynote-session/?fbclid=IwAR3z1lhDp0cOmGdTezMNUmKfVlfRqOzE9lLN3cfAXMUTWN7nXh3ZVEEQJC0

https://s2019.siggraph.org/ 

https://blog.siggraph.org/

T-Mobile and Sprint merger

Well, I only just found out about the T-Mobile and Sprint merger at a St. Patrick's Day party.
Another merger, and I feel like we're being boxed in, and losing our choices.
And it's more dough for a privileged few.
No mention on the usual news sources.

https://www.cnet.com/news/t-mobile-and-sprint-are-merging-heres-everything-you-need-to-know/

https://www.theverge.com/2019/2/14/18223819/t-mobile-sprint-merger-regulators-congress-hearing

https://www.wired.com/story/t-mobile-sprint-merger-is-scrambling-telecom-politics/

https://consumerist.com/2014/02/12/why-sprints-case-for-t-mobile-merger-is-logical-but-bad-for-consumers/

The Little Bummer Droid

Just getting a quick sketch down.

The Holiday rush has begun, at least for me.

My concern is "Digital Dickensian-ism":

We are at a point where not having the latest phone or gadget not only means a loss of status, but a threat to health and safety as well. If a cell tower goes down, can the public still get vital information on wildfires or hurricanes threatening their town? There's still battery powered radios, but who really keeps one? My upbringing has helped me try to tread as lightly on the Earth as I can. (And I still hang to a lot of old tech to pinch a penny.) But it is tech that media manufacturers and telecom companies don't want to deal with anymore. My point is that we should be able live with whatever level of technology we want, and actually need. I'm still impressed by the Amish back East!

I hope the world can heal, and get past its rage and madness in 2019.

Best,

Ken R.

The First Cintiq

(The first Cintiq from 2001?)
 
An issue came up where no one could recall exactly when the first Cintiq appeared on the scene. After some digging, this PC Magazine article from January 15, 2002 sings the praises of the new device as a practical drawing tablet where the artist actually can see their art directly on the tablet.

https://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,1172347,00.asp

 So I'm assuming this 15 inch unit with 512 levels of sensitivity came out in 2001. It's more of a trivial pursuit, but if anyone has an earlier sighting of a video drawing tablet, please let me know here. Technology changes so fast, and in my job I need to keep track of this.

Here's Wacom's new Cintiq 21from February 18, 2005.

 https://newatlas.com/go/3716/


https://wacom.com/en-us 

The Mobile Studio Pro is pretty awesome! 

CGI Dreamworks Animation Studio Pipeline

Hello group, 2018 has been off to a rough start for me, and I'm behind as far as re-purposing this blog for education, and updates on animation technology in general. DreamWorks has been kind enough to put together a presentation on the CG pipeline for us. Enjoy!

CTN Expo 2016 photos

A few snapshots of CTN Expo 2016 photos...

 

Woodbury University...

with its media heavy presence...

Me old Alma Mater, Edinboro University of Pennsylvania.Go Fighting Scots!  Good to see Mike Penz again.

The Animation Guild, my other bread and butter! Should be everyone's.

The stars from Moana... (copyright Disney)

And Woodbury's neighbor across the way, Disney. (copyright Disney)

 

The new tent was HUGE...

 Had some hassles with the rain, and a minor power failure, but it was CTN's largest and most impressive Expo yet. Congrats to Tina Price and everyone!

Shane Acker's 9 movie

Just realized it is September 9th, seven years since the release of Shane Acker's "9"movie.

(copyright 2009 Focus Features)

While everyone else is celebrating 50 years of Star Trek, (which is fine), I thought I should bring this little gem back out into the spotlight. As a student at UCLA, Acker created this short film about war, oppression, loss of personal freedom, and science run amok as his student project. "9" caught the attention of Tim Burton who worked with Acker to produce "9" as a feature film.

While I am a little tired of the post apocalyptic story theme, the David and Goliath struggle of the little doll people struggling against a devil device bent on devouring their souls is still worth watching. Acker's commentary on current world affairs is still disturbingly trendy, even more now today!

And it has one of my favorite actors, Martin Landau providing the voice of "2".

 

Enjoy!

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0472033/

http://www.focusfeatures.com/9

 

 

Behind the Scenes of Zootopia: Gnomon Alumni Panel

It was a packed house in the old Quonset hut auditorium as the Gnomon School of Visual Effects hosted five Zootopia artists, sponsored by Walt Disney Animation Studios. While the buzz for Zootopia may have cooled off a bit, the advances Disney has made should give them quite a lot of momentum at the box office for a while.

https://www.gnomon.edu/community/events/behind-the-scenes-of-zootopia

 Alberto Abril (Animator), Chika Saito (Modeler), Diana Zeng (Lighter), Dylan Ekren (Modeler), and Tyler Bolyard (Look Development Artist) each spoke about their time working on Zootopia, and their learning experiences at Gnomon and the other schools they attended.

They all seemed to have enjoyed working at Disney, and I must admit, I kind of envy their talents and the opportunities that they have had.

Studies of animals in the wild were shown, along with a pencil test of Walt Disney's Robin Hood. Special plugins for Maya, such as Xgen were discussed, along with lighting strategies, not to mention good old-fashioned hand drawn art for development.

Just the development of fur and hair seemed to consume a lot of time and resources. There was some "recycling" as one basic species model of a gazelle/deer was tweaked with different horns, fur color and different outfits to create extra background crowd characters.

(my photo from CTN 2015, copyright Disney)

Unfortunately, there will be no streaming of this presentation due to copyright issues. 

However, I did do a little digging to bring some examples of their work.

Here is Chika Saito’s Modeling Demo Reel 11/30/12

https://vimeo.com/55329417

 Alberto Abril's reel,

 http://www.albertoabril.com/

 Diana Zeng's blog,

 http://dianajzeng.blogspot.com/

 Dylan Ekren's work,

https://www.artstation.com/artist/dekren

And Tyler Bolyard's Facebook,

https://www.facebook.com/tyler.bolyard 

Just being on the grounds at Gnomon is always interesting. Their campus is the old Television Center Studio lot in Hollywood. The buildings are characters in themselves. There's a mixture 1930's and 1940's architecture that has a "Diesel Punk" feel to it. Add in the extra plumbing and cables with Gnomon's high tech interiors, you have some cool, gritty movie exteriors right there.

I'm trying to find out more about the history of the place, but it's past seems kind of murky right now. Which makes it that more interesting. UPDATE:

http://www.loopnet.com/Listing/16421261/6311-Romaine-St-Los-Angeles-CA/

The original home of Technicolor, set in a 1920's Art Deco style. There has to be more than a few ghosts haunting that building.

Stop using Flash Player

Will try to dig up more asap.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/adobe-is-telling-people-to-stop-using-flash/ar-AAfTImb?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=mailsignout

"Too easily compromised, eats up battery power on devices."

Update:

http://www.cartoonbrew.com/flash/adobe-kills-flash-name-rebrands-animator-friendly-animate-cc-124189.html 

Update:

http://www.engadget.com/2015/08/20/the-agonizingly-slow-decline-of-adobe-flash-player/

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/07/14/adobe_response_to_security_holes/

Walt Disney - American Experience on PBS

Well, I have to post this:

(copyright PBS)

(UPDATE) Man, where to start? What Walt did with film making, technology, copyright, marketing and celebrityship (if that can be a word) laid the foundation for the world presently we have. I would compare him to Thomas Edison, or even Steve Jobs. I think the key thing here is power. Walt had a vision, and an incredible sense of direction. By a combination of charisma, determination, and what  I believe were just plain lucky breaks, Walt saw ways to go beyond what even Windsor McCay was doing. And he wasn't afraid to push the envelope.

But success has its price. There are many stories of artists who created great works, but quite a few were impossible to live with. Walt was going to get what he wanted, and that was that.

The established studios that were successful at the time seemed to keep Disney on the run. Mintz studios? Gone. Fleischer? People still remember Popeye and Betty Boop, but those characters belong to King Features. Warner Bros. has Bugs Bunny, but with no "Walt" or Chuck Jones at Time/Warner to support him, he's fallen by the wayside.

Micky Mouse is known around the world, and is here to stay.

I will try to have another update asap.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/walt-disney/?utm_source=amex_homepage&utm_medium=direct&utm_campaign=waltdisney_2015

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/

http://www.pbssocal.org/tv/schedule/#page=schedule&day=20150914&provider=Broadcast

http://www.pbs.org/about/news/archive/2014/american-experience-disney/

I wouldn't be here, many people wouldn't be here, for better or for worse, if it weren't for Walt Disney.

Star Wars - The Force Awakens - Chewy, we're home!

"Chewy, we're home!"

(copyright Disney/Lucasfilm)

Don't let us down guys.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ngElkyQ6Rhs

Carbonmade

Not sure about this site.

I was helping someone try to set up a portfolio page at the lab. I managed to throw a page together with my cute stuff:

https://eagleone.carbonmade.com/projects/5586801#1

I was able to setup a basic account, but my friend kept having problems:

Carbonmade would not let her sign in after setting up an account. The buttons on the site literally stopped working.

Will try to do more on Monday.

Leo the Tech Guy

 I still listen to AM radio, and Leo the Tech Guy has something interesting to listen to on those slow Sunday afternoons. When I'm tired of sports radio, Leo has callers asking about Windows, hard drives, apps, cell phones, you name it. It just takes a while for them to get on topic I'm interested in.

I'm usually in the car, and not ready to use the phone while driving. It's more of a nuts and bolts program than Digital Village on KPFK, but Leo is a much more genial AM radio host than the others these days...

(photo copyright Leo the Tech Guy, photographer unknown)

http://www.techguylabs.com/

A world without books

Still getting used to a generation of animation students who don't rely on books. While there is a huge amount of material and tutorials online, I wonder how they "index" it all in their minds.

And I don't just mean bookmarking websites. Growing up with books made me learn how to "index" which specific material was in which particular book. My point is, what will they do when they are in a situation where they might be cut off from the web? Of course that might be in the midst of a huge natural disaster. Don't mean to be so gloomy, but what will the human race become?

 "Books? Yes, we have books."

(screenshots from George Pal's Time Machine, copyright 1960 Galaxy Films, Inc. Originally distributed by MGM, now handled by Warner Home Video )

Facebook and your privacy

Found this on Digital Village on KFPK. It seems Mark Zuckerberg has to know your business, even after you have logged out of Facebook. Anything to make an extra buck.

The procedure to keep Facebook off your back is listed here:

http://www.zdnet.com/facebook-turns-user-tracking-bug-into-data-mining-feature-for-advertisers-7000030603/

http://digitalvillage.org/audio/dv14062101.mp3

Did you ever have the feeling you were being watched?

Heartbeat Heartbleed Bug

First XP bites the dust, now this-

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jameslyne/2014/04/08/heartbeat-heartbleed-bug-breaks-worldwide-internet-security-again-and-yahoo/

http://www.businessinsider.com/heartbleed-bug-explainer-2014-4

Addition: Here is a list of sites listed by Steve Dyer, head of Woodbury University's IT department-

1. Google.com: Not vulnerable.

2. Facebook.com: Not vulnerable.

3. YouTube.com: Not vulnerable.

4. Amazon.com: Not vulnerable.

5. Yahoo.com: Was vulnerable. Yahoo Mail was vulnerable to attack but has since announced that it has been patched, along with other main Yahoo sites such as Yahoo Search, Finance, Sports, Flickr and Tumblr.

6. Wikipedia.org: Not vulnerable.

7. LinkedIn.com: No SSL.

8. eBay.com: No SSL.
9. Twitter.com: Not vulnerable.
10. Craigslist.org: Not vulnerable.
11. Bing.com: No SSL.
12. Pinterest.com: Not vulnerable.
13. Blogspot.com: Not vulnerable.
14. Go.com: Not vulnerable.
15. CNN.com: No SSL.
16. Live.com: No SSL.
17. PayPal.com: Not vulnerable.
18. Instagram.com: Not vulnerable.
19. Tumblr.com: Was vulnerable. Tumblr was vulnerable to attack, but Yahoo has since announced that it has been patched.
20. ESPN.go.com: Not vulnerable.
21. WordPress.com: Not vulnerable.

22. Imgur.com: Not vulnerable.

23. HuffingtonPost.com: No SSL.

24. reddit.com: Not vulnerable.

25. MSN.com: No SSL.

Digital Village Radio on KPFK

Check out Digital Village on KPFK.

 http://www.digitalvillage.org/

Even though they hardly discuss animation, this show is a good source of info regarding how people and technology can work together.