ASIFA-Atlanta 2008 Report of Activities

I just sent the following to the ASIFA International board. Their plan is to post it on asifa.net.

We've had a busy year!!

ASIFA-Atlanta 2008 Report of Activities

ASIFA-Atlanta had a fantastic 2008, featuring animators from our local chapter and throughout the world, including those who participated in ASIFA's International Animation Day.

We started the year in February with our first-ever screening on film (16mm), "To Hell With Hitler", a selection of WWII-era American propaganda cartoons, curated by C. Martin Croker. The screening took place at Atlanta's historical Plaza cinema.

In April, ASIFA-Atlanta helped to promote Atlanta Film Festival's "Animation Extravaganza" night, and ASIFA-Atlanta President Brett W. Thompson did an introduction and Q&A.

In May, we held our annual "Roll Yer Own" event, which showcases locally-produced independent animation. This year featured a wide range of techniques--for instance Moviekiss: The Lite Brite Video, animated with a Lite Brite toy; Knight vs Knight, animated on a TI-86 graphing calculator; and Bee Bog, animated traditionally and composited with AfterEffects. The event was very well attended and successful; the filmmakers were invited on stage afterwards for a Q&A.

In July, for our annual event "Blowin' Smoke," Atlanta animation studios showcased their best commercial work and generously took time to talk to eager animators seeking advice and employment. Participating studios included Primal Screen, Radical Axis, Turner Studios, and 70/30.

"Animation Attack!", part of the Atlanta Underground Film Festival, was perhaps our biggest event and occurred in August. We showed an animated feature, John's Arm: Armageddon, and two blocks of world-class animated shorts at Atlanta's historic Plaza Theatre. Films included Aaron Augenblick's Golden Age, Mathieu Labaye's Orgesticulanismus, Max Margulies and Naoko Masuda's God of Tears, and Tim Rauch's film Germans in the Woods.

ASIFA-Atlanta was very proud to celebrate International Animation Day on October 28th at the High Museum of Art's Hill Auditorium. It is one of our favorite events and makes us grateful to be a part of the worldwide animation community- we were happy to be able to exchange films with ten countries. About 400 people came to the two showings, and the positive feedback we received from the audience was overwhelming and wonderful. Thanks to Juliette Crochu for coordinating IAD this year.

In November, ASIFA-Atlanta brought Don Hertzfeldt to Atlanta as part of his tour for his latest film, I am so proud of you. Our screening coordinator Karl Sigler introduced the program and did a great Q&A with Don.

Finally, to finish 2008, in December ASIFA-Atlanta put together an art show, the theme of which was the Golden Age of Comics/Cartoons. Thirty-seven artists created sixty-five pieces of art which were on display in the Eyedrum's gallery space for over a month. The opening night for the art show was very well attended (Eyedrum's parking lot filled up) and featured music from local bands Omelet, The Falcon Lords, The Back Pockets, and Floating Coats.

For 2009, ASIFA-Atlanta is proud to have partnered with Atlanta's Center for Puppetry Arts to help their new film series, curated by Alan Louis. The series will include an evening of stop motion films as well as a screening of "Monster Road", the documentary about Bruce Bickford.

ASIFA-Atlanta will continue to have exciting events in 2009, as well as continue our recurring events, which include a weekly figure drawing class (run by Joe Peery) and the monthly Animators' Workshop, run by our screening coordinator Karl Sigler.

-Brett W. Thompson, President of ASIFA-Atlanta

Obituary: Brett W. Thompson (not me)

I'm still very much alive :)

But somebody with my name remarkably similar to mine isn't, anymore, sadly:

http://archive.deseretnews.com/archive/1143883/Obituary-Brett-W-Thompson.html

Thank you Google Alerts!

Also: Saturday, January 17th, come to An Evening of Stop-Motion Animation at the Center for Puppetry Arts at 8pm!

ASIFA-Atlanta thanks you! Plus: animation-related news!

Below is a mass email I sent out about ASIFA-Atlanta's show and other animation news I've collected for the past couple weeks:

Hello animation fan!

Thanks so much to everyone who helped make our first annual art show / music show / party a big success- volunteers, artists, musicians, and those who came out to support us!

We filled up Eyedrum's parking lot, had awesome art and music, and raised some money for ASIFA-Atlanta so we can keep doing exciting things in 2009!

Jerry Fuchs (aka "Fooksie") wrote about his experience, complete with pictures:

http://www.fooksie.com/news.html

I've started a Flickr group for anyone to upload photos from the night; so far, we have pictures from Jerry Fuchs, myself, Savannah, and Bianca Butler; the pictures are a bit unsorted but there's a lot there to look at:

http://flickr.com/groups/929092@N24/

If the show had been a film, these would be the credits; thank you to:

- All our artists, without whom there wouldn't be a show at all
- All our performers and musicians: William Tucker, Floating Coats, The Back Pockets, Omelet, and Falcon Lords
- Alena Spragg for getting the whole thing started and printing posters, getting snacks, helping with dropoff, emails, Facebook, etc etc
- Jennifer Barclay, Aubrey Longley-Cook and Mikel, who did an amazing job hanging all the art (didn't it look nice?)
- Jennifer for the delicious pie and beautiful ASIFA-Atlanta flyers and for the sign for the show
- All our door volunteers, which is something I always greatly appreciate: Alena, Jillian Fratkin, Sandee Chamberlain, Robert Paraguassu, and Mollie Brock
- Our videographers: Bryan Fordney and Sean Jarrett
- Our photographer: Bianca Butler
- Jay Blodgett for the mass emails and for making artist submission form
- Jess Blankenship from Eyedrum for all the Eyedrum help and art show guidance
- Nathan Brown from Eyedrum who did a tremendous job with sound and setting up the projector

Our next scheduled event is An Evening of Stop-Motion Puppet Films at Center for Puppetry Arts (http://puppet.org/) on Saturday, Jan 17, 2009, 8pm. ASIFA-Atlanta is proud to be helping with this event!

Come enjoy the end result of countless hours of painstaking puppet manipulation captured on film one frame at a time as we celebrate an evening of stop-motion puppet animation. The evening includes Adam Elliot's Academy Award-winning Harvie Krumpet from Australia, Haunted Hogmanay from Ko-Lik Films of Scotland, as well as gems from Ray Harryhausen and Screen Novelties International, Barry Purves and Corky Quakenbush.
Location: Mainstage Theater
Cost: $7; $5 Center Members

Just a couple days later, the Atlanta Jewish Film Festival (http://www.ajff.org/) will be showing Will Eisner: Portrait of a Sequential Artist, at Lefont Sandy Springs, on Monday, Jan 19, 2009, 4:40pm. It's possible a representative from ASIFA-Atlanta will introduce the film and do a Q&A. This will be the Atlanta premiere of the film, which is a documentary on Will Eisner. Mark Mayerson writes about it here:

http://mayersononanimation.blogspot.com/2008/05/will-eisner-portrait-of-sequential.html

Speaking of premieres, Delgo was released to theatres on December 12th! This indepenent animated feature was created here in Atlanta by Fathom Studios. It screened at Annecy as well as the Red Stick Animation Festival in Baton Rogue. It also won Best Animated Feature at the Anima Mundi Film Festival in Brazil. I'd love to see more independent animated features produced with local talent!

Atlanta Film Festival is seeking entries, especially good animation. ASIFA-Atlanta will be involved with the festival's animation night; if you have a good film, please submit! The last deadline is January 9, 2009. Details here:

http://atlantafilmfestival.com/index.php/Submissions/2009-Call-For-Entries.html

Local teen Jabril Mack, 15, won the 2008 Nickelodeon Greater Creator Award for his entry "Chicken Herder", which competed with over a thousand other entries! Article here:

http://www.11alive.com/rss/rss_story.aspx?storyid=124424

And the film itself: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90SnATFREPw

John Ryan, ASIFA-Atlanta board member and head of local studio Dagnabit! sent me their holiday card to share with everyone:

http://www.dagnabit.tv/2008Xmas/

We'll be having an ASIFA-Atlanta board meeting sometime soon to plan for 2009.

Here's what we have so far for 2009:

- Figure Drawing every Thursday at Westwood College
- Monthly Animation Workshop at Manuel's Tavern
- Monthly Boozer Doodle

- "An Evening of Stop-Motion" on Jan. 17th

- "Monster Road", documentary on Bruce Bickford, at Center for Puppetry Arts in March

- Atlanta Film Festival's "Animation Extravaganza" in April
- "Roll Yer Own" in May
- "Blowin' Smoke" in July
- "Animation Attack!" in August
- "International Animation Day" in October
- "Gallery Show" in December

More to come!

Take care and thanks for an amazing year!

-Brett W. Thompson, President of ASIFA-Atlanta

Collabamation with Em Kempf

"brettem"



I helped Em set up iStopMotion and her Canon ZR850, and we created this film together! She's much more experienced with this kind of animation than me, and is more spontaneous, but she's also inspiring! Music by The Back Pockets.

Thanks Em!

See her blog or her YouTube page for more of her work.

Blast from the Past: Review of "Fluidtoons" from 2006

Thanks to Google Alerts, I found an old review of "Fluidtoons" from when it screened at the 2006 Atlanta Film Festival!

Brandon liked it:

http://deeperintomovies.net/journal/archives/47

Makes me want to make more Fluidtoons and/or be in Atlanta Film Festival again. Thank you Brandon! :)

Fluidtoons are the easiest type of animation for me to do- around 2004, I figured out the very very basics of Flash and just started drawing and tracing, doing little straight-ahead animation exercises that eventually I assembled into "Fluidtoons" for the 2004 IFL screening at FSU, at the encouragement of my friend Cameron... I definitely wasn't going to submit anything, not having made any live action film, but Cameron said, "Why don't you put together some of these animations you've been doing?" It was at that screening it won the audience choice award! I had never experienced sitting in a theatre seeing people laugh at my animation before. It was quite a trip!

A couple years later, Joe Peery (my ASIFA-Atlanta predecessor and mentor) and Ward Jenkins saw it at the Animation Slam at the Earl in 2006, and liked it so much that it won somehow, and was entered into the Atlanta Film Festival. I met some important folks at that Slam: Joanna Davidovich and pretty much the entire Lillie B Ross Society, a member of whom (John Cason) now does beautiful graphic design for ASIFA-Atlanta flyers.

ASIFA-Atlanta Golden Age of Comics/Cartoons Show

Awesome press release written by Jay, ASIFA-Atlanta secretary! Flyer by John Cason!



FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
ASIFA-ATLANTA, IN ASSOCIATION WITH EYEDRUM PRESENTS
ART INSPIRED BY THE GOLDEN AGE OF COMICS/CARTOONS

OPENING, SATURDAY, DECEMBER 6th, 8pm - 11pm
EYEDRUM GALLERY
290 MARTIN LUTHER KING JR DRIVE SOUTH
ATLANTA, GEORGIA, 30312
(404) 522-0655

ATLANTA, GA - ASIFA-Atlanta, in association with Eyedrum, is proud to present its first annual ASIFA-Atlanta Art Show. In keeping with the spirit of ASIFA, the collection of work by its members is inspired by the Golden Age of Comics and Cartoons. There promises to be an exceptional display of character driven and humorous pieces that is indicative of the work being produced by Atlanta's animation community. The collection will feature contributions from over three dozen artists. (A partial list of artists is attached below.) The majority of pieces displayed will also be available for sale.

The show will be on display at Eyedrum Gallery with the following schedule:

Opening, Saturday, December 6th, 8pm - 11pm; ($7 admission; Free for Eyedrum Members, ASIFA Members and Participating Artists)

Regular gallery hours are:
Fridays (3:00pm - 8:00pm)
Saturdays and Sundays (1:00pm - 6:00pm), through December 28th.

Additionally, the Opening Night of the Gallery Show will feature food, drinks and live music performances by Omelet, The Back Pockets, Floating Coats, and The Falcon Lords. (Music contacts and further info is attached below.)

Promotional art (original poster design by John Cason) is attached and is also available for download at:

http://flickr.com/photos/brett_w_thompson/2851664966/

Partial list of artists:

Paige Adair, Deirdre Aims, Alex App, Joel Ball, Jonathan Bass, Andrew Bellury, Ryan Bousquet, Bianca Butler, John Cason, Aubrey Longley-Cook, Almon Ray Crosby, Chris Diamond, Jason Desilva, eggtooth, Lindsey Elcessor, Thom Foolery, Jerry Fuchs, jert, Amanda Goodbread, Kat Hagan, Merill Hagan, Chris Hamer, Ambrose Hoilman, Em Kempf, Josh Latta, Laurence Laufer, April Leigh, Solomon Mars, Oscar D. Mejia, Savannah Murphy, Ted Murphy, Anthony Owsley, Robert Paraguassu, Joe Peery , Claire Reeve, Brandon Ross, John Ryan, Rebecca Salcedo, Rebecca Scott, San Smith, Allen Spetnagel, Alena Spragg, Jacqueline Stringham, Stephen Sweny, Brett W. Thompson, Rich Tommaso


Featured music on Opening Night:
Omelet
The Back Pockets
Floating Coats
Falcon Lords

ASIFA-Atlanta is quickly becoming the foremost animation community builder in the Southeast. "ASIFA" stands for Association Internationale du Film d'Animation and was founded in France in 1960 as a membership organization devoted to encouraging animation. Our goal is to bring together people who are interested in animation and to give them a forum to share ideas, experiences, knowledge and, most importantly, animation! For more information, please visit: www.asifa-atlanta.com

Established in 1998, Eyedrum is a non-profit organization developing an interdisciplinary approach to the arts by incorporating a wide range of contemporary art, music and new media in its gallery space.
http://www.eyedrum.org

Don Hertzfeldt, Xtacles, Costa Rica, WonderRoot show, Eyedrum show

Oh man. I'd like to write more but I have to pack!

- Don Hertzfeldt tonight was awesome!! Thanks to everyone who came and especially to those who helped make it happen (Karl Sigler especially, and Robert and Laurence for their handiwork, and Alena who updated an important spreadsheet). I could thank so many people! Kelly Duane, whose blog I was reading then clicked on her link to Don's to discover he was going on tour which led to tonight, deserves thanks too, even though she's in NYC!

- There's a brand new series on Adult Swim by 70/30! You might know their previous shows, "Sealab: 2021" and "Frisky Dingo". The new show's a spinoff of "Frisky Dingo" and is called "The Xtacles". If you watch closely, you can spot my face in the first episode; look for the bearded guy in the second half of the show:

The Xtacles Epsidode 1

I don't know how long that link'll work. Here's an article about the series.

- I'm leaving for Costa Rica at 7am to help with the Montezuma International Film Festival there. I have not packed yet.

- There's going to be an amazing music and art show November 22nd at WonderRoot. Three of my most favorite bands in the world (Omelet, The Back Pockets, and Eshniner Forest) will be playing, along with other bands I don't know about yet. More details to come soon, but rest assured it's going to be amazing because Em Kempf is running it- and any show with Omelet OR The Back Pockets is great, and this one has both!!

- The next ASIFA-Atlanta event is our big art and music show on December 6th. If you're an artist, dropoff is December 3rd at Eyedrum. We're still working out the details for art dropoff.

Tonight only: CARTUNE XPREZ at 7:30pm in SCAD-Atlanta's Hub

Thanks to everyone who came to and helped with International Animation Day! It was a big success! If I have time I'll write up a little follow-up. Many thanks to Karl Sigler and John Ryan in particular.

So I just found out that tonight CARTUNE XPREZ is at SCAD-Atlanta's hub:

http://www.scadconnector.com/?p=652

The show is scheduled to start at 7:30pm.

Check out their website:

http://www.cartunexprez.com/

More info:

"Cartune Xprez" Traveling Animation Party

October 26, 2008

The multimedia dance duo, Hooliganship, will be presenting the latest incarnation of "Cartune Xprez," an 80-minute program of short animated videos and performances that celebrates the wilderness of imagination through motion pictures. Featured artists include Bruce Bickford, Shana Moulton, Takeshi Murata, Paper Rad and more. In addition to the cartoon theater performance, they will perform their most recent piece, "Realer," in which audiences strap on a pair of 3-D glasses to bear witness to a televised parade gone awry. This one-night event, on Thursday Oct. 30 from 7:30 -9:30 p.m., has been in the works for two years. The program features collaborations with Frank Zappa and major exhibitions at the Whitney Biennial, the Museum of Modern Art, Sundance Film Festival and many other institutions throughout the world. Hooliganship's live multimedia performance is followed by an animation screening. For more information, visit the Web site www.cartuneexprez.com or contact Professor Avantika Bawa at abawa@scad.edu.


Hope to see you there!

-Brett W. Thompson, President of ASIFA-Atlanta

ASIFA-Atlanta IAD 2008 Press Release

Our ASIFA-Atlanta secretary, Jay, is awesome. He wrote the following press release for International Animation Day 2008; thanks Jay!!

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
ASIFA-ATLANTA, IN ASSOCIATION WITH THE HIGH MUSEUM OF ART, PRESENTS
INTERNATIONAL ANIMATION DAY
OCTOBER 28, 2008, 7:00 PM and 9:00 PM
AT THE HILL AUDITORIUM OF THE HIGH MUSEUM
1280 PEACHTREE STREET, N.E., ATLANTA, GA

ATLANTA, GA - In 2002, ASIFA, the International Animated Film Association, launched a global event to celebrate the art of animation. October 28th was proclaimed as International Animation Day, commemorating the first public performance of Emile Reynaud's Theatre Optique at the Grevin Museum in Paris, in 1892.

Each year, ASIFA groups around the world celebrate International Animation Day. In 2007, about 40 different countries in all the continents celebrated this day. The Atlanta Chapter of ASIFA is excited to invite the film and art loving community to its third year celebration, with a free screening of animated films submitted from around the world: Argentina, Brazil, Bulgaria, China, France, Hungary, Iran, Israel, Korea, Portugal,...

ASIFA-Atlanta is particularly excited to be presenting this year's International Animation Day at the High Museum's Hill Auditorium! This will be the second year there, and the auditorium itself is an exceptionally appropriate venue to showcase the work of these international artists. The program continues to be gathered as as work is being shipped, transmitted and downloaded around the world, nearly up to the screening. The collection is being curated by Karl Sigler, ASIFA-Atlanta's Screening Coordinator.

The show is free and reservations are HIGHLY recommended. Please reserve your FREE ticket at http://asifa-atlanta.com before all 225 seats fill up! There will be two showings, 7pm and 9pm. Hope to see you there!


Promotional art (original poster design by Michel Ocelot; text and logos adapted by John Cason) is attached and is also available for download at:

http://flickr.com/photos/brett_w_thompson/2866558716/

ASIFA-Atlanta is quickly becoming the foremost animation community builder in the Southeast. "ASIFA" stands for Association Internationale du Film d'Animation and was founded in France in 1960 as a membership organization devoted to encouraging animation. Our goal is to bring together people who are interested in animation and to give them a forum to share ideas, experiences, knowledge and, most importantly, animation! For more information, please visit: www.asifa-atlanta.com

ASIFA-Atlanta Update, September 2008

I wrote this for ASIFA's members-only magazine. I didn't realize how much we'd done!!

I'm also realizing that this blog is slowing morphing into almost entirely ASIFA-Atlanta-related content. I'd like to post more Brett-related art stuff in the future. I think posts like the one about munnybrella is a good direction. We'll see!

Okay, here's the article:

ASIFA-Atlanta continues to thrive, thanks to our dedicated volunteers and the inspiring animation community in Atlanta. Since our last update, we've had three big events, and we have three more planned, in addition to our regularly recurring events- a weekly figure drawing class (run by Joe Peery) and the monthly Animators' Workshop at Manuel's Tavern, run by our Screening Coordinator Karl Sigler.

On May 26th, ASIFA-Atlanta had its annual "Roll Yer Own" event, which showcases locally-produced independent animation. This year was particularly impressive, featuring a wide range of techniques. For instance, we showed "Moviekiss: The Lite Brite Video", animated with a lite brite, "Knight vs Knight", animated on a TI-86 graphic calculator, and "Bee Bog", animated traditionally and composited with AfterEffects.

More films for "Roll Yer Own" included the music video "Code Monkey" by ASIFA-Atlanta webmaster Jennifer Barclay, and a brief introduction by ASIFA-Atlanta President Brett W. Thompson. Recent graduate Amanda Goodbread premiered her thesis film, "Curtains", at this screening. Two first-time local animators, Emily Kempf and Gary Eddy, showed their films as well. Two of the longer pieces, "Hitler's Brain" by Count Lear Bunda, local Adult Swim employee, and "24 Frames" by Brad Patullo (submitted on his behalf by Lee Crowe), were years in the making.

"Roll Yer Own" was very well attended- the Five Spot, our venue, was completely packed! We actually scheduled a second showing as a result. Many thanks to John Cason for the beautiful flyer that helped promote the show, and to ASIFA-Atlanta Screening Coordinator Karl Sigler for compiling all the films onto a single DVD, which is no small feat. For the second showing of "Roll Yer Own", we added one film, "Busted", by Matt Maiellaro. Although best known for this popular and amusing work on Aqua Teen, Matt's film "Busted" differs in its approach, featuring no dialogue and fluid, kid-friendly animation. Also special to the second screening, Gary Eddy performed his film's soundtrack live, singing and playing ukelele.

On July 14th, we showed Atlanta-produced commerical animation for another annual event called "Blowin' Smoke". Local studios showcased their best work and generously took the time to talk to eager animators seeking advice and employment. Atlanta studios that participated included Primal Screen, Radical Axis, Turner Studios, and 70/30; all of their work was impressive and inspiring, and we were very grateful to have several of the studio big shots in attendance (Doug Grimmett of Primal Screen, Craig Hartin of Radical Axis, Joe Peery of Turner Studios, and Neal Holman of 70/30).

One of the best submissions, an opening title sequence for a pilot called "Kupser", was from local animator Joanna Davidovich, who's great at design. Recent transplant Chris Miller also showed excellent, hilarious work, and locals Mark Smith and Laurence Laufer also showed commerical animation as part of the screening.

"Animation Attack!", part of the Atlanta Underground Film Festival, was a big success. We showed an animated feature at Lenny's, "John's Arm: Armageddon", and two blocks of awesome animated shorts at Atlanta's historic Plaza Theatre. Several of the films came from animators who were working on Superjail at Augenblick Studios in Brooklyn at the time.

Although all the films were amazing, we chose several to receive awards, including Aaron Augenblick's "Golden Age", which was given the highest honor of Best Animated Short. We gave Mathieu Labaye's "Orgesticulanismus" Best Foreign Animated Short, and Max Margulies and Naoko Masuda, who were in attendance from Philidelphia, received Best Student Animated Short for "God of Tears". We showed ASIFA-East member Tim Rauch's film "Germans in the Woods" which got Best Dramatic Animated Short. "Marvelous, Keen, Loony Bin", by Lizzi Akana, was a distinct audience favorite, and "Muto" received the "Most Impressive Animation Technique" award. Em Kempf received the Best Local Animated Short for "Maniacal" and Amanda Goodbread received "Best Local Student Animated Short" for "Curtains".

"Animation Attack!" was very well received and attended- it was a joy and relief for staff to hear the audience laugh loudly at films like Chris Conforti's "Frog" and Edmond Hawkins' "Soccer Time". Max Margulies, Naoko Masuda, and Amanda Goodbread answered questions from the audience, moderated by Brett W. Thompson.

Upcoming ASIFA-Atlanta events are International Animation Day at the High Museum's Hill Auditorium on October 28th, Don Hertzfeldt at Midtown Art Cinema on November 11th, and to end the year, an art opening on December 6th at Eyedrum, featuring a plethora of Golden Era themed artwork by local cartoonists and wildly creative music by local bands Floating Coats, The Back Pockets, The Falcon Lords, and Omelet. Details for these and future events can be found at asifa-atlanta.com.

-Brett W. Thompson, President of ASIFA-Atlanta

ASIFA-Atlanta Membership Form

This is an experimental replacement for our paper form, as beautiful as it is!

ASIFA (Association Internationale du Film d'Animation) was formed in 1960 by an international group of animators to coordinate and increase worldwide visibility of animated film. ASIFA's membership includes animation professionals and fans from more than 50 countries

Benefits to being a member of ASIFA-Atlanta:
- Discounts to screenings, festivals, and events
- The right to show your work in our annual screenings of local animation, "Roll Yer Own" and "Blowin' Smoke" as well as possibly have your film sent around the world as part of "International Animation Day"
- You'll be a member of ASIFA-International as well, which means you will get a subscription to the ASIFA members-only magazine
- And best of all, it offers you a chance to meet and talk with professionals, students, and other fans of animation!

Be a part of the thriving animation community in Atlanta- join ASIFA-Atlanta!

Superjail premieres tonight!

I'm a huge fan of Superjail. Aaron Augenblick hired an unbelievably talented staff, and he and Christy Karacas are brilliant.

Several of the films in Animation Attack! came from Augenblick folks who worked on Superjail! We showed two of Christy's films last year, and this year Aaron's film "Golden Age" got Best Animated Short, for instance.

I also got to visit Augenblick Studios briefly when I visited NYC. What an awesome place!!

So, Superjail premieres tonight at 11:45pm on Adult Swim, woo hoo!

I just found some extras on adultswim.com:

- Pilot (with extras!! wow!!)
- First Episode (airing tonight I think?)

Thanks to Radio Diatribe blog for these links!

I love Superjail for many reasons. It's great to see full, beautiful, crazy animation like this, and it's inspiring and encouraging that it was all done by hand and not shipped anywhere. It's great to see the crazy gags (I'm a sucker for violence). And it's really great to see super talented animators working on something they love (it shows!).

I'm hoping Superjail will have a big impact and bring more appreciation for hand-drawn, creative animation like this. Yay!

Support Superjail!! I want to see a second season happen, even though I've only seen two episodes, haha!

Quote about Don Hertzfeldt's new film

I've mentioned this before but thanks to ASIFA-Atlanta's screening coordinator Karl Sigler, Don Hertzfeldt is coming to Atlanta to show his new film (and his old ones too) on November 11th, 9pm, at Midtown Art Cinema! It's going to be awesome!

We just got this quote about the film, "I Am So Proud of You":

"A fucking masterpiece. I can't even begin to articulate my thoughts about the
film but it just gave me shivers and I wasn't able to attend the party after
the screening. Just had to be alone. It had this effect on a number of other
people here too. Stunning, beautiful, tragic, absurd work."

-Chris Robinson
Director, Ottawa International Animation Festival

Wow.

munnybrella at MINT



There was an awesome munny show at MINT yesterday; my little guy is in the picture above! I've got some other pictures of him that I might post later.

I was thoroughly impressed with the high quality of the pieces. I could talk about all of them, but you should just see for yourself.

More info here:

http://fantasyburrito.com/

Thanks to Victoria Warren and Chris for putting together such a great show, and also to MINT of course!

ASIFA-Atlanta Art Show!



ASIFA-Atlanta is having an art opening/music show/party! It's at the Eyedrum on December 6th. Entry will be free for ASIFA-Atlanta members, Eyedrum members, and participating artists, and $7 for other folks.

This art show was the idea of ASIFA-Atlanta board member Alena Spragg. We want to give our members and the community a chance to show their talents. We also want to throw an event to end the year with a bang!

Most of ASIFA-Atlanta's events are film screenings, but this event will showcase a plethora of art inspired by Golden Age Comics and Cartoons, as well as the extremely creative music of Floating Coats, The Back Pockets, The Falcon Lords, and Omelet. All of these bands either have visual artists as members or are visually interesting themselves. It is certain to be captivating.

The purpose of the theme of Golden Age Comics and Cartoons is to serve as inspiration and also to encourage research and appreciation.

ASIFA-Atlanta is the local chapter of the worldwide animation society ASIFA ("Association International du Film d'Animation"), which was founded in 1960 in France. One need not be an animator to be an ASIFA-Atlanta member. ASIFA aims to promote the art and appreciation of animation.

ASIFA-Atlanta puts together animation screenings of films from all over the world ("International Animation Day"), local independent and commercial films ("Roll Yer Own" and "Blowin' Smoke"), and historical cartoons ("To Hell with Hitler", curated by Clay Croker last February), as well as offering a regular workshop at Manuel's Tavern (www.atl-animators.org) and a weekly figure drawing class (every Thursday night at Westwood College).

Artists participating in this show include veteran animation professionals (Joe Peery, Todd Redner, John Ryan), award-winning comics artists (Rich Tommaso, who recently won the Eisner) and many very talented locals, including several people from the Hand Job Live Art Crew (Thom Foolery, Andrew Bellury, Ted Murphy, Chris Hamer, Amanda Goodbread), and dedicated ASIFA-Atlanta volunteers (Aubrey Longley-Cook, Laurence Laufer, Jacqueline Stringham), as well as independent comics artists (Alex App, Joel Ball, Ambrose Hoilman).

The lovely flyer was designed by John Cason.

The following is the list of artists participating in the show (so far!):

Alena Spragg
Alex App
Allen Spetnagel
Amanda Goodbread
Ambrose Hoilman
Andrew Bellury
April Leigh
Aubrey Longley-Cook
Brandon Ross
Brett W. Thompson
Chris Hamer
Claire Reeve
eggtooth
Jacqueline Stringham
Joe Peery
Joel Ball
John Cason
John Ryan
Laurence Laufer
Rebecca Salcedo
Rich Tommaso
Ryan Bousquet
Savannah Murphy
Solomon Mars
Stephen Sweny
Ted Murphy
Thom Foolery
Todd Redner

ASIFA-Atlanta Art Show!



ASIFA-Atlanta is having an art opening/music show/party! It's at the Eyedrum on December 6th, and you are invited :)

Entry will be free for ASIFA-Atlanta members, Eyedrum members, and participating artists, and $7 for other folks.

We are still very much looking for artists. If you email us soon, we will be able to include your name on the flyer when we print it up! :)

Here are the submission details:

- Any art somehow inspired by Golden Age of Comics/Cartoons (we're stretching it from 1920's to 1970's)
- Artists who aren't members of ASIFA-Atlanta will have to pay a $5 entry free
- Artists will be able to sell their art for a price of their choosing (so the $5 will hopefully be easy to get back!)
- Drop off day is November 17th
- Pieces will hang in Eyedrum for about three weeks
- Artists can submit 1-3 pieces
- Please email brett.w.thompson@gmail.com or spragg.a7@gmail.com to be added to the artist list

The following mind-blowingly amazing bands will be playing:

Omelet

http://myspace.com/chalkrope
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6XLfSv9KHsg

The Falcon Lords

http://www.falconlords.com/
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=us99VNHWIao

The Back Pockets

http://myspace.com/thebackpockets
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yxuOzOq-fgU

Floating Coats

http//floatingcoats.com/


Thanks to John Cason for making the beautiful flyer!

Upcoming ASIFA-Atlanta Events:

- International Animation Day at the High Museum on October 28th, free! 7pm and 9pm.You'll be able to reserve seats at asifa-atlanta.com as the date gets closer.

- Don Hertzfeldt at Midtown Art Cinema on November 11th, 9pm, $8 for ASIFA-Atlanta members, $10 for regular folks

- First Annual ASIFA-Atlanta Gallery Show December 6th at Eyedrum; bands playing are Omelet, The Falcon Lords, The Back Pockets, and Floating Coats! Participating artists and ASIFA-Atlanta members will get in free.

We are still very much looking for artists to submit work for the show; work is due November 17th and can be anything inspired by Golden Era of Comics/Cartoons. Please email Brett at brett.w.thompson@gmail.com if you are interested in being added to the list of artists. You'll be able to put a price on and hopefully sell your work- it will hang in Eyedrum for about three weeks. If you're not an ASIFA-Atlanta member, there will be a $5 hanging fee (but as a participating artist you'll get in for free).

Animation Attack! 2008 Awards

Previous blog post with thanks and summary

Firstly let me say that I love all of the films in the festival- being picked is an award in itself, as it were!

Last year we tried to pick a single film and couldn't so we gave the "Triad of Power" award to three films ("Adventure Time" by Pendleton Ward, "Sinking of the Hunley" by Drew Christie, and "Waif of Persephone" by Nick Cross).

This year we came up with categories which I think work better.

And here they are:

Atlanta Underground Film Festival
- Atlanta Underground Film Festival Best Short - "God of Tears"
- "AUFF" the Wall Award - "Karaoke Show"

Animation Attack!
- Best Animated Short - "Golden Age"
- Best Foreign Animated Short - "Orgesticulanismus"
- Best Student Animated Short - "God of Tears"
- Best Local Animated Short - "Maniacal"
- Best Local Student Animation Short - "Curtains"
- Best Dramatic Animated Short - "Germans in the Woods"
- Most Impressive Animation Technique - "Muto"
- Animation Attack! Audience Favorite - "Marvelous, Keen, Loony Bin"

Full list of films still at animationattack.com.

Animation Attack! 2008 Thanks and Summary


Photo by Karl Sigler!

Animation Attack! was a success! Many thanks to Eric Panter, Festival Director of the Atlanta Underground Film Festival, Bryan Fordney, who was in charge of projection for Animation Attack! and helped me get films, and Karl Sigler, our ASIFA-Atlanta screening coordinator, and Takuro Masuda, animator ambassador.

Also many thanks to all those who came to the shows and gave me such good feedback- it would appear that you guys liked it a lot, woo hoo! :) I heard that one person said that it was the best animation block they'd seen at a festival; what a compliment! Thanks to the Plaza too- Johnny and Gayle are always so amazing and helpful, and I really, really love the Plaza. And finally, a HUGE thanks to the filmmakers, of course!

I have to say that it was satisfying (and a relief) to sit in the audience (when I wasn't in the booth with Bryan) and hear everyone's reaction. They laughed a lot at "Frog" and "Soccer Time", and so many people mentioned "Marvelous, Keen, Loony Bin" to me. Of course "Golden Age" was a huge hit too! And "Muto"- I mean, I think all of the films were amazing.

I should also give a really big thanks to Stephen Schor without whom I wouldn't have had the honor and pleasure to meet a lot of these filmmakers in NYC. Aaron Augenblick, besides being a hero of mine, was kind enough to spread my call for entries amongst his animators (busy on Superjail!!); thanks to Aaron, too! And Vanessa at Augenblick, who's a good friend of Stephen's and is awesome. Be sure to watch the Superjail premiere on Adult Swim on September 28th at 11:45pm!

We were fortunate to have three filmmakers come to Saturday's show- local Amanda Goodbread, whose film "Curtains" we showed at "Roll Yer Own", and Max Margulies and Naoko Masuda, who came all the way from Philly! Their film, "God of Tears", was a festival favorite and rightly so, as it's quite breathtaking and beautiful.

I'm really happy with out things worked out! I can tell you some of the behind-the-scenes, though: I was in a panic all day Friday because when I connected my laptop to the projector, the image was blue and too big. After a couple trips to Best Buy, I replaced the VGA cable, fixing the color problem, and Johnny from the Plaza showed Bryan and me how to scale the image (plus I changed the resolution). I also got RCA couplers at Best Buy to make the sound work, whew!

Oh, one more thing: thanks our volunteers! My friend Laurence, an active ASIFA-Atlanta volunteer, took care of the door during Saturday's show, and Dustin took care of it during Friday's show. There were several other dedicated Atlanta Underground Film Festival volunteers (including William D Tucker himself, as a projectionist, which was delightfully ironic if you've seen the film he's in, "Panels from the Walls of Hell") that made the whole thing work. Thanks guys!

So my next post will be the Animation Attack! 2008 awards! Yay!

Good Day

I had a good day today! Check it:

- Saw the CartoonBrew post about Animation Attack!; thanks Amid!!

- Talked with a talented lady on the telephone. Her band, the Back Pockets, is playing at WonderRoot on September 5th. It'll be crazy! Ryan's in the band too!

- Helped out with the opening night of Atlanta Underground Film Festival; the film I helped project, Cuba-Libre, was awesome, and it feels like accomplishing something when films are showing they're good and people are watching. Sophia, who helped too, rocks, and Eric, festival director, is amazing. I wish the audience had been larger but I think as the week progresses the word will spread.

- Went to (and documented on video) my friends' crazy-awesome band Omelet. They're playing on August 30th at Lenny's!

PS Come to Animation Attack!

Current did an
Atlanta Underground Film Festival promo video which mentions Animation Attack! Nice!!

Animation Attack! 2008

Press Release on Jay's blog





Thanks to Bryan for the cleanup help on the first image!

Blowin' Smoke in AJC

http://www.accessatlanta.com/entertainment/content/printedition/2008/07/10/film.html

Rendering/exporting with Flash

Flash is not good at exporting (at least in my experience). It's not so fun to stay up really late finishing a project and then have to wrestle with exporting!

Here's what I do (thanks to Karl Sigler for showing me ffmpeg):

1. From Flash, export your animation as a PNG sequence. Most likely you don't want transparency, so pick "24 bit" instead of "24 bit with alpha".

2. Also from Flash, export just the soundtrack as a .WAV

3. Once that's done, join up the PNGs and WAV file like so:

ffmpeg -r 24 -i cartoon%04d.png -i cartoon.wav -b 900k cartoon.avi

"-r 24" means that your source animation is 24 frames per second. This is a good framerate to work in. Make sure this matches the number you have in your Flash file, though!

"-i cartoon%04d.png" tells ffmpeg where to find the PNG files. If you haven't done much programming the "%04d" may be confusing: it means "a four digit number padded by zeroes", and ffmpeg generates the filenames starting at 1. So in this case it would generate a series of filenames like "cartoon0001.png", "cartoon0002.png" and so on.

"-i cartoon.wav" tells ffmpeg to grab the soundtrack too.

"-b 900k" tells ffmpeg that the output movie should be 900 kbps. Depending on whether you're making a DVD or uploading to YouTube, you'll want to use different values here (the higher the number the higher the quality but the bigger the file also).

"cartoon.avi" is the output filename.

AJC Mention of "Roll Yer Own" re-showing!

Jonathan Williams at AJC mentioned ASIFA-Atlanta's "Roll Yer Own" re-showing!!

http://www.accessatlanta.com/entertainment/content/printedition/2008/06/19/spike.html

Roll Yer Own Re-showing and Blowin' Smoke

By popular demand, we've booked the Five Spot again for a re-showing of "Roll Yer Own"! June 25th, 8pm, Five Spot, free!



And on July 14th at the Five Spot also for free we have "Blowin' Smoke"which will showcase Atlanta-produced commerical animation! This is an awesome opportunity to see what kinds of great animation local studios create and also meet the artists who make cartoons for a living. If you're looking for a job in animation, it might also be helpful!

Awesome flyer by John Cason:



We're currently seeking entries for this event; any animation that was done for money is fair game!

Submissions should be sent on DVD to:

ASIFA-Atlanta
410 Candler Park Dr #B3
Atlanta, GA 30307

Email me with questions: brett@fluidtoons.com

Bee Bog on Vimeo

I just noticed "Bee Bog" on Vimeo! It looks so much better than YouTube:


Bee Bog from bryab on Vimeo.

"Roll Yer Own" Re-Showing
June 25th at the Five Spot, 8pm, free! Come see independent Atlanta animation!





This is ASIFA-Atlanta's yearly showcase of local independent animation!

This is a re-showing of the same great independent animation from Atlanta that we showed on Memorial Day- a lot of people missed out because of the holiday (although the Five Spot was packed!!), so we're showing it again for more folks to see :)

The best films of the night will be sent all over the world as a part of the International Animation Day DVD exchange.

Review here:

jaycbird.blogspot.com/2008/05/roll-yer-own-2008.html

My brief review and four of the films viewable online:

fluidtoons.blogspot.com/2008/05/roll-yer-own-2008-was-awesome-wow.html

List of films:

"Roll Yer Own 2008 Intro" - Brett W. Thompson - Flash - 0:47
"Pullumo Arrives" - Solomon Mars - Flash - 4:50
"Sustainability 101" - Mark Smith - Flash - 5:00
"Code Monkey" - Jennifer Barclay - Flash - 3:20
"Knight vs Knight" - Thomas Riley - TI-86 Calculator - 1:41
"Global Warming is Your Fault" - Jerry Fuchs - Flash/Traditional - 1:30
"Hitler's Brain" - Count Lear Bunda - Stuff - 10:19
"Playtime" - Candice Ciesla - Flash/Traditional - 1:40
"Moviekiss: The Lite Brite Video" - Gina Niespodziani - Lite Brite - 4:57
"Bee Bog" - Bryan Fordney - Traditional - 2:50
"Special Delivery" - 3D - Taylor Pate - 2:02
"Farewell to Momentary Picture" - Laurence Laufer - 2D/3D/Trad - 5:48
"Maniacal" - Em Kempf - Stopmo/Traditional - 4:48
"Madagascar Taxi" - Albino Mattioli - Traditional - 1:26
"Words Won't Fail When Words Are Not Applied" - Gary Eddy - ToonBoom - 10:26
"A Mother Goose Tale" - Paige Adair - Flash - 2:05
"24 Frames" - Brad Patullo - Stopmo - 18:12
"Curtains" - Amanda Goodbread - Mixed - 2:54

Bryan Fordney posted "GETGOT" on Vimeo! It looks beautiful!


Getgot from bryab on Vimeo.

Roll Yer Own 2008 was awesome!!

Wow. I'm so proud of the filmmakers here in Atlanta. Roll Yer Own went great!!

Many many thanks to Karl Sigler for doing such a great job putting together the DVD. He even made copies for all the filmmakers!!

Here's a very thorough and excellently written review by our ASIFA-Atlanta Secretary, Jay:
http://jaycbird.blogspot.com/2008/05/roll-yer-own-2008.html

Here's my intro film; I did most of it in one very late night, and the next day had Sean come over and lend me his amazing voice:

"Roll Yer Own 2008 Intro"


And here's Em Kempf's brilliant film "Maniacal":

"Maniacal"


And Bryan Fordney's absolutely gorgeous "Bee Bog", which I LOVE!! Bryan is definitely one of my favorite independent animators, and he's also my friend :)

"Bee Bog"

Bee Bog from bryab on Vimeo.

Jennifer Barclay is ASIFA-Atlanta's webmaster, and she did this awesome video:

"Code Monkey"

8pm, Five Spot, free!

Independent animation from Atlanta!!

!

"Roll Yer Own 2008 Intro" - Brett W. Thompson - Flash - 0:47
"Pullumo Arrives" - Solomon Mars - Flash - 4:50
"Sustainability 101" - Mark Smith - Flash - 5:00
"Code Monkey" - Jennifer Barclay - Flash - 3:20
"Knight vs Knight" - Thomas Riley - TI-86 Calculator - 1:41
"Global Warming is Your Fault" - Jerry Fuchs - Flash/Traditional - 1:30
"Hitler's Brain" - Count Lear Bunda - Stuff - 10:19
"Playtime" - Candice Ciesla - Flash/Traditional - 1:40
"Moviekiss: The Lite Brite Video" - Gina Niespodziani - Lite Brite - 4:57
"Bee Bog" - Bryan Fordney - Traditional - 2:50
"Special Delivery" - 3D - Taylor Pate - 2:02
"Farewell to Momentary Picture" - Laurence Laufer - 2D/3D/Trad - 5:48
"Maniacal" - Em Kempf - Stopmo/Traditional - 4:48
"Madagascar Taxi" - Albino Mattioli - Traditional - 1:26
"Words Won't Fail When Words Are Not Applied" - Gary Eddy - ToonBoom - 10:26
"A Mother Goose Tale" - Paige Adair - Flash - 2:05
"24 Frames" - Brad Patullo - Stopmo - 18:12
"Curtains" - Amanda Goodbread - Mixed - 2:54

Omelet performs Brett W Thompson at New Street Gallery

I think I have the most amazing friends in the entire universe.

OMELET is playing again tonight at Bradley's House wooo!

Fwd: ASIFA-Atlanta recommends XPT

Here's an email I sent out to ASIFA-Atlanta:

----

Although it's not strictly animation, ASIFA-Atlanta thought you might be interested in hearing about XPT, Experimental Puppetry Theater.

XPT is always very creative and imaginative and shows that Atlanta is a hub for the art of puppetry. If you appreciate animation, you might like creative puppet performances too! :)

Additionally, our very own active ASIFA-Atlanta volunteers Wes Parham and Emily Tsuboi are in performances for XPT!

See http://www.puppet.org/perform/xpt08.shtml for details.

Here's the info, courtesy of Em Kempf:

THIS THURS THROUGH SUNDAY 

FOLKS!

XPERIMENTAL PUPPETRY 

THEATER!!!

@ The Center For Puppetry Arts

(ages 18 & up only!)

1404 Spring Street N.W. @ 18th...

May 15-18 

Thurs-Sat @ 8pm Sun. @ 5pm  

http://www.puppet.org/perform/xpt08.shtml

404.873.3391

Thanks so much!

-Brett W. Thompson, President of ASIFA-Atlanta

PS Don't forget about "Roll Yer Own" on May 26th (Memorial Day) at the Five Spot! :)

Rock and Roll Lawyer Episode 1: CheerleaderCab.com

A while ago I wandered into Fellini's on McLendon (I used to go there nearly every night and kind of miss that part of my daily routine; I got a lot of good drawing done while waiting for slices of pizza to eat). One particular night my good pals Chuck and Mack happened to be there. Mack worked on Sealab 2021, Frisky Dingo, and heads the band Attractive Eighties Women, a band you must see if you haven't already. Chuck and Mack were looking for people to audition for "Rock and Roll Lawyer"!

"Do you want to be an actor for us?" they asked.
I said, "Sure!"

At the time of shooting, I didn't think I did very well at all, but I want to hug whomever did the editing because they enhanced it a lot! Thank you, whoever did the editing! I have no formal training as an actor or in improv, so I was very worried and thought the performance was awkward but seeing it now I'm really happy I was part of this project :)

I play a slightly exaggerated/twisted version of myself, haha.

John Cason, who did the brilliant design for the Roll Yer Own flyer (May 26th at the Five Spot, come come come!!), also auditioned and was given a part!

Take a look and tell me what you think:



Many thanks to Chuck for posting the video and Kate McManus for telling me it was up- I think she liked it :) Like Chuck, she's in LA. Also a huge thanks to Erni Crews for introducing me to this group of friends- Erni's in LA too!! But she is ultimately from Jacksonville, FL (DUUUU-VAL!).

Here's the trailer for "Rock and Roll Lawyer"; John's the first guy you see, who shot a dog:



In other news, I might be doing a tiny bit of animation at work, which would be a dream come true! I'm also hoping to have something short done for Roll Yer Own but I've been having some trouble focusing lately.

Here's a tiny sample though:



That's all for now!

Two Links to Blog Posts, Brief NYC Trip Blurb

So thanks to the generosity of Charles Judson, Gabriel Wardell, and Dan Krovich (of IMAGE Film & Video who do the hard work of putting on the Atlanta Film Fesival, which is no small task), I got to do the filmmaker Q&A and a brief introduction to "Animation Extravaganza"! I particularly loved the Q&A part- asking filmmakers questions was fun!

My pal Jay stayed the whole time and wrote up an excellent review of the event. Thanks Jay! :) In fact he wrote reviews of every day of the entire fest. He's dedicated!

The other link I want to share with you is Tim Rauch's email to me turned blog post where he describes in fascinating detail his process behind his animated film Germans in the Woods. Tim is doing a series of these films based on StoryCorps which you might've heard on NPR. It's incredible- the story is a real (and intense) experience narrated by a real WWII veteran. I would love to show it at this year's Animation Attack... I can't wait to see more of these- the material Tim is working with is so heartfelt and it comes through in his drawings. Tim and his brother Mike have a page for their studio at rauchbrothers.com.

I had the pleasure of meeting Tim when I visited NYC and went to the ASIFA-East board meeting, thanks to the kindness of David Levy (ASIFA-East's awesome President). Thanks again ASIFA-East folks for being so welcoming! :)

I had a great time in NYC! Tim was one of several amazing folks I got to meet when I was up there. I also got to stop by Augenblick Studios briefly- they're working really hard on my new favorite series Superjail, created by the unbelievably talented Christy Karacas. We actually showed Christy's incredible films Space War and Bar Fight here in Atlanta at the 2007 Animation Attack, part of the Atlanta Underground Film Festival; they're two of my favorite shorts ever. Many many thanks to Aaron Augenblick, Christy Karacas, and Vanessa Riegel for their kindness!

I was SO excited to meet Aaron and Vanessa and Chris Conforti and several others at a bar in Brooklyn- all because of my good pal Stephen Schor, who gave me a couch to crash on and is good friends with Vanessa. In my mind he is a hero. The fact that Aaron liked my drawings meant so much to me. Maybe I'll post a picture or two another time!

That's it for now! Don't forget about Roll Yer Own! :)

I have been busy!

I'm now President of ASIFA-Atlanta. Joe Peery, our previous President, did an awesome job, and it's an honor to take over from him.

"Roll Yer Own" is coming up again! Please submit or come and watch! It's free! May 26th, Five Spot. I would venture to say it's the most important event for independent Atlanta animation so far. Beautiful flyer by John Cason:



Recently it was Bryan's birthday. I drew this for him on a two-by-two foot board, something I learned to do from Hand Job:



I drew two of Bryan's characters seen prominently in his masterpiece GETGOT. Can you spot them?

And somehow Emer got ahold of the piece momentarily at Estoria, resulting in this picture, which I freakin' LOVE. It's so perfect:



Also: come to the Atlanta Film Festival's "Animation Extravaganza", at Midtown Art Cinema, April 18th, 9:30pm! I might be handling the filmmaker Q&A.

Art Show at Tilt!

Pieces of art by me, Thom Foolery, and Jeffrey Lerner!



The opening is this Friday (1/25/08) and starts at 7pm or so. It'll be part of the Castleberry Hills art walk! Tilt is at 274 Walker St, across the street from Marcia Wood and Ty Stokes (Google Maps link).

Thanks soooo much to Annie for curating this show and making the flyer!

Warde Thing Cartoons, Art Show

I have an art show with Thom Foolery and Jeffrey Lerner at Tilt in Castleberry Hills on the 25th (it's part of the art walk!). I'll be posting a flyer once Annie at Tilt makes one. Annie curates shows there and made this one happen- thanks Annie!!!

Also, Ryan sent me two cartoons he just did, and I think he is a genius!! They're minimal but very beautiful and strange (a great combination!) cartoons. I really love his character designs, colors, and trippy neon backgrounds!!

He's been practicing drawing and I can see it! And he's always been really good with color and strange ideas!

What do you think, would you watch these on Adult Swim? I would- I really really love them!! :)

Warde Thang Cartoon #1, by Ryan



Warde Thang Cartoon #2, by Ryan

Upcoming Events!

Fun things that are happening soon!! I would love to see you come to any of these- I've helped make them happen (except Hoo Hah) and appreciate your support of course!

This Saturday, Eyedrum, 9pm: "Hoo Hah"! There will be a play, a fashion show, and two beautiful animated videos by my friend Kristin Jarvis- she is brilliant :)

My dear friend Jacqueline put this together, and the last event she threw at the Eyedrum ("Daddy, I Want a Pony") was incredible and is the only place in Atlanta I've seen an actual pony, so I won't be missing this one. More info here!

December 17th, Five Spot, 8pm: It's an ASIFA-Atlanta party! We'll be showing beautiful international animation we didn't get to show at the High because it came too late: France, China, and Argentina! I'm super excited about France particularly :) And the Floating Coats are going to play music!

Janurary 20th, Eyedrum, 9pm or so: Brandon's going to do his puppet show "The Horrible and Tortuous Report" (I did a tiny bit of animation for it) and my friend Andre's going to play music with Isia Cooper and Gary Eddy and some others- really beautiful music!

Feburary 19th, the Plaza, 7:30pm: Clay Croker, the voice of Zorak from Space Ghost and brilliant animator, has hand-picked twelve cartoons from his 16mm collection- all themed around Hitler! Don't miss "TO HELL WITH HITLER", it'll be awesome!

And last night I did live drawing at the Five Spot for Hand Job, an event from the mastermind of Mr. Thom Foolery! It was a blast, and you should come next month :) Sean Jarrett was kind enough to swing by and videotape the three of us drawing (it was myself, Chris Hamer of URBN-POP, and Ted Murphy of Adult Swim). We used my Dreamcast to let people play NES games on the projector while we drew and painted on stage. Photos here!

I also sold a piece last night! Woo! Here it is (I might be able to find a better picture):



Thanks for reading!

Polar Bear Sketch

So I'm working with my two extremely talented friends
Ryan and Bryan on a new cartoon. Ryan's designing the main character, a polar bear! He just posted some new drawings of the bear, and they're great!

Anyway, based on Ryan's drawing, I sketched the character before starting to work on the storyboards.




He's not perfect- he definitely looks a bit stiff, but he is kind of an uptight character. It felt SO good to finally put some time into working on a cartoon.

Thanks to Ryan for telling me to go ahead and post this sketch!

Sammi Shredd on CartoonBrew!!

Wow!!!

So you know the video I posted last entry? My pal Sammi got it on cartoonbrew.com, holy smoke!!

http://www.cartoonbrew.com/music-videos/tom-jerry-metal

SO cool! :D

Wow. My very talented friend Sammi Shredd used his powers of metal guitar to re-perform the soundtrack to a Tom and Jerry cartoon, it's amazing!

"Cat and Mouse"


More info here

He even did the sound effects, on his guitar! Eeee! :)

Edit: updated so the video's embedded. Also, my manager digs it, wow!!

The Chameleon, Part 1


Part 2: http://youtube.com/watch?v=sNAaHRwV_Bk
Part 3: http://youtube.com/watch?v=HMNS0GHuqPQ
Part 4: http://youtube.com/watch?v=3EnUpm9E8lA

I'm only in the first part but I find the whole thing amazing.

This was a blast to do!! Len took great care of me and Jed did a great job shooting and editing, and I loved working with Matt. It was pretty hot out and Matt and I ran quite a lot- at the end of the shoot I was exhausted, haha. If you see my mouth really wide open in any shots, that's because I'm trying to get more air! :)

We went and got smoothies afterwards which felt great.

This film was screened at a small theatre in Sarasota where Colby worked at the time.

I really love seeing my friends in it. Cameron is hilarious as a caveman (and a crazy future guy), and Catlan as The General really cracks me up- he does this really funny, gruff voice.

Thanks so much to Jed for posting this on YouTube!

Animation Attack!

Animation Attack!, part of the Atlanta Underground Film Festival, is tonight at Eastside Lougne and also this Saturday (8/25) at the Plaza, both at 9pm!!

We have some pretty incredible films lined up for you to see, so I encourage you to come if you don't have anything else to do :)

Tickets are $5 at Eastside Lougne. At the Plaza, it's $7 for adults, $6 for ASIFA-Atlanta members, and $5 for students.

I'm creating the DVD for tonight right now actually, hah!

Hope to see you there!!


Oh! Also, many many thanks to Eric, Bryan, Robert, Tak, Fatimah, Aaron, Blake, Karl, Alex, and all the filmmakers for making this possible! :)

"Everybody Knows Time Machines are a Bad Idea"


My dear friend Kevin Seeber wrote and directed this short play and asked me and a couple of my closest friends to be in it. "Everybody Knows Time Machines are a Bad Idea" was the first thing to be shown on the OAF stage, which previously had been a shed full of junk. Bobby Z and Kevin, who both appear in this video, put a lot of work in and made the shed into the "Slusher Street Theatre", which is still being used as a venue today!! (See http://myspace.com/oafhouse)

This was one of three plays shown to debut the theatre, a night called "Jerks in Progress".

I'm not that happy with my performance in this play but I absolutely LOVE watching my friends!! Sean Jarrett is particularly hilarious, and you can hear William Tucker laughing pretty often in the audience.

Hmm, the video sort of cuts off suddenly as well but to correct that I'd need to find and re-capture the original tape. Maybe sometime...

Thanks to Kevin for making this happen and Shahar for agreeing to film it for me at the very last moment.

My really good friend
Jeremy Van Doren (who also did "Playing with Power", in an earlier post) recently emailed me to tell me he had re-edited this short film, "Will it Bounce?". I really love what he did with it!! :)

I'm not sure if I remember exactly but I think we had gotten together to shoot stuff for "Playing with Power", and afterwards we decided to shoot this. It was really fun! I don't think there was a script really, I think Grant just came up with the idea and we went from there.

"Will it Bounce?"


Thanks for watching!! :)

That might be the last bit of video with me in it- I've got one more in mind I'd like to post but I don't have it at the moment (Jed does though).

I really haven't done that much film acting- you've seen almost all of it now if you've been reading the past entries :) I really enjoy it though and would love to do more. It seems like less work than animation- like, I'm always amazed at how easily you can get a bunch of footage, to me it's like a deluge of frames.

I'm very glad to be back in Atlanta; I went to an amazing circus art event thing at MJQ on Thursday. It was incredible, I saw lots of friends I needed to see (thanks to Amanda Goodbread for reminding me to go to that).

So the last post I talked about being in some films my friends made...

Well, this was the first one!! I was a freshman in college and my dear friend Jed was kind enough to ask me to be in this short skit. It felt great.

Jed works in film in LA now!

"Enter the Trash Room"



There are a couple things you get to see here: me as a younger person without a beard and the inside of our dorm, Gilchrist, where I lived for my first two years of college. The names on the door "Brett" and "Robert" were my name and Robert Hill's name, who went on to make really cool films of his own (he also makes great music!) in FSU's Media Production program.

Also!! ASIFA-Atlanta is putting on "Blowin' Smoke" at the Five Spot on July 23rd!

I will be there but will probably be tired from travel- I'm in Ireland right now for work, and it's beautiful here, but I'm flying back that same day as "Blowin' Smoke", hah.

It'll be fun though, an animation showcase of local commerical work.

Thanks for reading!

Sometimes my friends who make films ask me to act for them- this is extremely flattering, and I always wish I could do better at it, but I have no training. Anyway it's a lot of fun, I'd love to do more!

My character appears at about two minutes in the following promo. Chuck, one of the first people I met in Atlanta, asked me to be in. He's moved to LA now and got none other than Erni to edit it!! Holy smoke!

"Rock and Roll Lawyer"



And my dear friend Jeremy asked me to play a homeless man in this film, which we worked on towards the end of college. It was really really fun! I miss him, he's in Austin now.

"Playing with Power"



The first films I was ever in were by Jed Shoemaker but I can't find any of them online- hopefully someday!! I don't even have a big beard in some of them, how about that?

Man I need to post more!! Ryan's blog is very inspiring.

Here's my favorite kind of drawing to do:



ASIFA-Atlanta's "Blowin' Smoke", the showcase of local commercial animated work, will happen July 23rd at the Five Spot. It should be a lot of fun!!

Speaking of which I should post some pictures from "Roll Yer Own"!! Thanks SO much to everyone who showed up. It felt wonderful to hear people clap for my little, very short, animated piece that I'd rendered at like 4am that morning, whee! Seriously, it felt great to have that kind of support. One particular professional animator I really look up to said to me, "Another one to add to the classics!" which meant so much.

Once I finish the short piece that was in "Roll Yer Own", it'll be a part of Sean Jarrett's music film about his trip across the country.

Check out the ASIFA-Atlanta Google calendar: http://asifa-atlanta-calendar.notlong.com!

I believe the next workshop lecture will probably be about different ways to encode/render video. Last meeting was the AfterEffects tutorial. Website is here.

Got myself a light box, some pegs, and some paper- I was very inspired by Bryan's setup! I had Bryan and Ryan over yesterday and Bryan showed us some traditional technique which we were very excited about.

Maybe it's backwards that I'm wanting to move towards traditional when everyone else is moving to Flash, which I've used for years now? Paper feels so good to draw on, though!! :) It couldn't hurt I suppose.

Oh! I went to the Yo-Yo show last night and saw a bunch of amazing local animator artists there. And my friend Adam on theremin!!! I didn't get to talk to anyone as long as I wanted but if I saw you there, please know that I was very happy to see you (Corey, Todd, Thom, Amber, Porkchop, Penney, Stephanie, Adam.... I didn't run into Mike unfortunately but I know he was there). And I got to meet Pierre, how about that?? :)

I do need to write in here more. Thanks for reading!

I drew this a couple days ago in my small sketchbook. Allison at Fellini's took a look at it earlier tonight and said she liked how thirsty the guy with the long tongue must be, out there in the desert! Hah!

Ooooo Ryan started a blog!!! I love his drawings so much!!

http://okapifigmentdroll.blogspot.com/

I drew this at a party last night! I left my sketchbook in my car but grabbed a paper plate:

The flash took out the background for me! :) I gave it to Carol, who's in Routines with William (see it at the Eyedrum May 24 to 26!)

My close friend and producer Steve Sharkey visited this weekend which was awesome. We partied with William; it was great.

Excellent Animation Workshop meeting tonight! Finally got to see Lee Crowe's demo reel, yay!

Ooooo my friend Ryan updated his website:

http://eshninerforest.org/

Check out his music and art!

http://eshninerforest.org/art13.htm

We're planning on making a cartoon together in the next year or so.

I drew this in the moleskine Karl gave me for Christmas! :) I started drawing in it after my sketchbook (and some other stuff in my backpack including storyboards, ergh) got stolen out of my car in the parking lot of R. Thomas. Always put your backpacks in the truck, kiddies!

Also, Roll Yer Own deadline has been extended to May 11th.

Quite unhappy with PowerDVD and WinDVD, earlier tonight I found AVS DVD player which lets you framestep forward and backward (hit 'Y' and 'U'; I love this!!). Looney Tunes are really, really fun to frame by frame!!

Geez it's been so long since I've posted much! Well here's an umbrella piece I did for Mint! It did not sell. Perhaps I should price my art lower (my good buddy Aaron's $5 pieces sold quickly, woo!).


The red one's mine :) The beautiful outfit that's on display was made by my friend Jacqueline!

Here's a closer look:


I gave it to Amanda for her birthday, yay!

More posts soon. Hopefully.