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Cartoon Brew 3.0 is Here!

Folks in love with animation have numerous places to congregate on the web. However, none seems to rally the people like Cartoon Brew. It’s hard to believe that it’s been around for over six years now and my how it has changed.

The site started off as mostly a news/opinion blog co-authored by Jerry Beck and Amid Amidi. Why they decided on calling it a "Brew" I do not know, however it is fair to say that both gentlemen bring some really contrasting posts and commentary that is always welcome.

Over the years, the site has undergone periodical redesigns and updates that have helped keep things looking fresh. However, it is with this latest version that the Brewmasters as they are affectionately called, have upped the ante.

Their latest efforts have hit the right spot alright. The site has garnered a community of sorts over the years with a pool of regular commentors (yours truly included) but besides the daily posts and the odd competition, there wasn’t really anything about to serve the sites community bar a serious discussion in the comments.

All that has changed however! With the latest update, the site now boasts many more features designed to pull Cartoon Brew even close to the center of the animation universe on the web. There is now a series of rolling industry headlines, a series of top posts, and of course, the obligatory latest tweets. These are taken from the Brew’s animators directory that encompasses a wide range of folks from the community. We are promised that the list will change as appropriate. Is there a possibilty that I might get on there one day? Perhaps, a man can dream can’t he? Anyway, the list is a fantastic place to see the various happenings and goings on from folks in the industry.

In addition to these changes, the commenting system has been upgraded to allow threaded commenting and ratings too! The threaded commenting adds greatly to the idea of the site as a community. No longer will I seem to be replying blindly to other posts; I can now engage in discussion!

Two other items of note include the repositioned CBTV (currently in the midst of a so-far fascinating student film festival) and the surprise addition of CB Live! Of course, the Brewmasters have always been forthcoming in publicising events that they either organize or are attending, but this section is specifically for events organized and branded as Cartoon Brew-related. This is perhaps the biggest indication so far that the site does indeed have a real, living community of fans outside the web. I am very much looking forward to seeing what kind of events are in the pipeline, especially any on the East Coast.

Much lauded, Cartoon Brew continues to garner the type of following that only such hard work and dedication from its Brewmasters can bring. Version 3.0 will certainly continue the site’s growth as a center for news, commentary and informed discussion on all things animation that remains unparalleled on the net.

Jumping Back Into the Fire

I’m jumping back into the fire again, God help me this time around what with work, school, weddings, Gaelic football and all rolled into the upcoming month!

There were plenty of exciting animation news announced while I was off. In case you missed them, here is a short list:

• Cartoon Brew 3.0 launched (there are some very exciting developments this time around that I will post about very shortly)
• The San Diego Comic-Con (no I’m not going, but that doesn’t mean I can’t have an opinion!)
• Cartoon Network begins developing original content in the Arabian peninsula
• Scott Pilgrim Vol. 6 released (it’s not animation and I haven’t received my copy yet, but dammit, it’s the final book in an awesome series)

I also have a few ideas knocking around that i would like to post about but, but right now, the noggin is kinda fried as a result of a long day combined with pizza and ice-cream. See you tomorrow.

Reminder: The Secret of Kells Outdoor Screening Tomorrow Night

Just a reminder to anyone even close to New York City that The Secret of Kells will be shown outdoors at the fancy sounding Socrates Sculpture Park as part of their 2010 season tomorrow night (July 14th). The event is organized by Rooftop Films, who basically do exactly what it says on the tin, showing films on rooftops!

As you should already know, The Secret of Kells is my absolute favourite animated film of the last couple of years and not just because it’s Irish! The film has had huge success in the US considering that it has received almost no promotion bar word of mouth!

This is an excellent opportunity to experience a wonderful film in an un usual place. Things kickoff at 7:00pm with live music before the film’s screening at 8:30pm.

Additional info can be found here.

THE SECRET OF KELLS – FREE SHOW
A free screening of this Academy Award nominated animated feature film
on the lawn at Socrates Sculpture Park in Long Island City, Queens. A
surprise Oscar nominee for Best Animated Film, THE SECRET OF KELLS
follows the adventures of 12-year old Brendan on a dangerous mission
to help complete a magical illuminated manuscript. Almost entirely
hand-drawn, this dazzling film, made in the iconic style of medieval
art, is a gorgeous antidote to the familiar style of today’s digital
animation.
http://www.rooftopfilms.com/2010/schedule/50-the-secret-of-kells

WHERE:
On the grass along the water at Socrates Sculpture Park
3134 Vernon Blvd. (Long Island City, Queens)

WHEN:
7:00 Live Music
8:30 Film Begins

Holiday Hiatus

Yes, I’ve finally slaved away at the office for long enough to be allowed a holiday. Don’t expect any posts in the next fortnight or so unless I discover something really interesting on my travels. 🙂

Of Mice and Magic

Cartoon Brew is pointing out that Leonard Maltin’s fabulous book, Of Mice and Magic is 30 years old. I must try and pick up a copy for myself.

Roger Ebert's Comments on The Last Airbender and Animation

It’s been established that I don’t really like film critics. It’s not a personal thing, for the most part, I tend to disagree with the way they review things. Having said that, I do hold certain ones in high regard, Roger Ebert being one of them. He’s pretty much seen everything at this point so he knows what he’s talking about when he says a film is pants. That’s not to say that you too will find it horrible, heck, he only gave one thumb up to How to Train Your Dragon and I absolutely loved it!

I am not certain whether or not Ebert is partial to animation or not, suffice to say that he does review almost all animated films being widely released. However, he is spot on with his review of The Last Airbender. He nails the movie itself, but his commentary on why it shouldn’t have been live-action hits the bullseye.

Leaving aside his thoughts on 3-D, the actors and the script, Ebert dives straight to what he sees a a fatal decision on behalf of the producers:

The first fatal decision was to make a live-action film out of material that was born to be anime. The animation of the Nickelodeon TV series drew on the bright colors and "clear line" style of such masters as Miyazaki, and was a pleasure to observe.

I tend to agree. Animated TV shows normally have a tough enough time succeeding on the big screen in animated form. To ask them to simultaneously make the jump to live-action is beyond even the best cartoons and Avatar is no exception.

Ebert declares his admiration for the clean, anime-influenced style of the cartoon. While it didn’t exactly set the animated world on fire, the show did draw deserved praise for its clever mixture of western animation skills and eastern looks. To the best of my knowledge, you can’t do something similar with live-action, unless of course your name is Quentin Tarantino.

Ebert also notes:

"It’s in the very nature of animation to make absurd visual sights more plausible. "

Which is why we can relate to a family with yellow skin and a talking sponge among other things. However, when taken to live-action, it is a tall task to ask audiences to accept circumstances and settings as being real. Sure we know they aren’t, but at least in animation we don’t expect them to be, in live-action we do. And no matter how technically perfect they appear, they still don’t seem real.

Would an animated version of The Last Airbender have been a better idea? Perhaps. It would certainly appeal to more fans of the original show and I am certain that it would not age as much as this new film surely will (think how old Lord of the Rings is starting to look, despite the bleeding edge technology that it used during production). As Ebert notes at the end of his review:

This material should have become an A-list animated film.

Except it isn’t. Let’s remember that animated films of animated TV shows make much more sense than live-action drivel.

Anomaly Appraisal: Neighbors From Hell

Yes, this is a tad late but I would rather have to wait and watch it online than cough up for cable every month. There were a few somewhat scathing reviews put out in advance of the show’s premiere a few weeks ago, namely in Variety, where the reviewer pretty much shot it down before it even left the gate. Not here though, oh no. On this blog we believe in positive criticism and looking on the bright side of life and all that.

FIrst of all, the setting: a family of demons get sent to Texas to stop a giant drill from getting all the way to hell. So far so ordinary. The twist is that what the Hellmans see on the surface simply does not compare to what they do underneath. It’s far worse!

The first episode is so clearly a pilot episode. There is the standard introduction of characters, the monologue about why they are where they are and of course, a convenient plot that introduces the audience to the setting and ancillary characters. It’s a pilot, so there’s not point getting too worked up over the plot. Every show must have an introductory episode of some sort and the producers here clearly decided to do that straight out of the gate. Nothing wrong with that, but it does not provide the best platform on which to measure a series.

The music in the show is rather standard fare really. There is nothing remarkable about it except to say that yes, it does contain some heavy metal. If it didn’t, I would have a lot of questions about a show supposedly centred on a bunch of folks from hell.

The animation was done using Toon Boom software, which I posted about waaay back when. It certainly provides for a much higher standard of animation than flash although it stil falls short of true hand-drawn animation. That’s not a problem though. The animation is remarkably smooth and certainly does not suffer from the jerk, puppet-like movements that flash is so susceptible to.

The character design is pretty darn good actually. There are plenty of cable shows where nickel and diming has resulted in character designs that look like they only got one pass through the saw and skipped the finishing table altogether. The designs are split into two groups: The Hellmans and everyone else. The family seems to fit in despite the fact that they are green.

Each character is only a small bit stylized and whose design most certainly matches their character. Therefore we have the father with his jacket, the mother with a somewhat attractive red dress, the daughter in dressed prim and proper (although this belies her demeanour) and the son in a T-shirt.

Pazuzu is perhaps the most interesting, mainly because he doesn’t really look like a goblin, more of a wild-eyed boisterous dog. His wide eyes and huge grin suggest a character that really is Balthazar’s best friend.

The characters are your usual nuclear family. The oafish father Balthazar tries his best his best to do right for his family as well as his wife. He gets in trouble with the boss, he betrays his best friend (a goblin named Pazuzu) and has plenty of pop-culture references in his catapult. He’s a likeable fellow overall.

His wife, Tina, is a somewhat more interesting character. Despite being a housewife, she is easily superior to her husband. She is driven and more than capable of fulfilling her own ambitions.

The daughter, Mandy, has the coolest head in the family. She is not above using violence against her brother though and is especially skilled at getting people to do her bidding. The son, Josh is your standard teenage boy. He’s always up to mischief and getting himself into awkward situations. It is hinted that he has a temper a well.

Much remains to be seen as to whether the characters become as richly developed as their backgrounds suggest. A common problem I find with the likes of Family Guy and more recently The Simpsons, is that hardly any episodes are devoted to the kids and their development. For the most part, they are fill in characters that come and go as needed but are rarely seen to have their own lives with their own problems. Hopefully later in the season, we will see a few episodes where the kids get a chance to mature as characters.

A character of note is Satan, if only for his voice-actor, the very funny Steve Coogan. It’s fantastic to hear him again, especially as he is hardly ever seen outside the UK. For those that don’t know, Steve is one of the funniest comedians of the last 20 years and created one of the most memorable characters to grace TV screens in Alan Partridge. He adds an awful lot to the character of Satan which in turn made the show much more enjoyable (at least for me).

Overall, I liked the show. It’s not the most fantasic animated TV show ever made (because that is currently airing over on Comedy Central and is back to what it does best) although it deserves to succeed on tbs. Could the jokes be improved a wee bit? Sure. They stray dangerously close to the gratuitous at time, I mean c’mon, do we really need to see horses going at it? The allusion should be more that enough for the viewer to get the message. Humour like that suggests a lack of finesse and the easy way out. It may be good for a cheap laugh onec, but it does not stand up during repeated viewing (for the most part).

Neighbors From Hell is a show thatis trying to prove that animation can indeed be marketed to adults. It deserves to succeed in that regard. I recommend you watch it at least once.

Animation and Civil Engineering: The Similarities and the Differences

As you may (or may not have noticed), I am not an animator. Never have and have never really had any desire to be one either. Why I have such a deep passion for animation is still beyond me. I suppose my response to the question why cartoons has always been the same as Frederator’s: "Because we like cartoons. They’re fun." They are fun and I like fun things, so that makes perfect sense.

Not being an animator means I must be something else. Which is true. I am in fact, a civil engineer by trade. Do you know a civil engineer? I doubt it. We can be a very boring bunch at times, in fact civil engineering has been considered the most boring of the engineering professions. So I guess that’s the first difference between animation and civil engineering: only one is exciting!

I suppose another difference is that animation allows folks to work on personal projects in their spare time. Sure a couple of my lecturer’s in college did some moonlighting on the side, but for the most part civil engineers don’t do much civil engineering outside of work. Animators on the other hand are more than able to indulge in personal projects after hours. As I’ve mentioned before, animators can do much more than just animation and I certainly admire them for that. I on the other hand can’t exactly go out and design my own road or bridge or whatever late at night and show off to the public upon completion!

The other difference is that civil engineers generally become professional. In other words, they’re skills are recognized by a professional organization. Besides, it’s required in just about every country around the world that as an engineer, you must pass a proficiency test to ensure that you know what you are doing. We’ve had enough examples of engineering oopsies with the likes of Tacoma Narrows. Of course, those were signed off on by a registered engineer, not a guy barely three years out of school! Animation on the other hand, has no such professional recognitions. Sure the union may recognize experience in their pay scale, and promotion to a more senior position is surely a sign of your talents. But there is no yardstick by which these skills are measured. This is surely because as an artform, animation skills vary greatly between individuals. Some may get it right straight out of school, such as Pendleton Ward with Adventure Time. Others can take a couple of years to get there such as Larry Huber with ChalkZone. Yeah I know, he isn’t an animator, but the same logic applies.

There is not much point in focusing too much on the differences. Both professions after all allow folks to earn a living and pursue a rewarding career. So what are the similarities? Well, I’m going out on a limb here, so if you see any mistakes, please feel free to comment.

The first is school. Many students study animation not so much to learn the necessary skills, but to learn how to use them effectively. School plays a very important role, in fact a necessary one for civil engineers. The days of getting hired and working your way up are practically over. Today, a Bachelors degree is a key requirement to getting hired. Animation is similar for the most part. A degree in animation can certainly help you land a job and schools more often than not give students the resources to create their own projects in addition to their schoolwork. I have seen a good few examples of student’s schoolwork helping them launch a career for themselves afterward. In fact, Cartoon Brew is currently holding their first ever student film festival and so far, the results have been fantastic.

Another similarity, is that both professions undertake paid work that is for other parties. In my case it is often for the state of federal government. I do the work, I get paid for it and they take the finished product and do what they need to do with it. Animation is very similar, especially if one works in a studio on a production either for the studio itself or its client. At the end of the day though, it is exciting for both to see the finished product, be it a TV show, feature film or the W-beam crash barrier you put in front of the light pole.

The most important similarity is networking. I can’t emphasize it enough. I know in civil engineering oyu can land a job based on your merits, but you stand a much, much better chance if you know somebody. Why this is, I cannot say. I kinda wish more was placed on what skills you have, but we are humans after all and as such we’re a very social, personal bunch. That’s not to say that you have to be part of an old boys club, oh no. As with animation, networking can open many opportunities that you otherwise would not have known about. Perhaps someone you know casually mentions that a position has opened up at their firm and they think you would be a good fit for the job. Or someone you know needs you to give them a reference or vice versa. In both civil engineering and animation, there are many events that you can meet new people. Professional organizations in both areas are a great starting point and also help you connect with people who have similar interests to yourself.

So there you have it. Civil engineering and animation. Two professions that may appear far apart at first, but actually have plenty in common.

The Economist on Pixar's Long Term Plans

I subscribe to The Economist, yes that one, the same "adult magazine" that Homer Simpson subscribes to. In last week’s issue, the regular column Schumpter discussed Pixar and the different way that Ed Catmull and John Lasseter had set the company up so as to ensure it would live on after they had left. I highly encourage you to read the article first, I’ll wait :).

Back? Great. The article is pretty straightforward in its analysis and the point it makes is an important one. Both Catmull and Lasseter have been the guiding force behind the studio for a long time and to an extent so has Steve Jobs, although that is not surprising seeing as he owned it for a long time.

There are many similarities between Apple and Pixar beside Mr. Jobs. Both companies are extremely product focused. Both believe that if they put enough effort in the will be rewarded with consumer acceptance. This is true to some extent but I can’t help but feel that right now, both companies are running on flywheel inertia: Pixar with its slate of upcoming sequels and Apple with the slight upgrade to the IPhone software. Dreamworks has proven that they too can make solid, entertaining films and other mobile phone companies have upped the ante recently with the latest group of Android powered phones.

What worries me though is how well the setup at Pixar will last. The article mentions the collaborative environment in Emeryville and how a lot of effort is put into fostering projects from the ground up rather than the top down. I’m sure Pixar is in Emeryville for a reason, being a tad less than arms reach from Burbank. However, physical separation does not mean a lot if the people calling the shots are not from there. Sure right now Lasseter is, but once he retires, where will his replacement come from? I doubt it is from Pixar.

All this effort to set up a different system may be for nought if Pixar continues with sequels. I am not sure whether the plan is to increase the size of the studio or keep it as it is, putting out one film a year or so. Dreamworks have upped their rate to three films a year, which may be more sustainable for what Jeffrey Katzenburg wants.

I have similar worries about Google. Sure right now, Larry Page and Sergey Brin are keeping an eye on the privacy aspects of the business (albeit somewhat unevenly) but once they are gone, what will happen then once the people running the show no longer have a personal interest in the company or its users?

We’ll see how things play out. I don’t want to do too much crystal ball gazing. Both John Lasseter and Ed Catmull deserve a lot of credit for building Pixar into a strong studio with a solid brand of work ethic that has ensured that every single film they have put out has been a success, not just in box office numbers, but on the story and visual side of things too.