Daily post 16 Oct 2006 07:51 am
Links d’Animation
- Here are a couple of animation links I came across:
. There’s a web site devoted to the work of Glen Keane that includes many pencil tests from his scenes as well as many drawings and model sheets.
. An animated film produced for the Vatican tells the life story of Pope John Paul II. Here’s the Catholic.net version of the story.
It was produced by the Spanish animation company, Cavin Cooper Productions.
José Luis López-Guardia was the producer/director.
To see the trailer for the film go here.
It isn’t Pope John Paul on the left but “Silver” from Treasure Planet. (Click to enlarge.)
. There’s a direct link to some of the images at the Disney exhibit in Paris at the Galeries Nationales du Grand Palais. This looks to be an interesting show; one presumes since a lot of the influences are also apparently on display.
The 360 page catalogue is in French and on sale on line here.
. To get as far away from Disney as possible, there’s an extended article about Run Wracke and the peculiarly interesting and unsettling film, Rabbit. It’s an unsettling reworking of the Dick and Jane readers as the two kids display lots of greed and maliciousnous in the
8½ min short.
A clip from the film’s opening can be seen on the “Recent Work” section of Run Wracke‘s site.
Firoz (in current comments) left this link to the entire film:
on 17 Oct 2006 at 4:20 pm 1.Daniel Thomas said …
Am I wrong to believe that the Pope John Paul II film is a Flash cartoon? Booo. There’s no way I’m sitting through an hour-long Flash animation. I’m a great fan of Homestar Runner, but a Strong Bad email only lasts a few minutes.
I appreciate how Flash has democratized animation, making it possible for so many people on the street level to create their own works. There’s a certain Ramones, CBGB’s influence (CBGB’s, sob) to it all. Bringing art to the masses can only be a good thing. But there’s so much in Flash that looks cheap, particularly in its limited color palettes and frame rates, especially when using pans and zooms.
You see flash animation taking over on television, and you worry about how the never-ending stampede to lower costs will take its toll on the animation artform. Quality animation requires a level of time and dedication. It requires you to spend more than a couple dollars on the tools.
While I’m happy to see Flash bring animation to everyone, I never want to see the skills of the true artists suffer. John K. rants on this subject often enough, and he’s infintely more qualified to speak on the subject than me.
On the other end of the scale, the Rabbit short is skillful, clever, and more than a little twisted. It’s a great use of pop art and storybook cliches. This kind of cynical deconstruction is common among my generation, so I’m a little skeptical whenever I encounter it, but in Rabbit, it works.
on 17 Oct 2006 at 4:58 pm 2.Michael said …
Daniel,
That’s a great posting. I absolutely agree with you re Flash animation and sometimes wonder if I’m not declaring myself an old fogey because of my dislike of the tool. It undercuts all animation and brings the artists back to the 1915-20′s. It’s dispiriting that all of the great methods developed at Disney’s et al in the 30′s are disappearing because of cheap intimate tools that give the untrained a chance to call themselves animators.
MS
on 18 Oct 2006 at 4:03 pm 3.Firoz said …
The full version of Rabbit can be seen on the BBC’s Film Network site:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/filmnetwork/A11607040