Michael Sporn Animation – Splog

Here are some bits I’d like to point out.

- The NYTimes has posted the most recent of Jeff Scher’s monthly videos for them. The piece, entitled You Won’t Remember This Either, is a followup to one he posted a year ago, You Won’t Remember This. The first film was a portrait of his son, Buster, from the first week of life to the time he was a couple of years old. The second film chronicles Oscar, his second son’s toddler life. Both present excellent capsules.

This idea (following the early years of an animator’s child) has been done a number of times – usually with excellent results. I think, immediately, of Al Jarnow ‘s study of the first year in his child’s life. That child, Jesse, is now grown up, is an artist in his own right, and has his own blog which features some of his dad’s films.

I also have to comment that the music for Jeff Scher’s films is by Shay Lynch, and it’s extraordinary. I think I listened to the new piece at least a dozen times for the music alone.

- In 2001, I did the film Mona Mon Amour with illustrator/designer Patti Stren. Now she has her own blog established with the help of designer Santiago Cohen. There you can see glimpses of many of the books she’s written and illustrated. You can also see the film Mona Mon Amour in its entirety.

While making this film I thought this was very funny material we were animating. I was surprised at the local screenings (of mostly animation-types) who didn’t laugh at all. I shrugged my shoulders and accepted that what I found funny didn’t work with others. Then, years later, it screened at MOMA as part of my retrospective. The audience – of mostly people I didn’t know – laughed loudly enough that it was hard to hear some of the jokes. You never can tell.

This same thing happened with Doctor Desoto. When I finished that film, I was sure it was a gem and people would laugh. A small screening I arranged didn’t bring a smile. I accepted the fact that I’d misgauged the humor. I put the film away from my view and sent it off to some festivals. The first time I saw it on a big screen was at the Toronto Animation Festival (the Ottawa Fest had briefly moved to Toronto). The audience laughed loud and long. The film won a lot of awards. You just can’t tell.

- A blog I happened to view, this week, was Lorelei Pepi‘s blog about the making of her film, Happy & Gay. There she offers some pencil test, some finished film and a lot of information about the making of. The bits I’ve seen make me interested in seeing the final. It seems to be a bit of The Whoopee Party, with a 2009 bent.

- A film maker whose work I’ve always loved is Karen Aqua. I am always reminded of this whenever I come across one of her films. The joy of the internet comes in tripping across a website like hers – one I happened to thanks to Lorelei’s blog. Karen’s an attractive site which really gives a good view of her film work. I have to say it was a real disappointment at the last couple of festivals I attended when I didn’t see her film. I’m sure she enters them into all of the fests, but there seems to be a limited perspective these days. Anyting that doesn’t wreak of bawdy, childish humor doesn’t make it. This is one of the positives of the ASIFA East festival. Many films you’d not see in other festivals get screened there. That’s the last time I’d seen one of Karen’s films projected, and we had the chance to talk at the after-party.

Speaking of the ASIFA-East festival, there was a time when their festival used to be held on the last Thursday of every January. Many times we had to trudge through snow to get to the screening/party. It was finally decided to move the date to May – usually Mother’s Day – to allow us to have better weather. Unfotunately, I miss that animation party in January. The holidays are over and we’re back to normalcy. For me, there’s a hole left in the end of January.

GOMotion Magazine is offering a free PDF download of the articles in their first issue.

This is a new animation magazine with lots of material to view and read. The focus is primarily cg animation, but if you’re a Kung Fu Panda fan, there’s lots to read.

There’s also other material to explore on their site. One assumes as they produce more issues the site, alone, will grow. Worth checking out.

Hopefully, they’ll also put a little focus on some Independent animators.

- Finally, let me direct you to Hans Perk‘s site A Film LA, in case you’ve grown out of the habit of checking it out. Having posted many drafts and documents for us already, Hans is now posting the draft to The Sword In The Stone.

This, to me, is one of the under rated features done in the late-Disney period. There’s a liveliness, an energy racing through the film that is just exciting. Most animation geeks point to the Wizard’s Duel as the highlight, but the opening sequence in which Wart meets Merlin is magical to me, and the squirrel sequence is so wholly original and beautifully animated that it should be on everyone’s study list. The film offers a lot.

Now with the drafts, the study becomes easy. Thanks, Hans.

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