Animation Nation

Today on the Forums, our webmaster Adrian (Skynet) started a topic that featured an animated story about Pixar's Secret Room. Some studios have secret rooms. I've had the distinct privilege of spending time in the secret room of a local studio here in the Burbank area, and I'd really like to tell the tale and share the photos I have, but it's a secret and I'd compromise the faith and confidence of my hosts if I did. You're welcome to view the video below and learn about how Pixar's Secret Room came about. You're also welcome to follow the link to the Forum topic and enjoy other animated stories about life at Pixar.

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Check out this incredibley beautiful 2D-animated trailer for "Siegfried", an amazing project soon on its way from Archaia Entertainment. It was produced by Pendragon Imageforge and directed by Alex Alice to promote his ambitious graphic novel trilogy that is inspired by the Richard Wagner operatic cycle, "The Ring of the Nibelung." It will finally be coming out in English this summer. This trailer is the official English debut announcement that was brought to us today through this Forum topic.

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You can also see a fip through of the Siegfried graphic novel in this video...

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Inspired while driving near Palm Springs, California, "The Windmill Farmer" was created at the UCLA Animation Workshop. It took Joaquin Baldwin 4 months to finish from the first boards until the final mix. Music is by Nick Fevola. The film was completed in 2010.

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Daran Carlin-Weber of Edinboro, Pennsylvania is working on an animated pilot for a passion project of his called "Summer Rec". He's initiated a Kickstarter campaign for it to raise money for the voice actors and other crew, with a goal is $7,500 by June 7, 2012. There's a good looking 45-second finished preview of the episode viewable to everyone, and for a donation of as little as $1 you can watch the full 14-minute animatic.

Here's the Kickstarter campaign for 'Summer Rec' along with the trailer for the project...

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This past May 7 just 10 days ago, I posted here on AN's homepage an entry concerning David Wolter's film "Eyrie" which was nominated as a finalist for the Student Academy Awards by The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Happy to report that David's film was one of 3 winners in the animation category. He hails from the character animation program at Cal Arts, and he also spent time at The Animation Academy in Burbank prior to that. The other two are "The Jockstrap Raiders" by Mark Nelson of UCLA and "My Little Friend' by Eric Prah of the Ringling College of Art and Design in Sarasota, Florida.

Let's revisit David Wolter's Eyrie, and also feature some video concerning Mark Nelson's film, The Jockstrap Raiders. Video for Eric Prah's film is not available online at this time, but you can visit his blog here. Congratulations to all 3 winners!

Eyrie by David Wolter...

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Mark Nelson discusses The Jockstrap Raiders...

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You don't often hear about someone with no experience in animation, deciding to take it upon themselves to produce a movie single handedly, but that's what Danny Brady has done. A music writer / producer, he started teaching himself how to make animated films in 2008 and kept on going. Today, he's amassed over 200 minutes of content, enough for a 2 DVD set of his project called "Chapel Street". Danny tells his production tale on this Forum topic. Take a look at the trailer for his unique film...

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Einav Deri has come a long way since I first met her. She was a beginning student in Character Design in September 2009 at The Animation Academy in Burbank with a lot to learn. Since then she's gone on to become a rising star in the animation world. Take a look at her before and after work here. 

A graduate of the Israeli Animation College and a Character Designer at Snowball VFX Animation Studio in Tel Aviv, she's on to new and exciting things. Einav has recently worked on three major animated TV commercials through Snowball. She designed the characters, some of the props and many of the background elements. Here's one of the commercials, which has her unique design look through it all. You can also follow Einav's blog to see more of her work.

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Located in London, Three Blind Mice is a studio that specializes in Concept Work, Storyboarding, Mood Films, 3D Animation and Animatics. In fact, they've created a video that describes their animatic production process. Three Blind Mice is a team of very talented artists who service the advertising market in the UK with their professional creative endeavors. The video was brought to our attention through a post in AN's Gallery. Designed and animated by Sam Burton and George Coffey, it also features music by Francis Sevier, Sound Design by Factory Studios, and the Narrated Voice Over skills of Simon Gregor. Check it out...

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Stash 92 drops a full three hours of extraordinary content including detailed production notes on 33 new animation and VFX projects, plus 11 insightful Behind the Scenes features, exclusive interviews, the newest advanced training course from Digital Tutors, and 10 downloadable music tracks from Zagreb drum and bass producer Beat Gates. Learn more about what's happening with the latest issue of Stash by heading to the Forum topic. You can subscribe, advertise and submit content to Stash as well by following the links provided. You can also get free 30 day access to Stash. Meanwhile, enjoy a peek at what Stash 92 has to offer...

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If you like hand drawn animation, you'll enjoy this video. It's the first year film project from Jared Liffreing, a student at Cal Arts in Valencia, California. Jared posted links to his film in AN's Gallery. I think it would be a nice addition and a change of pace to feature it on our home page.

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