Animation Nation

The movie is opening this Friday, August 5, 2011. Although it is a live action film, all of the apes in this retooling of the original classic are CG animation. Every one of them. It's remarkable that no apes were used in its production, as I understand from interviews I've listened to recently, considering how realistic they appear to be in most of the scenes.

Here's the trailer for Rise of the Planet of the Apes. Follow the link to the AN Forum topic for more.

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Not many people realize this, but the great comic actor Jim Carrey made his first major appearance in entertainment in a 1984 sitcom called "The Duck Factory". It was a short lived series, but historic in its content and made a memorable impact on me when it aired.  

The series took place in an animation studio that was having troubled times. It reflected in many ways the issues that were going on in the animation scene in Los Angeles back then, as major transitions were taking place that would put it on track for what's happening in our current day.

Here's the first part of the pilot episode. To view the rest of it, follow this link to the topic on the AN Forums.

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I've been interested in the animated music videos posted on YouTube by YourFavoriteMartian. I discovered them in February with a video called Zombie Love Song and have since become a fan of not only the novelty of the animation, but the fact that a link to iTunes concludes the video and offers viewers an opportunity to purchase the song.

These videos are the clever work of  Ray William Johnson. When they come out on YouTube, they immediately go to the top of YT's Most Viewed Videos. In fact, when Robot Bar Fight was uploaded just three days ago, it's since had 2,553,584 views as of this writing. Follow the link to the AN Forums as I'll be updating the community as to the number of views the video gets. Meanwhile, enjoy Robot Bar Fight. 

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Adrian Foster (Skynet on the Forums) is AN's Webmaster and highly skilled at finding unusual animation that you don't often see or hear about in mainstream venues. Another reason why AN is unique. He's been maintaining our Video Gallery for a couple of years now.

Lately Adrian's been developing a topic on the forums dedicated to the animated films of Ivan Maximov, a Russian animator whose work is highly intriguing. Here's the latest that Skynet has posted. It's called 'Tunnellage' and was produced in 2005.

To view more of Ivan Maximov's work, follow the link to the topic on the AN Forums.

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Big news today in the animation world, as the early 1990s TV series 'Biker Mice From Mars' is in line to be produced as a feature film. This is all the more exciting as I know of, met, or worked with just about everyone involved with this situation. From the artist who originally developed the show, to The Gang of Seven, whose deal with China and a $100 million production fund is making this possible.

AnimationNation from its inception 12 1/2 years ago, was at its core a movement to involve artists at levels that were previously unknown to us. Artists able to function at an executive level.  The Gang of Seven and the Biker Mice movie deal is further proof that a new age has arrived in our industry. Read more about this breaking news at AN's General Discussion Forums.

One of our newest members to the AN Forums as posted their first animated music video, created in a pixelart technique emmulating an old school arcade game. Raynoa is from Russia and has also included screen shots from the video on the topic in the AN Gallery.

Here's the video for all to enjoy.

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A new trailer from Warner Bros for "Happy Feet Two" went online today. Here it is...

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Follow this link to the AN Forums to see other trailers from the movie that have been posted, along with the link to the film's official website.

Prior to attending Cal Arts, David Wolter was a student of mine taking Character Design at The Animation Academy in Burbank, California.

I've been aware of this film for a while now, waiting for the opportunity to showcase it. It's available for public viewing on YouTube, so it's safe to share the video of David's fine hand drawn animated short film.

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In addition to the final version, the animatic for Eyrie is available for review as well. Check out the planning for this film by heading to the corresponding topic on the AN Forums.

Word is that David is now employed at DreamWorks. Congratulations DreamWorks! You've got yourself another highly talented artist on staff.

AN's new homepage is set up to feature video, so I've been thinking about which video to feature first. It came to me that I recently embedded something in the General Discussion Fourm that would be a perfect start to this aspect of AN's homepage.

John Lasseter has an expansive Hawaiian shirt collection, and in this video, he takes us on a personal tour of his closet. It occured on April 1, a day which is significant to AnimationNation.

So here's Mr. Lasseter at home, sharing his vast array of shirt designs with us, and we see that like everyone else, he puts his shirt on one sleeve at a time.  

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Andy Blazdell, Founder and CEO of Celaction Ltd and developer of Celaction2D animation software, has been a long standing member and supporter of AnimationNation for many years.

I'm happy to report the news that Aardman Animation has chosen Celaction2D software for their latest production.

Here's the press release...

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Aardman chooses CelAction for Tate Movie Project

London, UK (26 July 2011) – CelAction is pleased to announce the completion of “The Itch Of The Golden Nit” by Aardman Animations and Tate. This half-hour film was created using ideas and drawings from literally thousands of children aged 5-13 years old, and animated by Aardman’s team. Voices were provided by stars such as David Walliams, Rik Mayall, Catherine Tate and Alexei Sayle.

CelAction2D was the animation software selected by Aardman to maintain the hand-drawn quality of the characters, and to enable them to be animated quickly and to a high quality by the production team.

For more news about this project follow the link to AN's General Discussion Forum. You can also visit Celaction's site here.