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Because I totally hate the anime worship I see amongst fans, who seem to think that Anime is inherently different then American animation, despite the styles having been stolen from the Fleischer brothers in the thirties (amongst other early american animators).... I figured I'd create a thread dedicated to the love of animation.

Not animated films.
Not anime.

But animation as an Artform. And frankly one thing that irks me about anime is, I've noticed Japan and America both of entertainment industries that don't see anime as an "Art form".

So, I say screw that, and bring up the case of the Soviet Union.

Under Lenin (and Stalin and Kruschev), Films were seen as Culturally important. In particular, the animated film. So the Soviet Government more or less dedicated a branch of the government to the understanding of animation. Without the need of profit and the sole desire to create culturaly significant and influential films (not trying to praise communism. I mean, I'm a communist and all but the Soviet Union was a disgrace after Lenin died).

And the point here is not the superiority of Soviet Animation (alot of it is just as bad) but, well, I'll just show you.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wImBk5PO9GQ

It's inventive use of stop motion probably gets the point across... Animation is not limited too drawn pictures or clay models... Quite literally, the sky is the limit. I've started working on Sand animation... Sure, it's pretentious as hell... But I just want to explore different styles right now.

Yeah, even though I'm very hateful to most cartoons (from all over the world) I am dangerously passionate about animation.

Legally, I can only show you a couple things. I have to get a few more papers signed, then I can actually make a complete Portfolio. I'm also kinda waiting until my short film is done first, and I have early animatics from my next one. But, anyway, what I can show:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HO6DG4Sga6w

This is one I try to use to get jobs. It's pretty good, when you get right down to what it was. It's a class project that turned out beautiful. I would have loved to start out on Black, dim the shadows for another few seconds, and add a backlight at the end.

Unfortunately, it was a two person project: A Designer (from the Ad Design Class) and an animator (from the Special Effects Class). They created the logo and the storyboards. Pending who the designer was, we had very little freedom. We worked for them.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=efSozgsyIDA

This is my current short film, slated for a Valentine's Day release. This clip is missing a few frames, and the dialog. The Dialog I had I didn't like, so I'm rerecording it. Probably later today. There is a camera jump that is slight, but jarring... I'm trying to tweak that in after effects. Frankly, the actually footage turned out so well, I'm hoping people overlook that when they see the final project.

I have a commercial that will be done Monday, that will be screened before films in Local Suburban Chicago movie theaters. It's for an exhibition being held at my college. I'm going to see if I can get permission to put that on youtube, seeing that I have no right to it other then my own personal real. It shows you just how good of an animation program After Effects is.