I have posted this idea in the past, but I don't think anyone could understand what I was talking about. I would like to get a small group of animators together to do a Halloween them anijam. What is an Anijam? Here's one I did in the past with interested co workers when we were all working at Vinton Studios in the late 90s.
Every animator would be given an image to start and end with. All the different short films would be edited together to create a longer film. If you are interested in participating in this project, please sign the form below and we can go from there.
Summer is nearing to a close and again, it looks like nobody is interested it this project. (big sigh) Oh Well....
I have a box of old VHS tapes which I am currently exacting gold from the video recorded images into digital files. Most of these are pencil test which I collected from working on Animaniacs at StarToons back in the 90's.
And so, this is a test to see if I can post these tests for other animators to view and study. I am not selling these or claim to have invented the show or episodes, I only have a copy of these rare pencil tests which I would like to share with you and other interested folks.
Here's a pencil test from an episode I worked on called "And Justice for Slappy".
I don't know if I will be able to post more pencil tests, so this is just a test to see if I can post them under the title of Educational Purposes only. So, let me know if you liked what you saw and if you would like to see more, because I have quite a few.
Bob Gardiner and Will Vinton won their first Oscar for "Closed Mondays" in 1974 and worked on a few more projects before going their separate ways. I found these two rare interviews from an April 1978 issue of American Cinematographer about clay artist and animator Bob Gardiner.
20 Nights in Clay is an article about Gardiner producing a clay animated intro to the 10th anniversary of Rolling Stone Magazine TV special back in 1977.
This second article from the same magazine is more of an interview with Bob Gardiner about his work in plasticine and creative process. Its a pretty interesting look into his process of animating and creating characters in clay.
If you are interested in more about Claymation or Will Vinton, check out this blog post; Marq Evans ClayDream.
As a teenager, I discovered a Green Wizard who inspired me to learn more about
animation and filmmaking in general.
Mike Jittlov was a mathematic/language major at UCLA when he took an animation class to satisfy his art requirement. His first student films were two 2D shorts called "The Leap" and "Good Grief". His interested grew from there and soon he was making other short animated films, "Swing Shift", "The Interview," and "Animato".
Here's one of his early films called "Animato" which he made to show off his animation talents to future employers, the ploy worked and caught the attention of a producer at Disney (see way below).
"Swing Shift" was to follow below...
Here's an
article he wrote about making the film for American Cinematographer magazine, long, long ago... Note the price!
I wrote him a fan letter and got a chance to talk to my on the phone. He was very friendly on the phone and answered lots of my animation questions. Eventually, I met him at a science fiction convention in Florida when I was in high school. I had collected a few articles and post cards in very small detailed writing from him and will be glad to share it below if anyone is interested to learn more about this very creative person.
Disney was celebrating Mickey's 50th and hired Mike to come up with the following 3 shorts featuring Mickey Mouse. This is Mike Jittlov's Stop Motion Mickey Mouse which he animated and stars in. Disney was not going to give him screen credit, so he animated his credits in the big parade number at the end.
Jittlov then made his famous short film called "The Wizard of Speed and Time" which got a lot of attention and he would eventually make a feature film of the same name. Here's the short film that inspired me into animation...
Cleverly, he weaved a lot of segments from his past films into the story line. And the film will never win any acting awards. Jittlov was able to finish the film which wasn't under his complete control, but still contains some impressive special effects. Here's the feature below...
He would return to the big screen briefly as a dark spirit from the 1990's film "Ghost".
He's also pretty well known in the World of Origami. Here's a link to a dollar bill skull he designed if you are interested. https://youtu.be/y5wR8QgOoUw
I have been trying to get him to do an Animateducated interview, but he's a little shy about that these days. Maybe he'll change his mind? Happy Birthday Mike!
