Vimeo

Just made an account tonight and am excited to start shooting little things and posting them up there! Much higher quality than YouTube. Lots of great animations on the site that use After Effects. Like this one!

Trichrome Blue from Lois van Baarle on Vimeo.

thanks to someone i'll call "latka" for showing this to me!

Coraline

I watched this movie expecting hauntingly beautiful animation and some sort of nightmarish, but ultimately well-resolved plot. And it had all of that. I didn't expect my favorite part of the film to be its score. It was beautifully done and I recommend it with all my heart. It, of course, had a predictable general story (the neglected child who seeks love from her over-worked parents and when she discovers it in another way, is ultimately dissatisfied and misses her parents), but that was beside the point. The world was just so fascinating and intricate that it was almost overwhelming. And like I said, the score was gorgeous and by Bruno Coulais who did the music for Les Choristes as well.

Flash Animation--The Tale of Genji

I'm taking a class on Japanese image and text (we're reading literature, manga, etc.). One of our assignments was to interpret a part of "Evening Faces" from "The Tale of Genji" in a different medium, so I decided that since I'm teaching myself Flash right now, I might as well do something.

So here's my basic animation that I've put on YouTube:



The rendering is kind of strange for some reason, but it gives it an pretty cool effect. I used Illustrator for the imagery and the text is from Genji.

I'm excited to get better at Flash so I can make more nested animations!

Tim Burton at MoMA

I was in NYC this past weekend and got a chance to see the Tim Burton exhibit at the MoMA. It felt like I was at a chaotic circus (probably intentional) but I also was quite disturbed. Having seen a documentary about Disney animators that included footage of Burton as a young, awkward, and, quite frankly, creepy-looking animator, I appreciate of how creative and talented any cartoonist/director/illustrator/drawer is.

With Burton, however, everything has some sort of disturbed, cynical or morbid edge--it's very distinct and apparent in any of his work, but walking into that exhibit, I was almost overwhelmed by it. It almost felt like I was going into some sick child's room where he goes to torture puppies. Some of the drawings were beautifully grotesque, others were charming, and still others were humorous. But never was there any joy. It's amazing how teenage torment could provide so much fodder for Burton--he is incredibly prolific and aware of human reaction and emotion.

Burton is hauntingly clairvoyant.

Go see the exhibit (but not on the weekend because it was a MADHOUSE even when I went on a Monday morning).