So, last week in class we watched Rocky and Bullwinkle and Friends, one of my favorite childhood programs--through reruns of course. However, my favorite part of the show, since it is a variety program, is the Fractured Fairy Tale portion of the show. And we didn't watch it, what a shame.
I am just so entertained by the wonderful narration and quarky stories. One of my favorites is Jack and the Beanstalk: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YB1EE-FDgMk. There are a lot of them on Youtube...I highly encourage everybody to watch. This is really an outstanding show, it was directed at children, but my parents always watched it with us--and I think they liked it; certainly more than Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles anyway.
Anyway, for my final project I was thinking about working on Photoshop/final cut to make my images move frame to frame. I would love any suggestions for how to animate on photoshop; I'm slightly more adept at using Final Cut.
Thanks,

Matt

LEGO Fun...

This week we read about clay animation (I've always loved Gumby) and this seemed fitting seeing how our stop motion animations are due this week. Prior to working on it with my partner I remembered making stop motion clay animation when I was in elementary school. I explained that we spent most of the year studying Lincoln in 4th grade and that we did a clay motion project.
The stories we did were based on "Lincoln Myths"; one of which he had his top hat knocked off of his head and it spilled many important documents (where he allegidly stored papers), which spread through the streets. How much fun it was as a child...and still is.
I had a great time animating a lego stop motion. We had a great time making the scenery and developing the story; the process was a little tedious, but that's okay. In our animation there is a shark that swims up on a man in a boat. The man in the boat notices and tries to shoot the shark with a pitiful handgun. The shark jumps up and bites off the man's shooting hand. The man falls to the ground bloody. The shark continues to circle and the man runs to start the boats motor. The shark leaps from the water and bites the man's head off. The man's body bleeds on the boat while the shark swims out of frame. End.
I hope everyone else had as much fun with this assignment as I did!

Here it is posted to Youtube

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=whH2vm7acbQ

Enjoy,

Matt

The Simpson's holds a special place in animation history; it was the first of it's kind--a sitcom. We've discussed so much about how animation became "for kids". Saturday morning cartoons wrecked what could have been a viable adult medium--at least for about 40 or 50 years it did.
The Simpson's debuted on the FOX network in a time when FOX was all about making new, exciting programming--that would attract, yes, a younger audience (what better than a cartoon). There was a shocking revilation, adults liked The Simpson's as much as the kids. Adults liked it for it's content and kids liked if for its absurdity and the fact that it was a cartoon. A whole new market was open for media producers.
Countless shows have premiered since, the most popular of which is likely the wildly nonsensical animated sitcom "Family Guy", which I believe makes a mockery of the adult cartoons. Original Simpson's had meaning, morals, and jokes that related to the story line; in short, good writing.
After years, however, even a show as good as "The Simpson's" looses what good material they had and it should be "put on the shelf" so to speak.
"Futurama", however, is another brainchild of the creator of "The Simpson's" which again breaks powerful barriers--an animated sci-fi sitcom. For four seasons it was fresh and witty. There will be many more of these animated adult shows to follow.