James Buran described himself as an executive daydreamer. Until now! His first independent animated film, completed in just 2.5 weeks, launched today. Perfect for this dreary Monday morning before the election.
A guy who had his story, James dove into production. After a couple of weeks, he created art. Something that does what it’s meant to do – to make people feel. To think. But he was careful not to allow thinking to get in the way of thought. Wink. His unconfined hand-drawn technique and slaphappy tone adds excellent contrast to the film’s topic.
Nobody is the right choice, because Nobody bakes apple pie better than mom and Nobody can take a joke.
For more info and entertainment, the commercial motion design work built by James lives here.
over the weekend i attended the opening night of animation block party. watching animation and relaxing outside on the lawn of a high school in brooklyn – we know how to get down! most of the shorts in the mix were new to me such as this, this and this. great films and a really great night! and i finally had a chance to catch a new short by one of the ladies of animation, leah shore.
“for more than 20 years charles manson has refused to communicate with the outside world… until now. these are the actual never before heard phone conversations between canadian best selling author marlin marynick and charles manson.”
yes please! from there the film drops and you fall down the manson hole. it get’s outta hand, and purges energy that jumps off the screen and juggles with your brain. leah broke out the metal!
Maybe! This is an oddball opportunity to feature an unusual, dainty + ornamental piece of delicate workmanship.
Reel 13 is hosting another competition of 3 short films and this week, it includes “Down to the Bone” by Peter Ahern!
“PBS is giving us a chance to vote on airing a cartoon featuring an inside-out kid, comedic blood splatters and pseudo-sexual cat licking! Yay!” ~Peter
I have to say I’ve chosen very intriguing stills. Oh yah!
Do you want to see “Down to the Bone” on TV?!
It’s your call, darlings! Polls close this Wednesday, 4/4/12 @ 5pm. The film with the most votes will air on their tv channel this Saturday night!
Our dear friends at the Charleston International Film Festival invited us to design the poster for them again this year!
When they asked us to create an animated festival trailer as well, we decided to bring the happy creatures in the poster to life for the big screen. We hope you enjoy the spontaneous island dance party as much as these little guys.
The hamster is crushing on a red headed school teacher (meow!) and rescues her from evil demons, obviously. And the music by Colin Huggins kicks surfer butt.
It’s up for Best Short on Reel 13. So if you enjoyed the light comedy + epic adventure of this video, it’d be so weird if you didn’t vote. Voting ends for this week on Wednesday at 5PM. Holy sh*t it’s Tuesday. There’s still time!
I’m excited to discover this contest and might even submit my own if the mood strikes. Everyone should! Here’s some motivation — the winner receives $250 and is broadcast on Reel 13 Saturday night on THIRTEEN. On television.
Joy and I were delighted to see Leonardo DeLuzio’s short film Apt. 5A at the SoDak Animation Festival last fall. I liked it so much that I referred him to the Charleston International Film Festival to submit this year.
The fun thing about being an artist is you can draw pictures. Obviously. But you’re not just limited to drawing pictures to combat boredom or even to get paid. You can draw people Christmas gifts. You can make get well cards and Thank You cards.
This is the Thank You card Leonardo sent over after he was accepted to Charleston. Those are his characters from Apt. 5A with our girls. Absolutely love this.
Our little Cee Cee has so many horrible tales to share with you, preferably at bedtime. Our next short, Cee Cee’s Vacation, will be coming soon. Look! We’ve posted some rough layouts:
{via Bill Plympton ~ the Woodstock Film Festival 2011}
After many weeks of traveling with Place Stamp Here to screenings + animation festivals, pre-parties, after parties + after-after parties … we’re barely human anymore. We’ve become caricatures of ourselves!
In Woodstock, we attended two excellent screenings of the “Dark, Deep, and Funny” Animated Shorts, curated by Bill Plympton + Signe Baumane. LUMINARIS by Juan Pablo Zaramella won Blue Sky Studios Award for Best Animation! We’ve been big fans ever since his last pixilation, HOTCORN.
{Jane Wu, Bill Plympton, Signe Baumane, Joy V + Noelle M, Andy Kennedy, Jacob Kafka}
We were super excited to meet Andy Kennedy, creator of the award winning short film, ACCUMULONIMBUS.
The Coney Island Film Festival Opening Night Party was beyond insane. We’ve never been to any film festival like this one – it truly captured the essence of Coney Island with an outstanding performance by the burlesque ladies, sword swallowers, + fire dancers at the freak show! Sorry, “No freaking photos allowed!” It was so fun to be a part of + we hope to return next year to experience the festival in full. Added bonus, our friend Victoria Cook won Best Animation for her short, DEVIL TOWN. Congrats Victoria!
{Bill Plympton + yours truly at the MV Animation Spectacular}
The Martha’s Vineyard International Film Fest to represent our new film as well as our award winning trailer. It was unbelievable. From the sold out screening, to the bike rides, to the oceans white with foam! God bless Vineyard Haven… To find out more about the films that screened, Bill wrote a great write up. Words alone can’t explain my fun times, so here’s the experience in pictures:
When I was deciding whether or not I could make it out to MV again this year, Mocha Mott’s was the real deal breaker for me. It’s my favorite spot on Main Street. Every year, we sit + sip delicious chai lattes between screenings.
Art Cliff Diner is amazing! The food truck is open late night + has everything you could ever dream of, including enormous whoopie pies.
Jameson + I took a bike ride. Adventure time!
Easily the coolest truck I’ve ever seen.
No bikes allowed here, we continued on foot. There’s a little area on the island that is home to the Gingerbread Houses. Pay close attention to the love that I’m about to express for them. It’s one of the few places that even comes close to the Disney Magic Kingdom’s, It’s A Small World.
These are the Bauers. They fixed up their gingerbread house + painted it in all it’s glory.
A nice lady hanging her laundry out to dry…
This nice man was just sitting out on his porch, carving some kind of artifact out of wood. When I asked him what he was making he said, “A mess.”
Everyone in gingerbread land names their home. Like “Happy Daze.”
Well we had a week! It was fun to reminisce + share it all.
This is the reason why we work so hard, continually making films. Thanks to all the of the festival directors + volunteers for making it all wonderful as usual. I already can’t wait ’til next year!
Here’s a little trailer we made to introduce the screening tonight.
We’ll be hosting the show in collaboration with The Big Screen Plaza. The films were selected based on the vision of the individual artists, but their common thread is they are all uniquely beautiful + warm, but not fuzzy. We kill fuzzy.
DOWN TO THE BONE is one of our favorite short films and it is available online today!
This is the work of our friend, animator Peter Ahern. It was his senior thesis film at Pratt, made in 2009.
Synopsis!
Little Michael has vicious allergies, and when babysitter Meredith arrives for a night of no-nonsense, he’s swiftly dispatched to the yard…where his delicate condition takes a turn for the worse.
Here’s a cool little clip from SXSW 2010, where Peter gives some insight into the film during a post-screening interview
Head over to the Peter’s blog, Optic Candy, to read more.
