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No snow in our forecast!  The six snowflakes that fell on the last day of October do not count.

Up here in the Northern hemisphere, we expect snow for the holidays.  I remember some very, very, white and deep Christmases.  But that was then, long ago, when (insert your nostalgic holiday memory here).

Number 1 book on snow - ever:
The Snowy Day by Ezra Jack Keats.  This was the very first mainstream book to ever feature a child of color as the main character.  Although that is notable in itself, Keats' artwork and the simplicity of Peter's play raise this book to Book Idol level.  A gazillion stars of loving this book!!

While we are talking about The Snowy Day, Amazon Prime Video has tapped the talents of Angela Bassett and Boys II Men in its new animated version of Keats prize winning book.  Here's the story, on The Mary Sue, with a video clip and everything.   The video should be available now.

Red Sled by Lita Judge.  The book has no words - well, almost no words.  The illustrations of woodland animals "borrowing" a child's sled during the night are so precious.

The Snow Day by Komako Sakai.  A small rabbit is so happy when school is cancelled because of snow.  The falling snow mesmerizes him.  He has so much time to play.  But his father is grounded in another city because of the snow.  Sakai's muted paintings evoke that muffled quiet of a snowy day.  Her palette matches the grey sky and city streets in the snow.

 What is your favorite snowy day book?

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I just reached an important milestone: 30K followers on Instagram and YouTube at around the same time. To thank everyone—for following, commenting, and sharing, I made this little video (Link to video YouTube).

JamesGurneyArt on Instagram
GurneyJourney YouTube Channel

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"Symphony of Two Minds" is a short film about CG animation finding its own style amid a variety of influences. (Link to YouTube)

It begins with two cartoon characters eating a meal in an aristocratic dining parlor. They remark on how sophisticated their world is. It is visually sumptuous indeed, with hand-held photographic camera work and richly rendered textures.

But the low-class young man hasn't fully elevated himself from his origins in a hyper 2D anime universe, and he keeps experiencing flashbacks to it.

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Where are we headed with augmented reality? This short film by Keiichi Matsuda presents an unsettling vision of a possible future. The film superimposes digital animations over a mundane live action video showing a person's point of view as they ride a bus and shop for food. (Link to Vimeo)

Apps address us as personal assistants. Rewards and bonuses tally up like in a video game. Ads and offers leap out from products. Guidelines appear on sidewalks. The person interacts with this hybrid reality by using voice and hand gestures.

At the website Hyper Reality, Mr. Matsuda says: "Our physical and virtual realities are becoming increasingly intertwined. Technologies such as VR, augmented reality, wearables, and the internet of things are pointing to a world where technology will envelop every aspect of our lives. It will be the glue between every interaction and experience, offering amazing possibilities, while also controlling the way we understand the world. Hyper-Reality attempts to explore this exciting but dangerous trajectory. It was crowdfunded, and shot on location in Medellín, Colombia."
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via Cartoon Brew

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Howdy friends. Today I give you three more characters strutting their stuff. We have Mort Felinestien, Hank Tembo, and Mrs. Topeka. I trimmed the sections that you have already seen, so that it doesn't get monotonous. As I have stated in previous posts the first section contains the rough pencil animation I have used as the basis for all the other walk cycles. When I drop these characters into scenes in the final animation I'll stagger their walk cycles. In English that means they won't all walk in unison in the final. ; )

As you can see to the left here, Mrs. Topeka doesn't have much up and down in her walk cycle. I tried to match the suggestion of girth/weight (no offense Mrs. Topeka!) that I had in Mr. Topeka's walk a few weeks back. I have a feeling that as they approach you on the sidewalk you can feel these two characters before you see them. The concrete would tremble.

Speaking of trembling concrete, Hank Tembo (Swahili for elephant, according to Google) is sporting a stylish plaid Irish cap (which can be purchased in the gift shop on your way out). His toy/gift bag originally had the name Finnegan's on it, but it was too hard to read so I took that out.

And then of course there is Mort Felinestien looking oh so sharp in a grey suit which matches his bowler, the band of which matches his tie and socks! Mort is carrying a rolled up newspaper, which he plans to attack and shred once he gets back to the office.

One again that's the Marine Corps belting out "Up In The Morning". It seems very fitting with all the exercising going on around here. It's also one of my favorite cadences, and one I loved to run and ride to back in the day.

Next time I will try and drop a city sidewalk scene scrolling by in the background for next time. Something that loops, like the old Flintstone's backgrounds did. Something simple though. I want it to be interesting, but I don't want it to detract from the main purpose which is just showing off the walk cycles.

Walking Characters from ryanloghry on Vimeo.

As I have stated before my work flow is pretty basic. I draw the characters in my sketchbook. I scan the drawings and "cut them out" in PhotoShop so I can move the pieces. Then I pose them on each frame of the walk cycle (still in PhotoShop). Then I render it out as a Quicktime movie. I use After Effects and Premiere to composite everything together. As always I hope you have enjoyed my drawings and this animation. Thank you for stopping by, God bless, and have a great day.

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Japanese Comickers Magazine features some of the hottest artists from Japan. It’s a great way to take a look at all the different styles and…

The post Japanese Comickers: Draw Manga and Anime like Japan’s Hottest Artists Book Review appeared first on RABBLEBOY - The Official Blog of Kenneth Kit Lamug.

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I am so proud to be part of this - it's an amazing song from a brilliant album.  I had to listen to it a LOT to synch up the drawings, and I still love it.


It took me a week of mostly drawing and redrawing rain drops, with assistance from my niece Paula who did the lettering.











READ MORE ABOUT THE VIDEO AND THE REST OF THIS EXCELLENT ALBUM HERE!

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Hello everyone! I've added two more animated characters to the mix this week. an alligator, and a buffalo. I also added some Miles Davis for them to walk to. Five points if you can name the song and album(that's what we called a collection of songs before cds came along, for all you kiddos out there).

More Walking Animals from ryanloghry on Vimeo.

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Good morning everyone! Today I'm am sharing some work in progress. All year long I will be adding to the Christmas animation I posted in December. I will be adding more animated characters walking, and interacting in every scene.

In this animation I am showing on the left side the walk cycle I drew (thank you Preston Blair for your amazing work). In the middle of the frame is the black and white pencil drawn character I created, and matched pose for pose to my template. And then finally the full color character walking on the right, which I will drop into one of my scenes. My goal is to make last years animation look fuller, more lived in. I try to produce a card and animation each year, but since I usually start in August or September that only leaves me about 3 months to produce everything needed, which for a one man show is not very long. Last year I hit on this idea of creating an animation, and then filling it in, and improving it all year long.

I'm not sure why, but the above player is not allowing you to see the whole frame. I've tried jiggling the code a bit, but I couldn't fix it. Please go here to watch the whole thing.

I sure love to draw, and I love to make those drawings move. I again thank my wife Angela for getting me Adobe CS6 three years ago, it is an amazing tool that allows me to fulfill my dreams, and to work at a level higher than I've ever been able to achieve before.

A full list of the tools I used for this: Pentel .7mm mechanical pencil; a Pentalic hardbound sketchbook with 70 lbs. paper; an Epson 3200 scanner (thank you David Schrotzberger for giving me yours when my old one died unexpectedly); Adobe Photoshope for edge clean up and colorization of the pencil drawings, as well as creating the frame by frame animation; Adobe Premiere for comping each animation together.

As always I hope you have enjoyed watching this animation and learning how I work. Thank you for stopping by, and I'll keep posting updates as I finish more characters. Have a terrific day, and God bless! -- Ryan

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Director Joe Dante talks about the never-produced script for "Termite Terrace," a live-action film proposal about the real-life stories behind the animators who made Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck. (link to video) Via Cartoon Brew

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Mickey and Minnie were three-foot-tall mice with circles for ears living in a human world.

As long as the animation style was abstract enough, the absurdity of that idea worked. But as Disney animation became more realistic, it became more and more untenable.


Toy designer and Mickey collector Mel Birnkrant puts it this way:

"Mickey disappeared because of Disney's push towards reality, which wrecked a lot of things in my opinion. As [veteran animator] Ward Kimball explained to me—and this is the inside story—all of Disney was steering a course towards reality. And it got to a point where the story men, as well, could no longer swallow the existence of a three foot mouse. They could believe in Donald Duck as he was just large enough to exist in the human world (think Three Caballeros). But Mickey no longer made sense to them."

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Here’s a video cut posted by Jordan Hanzon which only shows the outside scenes from Disney Pixar’s Inside Out. Quite a dramatic change in tone!…

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I'll bet you've got 13 seconds to give a dancing banana. Spoiler warning: sad ending. (link to YouTube) Animation by Patrick Boivin.

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Doesn’t it just give you the feels?

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Watch this on The Scene. Chris Ware is neither a luddite nor a technophobe. He’s created computer apps and hearing him talk about his ideas for the technology, it seems that the cost of doing what he wanted is the sticking point for is vision. HE’s also made a few animations, in celebration with Jon […]

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A big year for Pixar, and a new category is added

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I somehow missed this mini-doc when it came out. (Link to YouTube) Directors Robert Kondo and Dice Tsutsumi describe how they worked with a group of young painters to evolve the style for their 2D-computer-animated short "The Dam Keeper."

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I took some time to guest podcast with a good buddy and award-winning animators Paul Pate & Jim Luhan. Check out part 1 of the podcast as we talk about our current projects, our inspirations and aspirations. I had a blast and I should really do this more often…

Let us know your thoughts if there’s anything specific you want to ask!

https://paulpate.wordpress.com/2015/11/04/17-ken-lamug/

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The best painting education I ever had was coming up with 11 background paintings a week—about 600 paintings in all— for the animated film "Fire and Ice," working for Ralph Bakshi and Frank Frazetta.

Ralph Bakshi and Frank Frazetta on Fire and Ice

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    Perfect timing! THE DC SUPER HERO GIRLS UNIVERSE IS LIVE! “Welcome to Super Hero High” the very first DC Super Hero Girls animated short, has just been launched on DCSuperHeroGirls.com.  Many other features went live today with an eye to a global rollout of the digitally immersive world beginning later this month. The toys will be displayed at NYCC […]

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This week we honor the work of Boston based cartoonist/animator Bob Flynn, who illustrated a variant cover for the latest issue of Kaboom’s Over the Garden Wall. Flynn has been contributing comics and covers to titles like SpongeBob Comics, ARGH!, Nickelodeon Magazine, and Heeby Jeeby Comix, which he co-created. I really like his bubbly, liquid-y, cartoon drawings; they really ooze to life on the page!

In addition to comics, Flynn has worked as a character designer for the animated series Bravest Warriors and he is the Director of Art & Animation at FableVision Studios.

You can read one of his self-published comics Brain #1 for free on his website here, and you can check out more of his art there while you’re at it!

For more comics related art, you can follow me on my website comicstavern.com – Andy Yates

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Good morning everyone!

Today I am sharing a rough animation I have created. I created this scene for my annual Christmas card and animation. First I drew all the buildings and the train in pencil, scanned them, and colorized & knocked them out in PhotoShop. Next I rendered an animation(quicktime movie) of each one, then I took all those quicktime movies into After Effects and rendered each one with snow falling. On each piece of my "set", as they go further back into my scene I added a little camera lens blur, I did all of this to add to the depth of the scene.

I'm really disappointed with the compression on this. It looks SO much better on my computer here at home. Maybe some day I will find the right settings, that will make a clean and clear video that is small enough to upload from my connection here at home. I will try to replace this video at some point with a version that has better compression settings. Also, I'm not sure why but the animation is cropped. I created a 16x9 animation and this is not as wide as it should be. If you want to see it un-cropped go to my Vimeo page and view it there.

Next I will add riders on the train, and people in some of the windows in the apartments. Some of them will be animated, just a little. I'm only one person and I only have until the end of November. This animation was a huge first step though, proving I could create the look I wanted.

I hope you enjoyed this project, I hope to post a couple updates as I work on this over the next couple months. As always feel free to leave a comment, and to share this post with others. I hope you all have a terrific day, and thank you for stopping by.

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I think this is the 2nd time we’ve honored a pair of illustrators together(the other being Los Bros Hernandez), but for all intents and purposes the Japanese dynamic duo “illustration unit” Gurihiru is “one” illustrator in the way the two works seamlessly together, focusing their particular talents in different skill sets to produce one beautiful picture. The Gurihiru team consists of Naoko Kawano(design, colors, webdesign) and Chifuyu Sasaki (design, pencils, inks). 

Gurihiru is known for their comics work on titles such as Avatar: The Last Airbender, Wolverine and Power Pack, and A-babies vs. X-babies, to name a few. Team Gurihiru is also known for producing many dynamic variant covers for comics, including this week’s Silk #7 variant.

You can check out more of Gurihiru’s art, including some of their game art design and animation work, on their website here.

For more comics related art, you can follow me on my website comicstavern.com – Andy Yates

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The Beat chats with Pat McHale, creator of the Cartoon Network miniseries "Over The Garden Wall" and writer of the 4-issue limited series at BOOM.

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Very excited to have had the opportunity to create concept art for animated biographies at the Smithsonian’s ‘American Enterprise’ exhibition - featuring leaders, thinkers & do-ers from the onset of industrialization through the Labor Rights Movement. Written/produced/animated by Benjamin Goldman Pictures. See the online version (soon) & get more info here

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