I will be representing the Cartoonist Conspiracy San Francisco in organizing a third year of CAM-JAM events with the Cartoon Art Museum Bookstore. The event is on Sunday May 22, 2011 from 11am to 5pm and the theme will be ANIMATION.
Yes, you heard that right! Our challenge will be to produce 30 seconds of DIY animation goodness that will use technology and old school art skills together to make something cool. We will have stations to do: Flipbooks, Wipe Board Animation and Sketchbook Animation.
The technique I am most looking forward too working with is the Sketchbook Animation which I blogged about HERE and HERE. The technique is to draw all the art for a couple seconds of animation in your sketchbook which is then composited on the computer into a short video.
In fact I created this sample the other night by drawing about 4 pages of art on 8.5″x11″ card stock (I need a new sketchbook, sigh) in about 2.5 hours and then spent about 2 to 2.5 hours scanning and compositing the work together. I am very pleased with the results.
So come on out and join a bunch of crazy cartoonist and make some animation. Artist of all levels are welcome.
The final work will be posted here on my blog after the event.
On May 22, 2011 the Cartoonist Conspiracy San Francisco and the Cartoon Art Museum Bookstore will be kicking off the third year of CAM-JAM’s, cartoonist collaboration events. The CAM-JAM’s have tried different themes in the past such as Tikis and Samurais, but this time we will go with something a bit more challenging…Animation. With a mix of old school drawing goodness and desk top video technology we will attempt to collaborate and create 30 seconds of animation within the length of the event from 11am to 5pm.
Will you come and join us?
When: Sunday May 22, 2011
11am to 5pm
Where: Cartoon Art Museum – 655 Mission St San Francisco CA
Cost: FREE for participating artists
What to bring: Sketchbook and any drawing tools that you like. There will be materials available to use at the event, but it’s always fun to share how you like to draw with your fellow artists.
The event will feature…
- Wipe Board animation – filmed with a digital camera and stop motion software artist will create animation by drawing on that office favorite the wipe board.
- Flipbooks
- “sketchbook” animation – inspired by the technique used on the short film animated “Nosy Bear” created with small drawings on a few pages of a sketchbook that are then composite digitally.
- Samples of animation by local artists
- Prizes
- Networking
- Treats
- Fun
Our hope is that cartoonist and artist of all caliber will join in the fun and help create animation on-the-spot.
To sign-up ahead of time, email the Cartoon Art Museum bookstore at bookstore@cartoonart.org or sign-in the day of the event at the front desk
BONUS: ANY ARTIST who shows their sketchbook on the day of the event will receive 10% off their purchase in the museum bookstore. Note: a few items are not applicable for discount.
For more information or questions contact:
Brian Kolm from the Cartoonist Conpiracy – staff@atomicbearpress.com
Heather at the Cartoon Art Museum Bookstore – bookstore@cartoonart.org
Cartoon Art Museum Classes:
Cartoon BOOT Camp – Summer 2011
June Cartooning Classes: Monday through Friday, 2:00pm – 4:00pm
Cost: $100 per week for Cartoon Art Museum members, $135 for non-members
It’s time for our sixth annual Summer Cartooning Classes! Cartoonist Brian Kolm will teach students how to storyboard, the basics of traditional animation and stop motion, and how to create their own cartoon characters, super heroes and more!
Ages: Intermediate level artists from 10-14 years old.
Time: All sessions run Monday through Friday from 2:00PM to 4:00 PM at the Cartoon Art Museum
(For past students: please note the time of these classes is different.)
Number of students: The class size is limited to no more than 14 students. The class is filled on a first come, first served basis.
Cost*: $100 per week for CAM members, $135 non-members – per student for each session. Fees must be paid in full to secure a seat in the class.
Sign up as a member and save! ( http://cartoonart.org/join-support/membership/ )
Supplies: Basic Drawing Materials will be provided. Students are welcome to bring in their personal sketchbooks and materials.
To enroll: click on the links below for each class you are signing up for. Online reservations are sponsored by Guestlist.
Please also fill out and submit the waiver and emergency contact form. Mail or hand-deliver the completed waiver and emergency form to: Cartoon Art Museum; 655 Mission Street; San Francisco, CA 94105 attn: Cartoon Boot Camp, email to: office@cartoonart.org or fax to: 415-243-8666. For any questions, please call: 415-227-8666 x300.
*Cancellation: All participants must be pre-paid prior to the first day of the session. Full refunds given with 2 weeks cancellation notice prior to the first day of the session. 50% refund given within 7 to 13 days of the first day of the session. No refunds given within 6 days prior to the first day of the session.
Stop motion is one of the earliest animation techniques, but it remains one of the most vibrant and challenging forms of animation. Films like The Nightmare Before Christmas, Coraline, Wallace and Gromit, Fantastic Mr. Fox, Chicken Run and James and the Giant Peach have led to a resurgence in this amazing genre. This class will explore the basics of stop motion films, and teams of students will create their own short animation as a final project.
Skills featured: Teamwork, Frame by Frame Animation, Digital Video Editing, Storytelling
Samples created by previous classes can be seen here:
Great stories begin with great characters! Through storytelling and design techniques, students will create their own original characters, developing the character’s personality and appearance, resulting in a final piece of presentation-ready artwork.
Skills featured: Drawing, Basic Anatomy, 3d Visualization, Storytelling, Penciling, Inking
Storyboards have been used since the early days of animation, evolving into a way to pre-visualize a film before time and money was spent on a project. Animatics combine storyboards with sound to create a “real time” film.
This class will teach the art of pre-visualizing a film project through the storyboard stage. Teams of students will visualize a short scene with pre-recorded audio.
Samples created by last year’s class can be seen here:
Skills featured: Teamwork, Storytelling, Digital Video Editing
I have been playing with Blender 3D, the open source (i.e. FREE) software. I mostly have been playing with techniques that could be used with 2D animation or Motion Comics. So here we go…
This was based on a tutorial I found where a 3d ground surface was made to roll like the waves and a simple boat model travels over the surface as it distorts. Kind of long and boring I know, but it was a good learning experience. The sky was added in after the fact in after effects.
The next tests were from a tutorial as well where I made a simple tree and added leaves that were simple 2D images. It looks pretty good, even close-up due too distorting the flat images of leaves to be curved and bent.
This time it’s just one tree on a hill…
Here is a simulation of shapes that act like they are silk streamers…
And last, but not least a simple snow scene where the buildings are simple shapes with digital artwork for the details.
After working on and off with my friend and colleague Alexis Fajardo for the last 5 months we have created an animated trailer for the graphic novel, Kid Beowulf and the Song of Roland. This is our best one so far and took the most time too. That was partially since it was not only the 2D motion comic stuff going on, but also 40 seconds of 3D animation. I have never done 3d animation before, but it was always a struggle. But after finding a great demo that showed how to use After Effects with the free program Blender 3D it became a lot easier.
Here it is: the Kid Beowulf and the Song of Roland trailer (from Bowler Hat Comics)….
And here you can see an evolution with the four other Kid Beowulf videos I helped create with Alexis in the past… (chronologically going back in time BTW)
Kid Beowulf and the Blood Bound Oath (book number one published though Bowler Hat Comics)….
A teaser with Hama the pig…
Kid Beowulf the original self-published graphic novel…
The Haunted Mansion ride at Disneyland just turned 41 and to celebrate I thought I would post some fan art inspired by the attraction.
There is an event in Anaheim held by the 1313 clube that I wished I was going too next week called the Marvelous Mechanized Magic Kingdom. They will have on displays actual Animatronics from Disney themeparks as well as have speakers like actor Neil Patrick Harris, designer of the monorail Bob Gurr, the voice of Wendy and Alice Kathryn Beaumont, costume designer for Pirates and Small World Alice Davis, script and song writer Xavier Atencio (‘grim grinning ghosts’), animator/artist Floyd Norman, Garner Holt
who’s company does all of Disney’s ride animatronics now, ride concept artist Larry Nikolai, Chef Mayhem of DoomBuggies.com, and many more.
First off a painting from 2003: (click for bigger image)
and some of the artwork I did for the fan podcast “Story of the Haunted Mansion” that was created by Patrick Hurd. The work below is only about half of what I contributed.
Well, my students this past week were really doing some amazing things, and they wanted me to let them know of the tools and software that was used in class and I want to share with all of you in webland what they achieved.
First off we did some Pixalation and Stop Motion. Those are both the same thing, the moving of objects filmed one frame at a time. For Stop Motion we were using and older version of iStopmotion (version 1). It’s Macintosh based and very simple to use which is why I like it. I have not really had a chance to work with version 2 yet, but would like to try in the future. www.boinx.com/istopmotion.
The program was used with just a DV camcorder on a tripod pointing down at a table surface and connected to the computer with a firewire cable. We animated clip art from Dover: http://store.doverpublications.com/0486995666.html which I printed out from the files that came with the book. There was also a battle of Fish vs. Birds with the students drawing their own art.
iStopmotion was also used to film some classic style drawn animation pencil tests of a ball bouncing. The students also went off and drew some new stuff on their own which made me really pleased.
Next off we enter the digital realm with a demonstration of Adobe After Effects CS4. http://www.adobe.com/products/aftereffects/ The program is used for special effects, animation and motion graphics. One strength of the computer is that it can manipulate and re-purpose artwork. Below is a video sample of some Dancing Bears done with one drawing that was first scanned in and had it’s background removed in Photoshop (http://www.adobe.com/products/photoshop/family/)and then using the puppet tool in After Effects. Then there is a Mysterious Man walking and Spaceships done with the digital version of cut-out animation.
Many of the same effects can be done in other programs like Adobe Flash, but After Effects handles the bitmaps better and is a lot more powerful even with a bit more of a learning curve. I also love the manipulation of flat layers in 3D space to get a ‘multiplane’ effect.
This is the same way they do the Motion Comics, which was one of my inspirations for this class. Artwork being re-purposed for animation.
Last we needed to come up with a simple idea for a short piece of animation in which the students would draw the art which would be brought into the computer and manipulated creating a whole story. After the class agreed to some story elements, everyone sat down to work on some drawings of what characters would look like. The drawings were placed up on the board and assistant artist Chris Conroy and I combined ideas into final designs.
The final result was always planned to be more of a motion comic, but with the art being created specifically for animating. To speed things up I roughed out a simple storyboard and the students worked on making the art which was scanned after class and prepared to be structured into an animation. A big thank to Graham Wong for his help on Friday working in After Effects to animate the drawings and having some of the students assist him.
The voice of the Nanny Ninja is Heather Plunkett and the lip assignments were done in JLipSync, and older java script based program. It’s a bummer since it only uses 8bit mono .WAV files which are very outdated by today’s standards, but it did still get the job done.
The student really did an amazing job of creating some fantastic art that helped tell our story. GOOD WORK GUYS!
Sadly time and technical difficulties have prevented the finished video to appear yet, but it will be finished up in the early part of July with the missing art and missing music, but a close to finished version is presented here as a Work in Progress.
Note: I also found a few drawings did not get scanned in the last rush to finish on Friday and so they will have to be replaced with something else. No art was left out except for that reason. A final version will be on-line in the next week or two with a few missing drawings, music and sound effects — but will look close to the video below.
Well, week 1 of Cartoon Boot Camp at the Cartoon Art Museum is over and it was really fantastic. We had a class of seven young intermediate artist who I helped to create a storyboard which was then edited together on the computer with audio to create an animatic.
An animatic is a pre-visualization of what a finished movie would look like by cutting together the storyboard drawings in sync with some audio on video/film.
The class was split into two teams to create two versions of art to match the soundtrack. Each team was headed by one of my high-school interns Benjy (team B) and Rena (team A). To create the final product we listened to a 1 min clip that was purposely vague as to the setting or exact situation. I had prepped for the class by having some colleges record a simple script as well as going and breaking down the audio tracks to get an idea of how much time things took.
The voices for all the animatics are Adam Abrams and Christine Moody. Here is the sound track breakdown that I created in after effects along with my own version of a storyboard to match it.
Thanks to the help of Benjy, Rena, Graham, and Nomi Kane we were able to scan the storyboards which I then placed in after effects. Two movies (one for each team) were rendered and additional audio was added by way of Apple’s Garage Band.
The music was from Kevin MacLeod, who offers the use of it royalty-free though the Creative Commons. Creative Commons is a system for creative folks to set how they would like others to use their work. This means that there are folks out their who allow others to use their work for their own projects in different ways.
Here is what we ended up creating in the 10 hours of class we had this week…
