I'll throw stuff at you for $5!

WARNING! Liam Rant Ahead! For those brave enough to read on...do so at your own risk. People with pace makers and mothers who are nursing are to stand 5 ft from this rant:

A lot of people went to see James Cameron's "Avatar" recently...it apparently out-grossed the #1 grossing movie of all time, James Cameron's "Titanic". But that's like saying a $17 hooker is better than a $6 hooker because the $17 hooker made slightly more money and if you wear special glasses she's a tad more attractive...but the experience is about the same.

So based on pure dollar sales, Avatar is the top grossing movie of all time. but lets also fail to mention that with the gigantic costs of regular tickets these days compared to 1997, its almost doubled. Then add, that you don't get the same experience if you don't watch with these special glasses that make it 3-D (WHOOP-DEE-DOO!) and if you don't see it in IMax, well then you are just wasting your money! So after the jacked-up ticket prices, 3D glasses, and the IMax theater prices...About a 1/4 of the overall Titanic audience could see Avatar and it'll be the top grossing movie of all time.

The most infuriating thing is that when people talk about it...its all about the technology of the film and how wonderful it is. And when I ask about the plot and if its interesting...I get a bunch of mumbles. Someone actually said to me (which actually set this whole thing off for me), "If you aren't going to see it in IMax, then its not worth seeing." WHAT?! I heard similar verbiage with "Transformers 2" and we all know how that turned out. How does that make it a good movie?! I swear to God...if I dressed up a turd as a cheeseburger with lots of great hand-crafted french cheeses and crisp lettuce and freshly cut pickles and tomatoes from the garden of Zeus himself...these people would eat and say "I loved it! The cheese was great!" Just because someone put a pretty 3D filter on a movie and said it was the greatest invention to movies since colored film...doesn't make it great.

Let's peel back the layers...take away the unnecessary 3D (which is purely there to add dollars to the ticket price) and then put it on the small screen in your living room. So all it has to rely on is the storyline, acting, and general directing and pace of the movie (LIKE EVERY MOVIE ON THE PLANET!!!). I have faith in James Cameron to make a great movie...he did give us "Abyss" "Terminator 2" and "Aliens". So I have no doubt that he can direct. But judging from what I've learned via critics, from what I'm to believe from trailers, and general word-of-mouth...is that this movie borrows heavily from "Dances With Wolves", "Fern Gully" and more recently a forgettable (3D) animated feature called "The Battle for Terra" which is actually more like Avatar than anything else since it features humans conquering a populated planet for its resources and one human must make a choice between his people or his new alien friends (OH! THE DILEMMA!). So originality isn't creeping into this as far as I can see. James even admittedly borrows from his own movie, "Aliens" with some of the designs like the drop ships and the battle mechs.

So if I am going to watch it, I'll rent the dvd. No one is going to make me watch a movie for $17 JUST BECAUSE its in 3D and on a bigger screen. So what...this 3D trend has infuriated me to no end. It doesn't do anything except make it kind of seem like things are flying at you. Really? You'll pay another $5 for crap to be thrown at you? I'll stand underneath the screen of "Avatar" with a cannon loaded up with the members of the Blue Man Group and shoot them into the audience...I'll BE RICH!!!

I made that!

Once again work and just general life has made it hard to post anything lately. But yesterday was a very exciting day that I had to put work on the back burner for a small time to make something special for this occasion.

WE'RE HAVING A BABY!

Just yesterday, we went in to see the first ultrasound of our new baby...and he was a rascal. He was jumping around and I think at one point he was flashing us his lil' bum. (note: I want to say at this point that we don't know the sex of the baby, its just easier to say "he" instead of "he/she" and more respectful than "it")

About this animation...I've been working on this for a couple of weeks...I must be Nostradamus incarnate, because I had no idea how close to bouncy he actually was until yesterday. I realize its unfinished, and I doubt I'll color it in anymore than it is, but its there to really work on timing and some different cycles along with quick transitions from one pose to another.

ENJOY!

Penguins are Jerks

I was working on this periodically for the past two months...a little here a little there. Just a test on timing and tweening. Personally, I like it. I might make into a series of animations if I find myself with the time. But I'm going to be participating more in animation contests for short animations. Hopefully that'll work out to my favor. I'll talk more about that when/if it happens. Right now its all about what work will allow.

ENJOY!

Old Man Walkin'

I finally broke down and got After Effects CS4 (AECS4). I found a copy for a couple hundred dollars less on Amazon.com. Still too expensive, but I should learn how to really utilize it since it is a good animation tool...its got some great animation enhancements including a 3D effect for 2D animation.

Anyways...I was just filling in some holes in my animation reel, one of which I am almost completely lacking is walk cycles. So I may do a few more after this one. But now that I can post these on my blog, I have a good reason to animate outside of work. This clip is a character I came up with real quick just to work on an interesting walk cycle. I originally animated his legs as a blur cycle...but thought the shuffle worked better. I'll try to come up with a couple more soon.

Sorry for taking so long to post anything interesting. Work, holidays and figuring out AECS4 has taken over my life. I'm still trying to figure out how to successfully import Flash .swf files with sound into AECS4...so the Wordgirl clips are still in the process of coming out to the blog.

On another note, the newest "Corporal Cup's Food Camp" short is up on the Lunch Lab website in the video section...so check that out as well!

I'm working on another animated quickie involving two penguins. I'll post that when its done.

Word UP!

Awhile ago in an earlier post, I mentioned I was working on a specific episode of Wordgirl which I was REALLY excited about because of the voice actor involved. If you didn't guess by the subtle hints I gave, it was the voice star of the Pixar studios film "UP", Ed Asner. The episode has aired and its old news, so its okay for me to post this. UNFORTUNATELY, Adobe has still not gotten off their fat, money-grubbing asses and fixed the quicktime problems with Flash CS4 and I'm gonna go ahead and predict that they won't until the next $200 upgrade (maybe), so until then, you'll have to enjoy the stills from my scene. These two shots are taken directly from the two scenes I worked on in this particular episode where The Butcher is robbing a bank, but then halted by Wordgirl and her monkey sidekick, Huggyface! They have a back and forth about a mispronunciation (like they do) and through the front door enters Kid Potato, voiced by the great Ed Asner! Its then established that Kid Potato, a retired villain who shoots potato dishes and products from his hands, is actually The Butcher's father and wishes to team up with him for a father-son crime spree.

I thoroughly enjoyed working on both of these scenes, and the storyboarder should get a lot of the props for his timing and shot planning. So for those who watch Wordgirl (good on ya) watch for this episode and this scene. For those who don't, go watch the show! It's very funny!

Lunch Lab LIVE!

Lunch Lab is live and the shorts I worked so hard on are getting posted. The first episode of 10 is up in the video section called "Food Camp". I did the layout and storyboards for the first 10 episodes (the other 9 are still to be posted). I would've posted the original storyboard Quicktime up on the blog, but I haven't wanted to spend $1000 for After Effects quite yet. This is a quick shot of the intro. Obviously the title card is just a placeholder until the designers had completed it for the actual animation. The premise of the show is basically a cartoon cooking show for kids. It promotes healthy eating habits for young kids. Some of the recipes are really interesting and simple. I'll be stealing a few of these recipes for myself :) Don't be surprised if you are having dinner at my place and you are eating mashed cauliflower.

Thanks to the creators and co-founders of Cloud Kid Studios, Evan Sussman and Dave Schlafman for giving me this opportunity to flex my boarding muscles...I loved every minute of it. And thanks to Alex Berry for putting up with my boarding and doing a great job animating these! Each webisode was written by Evan Sussman, Backgrounds and props by Jen Blicharz, Animation by Alex Berry and Sound Editing by Brian Smith. The voice of Corporal Cup is Megan Goltermann who did a great job bringing this character to life.

THE GODS ARE ANGRY!!!

We bought this cat tower which sits at about 7ft tall and has a little cubby hole. It was mainly for the cat to escape to when we finally got a puppy. Well the puppy adoption has been put on hiatus for now. But our cat, Tuck, still got a nice tall climbing toy to mess around on. Every now and then we'll find him on the top looking down on us as if he is our ruler and God. The Cat Tower is really the Mt. Olympus for kitties with delusions of grandeur.

Side Note: Thanks to Rob and Margaret for pointing me in the right direction for some GREAT deals on a nice tall cat tree. Tuck LOVES it.