Week In Review
MAGICK MOMENT:
Every so often you have one of those moments. Wednesday after History of Videogaming class a couple of the students stayed after. So how hard core of a gamer are you? A fair question. Students should always have the right to question the credentials of their teacher. They are spending good money that they may be paying back for years.
So I was breaking into Dec`s mainframe at night in 81 to pay a Dungeons and Dragons like game on a computer that I helped build. The dungeon was created top down view with text characters for the walls ( _ ) and an asterisk as the character and enemy. And I pumped a lot of quarters into the arcades in the 80s and I still play a lot of games on a lot of systems but I am not into online gaming scene. I did try to float a game in 2004 but my programmer talked a better game than he programmed. There is a 160 x 120 video of the reel from that game on the class website.
What do you mean float a game? The other student pipes in: there are a number of ways to break in, one is to develop a game and sell it to a gaming company. You should have come to the presentation they had Friday. The hiring agent for Obsidian, He was great. He went all over the best ways to break in.
Me with a smile behind my voice, Jim Rivers, yeah he was one of my students about 10 years ago when I was running my ROP animation class. Both him and his brother. Instance credibility through reflected glory! Those moments don`t come often but when they do there is a certain joy to them.
FREAK:
Another enjoyable thing this week was finding the first season of Freakazoid at Target. I picked up the last copy at my local store. I loved Freakazoid when it first came out. It was one of the first shows with an absurd attitude on in show reality. Sure, that is an idea that has been taken far too far and beaten to death in today`s market but it was refreshing at the time. And it was fun to see the directing credit of Ronaldo del Carmen.
FESTIVAL:
Saturday morning I ran the judging of the AEF/ASIFA Student Animation Festival at DreamWorks. Thank you Tim Johnson, Melinda Faffar and DreamWorks for hosting the judging.
There are some great animations in this first year`s festival offering that exceed the expected student level. The exceptional animations in the mix of student festival submissions made the judges` job easy. We did the screening in a pitch room and our deliberation in Tim Johnson`s office where we also got to look at his story development for 3 future feature animations.
I also got to talk to Tim bout my favorite scene (Hammy Time) in Over the Hedge, one of my all time DreamWorks favorites. Hammy Time is one of the best timed gags ever animated. It has a story arc that parallels 2/3s of the feature. The pacing is flawless. And the whole scene came from a throw-away gag that happened when the animals are first going through the garbage.
Another highlight of the day was meeting Ric Heitzman, 3 time EMMY Winner production design and art direction for Pee-Wee`s Playhouse. Ric came in at the last minute when another judge had to drop out because of last minute commitments at Disney Florida. As a stop motion guy I am a major fan of Playhouse, a show that did so much to promote stop motion and all forms of animation.
Got some cool stories from Ric on for Pee-Wee`s Playhouse, like the fact that at one time, about 4 or 5 years in, Paul Rubens wanted to go completely animated with Playhouse any only voice his Pee-Wee character. The network liked the idea but not enough to cough up the money it would take. Missed opportunities.
Every so often you have one of those moments. Wednesday after History of Videogaming class a couple of the students stayed after. So how hard core of a gamer are you? A fair question. Students should always have the right to question the credentials of their teacher. They are spending good money that they may be paying back for years.
So I was breaking into Dec`s mainframe at night in 81 to pay a Dungeons and Dragons like game on a computer that I helped build. The dungeon was created top down view with text characters for the walls ( _ ) and an asterisk as the character and enemy. And I pumped a lot of quarters into the arcades in the 80s and I still play a lot of games on a lot of systems but I am not into online gaming scene. I did try to float a game in 2004 but my programmer talked a better game than he programmed. There is a 160 x 120 video of the reel from that game on the class website.
What do you mean float a game? The other student pipes in: there are a number of ways to break in, one is to develop a game and sell it to a gaming company. You should have come to the presentation they had Friday. The hiring agent for Obsidian, He was great. He went all over the best ways to break in.
Me with a smile behind my voice, Jim Rivers, yeah he was one of my students about 10 years ago when I was running my ROP animation class. Both him and his brother. Instance credibility through reflected glory! Those moments don`t come often but when they do there is a certain joy to them.
FREAK:
Another enjoyable thing this week was finding the first season of Freakazoid at Target. I picked up the last copy at my local store. I loved Freakazoid when it first came out. It was one of the first shows with an absurd attitude on in show reality. Sure, that is an idea that has been taken far too far and beaten to death in today`s market but it was refreshing at the time. And it was fun to see the directing credit of Ronaldo del Carmen.
FESTIVAL:
Saturday morning I ran the judging of the AEF/ASIFA Student Animation Festival at DreamWorks. Thank you Tim Johnson, Melinda Faffar and DreamWorks for hosting the judging.
There are some great animations in this first year`s festival offering that exceed the expected student level. The exceptional animations in the mix of student festival submissions made the judges` job easy. We did the screening in a pitch room and our deliberation in Tim Johnson`s office where we also got to look at his story development for 3 future feature animations.
I also got to talk to Tim bout my favorite scene (Hammy Time) in Over the Hedge, one of my all time DreamWorks favorites. Hammy Time is one of the best timed gags ever animated. It has a story arc that parallels 2/3s of the feature. The pacing is flawless. And the whole scene came from a throw-away gag that happened when the animals are first going through the garbage.
Another highlight of the day was meeting Ric Heitzman, 3 time EMMY Winner production design and art direction for Pee-Wee`s Playhouse. Ric came in at the last minute when another judge had to drop out because of last minute commitments at Disney Florida. As a stop motion guy I am a major fan of Playhouse, a show that did so much to promote stop motion and all forms of animation.
Got some cool stories from Ric on for Pee-Wee`s Playhouse, like the fact that at one time, about 4 or 5 years in, Paul Rubens wanted to go completely animated with Playhouse any only voice his Pee-Wee character. The network liked the idea but not enough to cough up the money it would take. Missed opportunities.
posted by Larry Loc @ 1:36 PM
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