THE ART OF KUNG-FU PANDA

Yesterday my wife and I celebrated our 2nd wedding anniversary and she surprised me with this freakin' awesome book on the Art of Kung-Fu Panda. DreamWorks does a great job promoting their animated films, but some of their movies I feel have failed to deliver. Regardless, I have crazy high hopes for this film. I absolutely love the character design and art direction and from what I've seen in the previews the animation looks sweet! I'm definitely going to see this at the IMAX when it comes out. I just hope the film is as awesome as this book. Thanks Sweets!

*UPDATE* This book is even sweeter now because Kung-Fu Panda is easily my favorite animated film of the year! I even got to see it in IMAX!!! Skdooosh!

PRESTO!

Pixar's new animated short film Presto is inspired by Warner Bros. and Tom and Jerry slapstick, so you already know how awesome this is going to be. Doug Sweetland's directorial debut and these two pics have me super hyped!!! Can't wait!

*UPDATE* Best. Pixar. Short. Ever. Period. I am so inspired! Very rarely do you get to witness an instant classic. I'm not ashamed to say I enjoyed this short 100 times more than the film that followed.

BLINKING IS NOT JUST SOME RANDOM OCCURRENCE

Okay, okay... so the Suns and the Mavs lost in the first round of the playoffs and what Steve Nash and Jason Kidd are saying here seems pretty irrelevant at this point, but that has nothing to do with why I am posting this. After seeing these commercials a few times I began to notice something. Not only are the two players saying the same words at the same time, they are also blinking at the same time! It doesn't happen just on this one. There are a series of these commercials and as far as I can tell it happens in all of them regardless of which two players are speaking. You can check them out here.

Alot of times as an animator, you never stop to think about when your characters should blink so you randomly throw them in. Shawn Kelly calls this "Randomblinkitis." What's the cure? Well he says it's observation. We blink for a lot of reasons but according to Shawn the most important ones to remember when animating are:
1. When we shift our thought process
2. to show or hide our emotion
3. in the middle of a fast head turn

If anything these commercials have only reinforced what I have learned. Blinking is not just some random occurrence.

IF YOU LOVE PIXAR ANIMATION, GET THIS BOOK

Last week I turned 29. Sort of a scary thought considering how close that number is to 30. Anyway, I received birthday money from my family (which I gladly accepted) and with it one of the things I bought was this book "To Infinity and Beyond! The Story of Pixar Animation Studios."

If you are pursuing a career in animation or maybe you are just a fan of Pixar, I highly recommend you buy this book. I'm in the middle of reading it but what I've read so far has been inspiring. It's an encouraging thought to know even Pixar never gets it right the first time. They never settle for a good idea. They keep pressing on for the best idea and a common theme you'll notice in this book is "The best idea wins."

Most of the time your first idea isn't your best. In actuality it's probably the most familiar. So take on the challenge; if you don't get it right the first time don't give up. Keep at it! See James 1:12.

Go get this book!

BEST MONTH EVER!

What a month! Winning the 11 Second Club contest for February has been one of the most exciting things that's ever happened to me. On top of that I won an eCritque with Dave Burgess!!!

If you don't know who Dave Burgess is you probably know his work. He's been around quite awhile. Some of the films he's worked on are Aladdin, The Lion King, Tarzan, Shrek 2, Madagascar, Over the Hedge, Bee Movie and he is currently working at DreamWorks on Monsters vs. Aliens due out next year. With that kind of experience you can understand why I was thrilled to be critiqued by him. He was thorough in his assessment of my entry and I am so appreciative of the time he spent examining nearly ever frame. It was amazing and his words of encouragement meant everything.

And if that weren't enough, I was given the opportunity to voice my thoughts and techniques on animation with the first ever 11 Second Club winner interview! What an honor!

You can go check out the eCritique with Dave Burgess here and if you get a chance, you can read my interview here.

A BRAND NEW "HOW TO" GOOFY CARTOON!

Disney is reinvigorating it's legacy! What a time to live! It better be funny. Click here for a clip.

WALL-E POSTER

I can't wait for this film! Andrew Stanton seems like the coolest and I am pissed that I wasn't at Comic-Con this year to hear him speak. Looks like this film will have a lot of heart. Click here to watch the trailer.