I am doing an opening for our new online animation course….Animation FUNdamentals .

The course will be directed at junior high and high school students…and anyone, at any level can participate.

This partial sequence features Ty B. Bear in his most extensive animated appearance to date.

The pencil test is drawn in pencil and then shot with a mini DV camera into Flipbook by Digicel …the easiest animation software out there…

more tests of Ty B. Bear in the future…

Always Animated

Here is a short lecture demo on line of action as it pertains to thumbnails and posing.

Always thumbnail out your key poses before you lay down your keys- no matter what kind of animation you do : 2D, 3D, stopmotion.

Heres some animation from a CHARACTER DESIGN FOR TEENS workshop held at the Jepson Center for the Arts - a part of the Telfair Museum.

The students had a great time exploring different aspects of animation from 2D to Stop Motion. This represents the work of 4 classes.

Many thanks to each of the students (Charish, Olivia, Stephanie, Kelsea and Jeremy) for their hard work and talents.

Thanks also to the folks at the Jepson, especially Studio Coordinator, Torrey Stifel and Kent Braun from Digicel and the FLIPBOOK software.

A very SPECIAL THANKS to Michelle Armstrong (Lauria) - an excellent musician and daughter-in-law for her wonderful music and singing.

These workshops are always fun because of the passion the the participants.

Very Cool!!!

Hello.

I just cleared out my COMMENT box and the 2000 plus spam messages- that plus the 1200 + from the Christmas Holidays and it is NO FUN!

If you have a comment please email me at lanimate@bellsouth.net and I will transfer it to my page.

Thanks…

Here is My Christmas list of My Favorite Holiday Animation….enjoy…

Peace on Earth by MGM’s Hugh Harmon and Rudolph Ising (1939) nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize

Cosmic Christmas by Nelvanna directed by Frank Nissen

A Wish for Wings that Work (1991) Universal TV Animation, director Skip Jones

How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Chuck Jones

A Peanuts Christmas by Charles Schulz Produced by Bill Melendez

Mickey’s Christmas Carol, Disney Studios,1983, directed by Burny Mattinson

Ziggy’s Gift directed by Richard Williams (1982)

A Christmas Carol, A Ghost story directed by Richard Williams, produced by Chuck Jones

Twice Upon a Christmas produced by the Disney Studios

The Box by Paul Driessen (1975)

Rudolph the Rednosed Reindeer by Rankin and Bass (1964)

This is a pencil test of the TONY sequence from the animated film OUR WORLD. It was not included in the final because we had enough sequences between longer pieces of animation. If OUR WORLD is an ongoing project- then it will be added later…

All of my animation was shot in FLIPBOOK software by Digicel.

This is RUFF animation and the timing was changed in certain areas after this test…see if you can find what we changed…

Tony is based on my former producer Tony Ames- principle percussionist of the National Symphony in Washington, D.C.

Tony doesn’t really look like this- except for his “go for it” attitude in life. My BEST producer EVER!!!

Henri stars in the openning sequence of OUR WORLD

Whew! The annual art festival on Tybee Island coupled with their 120 year anniversary celebration as a city has come to a close.

We did very well selling tons of cards and prints - not only my paintings but Ty B. Bear, too! . My orginals did not sell- I kept the prices up there (300-400.00 for a small canvas and over a grand for larger ones). From talking to other artists, I decided to keep the prices to a point where only folks who LOVE the art will buy it.

Well I am back at work - madly rushing about…

AND…in two weeks FREE animation workshops will be presented by yours truly at AWN. It is a six week workshop… and I am finishing the materials for that…more on the workshop later…

This one was a little trickier because of the bulk of the character and the long head and neck of Tony. Note: what you are seeing stops at his nose…his eyes, forehead and head are above the nose.

In my renewed efforts toward OUR WORLD…a new card has been produced for the festival circuit (pictured above).

More later….

Here’s some more animation!

These are selected clips from the animated short, OUR WORLD.

This film was produced over several years and just finalized a couple of months ago.
The working premiere was screened in Cologne in October 2005 before a “standing room only crowd”

When I created the project I was thinking in terms of an ANIJAM (a film organized by Marv Newland)- a sort of animation relay.

I wanted to see what other folks thought of the world. I tried to involve students from schools here in the States…and for one reason or another
it never quite unfolded…

In 2005, I took the project to IFS - International FilmSchule in Koln (Cologne) and two groups of students along with
animator Jared Chapman in Austin, Texas and yours truly worked on the film. Work was produced in Savannah, Cologne, Austin and Provence.

The animation you see is some of my work on the film. I have added narration.

I want to thank Alexandra Ohlsen from IFS who produced the final film version. Also big thanks to Kent Braun of Digicel, Inc. for
the use of Flipbook software (the best and easiest 2D animation software around).

Thanks also to all the artists who worked on the film and to Sadie Miley for her work on the digital ink and paint of my sequences.

Last but least to my lifetime muse, Tricia, who for over 30 years has inspired me.

even more animated…..

Ty B Bear ready for summer and animation

This animated music video was created by folks in the Summer Animation Workshops presented by the Tybee Arts Association.

The music was graciously provided by MI (aka Michelle Armstrong Lauria). Yes, she owns the copyright to all the music- so don’t even think about it…..

The animation is the result of the hard work by folks in a one day adult workshop and a four day teen workshop.The idea was to celebrate and explore animation and have fun!I want to thank everyone for their work and a special thanks to the Tybee Arts Association and Natalie Von Lowenfeldt for their assistance with the workshop.And to MI…you are simply amazing!!!!

This is a pencil test from mister bagley - a blog based series I am playing with….

The premise is always the same…mister bagley is walking along and then he stops and takes something out of his bag…it could be an everyday item
or it might be totally outrageous. We will see…