Welcome to Canadian Animation Interviews

Our goal is to provide an online resource that showcases animation and the folks involved in producing it though online interviews and animation clips. We will mainly be featuring Canadian talent and events, but we will also do the occasional feature on talent or events from abroad.

Joseph Gilland discusses key diferences between Volume 1 & Volume 2 of Elemental Magic: The Art of Special Effects Animation

 

In this short Canadian Animation Interview clip Joseph Gilland explains some of the key differences between Volume 2 and Volume 1 of Elemental Magic: The Art of Special Effects Animation. There is also a short clip of Joseph teaching at the Elemental Magic Workshop in Toronto that was presented by TAIS at the NFB in Toronto.

Two addiional interview clips with Gilland:
Joseph describes how the smoke effects in two Disney films stand out
Joseph talks about a technique that transformed his effects animation

Joseph's website and blogs:
www.joegilland.com
www.elementalmagic.blogspotcom
www.josephgilland-tattoos.blogspot.com

Toronto Animated Image Society Website:
www.tais.ca

 

Speed Animation: Transformers 3 - Official Trailer - Final

 

This is my final rotoscope/animation pass on the Transformers 3 Dark of the Moon Trailer clip

For the past several months I've been experimenting with ways to get myself animating every day without it becoming tiresome. I've been working to get my animation to a place where it's like sketching (I can lose myself for hours in a sketch). I tried to do it with my Eggs Gone Wild stop-motion animation series, but everything started to become too restrictive because I was shooting in stop-mo. I had to have my set, lights, characters, props, special effects materials, rigs, green screen, hot glue, gelatin.... and so on all ready before I could take one frame and if I made a mistake I had to shoot everything all over again. It got to the point where it wasn't fun anymore.

That drove me to seek an alternative way to keep animating. I tried going the paper route but all the scanning and touching up made everything too complicated. This was supposed to be a fast, one-off thing that I could move on from at any point.

I'd had a copy of Toon Boom Studio for years. I bought it to do Robot Chicken style animation lip-sync for my stop-motion characters years ago - just before I got a gig editing for STUCK II in Toronto - and as a result I'd never taken the time to get into it aside from creating lip-sync time sheets.

I had however been updating it as the years went by with the intention of one day sitting down to learn it, but hadn't really found the time. About a year ago I even upgraded from Toon Boom Studio to Toon Boom Animate when Toon Boom offered an amazing cross-grade deal.

Then, during the middle of my "how to do easy animation" crisis, I got an email from Toon Boom advertising the free online tutorial videos for Toon Boom Animate that they're now providing to help teach users how to use the software. I decided it was about time to give Animate a shot and after watching several tutorial videos and doing some sample animations I was hooked. I've always been resistant to digital animation, because I like the hands-on tactility and spontaneity of stop motion, but the speed with which I can animate in Toon Boom is addictive. It's like a caffeine rush every time I grab the pencil and instead of creating 1 sec/hour of stop-mo animation I could pump out animation about three times as fast - depending on the complexity (*while rotoscoping reference footage - and not including effects work like explosions).

So by using a Wacom Tablet, my laptop,Toon Boom Animate, and movie trailers for reference I am able to happily animate while the time flies by.

Anyway, I figured I might as well post about my newly found animation heaven and let other animators who might be searching for the same thing know about my solution.

With this technique, as long as you draw loosely, the quirks from your drawing style still get into the animation, and when you're feeling saucy you can switch up characters in a trailer - like making them anthropormorphic eggs as in my upcoming Eggvincibles trailer, which is a mash mockery of movies like Clash of the Titans and Immortals.

Toon Boom also provides free learning editions of Animate so you can try it before you buy it (something I highly reccomend to make sure it fits your style). I've posted links to the various versions of the Toon Boom software in the right hand column.

posted by Grayden

Anime North 2011 Overview Video.

 

This video is for everyone that was there. I crammed as many video clips into it as I could. If you're looking for Anime North 2011 pictures they're on the Canadian Animation Interviews Blog.

Anime North was quite the ride. I've never been to a festival that was packed with so many people full of fun and positive energy. The costumes are second to none. This was my first time at the festive and I was impressed with the breadth of ages and material it covers. Whether you're a toddler or in your elder years there are events and panels that cater to your age and taste. You like J-Rock? Raves? Arts and Crafts? Animation Panels? Manga Comics? Maids serving you tea? Improv Comedy? Getting Autographs? Watching Anime films? Learning to Draw Manga? Anime Wrestling? Fan Films? Fan art? Meeting anime artists? Buying Anime Figures/Costumes/Films/Posters? Learning Japanese? Anime TV series? Cosplay? Ice Cream? I could go on, but I won't.

You name it, they had it covered.

This is the type of conference you could recommend to anyone and you know they'd have a great time. I'll be back next year.

Anime North 2011 is going on right now!

We're at Anime North for the first time ever and it's pretty amazing. We'll be posting interviews from the conference later in the week but for a sneak peak of some of our footage check out our Anime North 2011 updates on our Blog.

Anime North is hidden away in north-west Toronto, but it's worth the trek. The cosplay costumes are amazing and the breadth of the conference is breath taking. There's literally no way to go to everything and everything is pretty amazing. This conference has anime content for any age and any interest. I'd have to say this is the most all-encompassing conference I've ever been to and it's also the best priced. $55 gives you an all weekend pass. There are special events like the Maid Cafe that cost a little extra, but the proceeds go to Sick Kids Hospital. For a volunteer festival this place is run amazingly well and all the forums I've been to have started on time.

Anyway, if you're not at Anime North this weekend and you have an interest in animation, you should definitely check it out in 2012!

Patrick Boivin's latest stop-mo is a brick film re-creation of Pixar's Cars 2 trailer!

Patrick Boivin's Latest Video is now live! Three of my favourite companies and my favourite animation style all combined into one hell of an amazing short! Now this, folks, is heaven.

Waterloo Festival for Animated Cinema: 2010 Opening

Joseph C. Chen welcomes festival goers to the 10th edition of the Waterloo Festival for Animated Cinema (WFAC). There were twelve world class films screened this year at WFAC. The event was held at the Chrysalids Theatre, formerly known as the GIG theatre, located at 137 Ontario Street North, Kitchener, Ontario.

Montreal Stop Motion Film Festival: 2010 Opening

The 2010 Montreal Stop Motion Film Festival started off with a fantastic stop motion master class presented by Barry Purves, which was followed by sceenings of world class films throughout the weekend, and the festival finished off with a french presentation by animation auteur extraordinaire Patrick Boivin.

TAC - "Harmony: Music and Animation"

Composer, Lou Pomanti, and VP of Animation for DHX Toronto, Janice Walker, discuss the relationship between a composer and a producer and how this relationship is key to bringing music to a production. Paul Stillo, Senior Account Executive, Film & Television, SOCAN moderated the TAC event.

OIAF - Ottawa International Animation Festival 2010

The Ottawa International Animation Festival had a lot of great events and wonderful films to go to. We went to as many of both as we could and we will be editing the footage we took into short vingettes to share with everyone. Check back each week to see new OIAF vingettes.