Category Archives: Artists Interviews

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Way More Than You Ever Wanted to Know About Animaniacs

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Mental Floss has an excellent article up about the development of Animaniacs after talking with Tom Ruegger, the shows executive producer and creator.

I was fortunate enough to work for Tom on Tiny Toons, Tazmania, Animaniacs, Pinky and the Brain as well as Histeria, first as a character layout artist and then as a director, and I still count them as some of my very best years in the industry.

We interviewed Tom Ruegger years ago and you can read that interview here.

From the site:

One idea Spielberg suggested was to make the popular Tiny Toons character Plucky Duck the star of the new show. Meanwhile, Ruegger had been developing characters based on the personalities of his three young sons. These two concepts were combined to create three brother ducks. However, the team soon realized that, between Disney’s Donald Duck, DuckTales, Darkwing Duck, and Warner Bros.’ own Daffy Duck, there were already plenty of animated waterfowl on the market. Spielberg agreed, but said they needed to come up with “a big marquee name” to help sell the show.

Ruegger was inspired by the large “WB” logo on the water tower at the Warner Bros. studio. He proposed a group of siblings drawn in an animation style reminiscent of anthropomorphized animal characters from the 1930s, and called them the Warner Brothers. Although they have dog-like characteristics, the exact type of animal the Warners are meant to be is unknown. According to the show bible – a book filled with background information for the creative team on a TV show – their species is labeled as “Cartoonus Characterus.”

For a brief period, there were four Warner siblings—Yakky, Smakky, Wakky, and little sister, Dot. As the studio artists honed the designs, Yakky became Yakko, and Smakky and Wakky were melded into Wakko. After getting clearance from the Warner estate to use the family name, the show was off and running.

You can read the whole article on Mental Floss!

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We also interviewed the multi-talented Bob Doucette who did all those cool posters above (and in the article). Bob was my producer on Histeria while I was directing on it. Bob was one of our very first interviews on Animation Insider, and you can read his interview here!

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Viewster Launches Largest Online Animation Festival

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VOFF5 launches with fully-curated animation edition and a new jury made up of leading industry talent

Zurich – March 12, 2015 – Viewster (http://www.viewster.com/), the only online video service with its own global film festival, is launching the latest edition of the Viewster Online Film Fest #VOFF5: Animated Worlds (12 – 26 March), with films that bring to life some of the finest animated worlds – from far-off galaxies to worlds within our heads (the trailer can be viewed here). The festival has been fully curated and has a new jury of leading industry talent, who have been recognised by the likes of BAFTA and the Emmys.

#VOFF5 is the world’s largest online showcase of animation content, with the hand-picked festival selection covering the best global talent, from students to award-winners. There are over 140 short films from 37 countries, all of which have been selected on the merits of production quality and for their imaginative scope. The films comprise of various animation methods across 2D, 3D, CGI, Stop-Motion and Cel Animation. Each film in #VOFF5: Animated Worlds is listed in the festival catalogue, available to view online http://festival.viewster.com.

The festival winners will get a share of the $50,000 USD prize fund, making #VOFF5 the biggest prize fund in the world to reward purely animation talent. The final films will be chosen by the jury from the shortlist, following the public voting period when fans will watch, discuss, share and vote for their favourite entries.
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The new jury for #VOFF5 consists of:

  • Prolific voice-actor Yuri Lowenthal (Sasuke Uchiha in Naruto and Ben Tennyson in Ben 10, numerous video game credits such as The Prince from The Prince of Persia series)
  • Athena Yvette Portillo (Lucas Film producer of Star Wars Rebels and line producer on Clone Wars)
  • Samantha Youssef (Toronto International Film Festival award-winner for La Fuga Grande and character animator and director, with credits for Disney, Ubisoft and Filmax International)
  • Two-time Emmy winning animator Christophe Vacher (credits include work on Transformers: Prime,Despicable Me, 9, Enchanted, Fantasia / 2000, Hercules and Beauty and the Beast)
  • BAFTA-nominated animator Michael Schlingmann (credits include work on Corpse Bride,Paranorman, Alice in Wonderland)

Kai Henniges, CEO, Viewster, said: “#VOFF5 cements our festival’s position as a global fandom destination, where fanboys and fangirls can connect with each other and interact with the filmmakers around the content. The films in this edition of the festival are truly impressive and are a testament to the amazing talent out there, and the imaginative variety of styles and subjects in animation. Viewster is a global first-stop for fresh Anime content, and our catalogue has a wealth of complementary content across sci-fi and fantasy, so #VOFF5: Animated Worlds will play directly into our audience’s tastes.”

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The fifth edition of #VOFF hosts a number of award-winning creations and talent, including:

  • Posthuman (USA) – Screamfest ‘Best Animated Short’-winner starring the voice of Tricia Helfer (Battlestar Galactica)
  • The Silence Beneath the Bark (France) – Oscar nominated short which was also nominated for the Annecy Cristal and won the best animated short at the Toronto Worldwide Short Film Festival
  • ARK (Poland) – SIGGRAPH ‘Best of Show’-winner which was also accepted into official selection at Cannes, from director Grzegorz Jokajtys (animation/digital arts credits include Star Trek, Iron Man 2,Captain America: Winter Soldier, Hellboy and Pan’s Labyrinth)
  • Golem (Germany) – Won Rising Star Award at the Canada International Film Festival and Audience Award at the Creative Arts Film Festival, and is from director Tobias Wiesner (animation/digital arts credits include Game of Thrones, The Hobbit trilogy, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes and Hugo). The soundtrack is from renowned film composer Cliff Martinez (Drive, Solaris, Only God Forgives, Spring Breakers)
  • Way Home (South Korea) – directed by Oscar-nominated Erik Oh (Brave, Monsters University and the upcoming Pixar films Inside Out and Finding Dory, Oscar-nominated for his latest film The Dam Keeper)
  • The Gift (Chile) – crowd-funded film screened at over 90 festivals and has received numerous animation awards

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About Viewster

Viewster (www.viewster.com) is a worldwide online video service connecting passionate audiences. We are the first stop destination for anime lovers, featuring an ever-growing line up of the latest shows directly from Japan. Our wider catalogue brings the best of specialist shows and movies, with more than ten thousand titles across anime, thriller, sci-fi, and fantasy. Viewster is free, supported by advertising and available to stream on desktop, mobile and smart TV apps.

The Viewster Online Film Fest brings millions of visitors together with the creators. Each festival we feature the best up and coming filmmakers and invite our online community to help select the finalists. But we don’t stop there. We believe so much in fan culture, that we have created a global platform for fans to interact with each other, and we invite anime enthusiasts to join our translation community to create subtitles on a professional level. Meet with us – both online and at international conventions throughout the year.

Viewster, and its network of partner sites, serves an 18-24 year old audience of more than 20 million unique users per month across the U.S., U.K., Germany and Australia alone – the ideal advertising platform for all brands looking to bring cool stuff to awesome people.

All entries and voting: http://www.viewster.com
Official Trailer: https://vimeo.com/121808400

For more information, please visit: http://corp.viewster.com.
Find Viewster on www.viewster.com, in iTunes or Google Play

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Syd M Fini

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​What is your name and your current occupation?
My name is Syd M Fini ,and I’m storyboard Artist at SO! animation,Fictionville Studio and Brave man Media,I worked on two Animation shows at SO! Animation : LEARN OUR HISTORY and MONEY BRIGHT KIDS and We are going to start a new show soon . At Fictionville Studio I’m working on character designing and storyboards for a shadow play based on a Persian mythology .  And some Live action Commercials at Brave Man Media.

What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
I started with a feature film . I got lucky and I did a test for a director who needed storyboard artist .I was 20.I got the job and I dropped out college. The craziest part was he wanted me to be on the set everyday which is weird for a storyboard artist .It was a big production movie Called : Farzand-e-Sobh( and the Director was Behrooz Afkhami. He planted to get just one shot every day at Dawn or golden hour in the sun set . So I spent almost 3 years on that project . when the production was over I was 23 and it was 2006 and it was IRAN . The movie was banned because of political reasons and never saw the light of the screen but I learned a lot from Mr Afkhami and that 3 years was my college .After Farzand-e-Sobh I worked on another 3 feature Live action movies .CHE ,TODAY,The Child and the Angel and So many TV Commercials .Until I get the chance to Direct Animations and show what I learned how to Visually tell stories by doing storyboards for real movie directors.

What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
“Back From The Other Side” was the first big production animation that I directed and I’m so proud to be a part of the team and the shadow play that I’m working on now is so exciting .The director Hamid Rahmanian,He is such an amazing artist and he is so out of the box.

Where are you from and how did you get into the animation business?
 Im from IRAN and as I said before I have almost ten years of experience in the field of visual story telling and I was Continue reading

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Benjamin Norcross

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What is your name and your current occupation?
Benjamin Norcross, Character Animator for games.

What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
Ski bum/lift operator, Medic/Corpsman in the U.S. Military, Veterinarian Assistant

What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
Free Realms: for the kid demographic but the characters were fun and I was never told to tone it down a bit.  I could literally do what ever came to mind and for animation, nothing is better than having total creative freedom.  I made a duck-billed dinosaur do yoga!

How did you become interested in animation?
I love art and I was very seriously considering graphic design for marketing and I found a school that looked good.  When I got out of the Military the school had been bought out by the Art Institute.  Not only did they

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Scott Evans

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What is your name and your current occupation?
Hello. My name is Scott Evans and I am a freelance cartoon graphic designer and animator at www.lookcreativestudio.co.uk

What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
The animation I am working on is based on the craziest job that I had. Just after I turned 18 my Dad got me to pass exams so that I could be licensee of his new pub. I was suppose to me going to university in London, having just completed my A levels but my Dad convinced me to take a year off for work experience, to help manage his new pub in Torquay. Originally from Birmingham, the whole family moved to this seaside town that we had only ever visited once before, and Tony Dunne, now fellow Barstewards writer/composer and long time friend decided to come down for the summer with us. None of us ever returned home to Birmingham (and I never did get to university). Being in charge of a pub at 18 resulted in all the things you could probably imagine. Lots of drinking, lots of trouble and very little work. The pub last two years (though the memories live on!)

What are some of your favourite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
I do lots of cartoon artwork for businesses all over the world and I am grateful that I get to do that every day for a living. I can’t think of Continue reading

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Aaron Sowd

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What is your name and your current occupation?
My name is Aaron Sowd. I’m currently the president and art director at Aaron Sowd Productions, Inc. We specialize in storyboards and animatics for feature films. We also do some 3-D and previs work. Right now, we work exclusively for Will Smith and Overbrook Entertainment, doing development work. It’s a dream job, and they keep us very busy.

What are some of the crazier jobs you had before getting into animation?
I’ve worked as a professional artist more or less full time since I was 18. I spent about six years in comics before working on the Anastasia and Titan A.E. style guides for Fox. I was the art director at Stan Lee Media. I’ve been freelancing in just about every media since: film, TV, advertising and video games.

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What are some of your favorite projects you’re proud to have been a part of?
After Earth comes out this summer, and that was a blast to work on. I got to storyboard some of the additional scenes and meet M. Night. My favorite project is the one I’m working on right now — which is top secret, of course. Working on the first Transformers film, Solaris, the Transformers and The Simpsons rides at Universal, and the God of War and Rage video games were all career highlights for me.

How did you become interested in animation?
As a kid I grew up with no TV, so I got interested in comic books first, then animation. Our local library used to carry the Tintin and Asterix collections, and later I got into Marvel and DC. The first animation I can remember seeing was Continue reading