MAYDAY!

It's that time of year again, birds are singing, flowers are blooming...and animators will soon be sleep-deprived! 

That's right -- time for DePaul Animation's 2nd Annual MAYDAY! event.

In conjunction with our student group, the Animation Lodge, we’re again hosting an all-weekend long group animation project. MAYDAY! is a fun, educational, and exhausting endurance test that also gives everyone a chance to hang out and get to know each other.

Students, alumni and faculty will join together for 44 hours, working from 6pm Friday night through 2pm Sunday afternoon (but you don’t have to stay at school the entire time -- and you can work from home as well).  Remember, MAYDAY! is NOT a contest but a creative social event, so don't miss out! 

The schedule for MAYDAY! 2012:

6pm Friday, April 27: KICK-OFF!  We’ll meet in room 924 to introduce ourselves and choose a THEME.  Then we’ll animate. You can work on projects as groups or as individuals, in whatever medium you choose.

9am Saturday, April 28: breakfast

6pm Saturday, April 28: dinner

9am Sunday, April 29: breakfast

2pm Sunday, April 29: wrap-up

In order to participate, you need to RSVP Meghann Artes, at martes@cdm.depaul.edu  In order to plan for food and building security, let us know when you plan to be around (which night(s) you’ll stay over* and which meals you’ll be here for). *A word of advice: If you want to take naps, remember to bring a sleeping bag! 

Style Frames

In Storyboarding and Narrative Development, students were asked to take a panel from a completed project and depict it in the final style of their film. Next, the students were asked to visit the Art Institute and create the same panel in the style of an artist in the museum's collection. Below are two great examples from Maria Morales and Johnhenry Clark.

Above: Maria's style. Below: An homage to Impressionist painter, Edgar Degas.

Above: Johnhenry's style. Below: An homage to Cubist painter, Pablo Picasso.

Motion Graphics Typography Animation

In the Motion Graphics class this quarter, students have been working to interpret short pieces of stand-up comedy as motion typography. The goal is to learn something from the timing that these comedians use in their delivery. Here's three finished pieces:

Julia Simplicio, with a joke by Louis CK:

Tanner Wickware, with a joke by Steven Wright:

Matt Eriks, with a joke by Aziz Ansari:

Animation I is off to a roaring start!

Animation I is off to a roaring start this quarter! I am so pleased with the group of talented and motivated students I have this Winter.

Our first assignment was to create a morph animation. Below is Lucas Goins' incredible depiction of a human tail bone turning into a bird. Luke was inspired by the etymology of "tail bone" -- which you can read more about here. Check out Luke's Namesake below.

Working in Flash, students were then asked to animate an evolving cycle -- a loop which repeats, and with each repetition a new element is added to the animation. There was one catch -- each animation had to include a BEAR. Below is Colin Farrell's epic rendering of one bear's journey on his hog. Feel the roar!

Assistant Professor Jo Dery included in the deCordova Biennial

As DePaul Animation's newest faculty member, it is my pleasure to share news of my latest creative project. A new multi-media work, titled Chapter Three, was included in the deCordova Biennial, at the deCordova Museum and Sculpture Park in Lincoln, Massachusetts. The piece features an animated video projection as well as hand-bound books and sculptural objects, and it is installed in the museum's DeNormandie Library. Below you can find a still from the animated video.

Japan Animation/Game Dev Study Abroad Trip

During November-December 2011, twenty-two animation and game development students from DePaul traveled to Japan on a two-week Study Abroad trip, and toured several gaming and animation companies, including From Software, Grasshopper Manufacturer and Toei Animation. Look at some pictures of their trip to see what amazing and incredible experiences they had.

Animation Mechanics - Fall 2011

This is a compilation of student work from a 10-week Animation Mechanics class in our graduate Animation program. Students in this course study and practice the foundations of animation from the core texts "The Animator's Survival Kit" by Richard Williams and "Timing for Animation" by Harold Whitaker and John Halas. Students also study all 16 disks of Richard Williams' Animation Masterclass. In the class we give special emphasis to the importance of timing, spacing, and weight. It's old school!

Looking for Animators

We're looking for Animators to join our faculty. Production/studio experience is very important to us, so those without MFA degrees will be considered for a full-time non-tenure-track position. There are currently over 175 majors enrolled in our Animation MFA, MA, BA and BS degrees, and you'd be joining a full crew of 7 full-time and 14 part-time Animation faculty members. Animation resources include a stop motion studio, two green screen stages, a sound recording and mixing studio, and a mocap studio. Past visiting artists include David O’Reilly, J.J. Sedelmaier and legendary animator Yuri Norstein (and more coming this spring!)

For more details and to apply, visit http://facultyopportunities.depaul.edu/applicants/Central?quickFind=50866

Visiting artist Yuri Norstein demonstrates his
multi-plane technique during a workshop.

The Gift

As a final project in the Animation Graduate Seminar, everyone was asked to pick one thing that resonated with them from the material covered and make an animation based on it. I was extremely pleased to see such a great variety of influences and approaches, so I will be posting several projects throughout the month of December. Enjoy!

Lisa

1. Christal Charlery's "The Gift" (This is all your fault, Devin.)

Animation I: Final Projects

Animation I students finished up the quarter by producing a final project of their choosing, developing the work from storyboard through sound design. Below is a slimy sampling of the great projects produced by students!

First, let me introduce you to "Simba the Snail" -- created by Brian Almalvez.

And what follows is "A Strange Encounter" with the work of Aaron Hunt.

A Strange Encounter from Aaron Hunt on Vimeo.

It was a real treat for me to work with such great students during my first term as a faculty member in the DePaul animation program.

Our new MFA program

The deadline for our new MFA in Animation program is February 1, 2012. Everyone is very excited about this new offering, and to share the news we created a promotional poster that will be mailed to schools nation-wide in the coming weeks. Spread the word!

The Onion A.V. Club interviews Eyeworks

The founders of the Eyeworks Experimental Animation Festival, Lilli Carré and DePaul Animation professor Alexander Stewart, were interviewed about experimental animation and their festival on the Onion's A.V. Club website.

A.V. Club: Animation is a ridiculously painstaking process. What kind of person does it take to be an animator? 

Alexander Stewart: That’s a good assessment. Animation is extremely tedious, time consuming, and exhausting in terms of inspiration. In general, a 3-to-4-minute short film, would take an artist a year or nine months to make. So you need either to be crazy, or else mind-bogglingly patient to be an animator. You’re not depending on actors or a director of photography to make your film; you can sit down and, with the simplest tools, you control the ingredients involved to make exactly what you want to put in. It’s about expressing a singular artistic vision.

Don't forget to purchase tickets from the Eyeworks website and attend Eyeworks this Saturday and Sunday, Nov. 5 and 6, at DePaul's CDM Theater downtown!  We all love Eyeworks, and we're very grateful that Lilli and Alexander have held it at DePaul for its first two years.