Boing Boing: Quirky human behavior

Boing Boing: Quirky human behavior

In 1988, psychologist Fritz Strack of the University of Würzburg, Germany, asked two groups of people to judge how funny they found some cartoons. In one group, each person held a pencil between their teeth without it touching their lips, which forced a smile. The other group were asked to hold the pencil with their lips (not using their teeth), forcing a frown.

The results revealed that people experience the emotion associated with their expressions. Those with a forced smile felt happier, and found the cartoons funnier than those who were forced to frown...

Anthropologists and psychologists have long been interested in superstitions. One of the key categories of superstitious thinking is the "law of contagion", which says that when an object has been in contact with someone, it somehow acquires their "essence". Psychologist Paul Rozin and colleagues at the University of Pennsylvania have investigated how common such thinking is today.

They asked people to rate how they would feel about wearing a nice, soft, blue jumper that had been freshly laundered - but previously worn by someone else. As they varied the fictitious previous wearers of the jumper, it became clear how strongly people follow the age-old belief in magical contagion.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the volunteers were unhappiest about wearing the jumper if they were told it had previously belonged to a serial killer. On the whole they would rather have worn a sweater that had been dropped in dog faeces and not washed - raising genuine health concerns - than a laundered sweater that had been worn by a mass murderer.

Even in the 21st century, we are far from being the rational creatures that we like to think we are, as a final part of the experiment made dismayingly clear. When asked to imagine that the laundered sweater had been worn by someone who had contracted HIV through a blood transfusion, most people once again said they wouldn't wear it.

Animators expanding their lines of work - Los Angeles Times

Animators expanding their lines of work - Los Angeles Times

One of the students in my Class 1 at Animation Mentor sent this link out last night after Q & A. Good article, definitely something for everyone to keep in mind: Diversify as much as possible.

The Happiest Monster - by Jonathan Kim

Saw this on YouTube today, I laughed.

Long Flicks: to Cut or Not to Cut?

I think a lot of films could do for cutting out of about 20 - 40 minutes. If you can maintain pace and interest at that length, that's fine. But any time you notice people starting to squirm or fidget in their seats, yeah, go ahead and cut something already.

LOS ANGELES (AP) -- Director David Fincher knows some people may think his serial-killer saga "Zodiac" is too long at two hours, 40 minutes.

He's wondered the same thing himself but decided the film needed that much space to tell the story he wanted.

"Zodiac" and other recent epic-length films such as "The Good Shepherd" reflect an age-old Hollywood balancing act: satisfying filmmakers' artistic desires without causing audiences to squirm in their seats.

"I would have loved the movie to have been shorter. I just couldn't find a way to dramatically do that," said Fincher, whose previous films include "Fight Club" and "Se7en." "Nobody wants to wear out their welcome, but you want the audience to have a meaningful and varied experience.
...
"`The Godfather' merits all that time and more," said critic Richard Roeper of the Chicago Sun-Times and TV's "Ebert and Roeper and the Movies." "But 80 to 90 percent of the films I see could benefit from 10 to 15 minutes in cuts." (full story)

Cartoon Brew » Mickey Like You’ve Never Seen

I love the look of this.

"Based on a Neo-comic style, Mickey exists in a world of translucent imagery, shape shifting creatures and detailed patterns. With the help of a power-packed Neo-Suit full of gadgets, Mickey encounters extraordinary creatures from many new worlds, with stories and adventures that extend way beyond our galaxy."

Cartoon Brew » Mickey Like You’ve Never Seen



Technorati Tags: mickey mouse, cartoon, walt disney, anime, video, cool

The Living Animation Festival: Blog with lots of animated shorts listed

The Living Animation Festival:

Eye candy!

YouTube - Ishu Patel - The Bead Game

YouTube - Ishu Patel - The Bead Game:

YouTube - The Grandfather of Soul by Keytoon Studios

YouTube - The grandfather of Soul:

A crazy character dressed in the style of the sixties comes into a room and plays his favourite mom's old phonograph

Another nice one here showing off some water physics schtuff from RealFlow.

Rest in peace, Joe Barbera | MetaFilter

Rest in peace, Joe Barbera | MetaFilter:

The last of the great animation directors has died. Joe Barbera was half of the Hanna-Barbera Tom and Jerry cartoons for MGM. When that studio closed, they learned how to do cartoons for television on a much smaller budget, and gave us so manymemorable characters. Mark Evanier worked for Barbera, and is sharing his memories on his always excellent blog. duo that created the Oscar-winning

posted by evilcolonel (14 comments total)

YouTube - Frosty the Snowman -Original UPA 3 minute short film

YouTube - Frosty the Snowman:

In 1954, the UPA studio brought "Frosty" to life in a three-minute animated short which appeared regularly on WGN-TV. This production included a bouncy, jazzy version of the song. It has been a perennial WGN-TV Christmas classic, and was most recently broadcast on December 24 and 25, 2005, as part of a WGN-TV children's programming retrospective, along with their two other short Christmas classics, "Suzy Snowflake" and "Hardrock, Coco and Joe".

MIT sketching - MIT's Assist Sketch Understanding System and Operation

It's called MIT's Assist Sketch Understanding System and Operation.

MIT Assist Sketch Understanding System and Operation works by sketching a simple mechanical device onto the drawing board and then demonstrating how the system understands the sketch through movement. (Magic Paper: drawing out ideas) (http://rationale.csail.mit.edu/projects.shtml)

ASSIST: A Shrewd Sketch Interpretation and Simulation Tool

Draw objects like ramps, carts, wheels, baskets with springs, then hit run and this program MIT is developing will process physics-based simulations on what you drew. I could spend hours messing with something like this, I need it! Give it to me, MIT!! :>



YouTube - MIT sketching

CGTalk - Sugar Rush, short by Guillermo Careaga

Really nice work by Guillerrmo Careaga, Ringling has a reputation for graduating top-notch candidates.

Hi everyone! I graduated from Ringling School of Art and Design this past May, and I had meant to post my animated short months ago but I just didn't have the chance. Here it is though (you need the DIVx codec to see it):

http://webspace.ringling.edu/~gcare...isFinal_web.avi

CGTalk - Sugar Rush, short by Guillermo Careaga

Mayerson on Animation: The Grosses

Got this link from Ray Chase this morning. Interesting numbers, I'd like to see how many 'butts in seats' there were per film, just to get a better picture of how popular films were w/o shuffling increasing ticket prices, etc...

Mayerson on Animation: The Grosses

YouTube - The Fool Looks At The Finger That Points To The Sky (computer animated music video)

Great computer animated music video, by Aaron Bradbury, music by musicians Little Explorer.



YouTube - The Fool Looks At The Finger That Points To The Sky

Ringling School Portfolio - Christopher Cordingley

Nice short! Simple is good.

Christopher Cordingley

Ringling School Portfolio

Annie Awards 2006

Annie Awards will celebrate the best in animation during the 100th year of animation

Nominations are currently being accepted for the 34th Annual Annie Awards: Honoring excellence in the field of animation, the deadline for ASIFA-Hollywood to receive entry forms is October 6, 2006. ASIFA-Hollywood must receive materials for nomination judging October 27, 2006. To access all forms, including the Official Entry Form, visit the Entry Forms page. Call for Judges: ASIFA-Hollywood is looking for individuals interested in serving on the 2006 nomination committees. Click here for more information. Rules and Categories: The Rules are now available online on the Rules/Categories page Key Dates: Be sure to visit the Key Dates page for important deadlines. This website will be updated in the next week. Be sure to check here often for the latest up-to-date information on animation's highest honor.

Annie Awards 2006

shh-LIFE! - REPOST: The Fear of moving past blocking..

Good advice for newer animators.

"The more you know, the more fear you have.

Seems to be a rule true of many things.. tree climbing for example. Before you know about gravity and how much breaking an arm can hurt, you really don’t worry that much about falling out of the tree, you just sorta climb on up there and monkey around. It isn’t until you see your friend slip and fall and break her arm when you think “ohh.. wait.. this can be painful…” and you start to worry.

The same is true about animation.

When many animators first start animating they just move things around willy nilly, making things go this way.. that way.. etc. They have no fears, they just move things.

Granted, their animations may looks like ass squished up against a large pile of roadkill, but at least they have no fear." (full article at link) shh-LIFE! - REPOST: The Fear of moving past blocking..

Cloud Boy, Oh Boy! >>Drawn! The Illustration and Cartooning Blog » Blog Archive

"Tantalizingly short, and oh so sweet, Cloud Boy is a wonderful little children’s book by previously blogged cartoonist/ illustrator Rhode Montijo. That last link takes you to some cute craft ideas for the classroom, if you’re interested. I just keep loving Rhode more and more." (more)

Drawn! The Illustration and Cartooning Blog » Blog Archive » Cloud Boy, Oh Boy!

gezfry.com - online gallery

gezfry.com - online gallery

Picasso, Paula Scher, and the lifetime behind every second - Signal vs. Noise (by 37signals)

Picasso, Paula Scher, and the lifetime behind every second - Signal vs. Noise (by 37signals)