Tuesday, June 26, 2018

Charging Toward a Retreat - Organizational Meeting Notes #2

A Charge Toward a Retreat - Organizational Meeting Notes #2
ASIFA Central Subcommittee on Retreats and BBQs

Phone Conference Call/Zoom: Steve Leeper, Jim Middleton (secty), Gretchen Vinnedge, Robert Swieringa, Gary Schwartz
Tuesday, 26 June 2018, 7-7:40pm (Zoom says BE GONE, MORTALS!)


Some more of the August Retreat specifics were addressed and confirmed - some other items will be discussed “off-zoom” via email.  New material highlighted.

The Autumnal Retreat:
Location: Grand Rapids
Dates: Saturday, August 11 and Sunday August 12, 2018

Proposed Outline:
Saturday, August 11

11am - rousing, stretching, arriving at the theatrical location with snacks in hand for general consumption and minimizing distractions due to hypoglycemia

Opening remarks by Brad Yarhouse, ASIFA Central President - let the mayhem BEGIN!

NEW SPECIFICS!
Noon - 3pm Workshop
Here’s what we’re going with
1. A lip synch project, a brief 4 second bit of vocal gymnastics, promoting ASIFA Central.  Steve and Gary will be working on the narration text and will determine whether it will be pre-recorded or will be captured live at the workshop.
2. Gretchen has four (4) workstations available at the CMC site.  Dragonframe is available there.  Gary, Jim, and Steve all have workstations they can bring.   Steve is designing sand boxes, up to 8 of them.  Jim has a light board for silhouetting or 2D animation sketchery. 
3. Otherwise, it’s “BYOAS” - Bring Your Own Animation Supplies
4. Bring food! Drink! (It’ll have to stay outside the work zone) 

THEN - More NEW SPECIFICS!
3pm-5/5:30pm -Show and Tell, aka “Whatever the Hell We Just Made” (official ASIFA Central Sanctioned Term)
Jim will send out a request to the membership planning to attend to skoot along their intended participation works for the session.  Jim is also working up a standard half-dozen questions to ask everyone at the completion of the showing, with an emphasis on techniques and workflows employed.  The presentations will be recorded for editing into a document commemorating the event.  Jim's email is jim.middletonrx@gmail.com

5/5:30pm - 7pm - DINNER BREAK - on one’s own recognizances - such a variety, perhaps a deli, perhaps a bag of pork rinds

7pm - An evening show, no admission charge, but donations to the cause are always appreciated, if only to cover the light bill for the CMC
Two parts of the program are in the schedule -
Part One - Lotte Reiniger presentation (Chuck Wilson coordinating) - approximately 45 minutes
Part Two - The latest Ottawa showreel - approximately 45 minutes



Sunday, August 12
11am to 2pm - a BBQ “out back of the CMC”  - $5 will help defer the costs
Robert, Brad, and Gretchen will be the coordinators
We may freely enjoy each other’s company.  

Saturday, June 16, 2018

Anijam tests for IAD '18

The Poster Challenge:
First of all, to have a poster challenge, you need a poster:

Then take an asisgnment:
The task is to morph between two sets of eyes for this year's poster.  Set #17 goes to #1.
The tests are ....

#1 - 11 drawings to check for color balance and registration, run through Sony Vegas, looped front to back, shot on twos.

And an animated gif test on the first frame for background layering...

And, blending the first second or so...

And now with the final frames, for the background...

Unassembled frames, waiting for layering and final edit to a 3 second opus:



Press Release Notes:
ASIFA Central - IAD October Project and Poster

The eyes have it - 18 visions gaze upon the viewer, just as the viewer is drawn to the variety of imagined expressions they represent.  Rene Castillo of ASIFA Mexico, along with nine other animators at his Mandaraka studios, created these emotions, frozen in time, practically begging for life beyond their storyboarded existence.
Castillo noted that “every animator has a unique and personal point of view, with different styles, techniques, themes, colors... if we celebrate world animation, we must celebrate the diversity of looks.”
With this philosophy, he created his poster celebrating International Animation Day, expressing passion he has embraced since a serious auto accident gave him appreciation for the brevity of life.  Better to mold life into clay than a life of molded management.
ASIFA Central in the United States took Castillo’s vision one step further, molding each image into an animated continuum.  Their Anijam project will be completed in time to present at its August retreat in Grand Rapids.

Le fin, enfin:

...and the whole thing, assembled by the MASTER, R. Brad Yarhouse:

Wednesday, June 13, 2018

Typing on a Manual Anything....

Presenting the opportunity to hash out random noggin noises, a typewriter is faster than legible handwritten notes — and creates an immediate, organic record, without interruption for “improvement.” It allows me to argue with my thoughts instead of those of an algorithm-designed program.
These gatherings allow for tactile experimentation – perhaps an unusual example will become a new extension of these fingertips. We all become percussion performers in the process.

 At work...

On the road...

 With Oswald

With a beer...remember, write drunk but edit sober...

Saturday, June 09, 2018

ASIFA Central and Green Screen Frolix

June 9, 2018 - a rainy afternoon in Grand Rapids, with streets flooding in Battle Creek, and orange pumpkins heading to Singapore.  That calls for some video experimentation:

Part One - Melies as Mentor

Part Two - Koko Kicks Krazy

 Some guy with an old T-shirt and bad color sense

 Things quickly became surreal

 New guard, old glasses...

 A virtual Gary... we had to take a picture

Avatars abounding

Monday, June 04, 2018

ASIFA Central and IAD Anijam Concept - for discussion on June 9 2018


From our noble ASIFA Central President, Brad Yarhouse:

Hi Everyone,

I wanted to get your opinion on the ANI-JAM event happening this week. I am wondering about having the event be a starter for the jam. Those who want to gather locally can come to the Community Media Center, those who wish to Skype in remotely can connect with us there. We announce the ANI-JAM theme, goal, and elements and discuss among the participants the how to share files, whose piece links to whose, and then the participants go off to work on their segments. 


Here is the Theme and particulars:

The theme will be based on the IAD 18 poster which will be revealed on Friday this week. The poster is made up of a series of images of characters faces in extreme closeup with different expressions. Each face is done in a different style of animation. For the ANI-JAM each participant will be organized with a start expression and an end expression that links up with another persons start or end expression. The execution and interpretation of the expressions will be solely up to the participants. Which expressions and who does what will be determined at the start of the jam. Each participant has 3 seconds to animate their expression transforming to the other expression through whatever means they determine. A click track for the beat will be provided, a final soundtrack will be custom created by a member, I am hoping to get Andrew Zesiger, a recent KCAD graduate to do the music, but there could be others. 

The pieces would be due on July 1st, the debut of the completed jam would be at our Retreat. The completed jam would be used as a proof of concept for the other chapters in ASIFA to create their own ANI-JAMS that could be used as openings to IAD or as interstices between films on IAD. 

SO, this Saturday’s event would be less about making something during the event and more about launching the event. The core goal of the event (in my opinion) is to get animators from throughout our wide region connected and working together. The hope is that this would seed and lead to other collaborations.

What do you all think?
Brad

(watch this space for updates after Saturday's gathering...)

The assignments have been assigned - the challenge is presented!  Let the morphing (not morphine) begin!



Wednesday, May 30, 2018

ASIFA Central August Retreat Planning Notes

A Charge Towards a Retreat - Organizational Meeting Notes
ASIFA Central Subcommittee on Retreats and Exquisite Corpses
Phone Conference Call/Zoom: Steve Leeper, Jim Middleton (secty), and Gary Schwartz
Wednesday, May 30, 2018:  8-9pm

Steve and Jim coordinated the general outline, Gary was able to call in during the latter portions of the Zoom experience and contributed several options on workshop activities.  Bob and Gretchen were unable to phone in, so specifics were tabled to our next meeting time, TBA.

The Autumnal Retreat:
Location: Grand Rapids
Dates: Saturday, August 11 and Sunday August 12, 2018

Proposed Outline:
Saturday, August 11
11am - rousing, stretching, arriving at the theatrical location with snacks in hand for general consumption and minimizing distractions due to hypoglycemia
Opening remarks by Brad Yarhouse, ASIFA Central President - let the mayhem BEGIN!

Noon - 3pm
Workshop
Specifics depending on spaces and material - Notions from Gary include, but are not limited to:
metamorphosis, meat puppetry, sand, exquisite corpsing/Anijamming, paper collage, shadow puppets, white boarding with dry erasery, and lip sychronism.
The thought of animating food, possibly the result of hypoglycemia, brought up a Movable Feast, or Paschkemation, idea - as a Michigan tribute to Hemingway

3pm-5/5:30pm
Show and Tell, aka “Whatever the Hell We Just Made” (official ASIFA Central Sanctioned Term)
Beginning with the fruits of paschkemation and the workshop, moving to individual show and tell projects, with liberal time for not just the showing of, but the How It Was Done - what software, what production pipeline, what elaborate ruse for obtaining adequate funding was necessary...
Exhausted from the experience, this calls for

5/5:30pm - 7pm
FOOD - on one’s own recognizances - such a variety, perhaps a deli, perhaps a bag of pork rinds

7pm - the end of the night as we know it
Ottawa showreel - Steve may be able to obtain, Jim will be glad to provide funding for the bootleggery

Sunday, August 12
Exhausted from animation and food, the only recourse for Sunday will be –
an 11am barbeque - perhaps with leftovers of Paschkemation!

Jim will provide Steve with meeting notes, to be shared with rest of committee and other interested parties for input and comment.

Thursday, May 24, 2018

Linkage test between sites

Just a test to see if blogger connects with this creaky website.  It is a Flash animation, so a Flash player is needed to view it in all its glitchy glory:


http://animatingapothecary.com/SWF%20Animation/AVIANFLUInternet.html


And that, is that...

Sunday, May 20, 2018

1940 - Night time CBS comes to Kalamazoo

After nearly a decade on the air in Kalamazoo, WKZO was granted evening broadcast permission in 1940 - and they produced this memento to celebrate.  CBS came to western Michigan!

Edward R. Murrow, a very young Eric Sevareid, Conrad Nagle, Helen Hayes, Kate Smith, Dale Evans, Amos and Andy, and Gene Autry crackled forth with high fidelity and 1000 watts of broadcast power!




































Thursday, April 26, 2018

ASIFA Central/Midwest US Chapter Meeting Notes for April 25, 2018

Disjointed notes to the casual observer.
But these notes are for my quick reference for the next ASIFA Central Meeting...
this was a nice 2 hours I was able to contribute to...

ASIFA Board Agenda and notes, April 25, 2018 8pm on a phone near you
  • An amazing evening, a light breeze, a joy about us all, and it’s only the 25th.  
  • The office curtains wave at the setting sun…. Lucretius begs us consider the Epicurean life,
  • and the dog
  • begs for attention at the office doors … sweet spring …
Present: Julie, Brad, Chuck, Jim, Gretchen, Steve, Chris (enjoying the congestion), and Deanna
in the
car with her family, and Gary is in limbo, suffering from technical problems beyond his control

  1. Updates on sub party meetings
  2. Next Meeting - socks optional - coherence optional - May 30, 8pm,
  3. conference call , 2 weeks after the retreat conference call on 14 May at 8pm

2. Updates

  1. Members Survey Conversation - Chris and Jim have been chatting about this -
  2. working up the logistics - how do these notions sound for starters?
  3. Who is our focus - students, industry, those within the group or outside the community
  4. (students tend to have a lot of their own community - it’s good to sow those seeds early,
  5. as networking occurs on many levels, something students will discover later) - students
  6. at Webster have a community that could be tapped - how do we open the doors to them
  7. when they leave to join the industry.
Survey Monkey may be an option - Chris has been taking a look at it,
and it is a possibility for the survey process.  
Give students the understanding that connections with ASIFA can be a good draw
for networking - the students can join, but they’re not our primary target (Deanna)
The purpose of the survey is to meet the needs of our population, so perhaps using
the technologies and professionals involved on how they work with the workflow to work-around the shortcomings of the basic softwares and how the basics can be ramped up to an actual production process.  What are the work techniques?
From a questionnaire standpoint, the format of animation could be the starting point -
analog, tech, experimental…
Chris wants to become more connected in the midwest - it would be a great thing
to have a map of everyone - get a feel of location within the community -
the retreats are great to encourage this sort of thing.
Brad: get together a rough draft of the survey and send as an email to everyone
for review.  End of semester mayhem and madness!!!!! Jim and Chris can send notes back and forth over the next couple of weeks.
    1. Chris Sagovac, Jim Middleton - some notes on this subject from Jim and Chris:
    2. For example on FB polls:
      What do you find more valuable?
        Current news in animation
        Ability to network
        Critical feedback on your work
  Screening current animation
    1. How far are you willing to travel for a conference/meeting/festival/retreat?
      10 miles
      100 miles
      1000 miles
    2. How do you animate primarily?
      What is your Process?
Tips and Techniques

    1. We could also directly survey the members through their email or link it to the facebook
    2. page for some more open ended answers.

What are your expectations joining ASIFA Central?
-text box answer-

Do you have any particular passion in animation you'd like to share
as a presentation?
-text box answer-

Personally, facilitating networking, collaboration, and connections is
paramount. So the questions about music, artist groups, and animation festivals. We  can do a basic monthly poll on facebook, and a more in depth survey to the members via email and link the survey to fb for prospective members to learn more about them?
  1. Julie: Website development and amazement!!!!!!!
  • The website is our little storefront
  • Independent and commercial work presence - an opportunity for other regions
  • to peek in at ASIFA Central
  • Formatting, information, color experimentation and design tests
  • Wordpress is fluid with transferring its styles, but content has criteria for
  • proper formatting
  • Who are we?  What and who do we represent?
  • Comments on front page of website and the template:
It might be worthwhile to define our borders, explain our region?  If someone is checking in,
a map to show where our chapter exists?  Expand our presence to be a “midwest” chapter -
Deanna: the international groups were being confused as a “central/secretariat” to ASIFA
International, rather than “ASIFA Central - the Midwest US Chapter” - in the past, ASIFA
Central was the “catch-all” group for those not on the coasts.  Our chapter included folks
from Texas and even Canada before other chapters began to develop.
Chuck has not currently noticed confusion at an international scope, but have more often
confused ASIFA Central with the Colorado chapter.  A physical US Map to show our
membership as a loose border.
“If you’re an animator and you’re close to this region, we would welcome you.” (Steve)
Keep the reference a casual one, as ASIFA Central is a legal non-profit entity with a specific
name.

(Note: this could be a survey question - hey, do you want to be on our member map?
 An Opt In function)

The website is taking shape nicely.  Chuck has preserved the existing material in the drop
box for ASIFA.  He has the scanned pdfs of the current issues - the website can be changed
with the url forwarding set up whenever it is ready to change.  Chuck is an internet magician!!!!

MIDWEST ANIMATORS CONFERENCE IS A WONDERFUL IDEA and with that, WHY NOT A
PONY! At the end of a college semester, make that a pony KEG!!!

Chuck/Julie - tech question - can wordpress material be copied and forwarded over to the
new site?  Julie was thankful for the backup that Chuck created - will have to make sure that
the original site coordinators can handle the transferral (network solutions is the host and
holding our domain) because once things are changed, the original material will likely be lost.   
Wordpress premium account is $8/month. Going live deadline will have to consider the
technological aspects, especially with the animator conference approaching (July/August?).

    1. Deanna, Bob, Chuck
  1. Bi-monthly Animators Open Mike
    1. Brad, Steve, Gretchen
    2. Working titles ideas: Animation Pitch, Central Animation Collective,  Central Animation
    3. Studio, “Animeet-up”
      It starts with animators coming together to explore and foster their talents generating
    4. creative energy and support. Often we have ideas, but not the support of a network of
    5. animators, artists, equipment or tools to make them happen. Imagine dedicated creators
    6. sitting down together to discuss their ideas for projects.
      1. A Saturday 12:00-3:00 -- June 3, Saturday - an “Anijam” (a group project along a
      2. determined parameter, bring the materials, a timer goes off, you try to hit the finish
      3. line and everyone presents!) - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQcUqrKM3mc -
      4. CandyJam 1986
      5. Mo Willem did “Life” anijam https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Tpndwr58KA

Deanna - a conceptual or technical challenge - something about communicating
animation across corners … tie in with the International Animation Day …
Brad - some ideas on the upcoming IAD poster design/layout - next week we
should see something soon - the rough is coming up….

      1. Who: ASIFA Members
      2. Goal: Support community animation building
        1. Secondary goals:  develop projects for short film circuit, pitch for films
        2. and television, build and foster skills.
      3. Resources: community media center, our collective skills, collective tools.
      4. Type of work: Collaborative projects, individual artist who just want community
    1. First meeting looks like what??
      1. Share Everyone brings work in progress or ideas to share.
      2. Goal  Perhaps to come up with a short film that everyone can collaborate on.
      3. Build  Whiteboard, storyboarding, think tank session.
      4. Plan who does what, next steps.
A collective idea, a pull-together of skill sets and the range of styles among the
membership
  1. March IWD Event and Workshop - Chuck is conducting interviews
    1. Gretchen, Chuck, Julie
  2. Summer Retreat
    1. Gretchen, Bob, Steve, Jim
    2. Date: Saturday, August 11 -  have a board brunch member brunch or party the night
    3. before or the morning after? let’s make the event a single day  POLL HERE
    4. Freeconferencecall.com - get an assigned phone number - we can use Brad’s info …
    5. let’s use the same number and passcode
    6. Get info to the website ASAP as it becomes available to Julie!!!
    7. The group will have a conference call on the conference in May

New business:
Is there any way we can get prior International Animation Day poster images without the text on them
so we can add the ASIFA International logo and ASIFA Central logo ourselves and then use them for
advertising our local chapter? Like print up some postcards with the image on one side and information
about our chapter and a link to our ‘join ASIFA’ webpage on the other. Something that we can send
to university animation programs or hand out to people at our events that are open to the public. --
need to get clearance from the original artist -- could a variation on the theme work?

Can each of us write a paragraph about what we’re working on for ASIFA Central that we can include
in an e-mail to our membership? So, for example: Brad could do a “message from the President”
e-mail that would include a paragraph from Gretchen and I about our ‘Celebration of Women
Animators’ day including our workshop.