SIGGRAPH 2010 Computer Animation Festival - Out of thousands of animation and VFX entries, LFC’s Mercedes SLR 300 spot, Out of this World, made the cut. And yes, we are sporting smiles as wide as that Nokia Theater screen on which we’ll have the pleasure of seeing our work.

Celebrating its 37th year as the world’s most innovative and stimulating showcase of computer-generated animation and visual effects. This five-day international event presents a wide spectrum of computer animation genres and styles ranging from narrative character animation to scientific visualization and from commercials for TV to digital effects for futuristic movies.

If you are attending a single animation festival this year – SIGGRAPH 2010 is the one. Get your tickets here: http://www.siggraph.org/s2010/  Cheers and see you there!

How delighted was I to get a Google alert this morning for LFC Short, The Car and The Road. It’s probably the first one ever for that short. Hey, not only that, but the file clearly states that TCATR made it into the prestigious Austrian animation festival, Prix Ars Electronica, in 2008. Prix Selection: Smart Worlds.  How did we ever miss that in this day and age of all points bulletins at all times of the day and night 24/7?  So, for all of you that missed it when it first premiered I’ve resurrected it from the archive and I’m featuring it here and now. Thank you Google Bot for all your hard and diligent work.

The Car and The Road: A Romance in Automation, follows the trials and tribulations of a sensible, straight road as he seeks to reinvent himself for the car he loves. Watch, as the road bares his inner passionate self to woo the fun loving car “that can do things other cars only dream about.”  Sigh… a true love story for the modern era.

This charming work, directed by Jerry van de Beek and Betsy de Fries of Little Fluffy Clouds, was created for the Lexus Car Corporation. Described by the Association Internationale du Film d’Animation (ASIFA) as, “A lovely animated fable…” The Car and The Road pay homage and takes its inspiration from Chuck Jones’ Oscar winning film, The Dot and The Line. Original composition for the almost 4 minute film was scored by Trivers-Meyers Music LA whose arrangement fits hand in glove with the visuals. Commissioned by Los Angeles ad agency, Team One, The Car and The Road, is a colorful and imaginative feast for the eyes and fun to boot!

Animated using Adobe Illustrator, After Effects and Photoshop with Autodesk Maya and hand drawn frames. The Car and The Road will be seen on all broadcast media – that’s Cinema, TV and Web.

Most of us look back at our time spent at university with true fondness – a time of amazing achievement and pivotal moments unsurpassed by any other. A time when dreams become aspirations and aspirations become reality and every second is shared with friends made – ones that we carry with us for the rest of our lives. This is the story of Journey, a 30-second HDTV commercial and the first in a campaign for the California University of Pennsylvania.

Executed in an elegant painterly style, Journey, combines both 2D and 3D animation to recreate the texture and layered look of a traditional watercolor painting. In this watercolor world, one in which we can freely move around, the story unfolds of a student’s journey through life. Beginning with a single brush stroke on textured paper the river of life is revealed depicting two friends in a rowboat. As the canvas blooms into vibrant color the two friends begin to move through the university campus. Casually meeting up with another friend, together, they enter into the pulse of university life.

Effortlessly the camera moves us gently back to gradually orbit around the characters and in an echo of the story, allows us to fully take in both the pastoral scene laid before us, with students going about their day, and the effect of the growing color palette as it washes over the canvas to create vivid momentary and fleeting glimpses of the campus in all its diversity. A gentle pull out, up through a canopy of trees, moves us skyward like a soaring bird over the rooftops of the buildings to lay the entire campus before us.

The campus, characters and shaders were created in Maya. The animation was created in multiple layers finessed in After Effects. Compositing was done in-house at Little Fluffy Clouds.

The Mercedes-Benz SLR 300 is a machine like no other – sleek, sensual and legendary – the ultimate in bling. Not just the fastest production car in the whole world – with a top speed of 207 MPH – but a veritable goddess among luxury automobiles. In fact a possession so indulgent it’s positively out of this world.

So while the star of the spot is the McLaren SLR 300 undoubtedly the star of Little Fluffy Clouds studio is our creative + animation director, Jerry van de Beek, who modeled the car using available photographs only and without the aid of any factory specifications or a cad cam version. Working with partner, Betsy de Fries, the two designed and directed the spot together. Van de Beek animated the entire piece – writing specialized shaders, applying final gathering techniques, rendering complex layers and compositing the piece in After Effects. VFX extras were skillfully actualized to create a look as luxurious as the car itself.

Out of this World is an original spot designed, directed and animated by Little Fluffy Clouds. Production took roughly 8 weeks – sans model. This sizzling all CGI spot is animated in Maya, composited in After Effects and rendered with Mental Ray. The stunning VFX extras use Real Viz, Trap Code and Sapphire plug-ins.

Once every couple of years I attend Siggraph just to feel the vibe and to see if there are any cool tools that need some hands-on playtime. After feeling the cool thrill of seeing 3 of our IBM webverts on the big screen at the Nokia Theater in the 2008 CAF, I went back to the exhibition floor and found such a cool tool.

At the Wacom stand they were showing off their newish Cintiq tablets. I’ve seen these before but never really played with one. I’m always looking for devices and software to make the creative process smoother and this is one of those. The special feature of this tablet is that it has a built in monitor. This enables you to draw right on the canvas so it feels like you are drawing on paper. Those of you doing more pitches than jobs will realize immediately the worth of such a tool.

I’ve used Wacom tablets for over 10 years and can attest to the fact that they’ve saved my wrists. They are great for drawing and even for 3D but I still sketch on paper before I take the image into Photoshop. For me there has always been a strange disconnect to draw on one surface and to see it on another – the monitor. Now, with this Cintiq, that problem has been resolved and your brush strokes flow out of the tablet’s pen.

I decided to get the smallest one in their arsenal – the 12WX. I do like the 20 and 21 inch versions a lot but as I am a generalist, simultaneously using other devices, I didn’t want it to take over my entire desk space. Real estate is at a premium and I saw it more as a replacement of my regular tablet in combination with my 30 inch display. I wanted to be able to switch on the monitor part of the tablet for when I wanted to sketch.

Okay, so now you’re thinking, whoop-dee-doo, he finally discovered the Cintiq tablet. But although that’s great the cool thing I wanted to tell you about is a piece of software that makes using the Cintiq even sweeter.

Let me back up a little. The Cintiq 12WX is small and has a screen resolution of 1280 x 800. My 30 inch Dell monitor has a resolution of 2560 x 1600. The way you normally set up the Cintiq is by setting up your displays as DualView. This extends your desktop over 2 monitors and you can drag your canvas from PhotoShop to your second display – the Cintiq. If you want to work in Mirror View, in which both displays show the same image, you’ll have to set the resolution on both screens to the lowest one. In this case the one of the Cintiq. Believe me, 1280 x 800 on a 30 inch monitor looks awful. Also, I didn’t always want to always have the Cintiq monitor on and the Cintiq doesn’t have a switch to turn off the display (note to Wacom). When I’m not sketching I want to use the Cintiq as a regular Wacom Tablet by putting the monitor to sleep. What I found myself doing was switching display profiles in my Nvidia Control Panel every time I wanted to sketch.

I packed my bag and went out into the World Wide Web to find some help – and I did. The elegant solution that you all have to know about is the UltraMon at: http://www.realtimesoft.com. Their website is terrible but don’t let that put you off. I have to admit I paced up and down in front of this site before I found the courage to download their applet. UltraMon basically takes over your display settings. From your taskbar you can quickly switch from Single Display, Dual Display or Mirroring. This is great and already a lot quicker that opening your Display Control Panel to change it there but there is even a much nicer feature in UltraMon – it allows you to create short cuts. I created a shortcut for Photoshop in UltraMon. I won’t go into all the settings as I’m not writing a manual here but in essence this is what it does. When I click on my newly created Photoshop shortcut in my task bar UltraMon automatically changes my display settings to mirror. It wakes my Cintiq monitor up from sleep mode and displays full resolution (2560 x 1600) on my 30 inch display and projects this as well on my Cintiq. It probably does this by scaling 2560 x 1600 to 1280 x 800 but whatever it works. When I quit out of Photoshop UltraMon switches back my display settings to Single Display and puts my Cintiq monitor back to sleep. In short, UltraMon allows you to create shortcuts for each application that drive different display settings. UtraMon uses the icon from the original application for the shortcuts so it looks clean and professional.

This is a $40 “must have” piece of software if you own a Cintiq tablet.

The Car and The Road: A Romance in Automation follows the trials and tribulations of a sensible, straight road as he seeks to reinvent himself for the car he loves. Watch, as the road bares his inner passionate self to woo the fun loving car “that can do things other cars only dream about.”  Sigh… a true love story for the modern era.

This charming work, directed by Jerry van de Beek and Betsy de Fries of Little Fluffy Clouds, was created for the Lexus Car Corporation. Described by the Association Internationale du Film d’Animation (ASIFA) as, “A lovely animated fable…” The Car and The Road pays homage to and takes its inspiration from Chuck Jones’ Oscar winning film, The Dot and The Line.

Original composition for this almost 4 minute film was scored by Trivers-Meyers Music LA whose arrangement fits hand in glove with the visuals. Commissioned by Los Angeles ad agency, Team One, The Car and The Road, is a colorful and imaginative feast for the eyes and fun to boot!

Animated using Adobe Illustrator, After Effects and Photoshop with Autodesk Maya and hand drawn frames. The Car and The Road will be seen on all broadcast media: Cinema, TV and Web.

I am an unabashed Francophile. SO imagine how happy I was to hear that our short film, TODAY, was being featured not only at Festival NEMO in Paris but also at the 9th Elektra International Digital Arts Festival in Montreal. Deux Reve Français – if I may make make so free with the Franglaise.

The mandate of ACREQ is to forge links between electronic music and other visual media. Here at Elektra you can immerse yourself in the latest aesthetic currents in artistic practice with new technologies at their core. The Elektra refuses to be restrained by the boundaries created by many so schools and styles in our field. It is their mission to promote only the highest quality work. Robotics, digital imagery and music come together. Added to this fertile mix is a genuine desire to attract a wider audience, to democratize and make this culture more accessible – while also satisfying the specialists in attendance with more specific interests.

This high-calibre Montreal-based cultural initiative, presents artists and works of art that align the latest electronic music and visual creations derived from new technologies (animation, installation and robotics). Elektra unites creative media like music, video, cinema, design, gaming and audio or interactive installation with the latest digital technologies. Artists from all disciplines – composition, performance, dance, visual arts et al all with a common interest in artistic applications of new technologies – uniting visual with sound. Elektra not only welcomes artists from all over the world, the festival also features local talents, helping make Montreal the North American meeting place for digital arts. Our best wishes for a successful festival! We only wish we could be there.

Elektra 9e Edition International Digital Arts Festival Mai 7 – 11, Montreal, Quebec. Enjoy the blog and the live festival site at: http://www.elektramontreal.ca/

Could anything make your heart race more than Paris in the spring? Try animation + Paris + spring + being on the same bill of fare with director, Peter Greenaway. And while I’m at it, try being part of a festival that invites controversy by taking a stand against the lowest common denominator and openly stating that they will show only the best of the highest quality. Now add a true egalitarian splash by opening the festival up to all for free. Viva La France! Viva Festival NEMO 2008!

Festival NEMO 2008 takes place in Paris and Issey-les-Moulineaux, France. Here you can see the best of French and International cinema and animation. For this their 10th anniversary year, selections were purposefully chosen to give a lasting memory of what is most precious to cineastes – beautiful work of extraordinary quality, shown in optimal conditions. Festival Directeur, Gilles Alverez, states with passionate sentiments indeed, that:

“This is NEMO’s answer to the crumbling values of our art form by social networking sites like Facebook and the generalization of You Tube.”

NEMO showcases multimedia presentations and animations along with music videos and documentaries on such luminaries as Scott Walker, Smiths, Sigur Ros, Holy Etienne, Daniel Johnston, John Cage, and Phillip Glass. Catch audio visual performances from Pageantry + Transforma, Ryoichi Kurokawa, Quayola, Adriaan Lokman, Otolab, Mikomikona, Mylicon and Scanner + TeZ as part of the Cinema Vivant! A feast for the senses – let your passion rule.

TODAY screens as part of the Panorama International playing in Paris on Sun. April 12th at Axes Biarritz Salle de cinema and in Issey-les-Moulineaux, on Wed. April 18th at Le Cube.

Festival NEMO 2008- Le Rendez-Vous Multimedia D’Arcadi. Panorama International des Nouvelles Images Experimentales, Cinema et Animations Innovants. April 10 – April 20, 2008.

See: http://www.arcadi.fr/rendezvous/rv.php?id=1 for details.

The San Francisco Film Society describes animation as being:

“Currently one of the most fertile, creative and productive forms in cinema and television… animation occupies a unique point between artistic, experimental, commercial and industrial media, ranging from the latest visual FX-based arthouse films to family-friendly cartoons.”

Such is the clarion call to join them, and us, in a lively and surprising animation celebration screening at San Francisco’s Landmark Theater.

TODAY, a Sundance Channel promotional film commissioned in association with JWT NYC as part of their, Billy Collins Animated Poetry series, was directed by Little Fluffy Clouds creative team, Jerry van de Beek and Betsy de Fries. The film is an animated poem written by US Poet Laureate, Billy Collins, who narrates the piece.

Little Fluffy Clouds Sundance short, TODAY, screens on Saturday, November 10th at 4.30pm as part of the festival’s, Makers Dozen. This lively festival runs from Nov. 8 – Nov. 11, 2007 at The Embarcadero Center Cinema in San Francisco. See www.sffs.org for details.

Little Fluffy Clouds Sundance studio short, TODAY, is one of the innovative pieces showing at, The Art of Digital Show, a unique international exhibition featuring all forms of digital art. The public is invited to the Opening Reception Gala and Awards Ceremony on October 6th from 6 to 9 p.m. at the Lyceum Theater Gallery, in San Diego’s historic Gaslamp Quarter. The Art of Digital Show runs from October 6 to November 11, 2007.

Neal Benezra, director of the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA), fielded 104 pieces to be exhibited from 2796 entries submitted by artists representing 40 countries. Mr. Benezra selected works which embody imagination, original vision, sophistication, message, content, creativity and technical skill. The show includes 83 fine art pieces, 18 video art pieces, a 3D modeled sculpture, a digitally designed textile piece, and an amazing interactive piece – all of which create a distinct exhibition environment.

“Digital artists are pushing the boundaries and more directly expressing what is in their imagination than in any other art medium.  Our great love of this art form drives us to create a truly excellent presentation of digital art from around the world. Our goal is to elevate and promote digital art and to provide substantial benefits to the exhibiting artists.” ~ Steven Churchill, curator and founder of the event.

An estimated 1500 people, including most of the exhibiting artists, will attend the Opening Gala, and 20,000 people are expected to view The Art of Digital Show during the five-week run. A free 72-page show catalog will be available during the exhibit, featuring all of the selected images.

TODAY, is a Sundance Channel promotional film commissioned in association with ad agency, JWT NYC, as part of their, Billy Collins Animated Poetry series. It was directed by Little Fluffy Clouds’ creative team, Jerry van de Beek and Betsy de Fries. The film is an animated poem written by US Poet Laureate, Billy Collins, who narrates the piece.

See: http://www.artofdigitalshow.com for details.