Zod Threatens Fate of Your Planet


There's a new threat from General Zod in Man of Steel's final "Fate of Your Planet" trailer. Michael Shannon's Kryptonian baddie explains that he has "journeyed across an ocean of stars" to capture one his citizens that we are sheltering. Again, he gives Kal-El 24

Trailering New Lone Ranger


The latest action-packed trailer for The Lone Ranger (July 3), featuring the mother of all train sequences, still happily looks like Rango meets Pirates of the Caribbean (with echoes of The Wild Wild West and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid). "If these men represent

New Man of Steel Featurette


A new Man of Steel (June 14) featurette explores Zack Snyder's new post-9/11 vision of Superman. Playing off the alien angle for the first time Man of Steel first exposes the outsider in Clark Kent so we can be a part of his existential journey. Then once he becomes

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Shorts

SIGGRAPH Previews Production Sessions

Posted on May 15, 2013 by Bill Desowitz in 3-D, Animation, Education, Events, Festivals, Movies, Oscar, Shorts, stop-motion, Tech, Trailers, VFX, Virtual Production | Leave a comment

The tech behind Pacific Rim, Frozen, Monsters University, and Oz the Great and Powerful will be on display at SIGGRAPH 2013. Held this year in Anaheim on July 21-25, the production sessions are part of the Computer Animation Festival. Read more

Ray Harryhausen Passes Away

Posted on May 7, 2013 by Bill Desowitz in Animation, Below the Line, Clips, Movies, Oscar, Shorts, stop-motion, Tech, VFX | Leave a comment

Stop-motion and VFX pioneer Ray Harryhausen passed away Tuesday in London at the age of 92, according to an announcement on the official Facebook page of The Ray and Diana Harryhausen Foundation. The multi-award winner best-known for The 7th Voyage of Sinbad, Jason and the Argonauts, The Golden Voyage of Sinbad, and Clash of the Titans, became a cultural legend and an inspiration to every filmmaker that has worked in animation and live-action VFX movies for the last half century, (including Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, Peter Jackson, James Cameron, Tim Burton, Phil Tippett, Nick Park, and John Lasseter). Read more

Pixar Goes Photoreal for Blue Umbrella

Posted on May 5, 2013 by Bill Desowitz in 3-D, Animation, Clips, Movies, Shorts, Tech, VFX, Virtual Production | Leave a comment

By sheer coincidence, while Disney was in a romantic mood for its Oscar-winning Paperman hybrid breakthrough, Pixar was getting blissed out over its photographic love story between a blue and red umbrella. But of course Pixar is all about using its shorts as a testing ground, and the stunning global illumination tryout from The Blue Umbrella, which beamed on every object with real-world believability, also shined on Monsters University (which open together June 21st). Read more

IBM Makes Atomic-Size Stop-Motion Short

Posted on May 1, 2013 by Bill Desowitz in Animation, Movies, Shorts, stop-motion, Tech | 2 Comments

IBM Research entered the Guinness Book of World Records with the tiniest stop-motion movie ever made (45 nanometers x 25 nanometers) about an atomic boy having fun playing with a single atom. Read more

Monsters University Sneak Peek

Posted on April 25, 2013 by Bill Desowitz in 3-D, Animation, Movies, Shorts, Tech, Trailers, VFX, Virtual Production | Leave a comment

I got a chance to see the first 40 minutes of Monsters University earlier this month at Pixar along with the studio’s first photo-realistic looking short, The Blue Umbrella.  Both make use of global illumination, providing a whole new level of realism than we’ve seen from the animation powerhouse. Read more

Mysterious Mickey Mouse Short Annecy Bound

Posted on April 23, 2013 by Bill Desowitz in Animation, Festivals, Movies, Shorts, Tech | Leave a comment

Disney will unveil “a never-before-seen, hand-drawn, black-and-white Mickey Mouse short,”  Get A Horse!, at the Annecy Animation Festival. Read more

FMX 2013 Offers Iron Man 3 and Oblivion

Posted on April 21, 2013 by Bill Desowitz in 3-D, Animation, Events, Movies, performance capture, previs, Production Design, Shorts, Tech, VFX, Virtual Production | 1 Comment

FMX 2013 is happening next week Tuesday through Friday in Stuttgart, Germany. Unfortunately, I’m unable to attend but the latest conference on nimation, effects, games, and transmedia will be touting Iron Man 3 (May 3) and Oblivion, among other new and upcoming treats. Read more

Disney Lays Off Hand-Drawn Animators

Posted on April 14, 2013 by Bill Desowitz in Animation, Below the Line, Movies, Shorts, Tech | Leave a comment

How sad and ironic: A week after the wonderful Who Framed Roger Rabbit 25th anniversary celebration at the Academy, Disney laid off nine hand-drawn 2D animation vets as part of its studio-wide downsizing. Read more

Jerry Beck Launches Animation Scoop

Posted on April 8, 2013 by Bill Desowitz in 3-D, Animation, Blu-ray, Books, performance capture, Shorts, stop-motion, Tech, Videogames | Leave a comment

Animation historian Jerry Beck (formerly co-owner of Cartoon Brew) has launched Animation Scoop, which will be part of the Indiewire blog network, where I will serve as contributing editor, writing about animated features with interviews and behind the scenes pieces. Read more

Autodesk Unfolds 2014 Creation Suite

Posted on March 26, 2013 by Bill Desowitz in 3-D, Animation, Events, Movies, performance capture, previs, Production Design, Shorts, Tech, VFX, Videogames, Virtual Production | Leave a comment

In conjunction with Autodesk’s Unfold conference this week, they’ve launched the Entertainment Creation Suite 2014 with the latest versions of Maya, 3ds Max, MotionBuilder, Mudbox, Softimage, and Sketchbook Designer. They offer new workflow enhancements to handle complicated data sets more quickly and efficiently. Read more

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