Animated Travels

Fjorg gets saucy!

written by Joanne Weikel

Day 2 of the animation competition kicked off at 9am with a loud drumbeat and Afro Brazilian performers. The sound drew a large crowd in to watch the performances. The animation teams had worked through the night on their films so the very lively dancers lent some much needed energy to the competitors.

Paul Tillery, In Pyo, and Julien Lasbleiz, all of whom have films in the animation festival listened to the story pitches and gave the teams some last minute advice and critiques. Miles Perkins, the Computer Animation Festival Jury Chair also came in to see each films progress.

With only three hours left, the teams focused hard on finishing their films on time. So in Fjorg fashion, two more distractions were in store. First a belly dancer performed and was enticing enough to make quite a few people stop working. Within the hour a group of Samba dancers arrived and just about everyone stopped to watch. A few people were dragged onto the stage to join the dancers and the Fjorg chair and Viking High Priestess Patricia Beckmann-Wells joined in at the end. The infusion of energy kicked the teams into high gear for the final 2 hours.
Read the rest of this entry »

Day 1 and the contestants are already tired.

written by Joanne Weikel

SIGGRAPH 2009 Fjorg! competition started at 9am Monday, August 3 in New Orleans. In it’s third year, the event attracted many talented animators both students and professionals.

The competition, created by Patricia Beckmann as an Iron Animator event challenges the competitors to create a short film (15-45 seconds) from concept to finish in the short time span of thirty-two hours. To make the task more demanding, distractions are scheduled throughout the day to entice them away from the film making process.

Read the rest of this entry »