Roundup: February 2022

My pals at the Manchester Animation Festival have kicked off a new series of year-round social/screening events MAF Presents, which began earlier this month with their first programme They Love Me, They Love Me Not that kindly featured my latest film Speed. If you're up North be sure to keep your eyes on their site and socials for updates on upcoming events as I'm sure you're itching to get back into the swing of that whole human contact thang.

On a similar note, the wonderful Cardiff Animation Nights gang have resumed their in-person events as well as carrying on the online screenings they started during the pandemic, so be sure to follow what they're up to as well. Even more exciting is the return of the Cardiff Animation Festival, whose third edition will take place at their usual Chapter Arts venue April 7th-10th, knock wood, with an online version going through to the 24th. There'll be more specific programme info to come but in the meantime I can confirm I'll be there to host the filmmaker Q&As and Laura-Beth Cowley's recent project Crafty Witch is among the festival's official selection as part of the Shorts 7: After Dark category. Pop it in your schedules!

Also on the events front, the biennial British Animation Awards - on which I mucked in as preselector/jury - will be happening on March 10th at the BFI Southbank with signal events in Bristol, Cardiff, Salford and Stirling if a Thursday night trek to London isn't doable but you still want to check out the festivities. All being well I'll be at the main event so hopefully will see some of y'all in the big smoke; I won't hug you but we can affectionately exchange finger-guns. Otherwise be sure to check out their site for the various viewing and ticket options they have.

Before any of that will be Speed's inclusion as part of Anima Brussels next weekend. Since the announcement of the official selection I now know it will be part of the second Animated Nights block on Saturday, March 5th, kicking off at 10pm in Flagey Studio 4 and 10:30pm at Palace. I'm properly gutted that I won't be able to make it in person as seeing Sunscapades as part of the same programme a couple years ago was an absolute blast, but right now the faff of getting in and out of Belgium would just be too disruptive to make it feasible. Fingers crossed I'll make it back over there before too long.

Following on from last month's UK streaming release of Chuck Steel: Night of the Trampires, it will be traveling further afield as of March 1st with its arrival on streaming platforms in the US, Canada and Australia. It's a job I have a lot of fond associations with and it's really nice that all the hard work the crew put into it will get some wider visibility. Check out what viewing options are available to you here.

Over on Skwigly I've delved a bit further into the production of the incredible Netflix film The House (the directors of which I interviewed last month) via an interview with Nexus Studios producer/co-founder Charlotte Bavasso. As well as discussing the film itself we also go into the early days of the studio and what the future may hold - it was a real treat to chat with her and I hope you find her insights as inspirational as I did.

Having been out of print for a little while I'm pleased to see that We Still Care A Lot, the tribute album I contributed to in honour of the late Chuck Mosley, has finally gotten itself a digital release. You can check out the full album over on Bandcamp.

Not a whole bunch else I can explicitly talk about but if you happen to be one of those trendy youngsters who lurk about on TikTok you might want to go ahead and follow this little IP that's on the grow. The keen of ear may even detect a familiar vocal performance in the video below:

Finally, these pipes have gone viral.

Tidings, possibly of the glad variety

Mother of Christ, this year sure pissed by quickly, didn't it?

It's been a busy time leading to a pretty major December deadline, coupled with a bit of a lull between films of my own, so things have been pretty infrequent on the blog posts front. Somehow you've all managed to get by regardless and I applaud your emotional strength. While 2022 will be a bit busier as far as stuff I can shout about, I'll throw up one more batch of 2021 updates (unless we're able to squeeze in a final Skwigly podcast before the year is through) just to remind y'all I exist.

First up is the Ax Wound Film Festival which has just kicked off and whose full schedule is now available online. If you're based in the US or Canada you can catch Laura-Beth's film The Gift as part of their Short Film + Livestream Block F, which may well feature a director Q&A. This'll kick off 8pm Stateside this Wednesday (15th) and be available through to the 20th.

Another film of Laura-Beth's I was able to elbow my way into was Crafty Witch, a film component of her PhD thesis study at UWE's Centre for Fine Print Research. Having recently screened at major film festivals Encounters, Stop Trik and MAF (with more to come), she presented a behind-the-scenes seminar on the processes involved for the CFPR last week which you can watch above.

On the less-interesting subject of my own films, I've received the wonderful news that Speed will be part of the next Anima Brussels programme, specifically their Animated Night screening. This was the event that gave my preceding film Sunscapades its last major festival sendoff moments before the world went and got itself all pandemic-ey, so it's wonderful to see Speed wrap up its festival journey the same way. While I'm not quite sure of the exact screening date yet, the festival will run from February 25th to March 6th so be sure to follow their socials for updates.

It wouldn't be the holiday season without me pointing out that my book Independent Animation, which some might say is literally the most perfect gift imaginable for the animator, animation enthusiast or sentient human in your life (hell, buy it for the dog to chew on, I don't discriminate), is on sale with a merry ol' 20% off. In fact if you combine that with the special promo code X001 at checkout you'll lop off another holly'n'jolly chunk off the price. All that plus FREE shipping - I mean, I'm pretty sure I just saved Xmas, right? You're welcome. I do it out of love.

Seriously, it's full of amazing people talking about amazing work, you'll dig it. And who knows, it might not be around forever...

Castaways

In the latest episode of the third season of our Skwigly podcast series Intimate Animation, Laura-Beth and I meet director/animator Natasza Cetner, whose RCA graduation film Nigel was recently released online as a Short of the Week Premiere and Vimeo Staff Pick to much enthusiasm.
Using quasi-traditional 2D animation approaches, the film is an inventive spin on the story of Nigel, a lonely gannet who hopelessly falls in love with a concrete statue. Serving as a reflection of our own misconceptions in love, the film has screened at numerous festivals including LIAF, PSIAF, Anifilm, Animocje, Tricky Women, PÖFF Shorts, Animac and Animateka as well as being written up on outlets including Creative Review, It’s Nice That and Directors Notes.
Also discussed in this episode: Selected love’n’sex-themed films and event highlights from the recent Anima Festival in Brussels and new shorts to watch out for at the upcoming Cardiff Animation Festival.
Direct download here or stream below:

East and West

More good news for my latest film Speed, it will be part of the Official Selection for next month's Tokyo Anime Award Festival. The event looks absolutely spectacular and it burns a little that I won't be able to head over to Japan and enjoy it in person but as ever I'm enormously grateful to be involved at all.

Speed will be part of the Short Animation Competition Slot 3 alongside some absolute belters including Osman Cerfon's I'm Going Out For Cigarettes, Sarah Van Den Boom's Raymonde or the Vertical Escape and Michael Frei's Kids. Other films festivalgoers should keep an eye out for are Daria Kashcheeva's Daughter, Regina Pessoa's Uncle Thomas: Accounting For The Days and Ivan Rabbiosi's Iron Me. 

Slot 3 will be screening at 12:15pm March 13th and 5:20pm the following day at Shin-Bungeiza. 

It's also worth mentioning that this coming weekend my previous film Sunscapades will be getting probably its final major festival screening at the Anima Brussels Animation Film Festival. Following the announcement of its inclusion in the Official Selection back in December I now know it will be part of the Animated Night marathon screening that kicks off 9:30pm on Saturday 29th and wraps up in the wee hours of the 1st. Sunscapades will be playing fairly late in the programme so bring along whatever stimulants best keep you from nodding off.

It's looking like an absolute corker of a festival and you can swing by Skwigly to check out some of the programme highlights, special guests and industry days on offer. Laura-Beth and I will also be there from the 26th so pop over and say hello if you spot us.

Montage!

In these final months of its festival eligibility there are two events left on my wishlist that I'm waiting on before I start thinking about an online release for Sunscapades. One of them - the fantastic Anima Brussels Animation Film Festival - has just announced their official selection and I'm very happy to see they picked it for their Animated Nights category. Especially humbling to see it in such good company, alongside some brilliant new work by Erin Kim, Laura Jayne Hodkin, Fokion Xenos and Mirai Mizue among others. Don't have the specifics just yet but the festival runs from February 21st to March 1st; fingers crossed I'll be able to head over to this one in person.

Some non-film news is that I've just put out the first single from my upcoming sixth Struwwelpeter album My Head Is Too Small For My Body that I'll hopefully have done by mid-2020. This one features special guest guitars by my old chum Ed Richardson and is a Spotify exclusive so it can't be bought or streamed elsewhere, at least for the time being. Give 'er a whirl:

I'd always suspected there was a delightfully corny action movie montage song in me somewhere and I imagine that working on Chuck Steel a couple years' back knocked it loose. For the b-side I even did a special "80s Movie Montage" remix for it to amp up the cheese.

After taking a brief break from being on sale after Black Friday, my book Independent Animation: Developing, Producing and Distributing Your Animated Films is once again, yep, on sale! From now through to the new year you can get it at 20% off if you order direct from CRC Press, and if you act fast you may even get it in time for the holidays. This is another publisher-wide sale so it applies to their other books - and if you get two or more of then it's a meaty 25% off! Plus free shipping, of course. What are you actually waiting for?