Making Pests of Ourselves

I'm all a-quiver with girlish glee as I get prepped for my first jaunt to Annecy next week. It's one of the top five major fests on my wishlist I've yet to get a film in, along with Ottawa (the other three being Encounters, Clermont-Ferrand and Stuttgart, who all threw me a bone). Despite making it into Annecy Plus in 2011, my plan had been to make the jaunt when/if I got something into the main festival - but frankly that could take years, if it ever happens at all. Luckily I now have a fallback position: Journalistic scumbag.

"We don't need no stinkin' - well, they are quite nice..."

 Given the surge of positive Skwigly developments since myself, Steve and Aaron took it over, it's only logical to show my face at one of the industry's most important events. We're hoping to get some podcast and written content out of it, obviously, with maybe some video footage to boot. We're also aiming for some extra reach in general, so to that end we'll be pestering folks with fliers, badges and other tote-filling goodies. For our flier design I really wanted to pool resources and convey the community vibe Skwigly's cultivated over the years. I reached out to some of my favourite animators and illustrators for character designs I could group together in a big crowd shot. Here's how it came out:

Front

Back

I'm really pleased with it and feel happy to have so many talented friends and associates involved. Here's a breakdown of their contributions - click their names to see more of their work as they're all smashing pumpkins worth checking out.

Francesca Adams

Jamie Smart

David Hutchinson

Jane Davies

Joanna Hepworth

Kat Michaelides

Katie Steed

Matt Walker

Robyn Liebschner

Sam Morrison

Seb Burnett

Signe Baumane

Sophie Klevenow & Darren Walker

Steve Henderson

Tanya Scott

The remaining designs are from my own archive of characters I threw in to fill in some spaces. And because I'm an egomaniac.
Given how much fondness people have had for the Skwigly Podcast I've also produced an exclusive sampler CD of some of our personal favourite moments from our first year. It's borderline-impossible to group all of them and have it fit on an 80 minute disc but hopefully this selection does justice to all the amazing interviewees who've given us their time and insight. It's nice to have a little physical souvenir to show for an endeavour I had no clue would still be going strong after a year, especially in these last few days before the entire planet completely forgets what CDs are. Here's the sleeve design:

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If you'll be at Annecy yourselves drop us a line at skwigly.com!

Not about me for a change. Just kidding, I totally make it about me...

"Damned" (Dir. Richard Phelan, ©2011 NFTS)

This month's main Skwigly feature is now online, so why not give it a gander? It's a double interview with two of last year (a particular strong crop)'s NFTS grads Richard Phelan and Francesca Adams. Their films have the shared traits of being traditionally animated and having all-animal ensemble casts, though in every other respect they couldn't be further apart.

"Bertie Crisp" (Dir. Francesca Adams, ©2011 NFTS)

Phelan's "Damned" is a sweet-natured tale of a beaver with ambition whose grandiose plan to convert the forest into a giant dam goes awry, while Adams's "Bertie Crisp" is a brutally adult story of an emasculated bear whose vicious wife send him to steal the baby of their neighbour (who's already burdened with a quadriplegic, possibly vegetative husband). In their own vastly different ways they're both pissingly funny and are two of the more standout student films doing the rounds this year, so I was really glad to get a chance to chat to both filmmakers.

Animal Instinct - A Conversation with Richard Phelan and Francesca Adams

"A Morning Stroll" (Dir. Grant Orchard, ©2011 Studio AKA)

On that note it was fantastic to hear that Grant Orchard, who I'd interviewed last year, won the Short Animation BAFTA last night with "A Morning Stroll", which has been doing brilliantly and is also up for an Oscar. It really is a great piece of work and most inspiring of all is how it came together without funding, pretty much as a labour of love the studio crew contributed to in their spare time over a two year period. So mazel tov again to Studio AKA and kudos to their modus operandi!
If it's of interest you can read my interview with Grant here (I'm a coattail rider, I admit it unabashedly, but it's a darn fun ride) for some backstory on the film and his prior work to date.

A Conversation with Grant Orchard