Heavy on the puppets today

In the latest episode of the Skwigly Animation Podcast we welcome Mikey Please and Dan Ojari to discuss their seasonal Aardman short Robin Robin, coming to Netflix next month. Written by Ojari, Please and Sam Morrison, the short is produced by Helen Argo with Sarah Cox exec producing; it's lovely looking and something wholesome to bung on as the nights grow darker and foreboding-er, so be sure to add it to your watchlists.

Also discussed in this episode: Event highlights from this year’s upcoming Manchester Animation Festival, including feature film presentations My Sunny Maad (dir. Michaela Pavlátová) and Flee (dir. Jonas Poher Rasmussen), The House WIP, Animated Answers featuring Ainslie Henderson, MAF Fellowship Award recipients Jorge R. Gutiérrez and Sandra Equihua’s new series Maya and the Three and the return of the much anticipated/feared Skwigly Animation Quiz.

Stream above or hoarde it for keepsies.

After a long period floating around in distribution limbo Chuck Steel: Night of the Trampires (on which I whipped up some old-school, Richard Edlund-esque VFX and made some grunty background noises) will finally be getting itself a UK cinema release. Head over to the film's official site for local showtimes; it'll be around for a week or so from the 29th. If you're not sure what to expect, well, the trailers don't really leave much room for ambiguity:

It's sure to be contentious (I doubt the director would have it any other way) and I have immeasurably fond memories of working on it as well as the wonderful folks I got to know through it. It also boasts some of the strongest stop-motion animation I've ever seen by some of the absolute best in the business; a shame for them, then, that my job was essentially to scribble all over it.

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:

Front

Back

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

"Aardman erectile dysfunction"

While I've pretty much retired the film from festival circulation at this point, "The Naughty List" still gets the odd request from time to time and I'm happy to say it will get its first 2012 showing later on in the month. The 5th International Children's Film Festival Bangladesh will take place from the 21st to the 27th, as ever I'll put up my screening time and venue here when I find out.
On the non-me front, my first Skwigly feature of the year is an interview with fellow Bristolian and indiemator Sam Morrison, who's probably best known for the short "Rocket Science" which was pretty heavily circulated a few years back. His latest film "Greetings" got one of the best responses at this past Encounters Festival (for the fairly obvious reason that it's very goshdern funny) and is worth checking out along with his other work at his website. You can give the interview a read here:

A Conversation With Sam Morrison

Aside from him being an all-around nice chap, a perk of putting together the feature was being probably the first person in existence to type "Aardman erectile dysfunction" into Google for research purposes. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.