I hope I packed enough sunscreen

FFS

Happy Sunday everyone! Typin' atcha while bathed in the eerie, warming glow of Bristol Airport's flourescent lights at a time of morning I'm very rarely awake either by or until. Soon, however, I'll be Annecy-bound and it's sure to be a fun jaunt, if wet and exhausting. There'll be lots of Skwigly coverage, naturally, in fact some of it's already gone up. Steve has a round-up of the UK presence at the fest while I catch up with Patrick Osborne, he who directed the universally-beloved Oscar-winning Disney short Feast (that we spoke with him about previously). Since then he's been working away with the Google ATAP team on the VR film Pearl that festivalgoers can check out at the festival, where Patrick will also be part of a panel discussion on the possibilities and practicalities of VR filmmaking.

While most of what Annecy has on offer will be new to me, there are few personal recommendations for others who are attending that I have from my various travels and dealings in recent months. On the features side of things, look out for Ann Marie Fleming's NFB film Window Horses, which draws on the talents of some wonderful animators to tell a story of Iran's cultural landscape from the perspective of an out-of-water Westerner (I also have a director interview going up next week).
Also worth a watch is the fascinating Psychonauts: The Forgotten Children by Alberto Vázquez and Pedro Rivero, a feature-length outing for the characters established in the short film Birdboy boasting much-improved design and animation and some unexpectedly bizarre humour that was right up my street. You can read my full review of the film for more on what I made of it.
I also have to give props to Penny Lane's Nuts! - it's a film that at first strikes the viewer as misguided and a little confused, being an adaptation of a clearly non-impartial biopic of medical and broadcast pioneer 'Doctor' John Brinkley. As it goes on, however, all confusions are evaporated, revealing a very astute and commendable character study. Ironically my only issue with it is the animation, but I'll expand on why when my review goes up later in the week.
As far as short films are concerned, again there's a lot I've not yet seen but of the ones I have here are some absolutely cracking pieces of work to watch out for:
How Long, Not Long (Michelle Kranot/Uri Kranot, Denmark)
Squame (Nicolas Brault, Canada)
Spoon (Marcus Kempken, Germany)
Stems (Ainslie Henderson, UK)
Blind Vaysha (Theo Ushev, Canada) 
Accidents, Blunders and Calamities (James Cunningham, New Zealand)
The Head Vanishes (Franck Dion, France) - interview going up on Skwigly tomorrow.

In non-Annecy Skwigly round-up news, on top of an interview with Ren & Stimpy APC veteran and Looney Tunes-redesigner Jessica Borutski about her new show Bunnicula, last week was largely devoted to shining a bit of a spotlight on some fresh-faced Canadians who have recently made their first professional animated films as part of the National Film Board of Canada's ongoing Hothouse apprenticeship scheme. We did a similar thing last year, this time around hearing from Hothouse alumnus and Mentoring Director Malcolm Sutherland, as well as the filmmakers themselves: Curtis Horsburgh, Duncan Major, Rhayne Vermette, Lorna Kirk, Catherine Dubeau and Pascaline Lefebvre. There's some really lovely work there and the films are all very short, so give 'em some love.
Righto, time to wrap up, I've got a plane to catch.
UPDATE: No I don't! Not for another five goddamn hours. Top notch work, EasyJet!

Old Yeller

I dunno. It made sense at the time.

While I'm still keen to steer the musically-inclined amongst you toward my latest album The Birdcage with the toothy, glistening grin of a huckster shilling snake-oil, this week I dug out an older track from way back in '07 and gave it a bit of spit'n'polish. This is from an album of electro-cheese I wrote for some friends who helped with the production. At the time they were popping up as DJ troupe The Labrys Trio playing the various gay bars of New South Wales and wanted some original material to throw into their sets. The overall album, released as The Labrys Quartet (I was their 'honorary fourth lesbian') came out a bit patchy if I'm honest but there were enough nice bits to justify an eventual reissue down the line. This one I quite like for being so uncharacteristically DnB compared to most of my other stuff. One big lament is the choice of title/lyrics - had I but known how hideously overplayed the phrase 'Keep Calm and Carry On' would have become I'd have gone another way. Hindsight, 20/20, etc. As she often did with the early Struwwelpeter albums, my old pal Alison weighed in on the drum programming side of things with this one. Listen below or keep for keepsies, 'cause I'm kindness personified. On the subject of old, shoutey songs I also recently threw up a remastered version of the very first track from the very first Struwwelpeter LP, originally recorded way back in 2003. Juxtaposed against the general mellowness of The Birdcage it seems I had a lot more Red Bull in me back then. I'm off to spend a mellow weekend away with no distractions save for the new Palahniuk, but to leave you all with a literature recommendation of my own (not Throat, for a change) have a read of my review of experimental filmmaker Steven Woloshen's Scratch, Crackle and Pop, a very enjoyable read that made an area of filmmaking I had little frame of reference for very accessible and appealing:

Real wrath-of-God-type stuff

Bit of a manic week with a deadline today and two more Friday, so gotta make this one quick. BEHOLD - new Skwigly podcast: Discussion in this episode mainly focuses on the various upcoming awards ceremonies, dotted with the usual tangents such as Croods crudity and fond frog-cock memories. As always you can stream, subscribe or download directly. Guests include the recently Oscar-nominated Daniel Sousa, whose beautiful film Feral is now available to buy online. Also Skwigly correspondent Tom interviews Cartoon Brew's Amid Amidi (he who wrote a rather nifty little book called Cartoon Modern) and Steve talks to British Animation Awards director Jayne Pilling.

Jayne also has a few pretty darn decent books on animation under her belt, you can read my recent review of her latest Animating The Unconscious: Desire, Sexuality and Animation here.

On the subject of book reviews, I recently picked up Don Hertzfeldt's wonderful new graphic novel The End of the World from Antibookclub. The capsule review is that I can't recommend it enough, but the full review also went up on Skwigly this week. I also got wind that the man himself reposted it, which is mighty nice indeed.

Post by don hertzfeldt.

Ben just doesn't stop talking...

The zen approach to dealing with BT's ungodly customer service...

Just a heads-up to any Bristolians who might find themselves in my neck of the woods: Keep your eyes peeled for any BT Homehubs that might fall from the sky and brain you, for I’m alarmingly close to chucking mine off my fourth-floor balcony with a previously-undisplayed athletic strength only made possible through being driven to the absolute edge.
After a 36 hour Mexican standoff wherein the crafty plastic s***head would choose to drop my broadband signal only at moments when I absolutely needed it, we seem to have come to some sort of understanding and it’s now being good. But any more shenanigans and the little bastard gets its first and only flying lesson while I use my free hand to call up Sky and switch services.

All this is a rather long-winded and excuse-laden lead-up to announcing that our latest Skwigly podcast special on Bristol’s Animated Encounters is now finally up. While nobody seems too miffed about the delays, a recent surge in audience numbers (hooray!) has put an added pressure on the future of said podcast, and we’re currently working out a way to make the process more consistent and audience friendly; Ideally we’d do two one-hour episodes a month rather than one massive two-hour chunk that leaves people hanging for 4-6 weeks at a time. There’s fine-tuning to be done, but we’re getting there slowly.
In the meantime you should probably get comfortable ‘cause this one comes in at over two-and-a-quarter hours. Granted there’s a lot of ground to cover, my enthusiasm for the festival and the many talents associated with it seeing me amass a lot of material. Not least of which is my own warbling self waxing-asskissey about all the festival highlights. As it turns out I enjoy talking about stuff I like more than stuff I hate. I know, right? I’m as surprised as anyone.

I also got to interview my lovely friends Paul and Jane of A Productions on producing the animated visual branding for the festival each year, as well as animation programmer Kieran Argo and this edition’s special guest Paul Bush, a man who, despite firmly residing on the artistic end of the animation spectrum (while I, as is obvious by now, am still at the coyotes-falling-off-cliffs end) was very down-to-Earth and a sincere pleasure to chat to.
With fortuitous timing playing a big hand I also got to interview David Sproxton, chairman of the festival and Aardman producer/co-founder (along with Nick Park and Peter Lord, who I also got to talk to back in March for episode one). While the podcast edit of the interview focuses on Mr. Sproxton’s involvement with Encounters itself, there’s an upcoming written piece that I expect will be a little broader and Aardman-ey, so stay tuned for that one. Good stuff indeed.
As usual you can stream it below or download it for later. Of course, if you want to subscribe on iTunes and possibly even give us a rating/review that’d be golden delicious of you!
Skwigly Podcast Special 02 - Animated Encounters (11/10/2012) by Skwigly Animation Podcast

On a final note, this has nothing to do with anything, it just made me very happy tonight:

“Ch-Ch-Changes…”

I’ve just slept off this year’s Animated Encounters, our town’s local showcase for established talents, up-and-comers and, on occasion, lucky gobshites who get their films in purely by chance. While me falling firmly into the latter category of last year’s edition saw me making a pest of myself akin to a mild dust irritation, this time around my constant presence was that of an all-body skin rash, froghopping from screening to screening to event to workshop to screening to masterclass to restrospective to scree– okay, you get it. This was down to my first outing as an ‘official’ member of the press. OooOOOoooh!

Yep. Officially a scumbag.

You can read my day-by-day coverage of the festival over at Skwigly, with a podcast special in the same vein as our Annecy episode to come next week. Continuing our trend of sheer good fortune I was able to land a particularly awesome, high-profile guest, while simultaneously my co-host Steve managed to nab himself an equally terrific get for the episode that’ll come after. All told, we’re finding ourselves on a bit of a roll and the whole Skwigly operation is gradually morphing into a significantly bigger deal. There are several reasons for this, the main one being that Steve will be taking over the run of the ship very shortly, with myself contributing in a more expanded capacity than before.
Contrary to what I’ve recently been informed is a widely-head presumption, I’m not the guy behind Skwigly, nor was I ever – in fact its first incarnation predates my own professional interest and involvement in animation by at least a year (well, sort of - it was back when I was still doing strictly mograph stuff). Since I got on board last year my role has always been limited to content producer – writing reviews, interviewing people I admire, producing the podcast and so on. In truth I was never fully aware of what the grand plan of its owner was. Sometimes I even felt that distancing myself from the ‘persona’ of the magazine would help avoid a conflict of interest. Ultimately though I’ve approached it as an opportunity it would've been foolish not to embrace, and I’m still amazed that in such a short space of time I’ve been able to talk to quite an in-depth degree with so many amazing talents and even some industry heroes.
At the end of the day, either the direction or overall scope of Skwigly has proved irreconcilable with its creator’s full plate of other work and so he’ll be stepping aside to let Steve and I do with it what we will. I don’t see this leading to any changes, aside from amping up its consistency and, knock wood, broadening its appeal beyond an audience who just happen to have taste that matches mine exactly. Whatever happens, we wish Mr. Skwigly the Firste a fond ta-ra and we hope to do justice to the venture he began.
¡Viva la Revolución!
ANYway, back to Encounters. I had myself a great time thanks largely to Jude Lister, Kieran Argo, Fraser MacLean, Paul Bush, David Sproxton, Jane Davies and Paul Hill who all made the effort to help out with my coverage, not to mention all the lovely friends old and new who kept me company throughout the week. You can read my daily reports via the links below:

• Day 1
• Day 2
• Day 3
• Day 4
• The Award-Winners

Of course the main point of these festivals is the short films that stand out and make me feel all a-tingly and gooey with inspirationeyness, so here's a few trailers for some personal faves:

HEAD OVER HEELS - Trailer from Timothy Reckart on Vimeo.

Don Hertzfeldt's IT'S SUCH A BEAUTIFUL DAY (trailer) from Cinefamily on Vimeo.

1-KALi, the little Vampire -Trailer from Regina Pessoa on Vimeo.

"A Different Perspective" Trailer from Chris O'Hara on Vimeo.

THE PUB - Trailer from Joseph Pierce on Vimeo.

Oh Willy... trailer from Emma de Swaef on Vimeo.

Feral trailer from Daniel Sousa on Vimeo.

I'M FINE THANKS - trailer from eamonn o neill on Vimeo.

Also some of them are online in full already:

The Goat Herder and his Lots and Lots and Lots of Goats from Will Rose on Vimeo.

Gotye - Easy Way Out - official film clip from Gotye on Vimeo.

Phone Home from Lupus Films on Vimeo.

Bendito Machine IV - Fuel the Machines from Zumbakamera on Vimeo.

Book'n'Bill'n'Baby

Happy Wednesday, everyone! Thanks for taking the time to procrastinate and/or avoid real life long enough to drop by and enable my blathering bloggery.

SO my second convention appearance - at which I will be slinging "Throat" and other forms of cartooney booklike product - is this coming weekend at the London MCM Expo, which will be at Excel from the 25th to the 27th. Even if you don't give a care (pardon my language) about my book, there's loads of fungasmic shit to do, so book your tickets and get your sexy arses down there.

To discuss a book that I wasn't involved with (for what I can only assume would be a welcome change) I recently had the pleasure of being able to read and review the new book by indie animation legend and personal hero Bill Plympton, "Make Toons That Sell Without Selling Out". It's the perfect type of book for auteur animation filmmakers like myself and contains a great deal of guidance as far as honing one's skills, self-promotion and marketing, as well as some insights into the production processes of Mr. Plympton himself. The full review is online at Skwigly now:

"Make Toons That Sell Without Selling Out" - Review by Ben Mitchell
 

Okay, back to me! "Ground Running", my troublesome second film, is getting itself a rare and much-appreciated festival screening soon, at the 8th Detmold International Short Film Festival in Germany, which goes from the 7th-10th June. My film is part of their Animation screening on Friday (8th) at 4pm. The 7th edition was fantabulous enough to include "The Naughty List" so, having been included twice consecutively, I daresay they are a festival with highly refined tastes. I know, I know, I deserve to die alone. But then, don't we all, when you really think about it?

The continuing adventures of Papai Noel

Anima Mundi starts this weekend, and it's a thrill to say that "The Naughty List" will receive a whopping TEN screenings from then until the end of the month. It's shown as part of their International Panorama 2 section that will be screened at the following dates/times/venues:

Rio de Janeiro
July 15th - 5:30pm - Teatro 2 CCBB
July 16th - 2pm - Teatro 2 CCBB
July 17th - 3:30pm - Teatro 2 CCBB
July 19th - 5pm - Cinema Odeon BR
July 21st - 1pm - Centro Cultural Correious, Praça Animada
July 24th - 4:30pm - Cinema 2 CCBB

São Paulo
July 27th - 3pm - Livraria Cultura 1
July 29th - 9:30pm - Fund. Memorial da América Latina, Sala 3
July 30th - 10pm - Livraria Cultura 2
July 31st - 12noon - Fund. Memorial da América Latina, Sala 3

Coupled with the inclusion of my first animationey venture "House Guest" last year, the festival is making great strides in remedying my terror toward the nation of Brazil that those "Elite Squad" movies instilled in me. For info on all the other events and screenings on offer check out the festival website.Next month the film will be screening in competition at the Monterrey International Film Festival in Mexico. As with Anima Mundi it's another event that had the good manners to show "House Guest" a couple years back, and as such is automatically in my good graces.There's another Skwigly piece of mine up today, this one a review of the recent Allen Ginsberg biopic - and graphic novel tie-in - "Howl". My interest in it is mainly as an admirer of Eric Drooker, who was the animation designer and did a pretty impressive job visualising Ginsberg's work. Drooker's major graphic novels "Flood" and "Blood Song" are two of my favourites, and his long-standing association with the late Ginsberg makes him an ideal choice for the film's animated portions. Plus the number of film reviews that dismissively referred to the film's 'cartoon parts' were starting to bug me, so I wanted show it some respect in that regard. You can read it here:
"Howl" Film & Graphic Novel Review by Ben Mitchell

Big Plympin'

While I blather constantly on this blog regarding my silly little films and my silly little life, there's a silly little voice in the back of my silly little brain that constantly screams: "Hey DUMBASS, who GIVES A SHIT?!"
To be honest, I write because I like writing, and for the most part all I have to comment on is the incremental, ponderously slow progression of my career. Keeping this up has been hugely beneficial for reference and updating contacts and SHUT UP BEN SHUT UP FOR THE LOVE OF GOD WHY IS YOUR OPINION OF HUMANITY SO LOW THAT YOU THINK ANYONE WOULD GAIN ANYTHING FROM READING YOUR DRECK?
See, there...that's what...yeah.I'd really like to channel the writing impulse in the direction of stuff other people might care more about, while generally staying within the world of animation. To that end I've been doing some freelance writing for the online animation magazine Skwigly, beginning with three articles on Bill Plympton, one of my more significant influences. Two of them are up now, the first a review of "Independently Animated" which, as I've said before, is a great goddamn book so check it out.The second is an actual interview I was able to get with him while we were both at ITFS last week. It was a pretty superb way to start the trip (well, for me) and he was very generous with his time, sharing a lot of insights into the industry, independent scene and the animation process.
Read "A Conversation with Bill Plympton" by Ben Mitchell at skwigly.com
Given that I was disheveled, all over the map (on the tape some of my questions come out like Yoda dialogue) and hadn't slept for thirty-six hours he was incredibly accommodating, even signing a bunch of merch and sketching me a character from his newest in-progress feature "Cheatin'" (see vid below).

The third article will be more focused on "Guard Dog Global Jam" and I'm presently working on getting some of the other collaborators to contribute to it. Before then I'd like to have some more book reviews, articles and interviews up on the site so if any of those get published I'll link to them here. In the meantime, please do me a massive favour and spread the word about Skwigly through their Twitter, Facebook et al. The more I'm writing about other people, the less I'm talking about my boring ass, so everybody wins.