Animated Chat 2011: David Daniels and the Strata Cut

The first Animated Chat of 2011’s edition was with the American artist, David Daniels. The conversation was funny and delightful, just like Daniel’s work. He shared with us important moments of his childhood, which have determined the great artist that he is nowadays. One look to a cake made of clay might have changed the way he uses to see and think the world through. As he said in his interview, this epiphany took many years to be transformed into something real, that he could actually work on. He developed Strata Cut during vacations and his first attempt to put it in practice came with the production of the film Buzz Box, a very dense piece of art. After that, he did other films using Strata Cut, such as Journey from a Melting Brain and Freaked. In need of paying the bills, he end up walking away from his clay blocs and started his own firm, the Bent Image Lab.

We were really excited to see all this colorful blocs of clay. The magic was going to happen in front of our eyes and we thought that we were going to be able to see how he does that. People always say that a good magician doesn’t reveal its tricks. Well, David did try it, but no one understood a thing. He has been improving Strata Cut’s technique since the 80’s. His work involves the calculus over the velocity of the cut and the how many degrees must the knife be in relation to the clay to create one specific design. To cut a long history short: it is very complicated. The audience was really surprised to see how David could think all that through. It almost looks like he thinks in a different frequency. We all see the world through different lens from each other, but it seems that Daniels could face everything from a structurally different point of view. It is not a coincidence that, in thirty years, he has never been able to teach this technique to anyone. Maybe the long time between having that first epiphany and actually develop the technique, must have prepared his mind to this new way of thinking.

The most incredible part is trying to understand the theory behind the simple cut of clay. It is not only about doing beautiful images, there is a whole concept underneath the process that relates to the way the artist thinks space, time and even life. Strata Cut blocs of clay are an attempt to transform time into something physical and make us able to see it, simulating the fourth dimension into a 3D structure. He says that we are all blind because we cannot see the process, which he calls extrusion. We humans are only capable of seeing the image that appears when the knife cuts the clay bloc, which he sees as the “present”, but we cannot actually see the process. Strata Cut tries to reveal physically the extrusion of being in time. Extrusion is the name of a mechanical process that gives substance an oblong shape. To understand this process check Peter Jansen’s pieces of art. This artist was Daniel’s biggest inspiration when building Strata Cut.

David has been long gone away from animating Strata Cut films by hand. His is now working in a computer program in the attempt of digitalizing clay, adding new possibilities to the technique. What excites him the most is that, if the project works, he will be able to cut the clay in unthinkable angles. He confessed to us that Anima Mundi Festival and all the talking with other animators who admired his work have made him willingness to do Strata Cut movies again. We hope to hear from him in the festival next year!

To know more about David Daniels's work and philosophy, check the interview recommended by the artist!

Miwa Matreyek talks about her work Mith and Infrastructure

We don’t need words to describe an image like this. Anima Mundi 2011 has a very special guest: Miwa Matreyek, who brought her performance Mith and Infrastructure. Graduated in Experimental Animation in CalArt, Miwa is an animator, designer and multimedia artist. Her capacity to integrate different artistic aspects is an important component of her work. In Mith and Infrastructure we can see the presence of art, animation and music, all united in a place where the absence of natural laws makes it hard to tell the difference between real and unreal. For the artist, the point is exploring how animation and reality can influence each other. Check out the interview we did with Miwa, in partnership with TV Brasil' program, Animania!

How was your first contact with animation?
Miwa: I arrived to animation by making collages and then making the collages move with music. Some of the earlier inspirations were Brothers Quay, where there is a lot of work with collage, as well as with stop motion. I have a real interest in music and animation sort of working together, creating this dance. My works often tends to be choreographed to the music as well.

What is the performance idea? Where did you get the inspiration to do it?
Part of it came from being in school at CalArts. I began taking classes in the theater school, especially a little bit with puppetry, what really opened up what I was doing with animation. I was interested, even though my performance was on the screen, in taking animation and transforming it into a more physical sense. And I hope that in my work, by mixing my physical body with my animation, the animation becomes a little bit more real and my body becomes a little bit more fantastical, into this sort of strange illusion combination world.

How do you transform your body into an animation? Can you explain a little bit more for us?
In my work there is a lot of play with scale. The animation would be a city and I’m walking in the city, and all the sudden I’m this giant, walking into the city. Animation kind of has this way where it can transform time, where something can be speed up or something can be slow down. And what does it mean for a real body to be in that space? I’m interested to see how the laws of physics kind of don’t apply in this body, in how gravity doesn’t work either, because there is sort of this floating way the body can move within animation. I’m not sure if I’m explaining it right. It is hard to explain because it is more like a feeling.

Can you tell us little bit about CalArts?
CalArts is an amazing school. It was actually founded by Disney, to be the animation school for the Disney’s animators and now it is becoming like a full art school, that has dance, theater, writing, music, animation and fine art. They really encourage collaborating across disciplines. So, you know, you meet with the dancers, then you create something new and then you meet with the musician and they help you with your film. So it’s very inspiring in that way. And being at this animation festival right now, kind of reinforces all this in me, because a lot of people here went to CalArts, like Léa Zagury, one of the founders of Anima Mundi. The history is very deep in the animation world with CalArts. And I’m really excited to be a part of it.

Did you produce the animation in your performance? Do you like to do only animation? Which are you favorite styles or techniques?
I studied animation and I primarily consider myself an animator and a performer second. I don’t really want to be recognized as a performance, I’m shy about it. In animation, I usually most after affects, a lot of compositing life video elements with sort of collagen images, like photography that I take from around the street.

What other artists inspires you?
Someone that really inspires me is Michel Gondry. In my work there is a lot of puzzle solving: figuring out how the layers are gone work together with the body, for example. There are a lot of small puzzles that I have to solve. I think that Michel Gondry has also a lot of puzzles that he solves. Of course there is also the music and the images kind of combine together into this really beautiful dance. His work really inspires me, especially his broadness of experimentation.

Does your performance try to show that animation can be more than the films we set on the screen? That the horizon can be amplified?
I’m not sure if that is what I’m trying to show. There is a lot of figuring out the puzzles in my work. It actually works as these little vignettes that I string together and I hope that there is sort of a narrative arc, at least the feeling that I’m taking the audience somewhere.

What touches you in this work? What moves you to do it?
For me the most important is really the puzzle solving. There is a lot of things that I find fascinating, you know, baking, cooking and just look outside of my window, things that inspires me everyday. It is about imagining the image and wanting to create and actually play with it through animation. And then making the images through shooting video and compose it. It is like a collage of layers, my body is part of the collage and the two projections are combined with my body to create an image.

Did you performed in other countries? How are people receiving your work?
I’ve been touring this piece around. I’ve been to France, England, Beijing, Norway, and Canada. This is the first time in South America, even in the southern hemisphere. The reception has been pretty great because I think that is really universal. There are no words, just sort of a happy feeling and that translates into any country.

Do you know other artists that are also trying to cross the line between animation and other kinds of art?
It seems that projection mapping is really taking off in terms of projecting into buildings and transforming the buildings, which is also very interesting when it is really done well. PikaPika definitely is part of this movement. I’ve also seen interesting zootropes, like 3D sculptural zootropes. There was someone named Gregory Barsamian that I was in a festival with and he made this really amazing sculpture with strobe lights and the sculpture keep spinning really fast, which is probably dangerous, but creates this really visceral and beautiful animation in front of you. That is so much more striking than see 3D films with glasses on. It seems like that the film festivals have been more open to not just film, but film and installation or film and performance. There is this move of opening it up and take it to this whole new thing for the audience, what is very exciting. And it is also very interesting because most of the artists that do things like that are not necessarily animators or film makers, but they arrive to film and animation via being a sculpture or a photographer or something else, like a digital media artist. It is very interesting to see film and animation from a different perspective.

Anima Mundi Web and Cell: choose your favorite!

Anima Mundi has always been ahead of its time. Even before digital revolution spread itself in Brazil, the festival was already trying to promote the expansion of animation towards several different platforms. That is why, besides the film competition, two other contests were created. Anima Mundi Web focused in animations specially design for internet and the other one, Anima Mundi Cell, for cell phones. The point was to encourage the animators to learn how to deal with the new media technologies, letting then not only prepared, but also guarantying the possibilities of animation within every kind of platform.

Nowadays, the need of learning this kind of skills is even stronger. In one of Anima Forum’s lectures, Exporting Animation, Kevin Geiger, president of Magic Dumpling Entertainment, pointed out an important issue for those who wants to transform animation into a lucrative business: adapt to the revolution in distribution. Kevin believes that copying the mainstream American model is copying something that is dying. The advice is to be transmedia, create interactive contents and develop alternative forms of advertisement and marketing.

Following the modern tendencies of convergence, the competitions were put together, creating Anima Mundi Web & Cell. The videos are judged by the professional and the popular juries. You can check all the works that were sent here and choose the one you like the most!

Last year was Anima Mundi’s 18th birthday. During all this time, the festival has grown side by side to Brazilian animation industry, which has only achieved the status of solid economic sector in recent years. Nowadays, we can affirm that the animation produced in Brazil is high qualified, what allows us getting new responsibilities. On the other hand, we are now mature enough to identify the obstacles and challenges that remain in the horizon, separating us from being an international platform of animation content. We have grown, yes. But that doesn’t mean that we are ready. So the question is: what now?

Trying to solve this tuff puzzle was Anima Forum’s job. This four day event runs at the same time than Anima Mundi and is specially designed to professional animators. Besides open debates about Brazil's animation industry and ways to develop it, the participants also learn a lot in the Masterclasses. “Teachers” from all around the world come to share a little bit of their experience in the animation field. This year we had American David Daniels, who invented an incredible technique with clay, called Strata Cut, Tom Cordone, who came to talk about the movie Rio’s design and art project and Ryan Woodward, a storyboard artist that has made draws to films like Ironman 2 and Spiderman 2 and 3.

In 2011, our main priority was to create a space where free speech could flourish and in which we were all able to discuss what should be done to guarantee the rights achieved so far. In many ways we have achieved this goals and now is time to put then in practice and stood up for the things we believe. Animation is one of modern life’s main cultural spots and is very important that we fight to maintain it. In the next posts you can check more information about the classes and lectures of Anima Forum.

Getting to know a few more about Brazil

We dedicate special sessions for foreign movies, but we are very proud to also display what is produced here. Our feature movie invited for the session Panorama in 2011 is Morte e Vida Severina em Desenho Animado, directed by the Brazilian Afonso Serpa. The film is an animated version of the book Morte e Vida Severina, Brazilian writer João Cabral de Melo Neto’s master piece. The movie has already been adapted to the theatre, the television and was even transformed in music by the world-famous Chico Buarque. In 2005, the text became a graphic novel, illustrated by Miguel Falcão and then was brought to life in Serpa’s animation movie. The soundtrack was idealized by Lucas Santanna and the voice of the main character belongs do the Brazilian actor Gero Camilo.

The film, a P&B made with 3D technology, portrays the harsh life of Severino, a migrant that leaves the dry northeast area of the country because of the poverty and lack of opportunities. In Brazil, the hunger and malnutrition that has made tons of victims in the lasts centuries is not a matter of climate conditions, is actually the result of the almost eternal Brazil’s concentrate land issue, a reality that remains strong until today. The art design of the movie embodies the roughness of the dry place where Severino live and walks upon and the simplicity of the pencil’s trace makes it hard to define what is land and what is person. The character is practically molten to the land that he will never be able to call his. The movie is not only a tribute to one of Brazil’s most recognized writer and poet, but also a wake up call that shows that this unfair situation has never left us, in spite of how much money our economy makes.

A window to the rest of the world

This year’s edition of Anima Mundi is more international than we usually see. Besides the movies that came from all over the world, we had two specials shows from oversees. One of then is the Session Chilemonos. Every kind of animation in Chile is known as “mono”. In the last ten years, Chile’s animation industry has grown severely, with the production of tv series, short and feature films. Chilemonos is a project developed by the group Spondylus Producciones. Their main concern is to make sure the world knows Chile’s animation contents. There are six short films being exhibit in Anima Mundi, which were never displayed in Latin America before. They were first seen abroad by the Europeans in the 2011’s Anima Festival, which took place in Brussels. The “monos” surprised by the great variety of genres and techniques that were explored in the movies. The films embodied modern tendencies of animation mixing then with traditional elements inspired by American indigenous culture.

France is also well-represented in Anima Mundi this year. Two feature films were made available by the French Embassy in Brazil. Chronopolis were produced in 1980 and mixes objects animation with the still undeveloped 2D technology. The film tells the story of Chronopolis, a city lost in time, where the citizens lived immerse in their own immortality. The film was directed by Piotr Kamler and took more than five years to be finished. Purely visual and full of attempts to break the formal temporal logic, the film echoes in the cinematography the central point of the screenplay. Anima Mundi is also displaying the film La Planète Sauvage produced in 1973 and exhibited in Brazil in the end of this same decade. The movie, directed by René Laloux, portrays the story of a planet where human beings are brutally infantilized and oppressed.

Anima Mundi Festival in one of the most important windows for the Brazilian animators not only to check everything that has been create all around the world, but also to show all the great stuff that are being produced here. This international exchange is one of the richest things about the work we develop. If you have any doubts or whishes to see your country represented in our festival please do not hesitate to contact us.

Making animation films in Anima Mundi's workshops!

Anima Mundi’s Festival is an event that takes over the city of Rio de Janeiro, bringing lots of colors, joy and fun, as if it has life of its own. And the festival has a heart: the set of locations composed by Centro Cultural do Banco do Brasil, Centro Cultural dos Correios and Casa França-Brasil, all located in the city centre. Between this last two, there is a small square, usually empty in normal days. During Anima Mundi, thought, the square comes to life and transforms into Praça Animada. They built a very big tent there and everything looks magical as the first time we go to the circus. Inside this tent there is a huge cinema screen. This is the place where the films that win the competition are exhibit in the end of Rio’s festival.

In Casa França-Brasil’s and CCBB’s halls there were the animation workshops. The most famous one is called Pixilation, where you can self transform in a character of a stop motion short film! The participants put on costumes and do some sketches. Instead of filming the scene, the monitors take several pictures and then join everything together, creating a small movie. The magic relies on the in between: you can make hats disappear, transform guys into frogs, and a whole lot more interventions that will look like specials effects in the screen.

The others workshops taught us how to make our own animations with several different techniques. The most well-know is draw in paper. You need approximately twelve pages with different draws of a sequence of events. They are all photographed and put together in sequence to create the illusion of movement. The clay workshop used the same logic. The kids built up clay toys and animated then using a photo camera to create the stop motion. The interaction between the kids and their characters is very important because they are free to think their own stories and create a mise-en-scene, in which they can easily move and interfere. You can do animation even with sand! All it takes is to find a bunch of it and spread it all over a smooth surface. With a paint brush, you slowly draw something or write your name, taking pictures of every single transformation in the sand. In the end, you will see the words appearing like magic.

You must be asking yourselves how the kids put together all this photographs to create a film. Easy! With MUAN (Animations Universal Manipulator), a free software created by Anima Mundi’s team of animators, developed by INPA (Applied Mathematics Institute) and sponsored by the company IBM. MUAN is specially designed to children, so his computer interface is very simple and intuitive to make the job easier. Small kids can easily find out how to work on the program by themselves. The software organizes the photos in sequence allowing a little film to be formed. The biggest conquer of developing this program is that it can put more people in contact with animation, once there is no need of spending lots of money to buy advanced programs and to pay lessons of how to use then. You can download MUAN for free! Just check here!

Last but not least, we have the “analogical workshops”, the ones that did not require the use of digital equipment. Animation is a very old art, since 1833 exists, for example, the zootrope, the first equipment which was able to produce the illusion of movement. Everyone was able to check and use this amazing object. Another analogical workshop is the one that uses the Moviola, an old school film editing machine created in 1917 before the dawn of non-linear editing suites. The participant receives a 35mm film and draw direct into it, using a special pen. After that, the film can be seen in the Moviola.

Anima Mundi is not only a world famous animation festival. It is also an event that cares to inspire the kids in Brazil not only to like to watch animation movies, but also to want to make it.

The Magic Place for Children

The 19th edition of Anima Mundi is now leaving Rio and heading to São Paulo. If you couldn’t be here to check this amazing festival, our blog will bring the news for you! In 2011, Anima Mundi’s film selection pleased the kids (even thought we know there isn’t a limit age to love animation). Check the children’s favorites!

We started on friday with The Missed Lynx, 2011’s feature film winner. The film follows the misadventures of a group of animals to escape from being kidnapped by an unscrupulous hunter, hired by a “benevolent” millionaire, named Noah. The eccentric old man, aware of nature's deterioration hatches a plan: to build a new “ark” and keep a pair of animals for each endangered specie. He recruits Newmann, a cool blooded hunter. But even the best hunter in the world will face endless problems as he try to capture our animal heroes under the leadership of Felix, a jinxed Lynx.

The winner of the silver medal was the very delicate Japanese movie Hearth and Yummie. The animation film tells the story of Heart, a T-Rex who was found still inside the egg by an herbivorous female dinosaur, which raises him as her own baby. The film questions the existence of something we call “essence” in a very beautiful way.

We also had a special show for the Aardman’s most famous character: Shaun the Sheep, with bright new episodes. Shaun is the leading character of this British tv show. He and his friends turn the farm they live upside down in hilarious adventures.

Besides the feature films, we had a session only with short films for children, called Comkids – Prix Jeneusse. The seven short movies were reunited by Midiativa – Brazilian Center of Midia for Children and Adolescents. The premier concern of this institute is to develop audio-visual programmes for children with high quality contents. They work like an observatory, analyzing and mapping every program that is specially designed for children in Latin America. They also look forward to increase the public debate within this field of animation. This special show makes us think about the power of animation when used such as an educational tool. We can point out the short films Things you Think – Love, made with several children’s illustrations about what they see when they think about love, and Paul and the Dragon, the touching story about how kids face harsh realities. And we couldn't forget the amazing Juan Pablo Zaramella with the movie Trip to Mars, elected best short movie by the Popular Jury in 2005.

Another great session especially design for children is Panorama 6 – Child TV. Anima Mundi brings seven episodes of children’s TV series from many different parts of the world, including Brazil. The idea is to show what is being produced internationally and at the same time provide fun as big as the cinema screens to the kids. The show comes with episodes from United Kingdom, Check Republic, Taiwan and Colombia. An episode of the program Trank Train, one of the first TV series that were created and produced entirely in Brazil and was actually exhibited in national channels, had a granted spot in the show!

For those kids that are already drawing and thinking about animation, the tip is to go and see the show Future Animator. The panel reunites films produced by children and adolescents that are starting to discover the magic in the animation world. The films are made in schools or at home. In the next post you will hear more about MUAN, a very simples and easy animation software developed by Anima Mundi’s team, and then you can start doing animations with your own kid!

Anima Mundi is a place for children and their families. Check in the next post everything about all the animation workshops available for the public and more details about how you can do it at home!

Could we wait any longer?

The 19th edition of Anima Mundi started today in Rio de Janeiro! In a dreamy and joyful environment, so well portrayed in the illustrations of Priit Pärn, we had a slightly taste of the next ten days. Inside the familiar cinema tent and enjoying a tasteful combo of popcorn and guaraná, a typical brazilian drink, the faithful audience of the Festival was feeling again almost at home. The expectation was big: the four directors of Anima Mundi, Marcos Magalhães, Léa Zagury, César Coelho e Aida Queiroz hurried up theirs speeches, but without forgetting to highlight the most important events that will be happening in this year’s schedule, which you can check here.

The first session of films inspired the best emotions in all of us. The next ten days are surely going to be very exciting. If unfortunately you couldn’t be here to see the place that inspired Carlos Saldanha’s blockbuster, don’t worry! Come and check everything here in our blog. Let the Festival begins!

19th ANIMA MUNDI Starting!

The 19th edition of ANIMA MUNDI is about to start! From 15 to 24 July, the festival takes over Rio de Janeiro, in Centro Cultural Banco do Brasil, Centro Cultural Correios, Casa França-Brasil, Odeon BR, Arteplex Botafogo and Oi Futuro Flamengo and Ipanema. Then it moves to São Paulo, from 27 to 31 July, in the Latin American Memorial, Centro Cultural Banco do Brasil, Espaço Unibanco Augusta and Cine Livraria Cultura.

To resume, we have short and feature films for children, adults, art films in the Gallery, student films and even films made by big studios such as Aardman ( Shaun the Sheep show) and Pixar (with a special screening for its 25 anniversary!).

We have many international guests, beginning with the Animated Chat with Brazilian Carlos Saldanha the director of Ice Age 2 & 3 and RIO, then moving to David Daniels (inventor of the fantastic technique of clay animation, strata cut ) and the cult Japanese director of animes, Shinichiro Watanabe, author of Cowboy Bebop and Samurai Shamploo.

RyanWoodward will give a masterclass on storyboards and animatics, and Tom Cardone will teach about the art and design of features such as Tim Burton's Nightmare Before Christmas, Disney's Beauty and the Beast and Blue Sky's RIO.

We will be back soon with more info!

Record-Breaking Submissions!

Due to the huge number of submissions this year - its a record! - the notice of selection is postponed to may 20th, this Friday.

Direct call from Anima Mundi selection:

1,256 DVDs are already circulating on Anima Mundi "Babel Tower". Only 200 are missing to the end of receipts! Very very soon we'll have the list of selected films of this year!

And already a record was broken: 17 feature films submitted this year!

Anima TV on air!

This Sunday (April 17), Trunk Train and Duck-ticks and Catapults, both carried out by AnimaTV program, will debut on TV Cultura and TV Brasil. This will be the first time ever that national television channels will air an animated series entirely created and produced in Brazil.

Anima Mundi closely followed the progress of this important project for the deployment of Brazilian animated series on national open television. Those who have attended the panel "Anima TV - an assessment" in Anima Forum 2010 may have heard producer Marta Machado, president of ABCA (Brazilian Association of Animated Cinema), recalling that AnimaTV project started to be planned in the 2008 Anima Forum. The director of Trunk Train, Zé Brandão, said the seed of the series was born when he was attending a masterclass of Anima Mundi.

Among the positive points raised by the participants of the discussion in Anima Forum, the stimulus to formation is one of the most important. Cristiana Oliveira, executive coordinator of AnimaTV, highlighted the great opportunity offered through workshops on the methodology of producing an animated series.

But today we really want to congratulate the producers of the debutting series, Copa Studio and Zoom Elefante. We wish success and continuity for this season and for the next ones!

Visit the blogs of Trunk Train (http://www.trombatrem.blogspot.com) and Duck-ticks and Catapults (http://www.tvbrasil.org.br/animatv/carrapatos-catapultas/index.php).

AnimaTV, First Program for Production and TV Broadcast of Brazilian Series, is a realization of the Audiovisual Secretary - SAV and the Department of Cultural Policy - SPC, the Ministry of Culture - MINC, Brazil Communications Company – TV Brasil, Padre Anchieta Founding - TV Cultura, the Brazilian Association of Educational and Cultural Public Broadcasters - ABEPEC, with the support of the Brazilian Association of Animation Film - ABCA.

Priit Pärn art at Anima Mundi 2011

The art of this year’s festival, created exclusively by Priit Pärn, the most famous cartoonist and animator from Estonia, is already at the Anima Mundi site (http://www.animamundi.com.br )!

Pärn is an international animation celebrity and was our guest in 2009 for the Animated Chat!

Priit Pärn has been present with his work in Anima Mundi since 1999, when an Estonian Retrospective featured three of his movies: Kolmnurk (1982), 1895 (co-directed with Janno Põldma, 1995) and Night of the Carrots (1998). In 2006, Frank ja Wendy, Hungerburg (2004), co-directed with Priit Tender, Ülo Pikkov and Kaspar Jancis, was screened at the Short Film Competition, as well as Tuukrid Vihmas (2009), co-directed with his wife Olga Pärn, in our 2010 edition.

In 2009 Anima Mundi had the honor to receive Priit and Olga Pärn in person for the Animated Chat, with a retrospective session that exhibited 1985, Remix (2000), Oiva (2001), Karl and Marilyn (2003) and Ma Kukla Tunnen Eluaegset Kuula... (2007, co-directed with Olga Pärn).

Pärn has also been an Animation Professor for 18 years, art director of the Department of Animation Art Academy of Turku in Finland and art director and animation school Joonisfilm of Tallinnfilm Studio.

As the recent Priit Pärn films, the illustration for Anima Mundi was also made in collaboration with his wife Olga. We have asked the artist to portrait his impressions of our festival and Brazil, so different and distant from Estonia… The result brings us the same irony and irreverence that characterize his animations. Thanks, Priit and Olga!

"Rio", by Carlos Saldanha

"Rio" debuts in Brazil as the animation feature most expected ever by Brazilians. Everybody here is curious to watch the adventures of Blu, a male macaw supposed to date the last female of his species, traveling through the postcard sceneries of our wonderful city.

Carlos Saldanha, director of the film, was born in Rio and is a longtime friend of Anima Mundi! Carlos attended the festival since he was a student in New York and spent his holidays in Brazil. After that, representing the studio Blue Sky, he presented a seminar on computer graphics in 1996 and another in 1997 called “Light. Camera & Action”. In 2000, Blue Sky won the Best Portfolio prize and in 2002, after directing "Ice Age", Carlos Saldanha came to participate in Animated Chat by telling the audience about his career as animation director.

Those who attend the festival for a long time will certainly keep with care a VHS copy of the "The Best of Anima Mundi Vol.1" anthology, featuring Saldanha's graduation short film, "Time For Love" (1994).

We look forward to receive Carlos Saldanha again in Anima Mundi 2011 to celebrate together the success of "Rio"!

Submission numbers

Directly from Anima Mundi “Tower of Babel” enrollment the first numbers come:

1451 submitted films

Of these, 325 are Brazilian!

And the mountain of films’s only growing. Until now 760 DVDs are reached.

Submissions are closed

Animators on hold?! That's right. Once the rush of festival entries is over, now is the time to wait for the selection.
But the Anima Mundi crew never stops, never sleeps, and spends the days in office walking up and down a Babel Tower of emails and DVDs to be registered. Aanimation from all over the world, all over the place!
Soon, great surprises will shine on the festival screen.

Last day for registration

Today is the last day for registration at Anima Mundi:

http://www.animamundi.com.br/

Don’t miss it!

Annecy´s shorts selection!

The selection of shorts of Annecy International Animation Film Festival came out. The oldest animation film festival in the world chose 178 films for the competition (Short Films, Graduation Films, Music Video, Advertising Films, Educational / Scientific / Industrial Films, TV Series and TV Specials) and 35 films out of competition.

Among the 43 films selected for Short Films Competition, at least four of them were in Anima Mundi 2010: The Lost and Found Box of Human Sensation (Germany) by Martin Wallner and Stefan Leuchtenberg, Schlaf (Switzerland) by Claudius Gentinetta and Frank Braun, Something Left, Something Taken (USA) by Max Porter and Ru Kuwahata and Zbigniew's Cupboard (Poland / Great Britain) by Anna Magdalena Osinska. Between the 60 films in Graduation Films Competition, one also were in Anima Mundi last year: Serenade (South Korea) by Lee Han Bit.

Tempestade - César Cabral

But our greatest happiness is in the Out of Competition selection. Between the 35 films selected, three were at the Anima Mundi 2010, and one of them is Brazilian! They are: Babioles (France) by Matthieu Auvray (Matray), Muzorama (France) by Elsa Brehin, Raphaël Calamote, Mauro Carraro, Maxime Cazaux,Davaud Emilien, Laurent Monneron and Axel Tillement, and our Storm (Brazil) by Cesar Cabral. And as a joy never comes alone, another Brazilian also participates in this section: Timing (Brazil) by Amir Admoni.

Feature films selection will be released in March 15th.

The Lost Thing won the Oscar for Best Short Animated Film

And the Oscar for Best Short Animated Film went to The Lost Thing, by Andrew Ruhemann and Shaun Tan!

The film won the Professional Juri award for Best Soundtrack on Anima Mundi 2010.

Watch the trailer below and remember it!

The Oscars are coming!

The Oscars are coming! Sunday (February 27th), the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences will award the previous year's best films. Among the animated films selected by the Academy are some that have been brought to Brazil by Anima Mundi - and three of those have been awarded here!



In 2010, Anima Mundi screened the French short Madagascar, Carnet de Voyage,which won Anima Mundi Directors' Award and Best Art Direction Award by Professional Jury. The Gruffalo was one of the favorites of the public and it was chosen by the Jury in 1st place as Best Short for Children and SP in 3rd place in Rio. The Lost Thing carried the trophy for Best Soundtrack by the Professional Jury.

See the list of nominees Animation 2011 and place your bets!

Animated Feature Film
Toy Story 3, Lee Unkrich (USA)
How to Train Your Dragon, Dean DeBlois and Chris Sanders (USA)
The Wizard of Sylvain Chomet (France / England)

Short Animated Film
Day & Night (USA), Teddy Newton (Pixar)
The Gruffalo (England / Germany), Max Lang and Jakob Schuh
Let's Pollute (USA), Geefwee Boedoe
The Lost Thing (Australia / England), Andrew Ruhemann and Shaun Tan
Madagascar, Carnet de Voyage (France), Bastien Dubois

Anima Escola 2010

This blog may seem in a halt after our 18th festival edition in last July. But the truth is Anima Mundi team hasn't stopped a minute since then!... In addition to the preparation of our next edition(s), we have every year to deal with a big commitment with Education: our project ANIMA ESCOLA (Anima School).

In 2010 we started with a double challenge: besides the municipal schools in Rio de Janeiro, with elementary and middle schools, we are also present in the State of Rio network of public schools, dealing at this time with four high schools, introducing teachers and students to the animation language.

From August to December, there will be several workshops and courses training more than 200 teachers in Rio de Janeiro City and State. As a result, many films will be produced with technical and artistic support of our team.

We will be soon posting more details about all this!

Stephen Hillenburg at Anima Mundi

One of the most anticipated meetings in this year's festival was the Animated Chat with Stephen Hillenburg, held at the Animated Square in the penultimate day of the festival in Rio. The inspired creator of SpongeBob shared with the audience a little of the trajectory of one of the most successful animated series of all time. And apparently the source could not be different: it all started in the sea.

Graduated in marine biology in the 80s, Stephen has created an educational comic book called The Intertidal Zone, where life in the oceans was presented by... a sea-sponge! Later, he joined CalArts, where he completed master's degree in experimental animation in 1992, and directed two short films which run festivals around the world: the political satire The Green Beret and the abstract Wormholes, with insights inspired by Albert Einstein's the theory of relativity.

Stephen presenting his Wormholes

His early work has served as an entrance to work at Nickelodeon, where he joined the production crew of Rocco's Modern Life. It was there that his colleague Martin Olson discovered Hillenburgs's and suggested the biologist and animator to create a series of marine animals. The result is a blockbuster that won Emmys and Annies in several seasons in the last 10 years.

Whenever asked about what is autobiographical in character SpongeBob SquarePants, Stephen, although denying any conscious intention, revealed: he showed a picture of a child and put it side by side with his famous creation.

About his direct influences, the animator recalled adult characters with child personality such as Charlie Chaplin and Laurel and Hardy. According Hillenburg, the dynamics between Laurel and Hardy is a pillar of this kind of humor.

At the end of the screenings, Hillenburg also answered some questions from the audience, mostly made by small fans of the series. And he could not avoid one of the most insidious: what is the secret recipe of Crab Burger. And the animator ran way: "I don't not know , it's is a secret even to me. But nice try!"

Anima Mundi Web & Cel: the winners

The winners of the Web & Cel contest were were also announced São Paulo, check it out:

Popular Jury

DINGBATS - Henrique Kopke - Brazil. Watch here

Professional Jury Award

COLORFUL EU) - Peter Vadocz - Hungary. Watch here

18th anniversary Award

There's Bliss in the Kiss - Melanie Beisswenger - Germany; Singapure - Watch here

Anima Mundi 2010: São Paulo awards

Check out the films chosen by the public in São Paulo:

BEST SHORT FILM

1. DER KLEINE UND DAS BIEST - Johannes Weiland; Uwe Heidschötter - Germany

2. LA DAMA Y LA MUERTE - Javier Recio Gracia - Spain

3. LOGORAMA - François Alaux; Hervé de Crécy; Ludovic Houplain - France

BEST BRAZILIAN SHORT FILM

1. IMAGINE UMA MENINA COM CABELOS DE BRASIL... - Alexandre Bersot - Brazil

2. POMBINHA BRANCA - Fernando Augusto Dias da Silva - Brazil

3. EU QUERIA SER UM MONSTRO - Marão - Brazil

BEST FEATURE FILM

1. MARY E MAX - UMA AMIZADE DIFERENTE - Adam Elliot - Australia

2. BOOGIE EL ACEITOSO - Gustavo Cova - Argentina

3. THE APPLE & THE WORM - Anders Morgenthaler - Denmark

BEST STUDENT FILM

1. DER PRAEZISE PETER - Martin Schmidt - Germany

2. MOBILE - Verena Fels - Germany

3. FORMIC - Roman Kaelin; Florian Wittmann - Germany

BEST SHORT FOR CHILDREN

1. O GRÚFALO (THE GRUFFALO) - Jakob Schuh; Max Lang - UK

2. SIM, VIRGINIA (YES, VIRGINIA) - Pete Circuitt; Bitstate - USA

3. POMBINHA BRANCA - Fernando Augusto Dias da Silva - Brazil

ANIMA MUNDI DIRECTORS' AWARD

MADAGASCAR, CARNET DE VOYAGE - Bastien Dubois - France

NÚCLEO DE ANIMAÇÃO DE CAMPINAS AWARD - BEST BRAZILIAN STUDENT FILM

POMBINHA BRANCA - Fernando Augusto Dias da Silva - Brazil