I thought you all might like to get a sneak peak of the concept art I've just completed for a new short film I’m about to attempt. As you probably know, I’ve written a number of 'how to' books on animation, so I thought it was time for me to step up to the plate and show that I can actually practice what I preach. The new film will be called "The HERMIT", a short story inspired by an unpublished book from author Anthony Richardson.

The film will be entirely hand-drawn, so I’ve no doubt it will take me several years to complete! However, I wanted (and needed) the challenge of creating an animated film that is both beautiful to look at and yet has sense of wisdom in its storyline too. I definitely think the animated world is ready for such an change of pace and so, hopefully, this will be it.

Anyway, I’ll definitely publish 'work in progress' on this blog-site as I go along, so that everyone can check-in on my progress from time to time. (And maybe students of animation can get a better insight into just how animated films are put together?) But please be patient! This is a labor of love for me and therefore it definitely can’t be rushed!  Indeed, I’m probably going to have to lead the life of a ‘hermit’ myself, just to get it all done!

Tony.   :^{)}=-

I've decided to start a collection of eccentric walk tests for a project I cannot talk about just yet. However, I wanted to share the first one of these at this 'first pass' test stage. There's clearly a great deal more polishing and clean-up to go with it yet, but I do think it still may prove instructional at its present level. (Animated on 1s by the way!)

Later I will provide a means of supplying animation students with a far more detail explanation of my process in creating eccentric walks. However, in the meantime, I hope that just by seeing them you will at least get something from the exercise.

Watch this space later for further editions!

I just took advantage of the Memorial Day weekend to complete a pitch for the Direct TV short film competition. The competition ends tonight (May 25th) on filmaka.com and so it's been a bit of pressure as I only heard about it mid last week.  Anyway, whereas I suspect that most entries will be live action/special effects films, I've decided to bite the bullet and go for traditional 2D animation.

'Danny'... my central character!

I know that this schedule and budget is insane from an animation point of view, but with some fabulous colleagues who have all shown interest in helping me, I think its not impossible. (Especially as we're all on a summer break from classes at DigiPen.)

Peter Moehrle's beautiful initial concept piece.

Needless to say, I'll report back here if we hear anything. (Well, perhaps only if its 'good' news!)

Tony.   :^{)}=-

I've just met a remarkable professional who is currently the DigiPen campus in Redmond. His name is Michael Cottam and he's here to acquaint himself with the DigiPen BFA in Production Animation program, as he will be teaching parallel classes at the Singapore campus this coming fall.

Michael on the steps of the Sky Walker Ranch in California.

However, in meeting with him I was delighted to discover that he was indeed a fellow ex-pat Brit... hailing from Blackburn, Lancashire. In addition to that, I was extremely impressed with his work, especially his extensive knowledge of all things 3D and SFX technical. Particularly impressive is the fact that Michael is entirely self-taught, essentially inventing his skills as we went along through life, from from a time before the current industry and technology became commonplace. What is additonally impressive however, is his capability of drawing, concept art and production design! It seems that this was a talent he'd had from and early age. I was particularly blown away by two drawings he showed me that he done as a young, untrained 10-year-old.

One of the drawings that Michael did... at 10-years old!

The especially inspirational part of Michael's life story however was the fascinating experiences he'd had before entering the employment market. I can readily identify with what he had to say on this as being of a similar age I could readily relate to his experiences at school, being someone also who succeeded despite the system and not because of it. The following is something that was inflicted upon all of us 'factory fodder'/'working class' kids in England at the time.

Anyway, just before he was about to leave school and join the world of the employed it was a requirement of the British educational system at the time that you meet with the 'careers officer' at least once. The careers officer's job was to give you career advice and wisely guide you to the profession of your choice. This was a good idea in theory but the practice was in fact far removed from that! Anyway, shortly before Michael had met with his own particular career's office he had seen the original 'Star Wars' movie for the first time and was particularly impressed with the opening 'mothership' shot. (As I think we all were when we first saw it.)

Another of Michael's drawings... aged 10!

Suffice it to say, the careers master duly asked Michael what he wanted to do when he left school and Michael responded in all sincerity that he simply wanted to work with George Lucas and recreate that incredible opening shot in the 'Star Wars' movie! (Now in hearing this you have to realize that at this time Blackburn, like most provincial places in the UK at that time, north and south, but particularly in the north, was a run-down, no-hope, industrialized town with nothing but local businesses and/or heavy industry as a viable means of employment. Also, at this time, there was no such thing as desktop computers... let alone the technology to produced a special effects movie like Star Wars!)

Anyway, the career's office looked Michael up and down in a very smug way and very snottily told him that he should forget that kind of thing. He added that Michael had no talent whatsoever and he should therefore consider a more 'sensible' career as an electrician or some other similarly obtainable profession. Left with no realistic options but to follow this 'sage' advice, Michael became an electrician.

However, many years later and by an extremely circuitous route that is too long to go into here, Michael found himself as a pioneer in the emergent computer/games industry. Furthermore, as a result of his pioneering successes in both games and film he was ultimately offered a job to work alongside George Lucas in California! However, not only did Michael get to work alongside his greatest idol at that time, but he was also actually commissioned by Lucas to recreate the game version of that famous opening shot in the Star Wars movie!

Michael subsequently confirmed to me that this was not actually the proudest moment in his life. That was reserved for when he was able to fly his parents to San Francisco to visit him at work. On the day they were there, they went to the Sky Walker Ranch restaurant for lunch where the excited couple actually got a glimpse of George Lucas! Surely, if there is a better 'don't give up'/'anything is possible' legend in this day and age than this, then I have yet to hear it! 

The latest example of model art that Michael has created!

Bravo Michael!

It seems that I’m destined to experience this current stage of my life revisiting the past for a while longer. In going further though storage boxes that have collected dust for some time now I chanced across a short story I wrote when I was still at art school, more decades ago than I care to remember! 

It is a quite unusual story to be honest. Specifically, a 'typographical children’s story' to be precise... and one that was almost published in London the first time it saw the light of day. At the time I wrote it and illustrated a couple of very graphic-like images and then was introduced to the publisher, “Dennis Dobson”, by my illustration teacher at the time, Ralph Steadman. The publisher liked it when he saw it but because it was quite ‘progressive’ for a children’s story to his way of thinking, he said he wanted to do some market research on it first before he committed to publication. Needless to say, I was on edge while the research was being conducted. It was such a big thing for a student to have his first creative work accepted and published, so I was very excited about it.

However, although the research came back positive, Dennis Dobson ultimately turned the book down, sadly… feeling that it was a step too far for his normally conservative company.  I was so disappointed to hear the news, as I wanted to be a children’s book illustrator at the time and had actually convinced myself that it was going to happen. The biggest irony of all however was to follow. In having received the rejection letter from Dennis Dobson earlier in the week, I chanced to read a British “Times” article the following Sunday, highlight what the author believed was the ‘demise’ of British children’s publishing. He was bemoaning the fact that all the available books at that time were far too conventional and was asking, "where are all the adventurous and progressive young British children's book writers and artists"! I was tempted to write and share my painful experience at the hands of Dobson’s. But I thought better of it after a while, believing that I might submit further stories for publication shortly after that and didn’t want them judged with a prejudice or jaundiced eye. As it turned out, I didn’t submit any more stories... I ended-up animating them... so I guess I should have shown more guts about it upon reflection.

Its always fun to splash paint around... something I learned from Ralph Steadman!

Anyway, in finding my children’s story recently I chanced to show it to a couple of friends who were very close to me, especially my literary agent friend, Bob Silverstein, of Quicksilver Books on the east coast.  Everyone liked the story apparently and Bob even said that if I produced some illustrations for it (the old ones had been long lost, being created at a time long before digital backups were the norm) he would try to sell it for me.  Suffice it to say, I have since been working hard on this during my spring break at DigiPen... and I once more have high hopes of finding a publishing home for the story after all these years!

Minimalism rules... OK?

It has actually been a joy working on the material to be honest. Its a rare opportunity for me to create original images that I don’t have to think about animating later. Consequently I can be far more creative with what I attempt, drawing very much on my main student focus... 'graphic design' and 'typography'. ‘Watch this space’ for news of how it all fares at some time in the future. (Surely it still can’t be adjudged ‘ahead of its time’ again... after all these decades have now gone by?)

A year or so ago, before I moved to my current location, the local Starbucks I used to frequent had a large 20” x 30” picture frame on its wall that was crying-out to be filled with something. So I quite voluntarily offered to create a poster image for them every month, which they would let me publicly display to customers of the store. This was great fun. Within reason, I could do anything I chose to do and therefore I did so on a regular basis! However, the most popular piece I created by far was the “BEANA-LISA”!

The BEANA-LISA was quite simply a version of the original Mona Lisa, but constructed with thousands of hand-drawn coffee beans of varying tones and color value. I know, its a quite insane undertaking… especially as I wasn’t being paid for it! But then again I guess I’m a typical ‘Virgo’ type and Virgo types tend  to delight in tiny details! For an example of just how tiny those details are, here’s a close-up of just one section of the picture…

Now I suppose you’re probably going to suggest that I should ‘get a life’ after looking at this. However, I would argue in reply that after a career that has been entirely dedicated to drawing countless drawings… 24 drawings per second to be precise… to make my animated films, the entire BEANA-LISA exercise was actually a quite relaxing ‘therapy’ for me.  The staff at Starbucks liked it, the customers most definitely liked it and in a strange and insanely masochistic way, I totally loved it!

It is strange how life often moves in cycles, even waves. It seems that nothing significant happens for long periods of time then, suddenly, everything happens at once! That was what it was always like with my Animus studio in London. It was either ‘feast or famine’. In other words, you either have too much work... or not enough!

Smaller cycles seem to afflict us too of course. For example, this Sunday I decided to go through some old storage boxes with the intention of throwing out things I no longer needed. However, I found myself diverted by a number of old papers from my past, including photos from my studio days that I’d forgotten I’d had. They mainly related to the time when I leased studio space at “Prominent Studios", the Monty Pythons' own film complex offices in Camden Town, north London.  But there were also pictures of when I traveled to Nashville... oh, and a preliminary letter of intent from Disney, when I turned them down after being asked to direct “The Duck Tales Movie”.

These were heady, carefree days indeed. Cool too! Especially when there was the likelihood of bumping into one or more of the ‘Pythons’ on an almost daily basis... or even a royal prince, or perhaps Salman Rushdie... all of whom would watch sneak previews of major theatrical movies from time to time in the private theater there, long before the films actually hit the UK cinemas. (And we were more often than not invited too of course... but not always when high security was involved!)

In truth I almost developed an animated movie with Python Terry Jones at the time, just after he’d got back from the Tokyo Film Festival. He’d been intrigued by a number of Japanese prints he’d come across while out there… mainly 'Hokusai' and 'Hiroshige'… and knowing I’d won a British Academy Award for my own Hokusai short, he asked if I’d be interested in working with him on a story idea he’d written out, entitled “The Road to Edo”. He wondered if I would direct it too. I said I'd be delighted. The story was in fact a great, swash-buckling adventure story involving two young children intend on inflicting revenge on a wicked war lord from Edo who had killed the kids' parents and then fled with his spoils of war, back to Edo, along the endless road .

Outside the Prominent Studios office with effects animator, Andrew Smith.

The story was mainly a tale of intrigue and scary events, involving ghosts and dragons and dastardly demons that the children would encounter along the way... until the ultimate and inevitable conclusion to the yarn. I was extremely excited to work on it with Terry. However, just as we were about to start in earnest the Pythons all suddenly exited for a new film production of their own and the Edo project ended-up collecting dust in a Prominent Studios filing cabinet somewhere, presumably forevermore.

Needless to say, it amuses my friends and loved ones to see the pictures of me from all that time ago. So, just for your benefit folks, here’s some more to chuckle over!

On the "Grand Old Oprey" stage in Nashville.

Anyway, as I was saying before I changed my chain of thought... life certainly happens in cycles. Having just found this treasure trove of paperwork, pictures and memories, I was sent (the very next day) a link to a superb blogsite (http://thethief1.blogspot.com) that has tracked the progress and aftermath of the Dick Williams’ fated masterwork movie, “The Thief”. This was a film of 26 years in the making and yet one that was never completed quite as Dick wished it to be.

One of the latest blogs on the site that my attention had been drawn to was a posting of a photograph that featured the Richard Williams studio staff from 1975, when I was there. In all honesty I’d completely forgotten that it had even been taken. But when I looked at it, lo and behold, that’s exactly what it was… and lo and behold there was I too!  Peeking just over the shoulder of the great Warner Brothers veteran, Ken Harris… my teacher and mentor for some of the 7 years I was at the studio… there clearly appears a solemn, beardless and yet quite cherub-faced young animator by the name of Tony White!

The Richard Williams studio 'class of '75'... with yours truly being the 8th head from the left on the back rows!

Needless to say, I was staggered to see this… especially with such illustrious company around me as the aforementioned Ken Harris, the ex-Disney maestro Art Babbit, and the ‘Betty Boop’ originating animator, Grim Natwick. (Not forgetting Richard Williams in the foreground too, of course!) It has all seemed quite normal and natural at the time. But now, in retrospect, the enormity of that moment would really hit home for any genuine animation fan.

Needless to say that, and the previous day’s discoveries, invoked significant, nostalgic emotions for me. I could almost smell those days of cel paints, rostrum cameras and Moviolas… not to mention the gentle flipping of animation drawings as silently focused animators perused their animated scenes before shooting.  (And not a computer or piece of digital technology in site!)

Barely a wrinkle in sight in those days. This must have been a time of 'feast', not 'famine'!

Anyway, I hope this gives enough of you a laugh to see these records of the 'ghosts of my past'. As for me today? I’m still waiting for the third nostalgic phase in this current cycle. For everything comes in threes, doesn’t it? (At least, that’s what we’re told!)

Now just where did all those years go? 

Tony.  :^{)}=-