Animated Events: the OIAF 2020

"We'll... meet again..."

Normally at this time of year I would be traveling to Ontario for some much needed rest and relaxation in Toronto before making my yearly pilgrimage to the beautiful city of Ottawa for the Ottawa International Animation Festival. Yet along with the rest of the world I was stuck at home, tragically discovering that (like most introverts) my normal lifestyle was called 'quarantine'.

Fortunately, the fine people at the festival were working hard so that animation lovers all over the world could enjoy the festival. All of the events and screenings were moved online and the festival was extended from four days to two weeks so attendees would have lots of time to watch screenings and talks (and replays of talks).

Personally, I spent a lot of time looking for inspiration and motivation.

While I like to take daytrips to museums and zoos and the occasional 3-day weekend trip during the year for events that are usually animation or art-related (because, well, that's where my interests lie), my trip to the Ottawa festival is THE event that I look forward to every year. Taking some time off to explore Toronto and visit with friends for a couple days then enjoying the sights and sounds of Ottawa between festival screenings, it really recharges my creative batteries. While I split the nine-ish hour drive up into two parts on the way to Ottawa, I'm usually so excited and charged up that I make the whole drive home to Michigan in one day. Clearly, that didn't happen this year, so... looking for inspiration and motivation.

Over the two week span of time, I recaptured the experience by rediscovering and recreating some of the things that I liked (and missed) most about the festival:

So that I wouldn't miss anything, I went to FedEx Office and created a printed and bound copy of the OIAF Program book. Then made my own festival badge--gotta keep those collections current.

During what would normally be the Friday Animators Picnic hosted by Cartoon Network, I made some OIAF 2020 cupcakes.

On Sunday, I found the only Dairy Queen in the Lansing area that serves a Cherry Arctic Rush (although apparently here in the States, it's called a 'Misty Slush'. Go figure).

And in keeping with my usual "dining with something to read", I took my favorite light novel series to the local Chinese restaurant for dinner.

Well during the first week, I was kind of feeling that festival atmosphere and kind of not. So I decided to write down the pros and cons of the experience in hopes of getting a little perspective.

PRO: Not spending tons of money on travel and lodging.
CON: Between my housemate and my geriatric cat, it's so noisy during the day that I have to lock myself in my studio in order to watch the screenings.

PRO: I get to do things while I'm listening to the talks, like fold laundry and organize my desk and bookshelves.
CON: I'm not getting nearly as much exercise as I normally would while walking around Ottawa.

PRO: I don't have to deal with rude groups of people cutting in line while waiting to get into the theater.
CON: I don't get to see the films on a large movie screen--though my television is pretty choice, luckily it'll take an HDMI link from my laptop.

PRO: Lots of my favorite snacks which I can't take into the Bytowne Theater cause the wrappers make too much noise and I don't want to bother the other theatergoers.
CON: No big bags of Bytowne popcorn topped with freshly melted butter! :(

PRO: The festival has extended the OIAF by a week so I get to see everything I want to no matter when it's scheduled.
CON: If this freaking cat doesn't leave me alone, I swear I'm gonna...!

PRO: I can duck out for three hours and attend an online TAIS workshop on digital rotoscoping without missing any screenings.
CON: Y'know, there's no real "con" to balance that out. Through the miracles of modern technology, I can still experience events at TAIS and the OIAF instead of having to choose one and missing out on the other wonderful experience.

By Saturday's day of Professional Development events, I was in a much better headspace. So I started recording comments and thoughts that I found inspirational; like the following:

"At the end of the day, there is no experience wasted if you learn from it."
~Latoya Raveneau
Director, Disney Television Animation

"Classical music makes tiny worlds feel so grand."
~Madeline Sharifian

"Chance favors the prepared mind."
~Jermaine Turner

"You always be humble."
~ Jay Francis (on breaking in to the industry)

"Every mistake you make is a mistake you never have to make again."
~ Lauren Faust

"Not everyone has to go to their dream school to get their dream job."
~ Maaike Scherff

"Act like a professional not a fan." - regarding internships
~ Maaike Scherff

"Quality over quantity. I have a small portfolio... You want your work to be consistent."
~ Marisa Torres

While home on vacation for the second week of the festival, I took some time between screenings and sifted through my big box of Ottawa Festival curiosities and found some fun stuff from the past twenty-six years. Lots of good memories sitting in that box just waiting to be rediscovered.

Treasures ranged from postcards to a 'Bunny and Squirrel' game that they gave out in the festival bags, buttons I picked up at the studio and school room on Saturdays, and even a film strip from Carole Beecher and Kevin D.A. Kurytnik's Mr. Reaper's Really Bad Day.

I didn't watch any of the features this year. None of them really spoke to me. I started one, but ended up turning it off about twenty minutes in, so the only reviews this year are from short films that I found inspiring.

I've really been enjoying Patrick Smith's series of replacement animations -- inspired by the works of Paul Bush, apparently. Well, his latest Beyond Noh holds a special place in my heart due to the fact that during pre-production, Patrick put out a call for photographs of any masks we had in our possession and apparently some of mine got included in his film.


KKUM, by Kang-min Kim was an interesting entry--the characters and sets for this stop-motion film were made out of big blocks of Styrofoam. It went on to win awards, and rightfully so, but the thing I remember most was Kang-min talking about his film after it screened and he warned the audience not to melt Styrofoam in a room with poor ventilation.


Women Undercover 'Yola' (Les esponnes racontent 'Yola') by Aurelle Pollet was a fascinating look at one woman's role in the Israeli spy agencies. I won't say more because you can watch the full episode in the embedded video above. But it's worth a watch not just for the story but for the graphic style of the film.


Bøygen was one of those abstract animated films that I found very enjoyable not just because of its own artistic merits, but also due to the fact that I taught a chapter on visual music in my Animation History class. Learning about the origins and history of visual music enriched my experience when I first saw Bøygen. As I watched the film, I was taken back to the works of Walter Ruttman and Oskar Fischinger. Would really like to see this film again in it's full-format, not just an excerpt.

It was a real treat seeing Burrow Madeline Shariafian's short film created through Pixar's Sparkshort program. Burrow is a cute film filled with cute little characters and very subtle wit. Would love to watch it again.

And then there was Jean Franscois-Levascue's stop motion film. It was awesome to finally see Jean-François Lévesque's film I, Barnabé. I had the privledge of visiting the NFB and having a guided tour of his set a couple years back. And not only did Jean-François show us models, sets and the lighting setup he'd assembled for his film, Jim Randall was also there with prototypes of the models he was building for I, Barnabé. And then, a couple weeks before the OIAF, Jean-François gave a presentation on the making of I, Barnabé at the online-version of the 2020 Montreal Stop Motion Film Festival--even though they didn't show his film! You can see the trailer on the NFB website, and hopefully the full film soon. It's a real treat!

I, Barnabé, Jean-François Lévesque, provided by the National Film Board of Canada

The last experience I tried to recreate was musical. At the festival, I usually hear a song that really speaks to me. Occasionally it's a song played during an animation. Mostly though, it happens to be a song that is either playing in the theater before the screenings or a song that was used as a musical score for the festival trailers or bumpers that play before and after the events. When I find a song that resonates with me, and the festival experience, I'll find it on iTunes and drop a buck or two to buy it and load it into a playlist for the drive home. You can experience this year's song embedded below on YouTube.

See you next year Ottawa (hopefully).

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Animated Thoughts: TAIS Workshops in the time of COVID

Because of the lockdown, the Toronto Animated Image Society had moved all their workshops and courses online--with many of the workshops offered free to TAIS members. While there's nothing like an in-person workshop at the TAIS offices (and an "animation tour" visit to Toronto), taking a couple workshops online was a very cost-effective way to learn some new skills.

As I was in the middle of  the Montreal Stop Motion Film Festival, the timing of this TAIS event was very fortuitous as it provided a very nice break from the screenings. As much as I enjoy screenings and panels, sometimes you want to get your hands dirty and interact with the subject matter.

My current workspace

This particular workshop was really interesting and rather unique. Titled 'Stop-motion in Small Spaces: Setting up a home studio', Neil Burns ran a session dealing with the challenges of stop-motion animation production -- not of making a film on a limited budget, but of having a limited space where you could animate. So, in the preceding week, we all sent in photos of our home studios (or the spaces that we had to work with) and then Neil helped us come up with solutions that would allow us to best utilize the space that we had to film a stop-motion production -- both using a downshooter setup as well as using a 3d set.

Over the next three hours, Neil provided some excellent critiques of our workspaces based on the films we wanted to produce, the animation techniques/visual styles we were going to use, the equipment (and software) we had available to us, and the lighting issues we would most likely face in our setup. Unfortunately, while he had some good suggestions for (re)organizing my workspace, there was one issue none of us could solve during the workshop: my carpeting is really soft and plushy so it tends to make tripods, lights, and sets move slightly when I'm navigating a stop-motion set and animating.

A lot of workshops I see (and attend) deal primarily with filmmaking techniques: storyboarding, scriptwriting, animation software, and animation styles (2d hand drawn, replacement, etc). However, not too many deal with some of the peripheral (yet still very important) production issues, like financing your film, managing production assets, and--in the case of this workshop--designing an efficient workspace that meets the needs of your production. Workshops like this one hosted by TAIS helps fill in some of the gaps in our filmmaking knowledgebase. While trial-and-error can work, and the internet is a vast well of information, it's nice to talk to someone who has actually been there and can provide hands-on experience directly to your personal situation.

Animated Events: Gen Con Online

Gen Con was kind of wild card this year. I had purchased the online badge and rolled over my in-person badge to next year in order to help out the convention. The online badge was only $20, but I opted to have a physical copy shipped to me. Just because. But I was left wondering if there would be anyone running events that I was interested in. Well, I shouldn't have worried. Like I do during in-person Gen Con, I chose to split my time between events that would help me grow as an artist as well as some fun stuff--usually shopping and gaming.

Turns out that Amazon was running a heavily discounted special on the three core rulebooks for D&D 5e, so I took the plunge. I bought the Beginner boxed set when it first came out back in 2014, but wasn't impressed enough with the set to want to get back into it, and every attempt afterwards stymied my efforts -- including when I tried to get into the local D&D Adventurer's League games only to find out that everyone was running them on Wednesdays at 5:30 p.m. (I usually get out of work around 6-ish). But, the price was right so I plunked down the cash, and when they arrived, I was very pleased with the purchase. The foil covers were nice, but I think I might get another copy of the Players Handbook--a standard edition so I won't get upset if the cover gets dinged or dented. During this time, I looked into registering with Zero Session and playing a beginners game of D&D online. Zero Session is a group of tourguides and actors down in New Orleans who are also gamers. When the lockdown hit, they went online and now, for a modest fee, run RPGs for people all over the country who are also in lockdown. My experience with them would prove fun enough that I started looking into playing D&D solo until I could find a group in my area that could accommodate my wonky work schedule--even if it means I have to start DM-ing again. The "History of D&D" panel and the "what led to the downfall of TSR" panel pretty much sealed the deal for me. Before the con was over, I ordered the Essentials boxed set, one setting book, two adventure modules and a pair of the splat books. Even after forty years, D&D is still in my blood.

The drawing session that Gen Con hosted was okay. Unfortunately though, because the models were streaming video from their homes, and there was a wide variety of cameras and lighting, it didn't exactly go smoothly as one would hope. A lot of the lighting really didn't work for the cosplay outfits that the models had chosen. And it was sad too, some of those outfits looked like the cosplayers put a lot of effort into them. I also liked how the organizers had selected models across a range of ethnicities and body types. It was really nice to get a little variety in my sketchbook.

Well, at this point, I think I'm through with the Gen Con animation panels. They're usually hit-or-miss for me, usually more miss than hit. But this year was pretty much the end. One of my big pet peeves is when you have a fifty minute panel to cover a topic and you bring in more than three people (not including the moderator) and you spend most of the time introducing the panel speakers by having them talk about themselves and their careers. It usually leaves about ten to fifteen minutes where they talk about the subject and then open for questions. Idiotic. Needless to say, when the guy who dominates the conversation during the panel is a live-action filmmaker whose only experience is watching anime with his kids--and he gets most of his comments about the Japanese animation industry and the production process completely wrong--well, it's time to move on. Add to that: the "Production Sound" panel was totally forgettable. No more film and animation track at Gen Con for me. I'd rather go back to the "Author's Avenue" cause at least there I'll learn something useful about developing relatable characters or building believable worlds or how 'print-on-demand' is changing the publishing industry. As much as I want to learn things at Gen Con that further my animation career, sometimes you just have to cut your losses and move on.

One of the high-points of the con was the poisons and toxins panel for 5th edition D&D. Run by an actual doctor, he gave a good summary of the types of poisons and toxins out there in the real world, how they are classified, and what effects they have on the human (humanoid) body. Then, he converted them into a nuts-and-bolts version that was directly applicable to 5th edition D&D campaigns complete with suggestions for how DMs could "simulate" the effects of being poisoned over time on a Player Character who missed their saving throw. His presentation was so good, I immediately signed up for the same panel that he would give on the following day.

Now, with regards to gaming, I had the chance to play both Senet and the Royal Game of Ur with a bunch of people over Zoom. Both games were very much like Backgammon and both were very enjoyable games. I put them down on my ever growing list of games to buy (once I find someone to play them with). Online virtual gaming is... interesting. While I had a good time playing the card game "Sushi Go" in an online venue that will eventually be a VR gaming environment, I don't think they're ready for primetime yet. But it will be interesting to see how it all shakes out once VR is more widespread as a gaming interface.

And thus, Gen Con Online 2020 came to an end. I can sum up my experience in one sentence: Online Gen Con may not be best Gen Con, but it is much better than no Gen Con.

Hopefully next year we can all meet up again in Indianapolis for the best four days of gaming.

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