JOSH: We’re building the staff up and using a lot of the concepts you’ve seen on our previous shorts, like the Social Networking Wars. We’re taking those characters of Friendster, MySpace and Facebook and having them live in an apartment together, a la Three’s Company with a laugh track. They’re always trying to get girls over, and trying to keep Friendster out of the loop.

Never seen SuperNews? Start with the YouTube hit The Immigration Debate.

Thanks to Simon Owens for the story tip.

So many great animators got their start at Spike and Mike’s Twisted Festival of Animation. The first US screening of Wallace & Gromit was at a Spike and Mike’s event, and Mike Judge, the creator of King of the Hill, saw his short Frog Baseball premiered in 1992 at the festival, which wound up turning into Beavis and Butt-head.

As attendees will likely recall, the wildly-popular Flash-animated series Happy Tree Friends has been regularly featured in the Sick and Twisted festival. Kenn Navarro, co-creator of HTF, knows the impact Spike and Mike’s has had on our industry. “If the animation world ever had a rock star, Spike would be it,” Navarro said of festival co-founder Craig ‘Spike’ Decker.

At last month’s Comic-con event in San Diego, I got a chance to interview Spike about his Gauntlet show, his new website and his upcoming 3D show.

A big thanks to Jason Costello and Mondo Media for the help with the interview.

In honor of this moment, we present to you an interview with Mike Foran, the Executive Creative Director at World Leaders Entertainment, the studio where the Net10 campaign was produced.

AARON SIMPSON: How did you guys end up partnering with Droga5 to work on this eight spot campaign for Net10?

MIKE FORAN: Droga5 was looking for an animation studio that could tackle a retro style reminiscent of Alex Toth and 70’s era Hanna Barbera superhero cartoons. Seeing that World Leaders produces The Venture Bros. for [adult swim] and that our VB artists design in a similar style, Droga5 selected us for the competitive bid. They asked us to submit a style frame, which we produced, revised, and then we offered a second style frame with even more characters. We leveraged the talent of our crew, particularly Matthew I. Jenkins, a lead VB Character Designer to create the frames that dictated which studio would win. They really liked our approach and aesthetic sensibility and awarded us the eight commercial campaign.

AARON: How long did the production last?

MIKE: The eight spots took about six months – from an extensive character and background development process through the final effects pass and delivery. Last summer we spent a good deal of time refining the look, feel and color for each of the League of Evil characters. Concurrently we spent time creating a fun-but-evil lair to house this unique cast of villains. Every subtly was dissected and discussed over numerous conference calls. Everyone really wanted to make this campaign the best it could be – time wasn’t really the issue.

AARON: What was involved in the production and who was responsible for each step?

MIKE: Droga5 provided us with the excellent scripts and rough character concepts. Matt Jenkins handled the character and background design and oversaw the storyboard process with me. I sat in with them during recording to provide some input on animation issues. Once we had the scratch tracks we got started on the storyboard process. The storyboards, layout, and pencil test animation were completed directly in Flash on Wacom Cintiqs, which allowed us to move quickly. But Flash alone didn’t provide the right look for our project as we needed a more traditional look. So we developed a Photoshop process for digital ink and paint, while still using the Flash environment for speed and versatility. The finished elements were then imported into After Effects for compositing and effects. We developed our own techniques for recreating the exact look of 70’s era film stock, with all their original imperfections and the effects of age.

AARON: What was the most difficult part of the production?

MIKE: It was a challenge to keep things in the realm of the era we were satirizing. Our work pipeline is all digital, but the artists of the era worked solely on analog tools. We had to concentrate on working in an analog way, as if we were working with traditional paper and pencils. We didn’t want to use a lot of short cuts that Flash provides, as they would have seemed out of place on this project. And with all the digital effects at our disposal, it’s very easy to utilize some esoteric thing that wouldn’t have been used back in the 70’s, particularly with the budgets they had.

AARON: How does this production process differ from some of World Leaders other productions?

MIKE: This is actually a progression of the production pipeline that we’ve developed and used for many of the studio’s projects in the past. By combining Flash with our other tools in such a seamless fashion, we’ve created a very versatile pipeline that’s as cost effective as it is quick to use. The new Adobe CS3 software helped in this case as the work we were doing in Flash integrated more quickly with After Effects, so we were able to save some time and increase our flexibility for changes.

AARON: How long have you been using Flash in your productions?

MIKE: World Leaders has been using Flash since we founded the studio. Back when it was called FutureSplash, I used it on some cut scenes for video games. When we founded World Leaders, our first project was producing 10 episodes of WB’s Gotham Girls (recently re-released on the Birds of Prey DVD) which were produced and delivered with Flash. We have used Flash in some capacity on practically every job we have ever done.

AARON: What’s the best part of using Flash in a production?

MIKE: Simply put – speed. It allows us to quickly test out animation with real time playback. We have developed a fully digital production pipeline that helps us to go from storyboards, animatic, layout directly into pencil test or final animation very quickly.

AARON: What was your reaction when you heard that your campaign had won Gold Lion at Cannes Lions Advertising Festival?

MIKE: I was very excited – it’s the most prestigious award in the advertising industry. But all along, I had high hopes for this campaign. From the moment we saw Droga5’s excellent creative, we knew this was going to be a great project to be a part of. They clearly understood the subject matter they were satirizing, and from World Leaders experience creating The Venture Bros., they knew we got it. I’m extremely excited that everyone else gets it too.

AARON: What commercial jobs have you been working on since?

MIKE: We recently completed a fifteen second commercial for Choice Hotels, featuring their rebranding of Econo Lodge. That’s really exciting because they have not advertised nationally on television in over ten years. We’re also starting up production on a web PSA in collaboration with DraftFCB for City Harvest. They are a fantastic nonprofit organization that rescues perfectly good food from restaurants that would otherwise go to waste, and donates it to homeless shelters. DraftFCB’s creative work on this project is great, so I am really excited to direct this spot.

AARON: What else is in the pipeline for World Leaders?

MIKE: The Venture Bros. Season IV is underway, and we have some ten entertainment projects in various stages of development that we are particularly excited about.

AARON: What has been your favorite Flash animation production?

MIKE: The one I am working on RIGHT NOW. Nothing excites me more than the new.

AARON: Thanks for the interview, Mike, and congrats on the award. For more Net10 animation, head over to the no-evil.net mini-site.

AARON SIMPSON: The question always seemed to be “why not turn Homestar into a TV series?” Is a platform game a more natural evolution for you guys?

CHAPMAN BROTHERS: I think so. Video games have always been a big part of homestarrunner.com – from visuals, to music, to the actual games on our site. And the WiiWare download service also seems to fit with the way we do things.

AARON: Was SBCG4AP in motion before you created the Viidelectrix Wii game page (which features games designed for the Internet Channel of the Nintendo Wii)?

CHAPMANS: No. We had made the Viidelectrix page several months before we heard from Telltale.

AARON: It seems like every Nintendo platform has appeared in some form or another in the Homestar universe, so this game only makes sense. But had you two discussed a Homestar Runner platform game in years past?

The very first Homestar Runner episode,
Super NES, produced in Mario Paint

CHAPMANS: Not really. But it’s true that a game on a Nintendo console “makes sense.” After all, the first time these characters were animated, it was in Mario Paint.

AARON: For those not up to speed, what is a “point and click graphic adventure?”

CHAPMANS: The player uses the Wiimote (the Wii remote control) to point at and click on objects or characters in the game to make Strong Bad interact with them. He’ll talk to it, walk to it, pick it up, use it, make fun of it…whatever the appropriate reaction would be. You basically explore the world and use the objects to make Strong Bad do the kind of stuff Strong Bad likes to do.

AARON: Do you think gamers unfamiliar with Homestar Runner will “get it?”

CHAPMANS: I think so. As with any game based on a preexisting property, being familiar with the characters and the world beforehand might enhance gameplay in some ways, but I don’t think it will make playing the game or solving the puzzles any easier. The first episode is a pretty good intro to the characters, so I think newcomers will be able to figure out what’s going on pretty easily.

AARON: Was Strong Bad the obvious choice for the game lead?

CHAPMANS: Yeah, Homestar would’ve been fun too, but Strong Bad made the most sense.

AARON: You’ve experimented with 3D animated versions of your characters in the past, but this is by far the biggest undertaking with the extra “D.” Was there a particular character that proved most difficult for the team to design?

CHAPMANS: Homestar and The Cheat always present problems when the extra D is added. They usually only get seen from a side view, but you see both eyes so it’s not a true side view. Anyway, the 3D modelers at Telltale did a great job of solving those issues.

AARON: You’ve said in a previous interview that the project required “millions of emails.” Did you ever find your way to the Telltale headquarters in California?

SBCG4AP was produced by Telltale Games
the team behind Sam and Max

CHAPMANS: We’ve been there a couple times. It’s right next to the San Quentin prison, so that’s pretty cool. They have the exact same oval posterboard portrait of Abraham Lincoln in their office as we have in ours.

AARON: What type of animation guidance did you give the team?

CHAPMANS: We sent them a bunch of .swfs to show them all the ways the characters tend to move in different situations.

AARON: Rob Schrab (Scud: The Disposable Assasin, Twigger’s Holiday, co-writer of the Oscar-nominated film Monster House) appears to be a big Homestar Runner fan. Have you guys ever collaborated?

Download Rob Schrab’s Trogdor wallpaper
1024×768 – 1600×1200

CHAPMANS: We met Rob via email in 2001 and have met him several times when we go out to Los Angeles. Matt was a huge Scud fan back in the day and even dressed up as Scud for Halloween in college, so when we heard from him we were psyched. Matt did animated sequences for a couple of Twigger’s Holiday episodes and for a Channel 101 awards show and even has a pinup in the latest issue of Scud (#23).

For Trogdor’s 5th birthday, Rob did a desktop wallpaper (1024×768, 1600×1200) for our site. We’re always trying to figure out ways to do something cool together but busy schedules and opposite coasts keep delaying the inevitable coolness that will go down when we can finally collaborate full-on.

Let’s get a little more info on that topic. We turn to Rob Schrab, an amazing independent creator in his own right.

AARON: Rob, do you remember how and when you first discovered Homestar Runner?

ROB SCHRAB: I remember hearing about this internet cartoon Homestar Runner over and over again. One time my writing partner, Dan Harmon, told me “You gotta see this. These guys made their own little world!”

I checked it out one rainy, depressed afternoon and it turned my day completely around. I ate up everything the Chap bros. had to offer. I had to write them just a quick note, “Hey guys, love your site!” They wrote back right away, saying they knew Scud and Robot Bastard. I was totally flattered.

AARON: Which Twigger’s Holiday sequences did Matt contribute to?

ROB: Episode 2 and 5. Ep. Two is great, it’s during the I Hate Reading! song. Matt did all of this crayon animation (based off a Batman cartoon he did for a film fest Harmon and I did). Really made the show pop. Super fun. Then he threw together this beautiful opening for the beginning of the final episode. Actually, I have to say Homestar Runner is a big inspiration for Channel101.com. I loved the fact that there was an episodic story being told on the internet, like mini TV show. So I glommed that off the Chaps.

AARON: What kind of direction, if any, did you offer to Matt for his Scud pin-up?

ROB: I gave Matt no direction on the pin-up. I wanted to see what he came up with. Those guys are amazing designers. I love what they do.

AARON: Congrats on the incredibly successful conclusion to Scud: The Disposable Assassin. What should Flash animators know about the Scud Fan Film Contest?

ROB: Put Scud in the short! You’ll have a chance to win then.

I keep hearing people say “I’m doing a fan film about a guy reading Scud.” or “It’s about two guys fighting over issue 24!”

Really, put Scud in it. This contest is about how you see the comic book as a moving image. Flash is perfect for this!

AARON: Alright, back to the Chapman brothers. Are there any other noteworthy Homestar Runner fans you’ve come across in recent years?

CHAPMANS: Um, someone emailed us that Geddy Lee was wearing a Trogdor shirt at a concert a couple weeks ago. I don’t know if it’s true or not.

The 1989 NES game Baseball Stars

AARON: Do either of you have a favorite NES game?

CHAPMANS: My friends and I played Baseball Stars well past regular NES’s heyday. I always liked Golgo-13 a lot too. It had side-scrolling stuff, sniper gun-sight stuff, and driving stuff too, I think. It had a decent story too. At least as a ninth-grader I thought so.

AARON: A least favorite?

The 1988 NES game Seicross

CHAPMANS: Magmax? Seicross?

AARON: What game platforms do you guys currently use at home?

CHAPMANS: Most of our game playing is on the DS, but we both have and Xbox 360s and Wiis.

AARON: What’s a favorite Wii game at the moment?

CHAPMANS: We have been playing Mario Galaxy during lunch for the last however many months and just got to Bowser last week. We’ll generally play until we get 1 star and thats it, so it’s taken awhile. We just got to Bowser, so we’ll be done soon.

AARON: Thaks, guys. For more answers, check on the 2-part Cold Hard Flash interview with the Chapmans from 2005.

As part of the ongoing CHF Radiohead/Aniboom Interview Series, we visit with Andrew Kauervane, an artist with a history of music videos, and also a man with some skin in the game. He recently submitted this Flash-animated piece below to the contest. This is Andrew’s take on Radiohead’s moody track All I Need.

Here’s some concept designs Andrew sketched out before diving into production:

AARON SIMPSON: Tell us about the concept of your Radiohead contest submission?

ANDREW KAUERVANE: My concept really revolves around the concept of loneliness and love. I know it sounds corny but that’s what the lyrics did for me. My video exhibits a bit of a self-help message: There is someone out there for everyone. A rainbow to add meaning to your life. You just have to look for it; don’t mope.

AARON: How did this differ from your work on the SheBeats video you produced?

ANDREW: It’s significantly different because I’m doing something I like. I get to be as versatile as I want with the artwork and concept. With this one I’m going for a more avant garde look. I have flashing splatters serving as fills for items, film grain over the animation, and old black and white photography of wars, outdoors, and even newspaper clippings. I’m having alot of fun with this.

AARON: So, how is the process of directing a music video different from other animated work you’ve directed?

ANDREW: It’s not really that different. I stumble through pretending to know what I’m doing and people seem to like the outcome. With music videos it’s a lot less mathematical if that makes any sense. When I do “traditional” cartoons with a set script, voices, and all that I have more of a start to finish mentality. With music videos I feel like the only thing on my mind is doing it and liking the result. I’m a music kind of guy; it just brings out the best of me.

AARON: Do you have any routines for uncorking your creativity?

ANDREW: Yeah, it goes back to the music thing. Typically to get things flowing I listen to a band or musician that has a particular quirk that makes me click. That’s really about it.

AARON: Do you feel constrained to the narrative embodied in the lyrics?

ANDREW: I do. But that doesn’t mean I can’t really bring out the best of the lyrics in visual interpretation.

AARON: Do you find feedback important during the creation process?

ANDREW: I’ve actually never really thought about that. I suppose I do, I’m constantly sending progress of my work back and forth to this girl. I guess if I’m really close to the person I think feedback from them is really valuable; it is important.

AARON: Speaking of “important” – how important is it to keep the animation aligned with the rhythm of the music?

ANDREW: It is typically vital that the animation of a music video syncs up with the rhythm. At least for me anyways. It keeps me interested to see things move in accordance to its sound, it makes the animation vivid and, I think, makes listening to the song more enjoyable if it’s your first time hearing it.

AARON: How do you break up your process within the software? Animatic, rough animation, final?

ANDREW: At this point in my “career” I’m actually getting more into the preparation processes. In the past, I didn’t do any kind of storyboard or rough animation – I just had a drawing of the characters head shape behind everything, and I went straight into animation. However with the Shebeats video and now this All I Need project, and even with my more recent cartoon projects, I’ve been dipping my fingers in some storyboarding. I always thought it was interesting to see rough drawings go into something polished, so for me it makes the animation experience somehow… psychologically rewarding. If that makes sense.

AARON: Let’s take a look at some of Andrew’s storyboards from his Radiohead contest submission:

AARON: Do you currently have a favorite animated music video?

ANDREW: I would have to say my favorite animated video of all time is Clint Eastwood by Gorillaz. To this day I still strive to learn to make my animation move like Jamie Hewlett’s. Truly talented people.

We were already impressed. Tom Neely didn’t need to go become an award-winning graphic novelist, or launch an amazing gallery show. His self-published graphic novel The Blot was received with an abundance of rave reviews, and his gallery show at the Black Maria Gallery was packed with 34 new paintings and scores of people at the opening. But now we’re more impressed.

Neely at the Black Maria Gallery

Before all that, Neely wowed us with his film Brother, Can You Spare a Job?, which resulted from the success of his entry into the 2003 Bush in 30 Seconds contest, where he placed as one of 4 finalists in the Animation category. His follow-up was an eye-popping music video for the band The Muffs – again in the Fleisher-style. In this Radiohead Contest interview below, Neely details the production of this video as well several other projects he has his fingers in now.

AARON: Why are music videos often so “experimental?”

TOM: I guess there’s just more freedom because it’s film done on a small scale with fewer people involved. I think that’s the best way to get really creative ideas made. Music often lends itself to more abstract ideas, so experimental visuals work well with that. It’s more accessible for a short video to be abstract or experimental for some audiences because the music gives them an anchor to help understand the film. Looking at music videos on TV these days, I think we need a lot more experimentation to come up with some better ideas.

AARON: How is the process of directing a music video different from other animated work you’ve directed?

TOM: Well, I’ve only really done 2 cartoons. Stylistically, my two cartoons are very similar, but the differences between The Muffs video and Brother, Can You Spare a Job? were pretty significant. For Brother… I animated the whole story without sound. When it was near finished, Greg (co-writer on this cartoon) picked out a lot of music that he thought would fit. In many cases we were amazed that some musical cues just fell right in place perfectly. Others had to be edited, or the animation would be tweaked to fit a little better. With the music video, the music came first and was the inspiration for much of it. When I heard the opening chords of Don’t Pick On Me I immediately saw the opening scene of the Villain tying Kim to the tracks while a train was chugging along in time with the music. The whole idea came to me pretty easily the first time I heard the song. Brother… was my first cartoon, and the animation is much more limited and relies heavily on Flash tweens and symbols. I think I made some significant improvements when I did The Muffs video. But looking back at it a few years later, it looks a little too “Flashy” to me… Not that there’s anything wrong with Flash, but when you’re using it to make something that looks more like old animation, the limitations become obvious.

The Muffs – Don’t Pick on Me

AARON: So what work-arounds did you employ to make Flash work for you?

TOM: Flash has a lot of limitations, and I think I found every one of them while working on this cartoon. But the one thing that I think Flash does well is working with that rubber-hose style. For many of the arms and legs of the characters in my Muffs video, I would draw with the stroke set to 5 or 6 and then animate those parts directly in Flash by drawing with the pencil tool. After animating a full sequence of rubber-hose arms, I’d then select all of those strokes, convert lines to fill, color them, and then add a black outline stroke around the new shapes. Some of them would have to be re-drawn in the end, but the stroke tool works pretty well for rubber-hose animation.

AARON SIMPSON: For your Don’t Pick On Me music video, what reference animation inspired you?

TOM NEELY: I’ve always been a big fan of the early Fleischer Studios stuff. All the Betty Boop and Popeye cartoons are my favorites. Nothing beats the weird surrealism and frantic action of some of that stuff. The Kim character was sort of designed after a combination of Betty Boop and Olive Oyl. Early Mickeys and Bosco and really just about any black & white era animation is a big inspiration to me. I love all that stuff. The villain character was largely inspired by Snidely Whiplash from the Dudley Do-Right cartoons, but also many of the stereotypical silent-era villains that inspired the character of Snidely. For some of the gags, I took a lot of inspiration from the king of gags – Tex Avery. The safe falling on the X gag is stolen from one of his cartoons (I can’t remember which one off the top of my head). The banjo gag is a variation of the old dynamite-piano-key gag that was in a lot of Tom & Jerry and Daffy vs Bugs and other cartoons. I’m not really a gag man, so I relied heavily on gags that I’ve always loved from old cartoons. It’s hard to come up with new gags when it seems like all the best were already made by Avery and Jones.

AARON: How important is it to keep the animation aligned with the rhythm of the music?

TOM: I think it depends on your story. With my video, I wanted the characters to be acting and singing along with the music, so it was very important. But other videos might be less reliant on that kind of timing. This cartoon was the first time I ever animated to sound. Kim singing is my first attempt at syncing the mouth animation to sound. It was hard to figure out. I don’t know anything about time-sheets or any of the “real” way that animators do that. I just figure out my own way to do it. I think, for the most part, it worked out okay. But there are some parts of the animation that I wish were synced to the beat of the music a little better – like the mallets hitting the villains head in the last scene – they’re just slightly off from the beat of the song and that has always bugged me.

AARON: Do you have any routines for uncorking your creativity?

Rise Above – 2007 print by Tom Neely
from his show at the Black Maria Gallery

TOM: I take a lot of long walks around my neighborhood when I’m working out story ideas. Just me, my dog and my iPod and I’ll just wander around the streets thinking about how to work out my stories. Once I figure out the problems, I go home, sit in my back yard with a pot of tea and write/sketch out my ideas in a sketchbook.

AARON: Once those ideas are in motion, do you find feedback important?

TOM: It can help sometimes, but often I find it more of a hindrance. Everyone brings their own ideas to the table, so anyone who looks at your art will give you advice based on how they would do something. I usually find it more frustrating than helpful. When I’m working on more personal work, like my comics or painting, I don’t really show anyone until I’m done, or near done. I don’t like to have anyone else’s voice in my head while I’m working on my own art. I always think about something Philip Guston once said about this:

(paraphrasing) When I first come into the studio to work, there is this noisy crowd which follows me there including all of the important painters in history, all my contemporaries, all the art critics. One by one they all leave. Eventually all of them will disappear. Then even I leave the room and then I can begin to paint.

When I have a problem that needs some outside opinion, I have a few close friends who are artists that I trust to give me good advice. But for the most part, I prefer to finish a project, then hear the critiques and learn from mistakes that I find in the finished work. Otherwise, too much outsider interference can really slow down or destroy my creative process.

AARON: Do you have a favorite animated music video?

TOM: Hmmm… I don’t know if I have a favorite. Off the top of my head a few pop into mind – that new Bjork video (Wanderlust) is pretty cool. That White Stripes video that was animated with Legos is really cool. Monkmus has done some good ones. I like all the Gorillaz stuff. I really like some of Steve Woloshen’s abstract scratch-film animations. He did one to a Hendrix song (Curse of the Voodoo Child) that would sort of count as a music video. I haven’t really kept up with some of that recently. Some of the best animated “music videos” were done back when Louis Armstrong or Cab Calloway lent their songs and voices to Betty Boop cartoons.

Snow White (1933) Cab Calloway singing St. James Infirmary
Betty Boop film directed by Dave Fleisher, animation by Roland Crandall

AARON: Your graphic novel The Blot was well received last year. Do you have another one on the way? Any more animation in your future plans?

Tom Neely’s self-published graphic novel
The Blot - Order Now

TOM: Yeah, it’s been doing really well. I won an Ignatz Award, got a lot of good reviews, and ended up on several “Best of 2007″ lists in the comics journalism world. It’s a self published book and it’s been a lot of work to get it out there, but it’s doing well so far. I’m happy with it.

As for current projects in comics: I’m working on a comic book that will be a part of a box set by the band The Melvins. I’ve always loved the Melvins, so it’s been a lot of fun. The box set is a limited edition vinyl release of their album A Senile Animal that will come out from Hydra Head Records later this summer. Many of the song titles for that album were things like The Blood Witch and A Talking Horse which made it easy to come up with an interesting cast of characters. The story doesn’t follow the lyrics of the album, but their lyrics are pretty surreal and nonsensical anyway. I’m using that surrealism as the inspiration to write my own story with these characters. It’s sort of like a comic-book music video for the whole album (you can see the first 6 pages on my blog). I’m also writing my next graphic novel, but that’s still in the early stages and I don’t know when I’ll be done with it. And I’ve been posting weekly “comic strip poems” on my blog every Wednesday. It’s funny to me that everyone keeps telling me that my comic strips are depressing.

In animation, I’ve been doing a lot of freelance work for Disney. If you’ve seen the “my pets” thing on their Game Kingdom website (must be a paid member to view), I created and animated all the hybrid-animal pets that you can “adopt.” Apparently it’s the most popular thing on their site and they’re thinking of making toys of the characters that I designed. Someday I’ll wake up and see them on Saturday morning cartoons and I won’t see a dime from it – ha ha! I’ve also done a little bit of background clean-up work on the new Kids’WB! series The Spectacular Spider-Man.

I’m helping my friend Levon Jihanian on an animated short that he has created. It’s sort of an Adult-Swim-ish cartoon based on his Giraffe Death Force characters. He is doing all the key art and backgrounds while I’m animating it for him in Flash. It will be very limited animation in the style similar to the old Johnny Quest cartoons. And lastly, I’m doing a little animated intro to a friend’s independent film that involves two platypus characters and a bong.

So, I’m still doing lots of Flash animation every day for freelance work, but I don’t have any of my own animation projects on the horizon. I’d like to do more of my own animation someday, but lately I find myself wanting to get away from the computer and just going to the drawing board to pursue my more personal work in comics and painting. But there are ideas in the back of my head for cartoons that I will hopefully get around to someday.

AARON SIMPSON: What was the overall design concept for the promotional pieces?

TEAM ROGER: The design concept came from this year’s KCA slogan of When Hollywood meets slime! We took iconic Hollywood elements and tried to represent what would happen if the Nickelodeon brand crashed into them. We knew we wanted something gooey and organic that would fit well with Nickelodeon’s style.

Liam Lynch (Tenacious D in The Pick of Destiny, Sarah Silverman: Jesus Is Magic) directed the live action shoot. He provided a rough animatic which a had a general direction for the storyline. From there, we begin designing panoramic storyboards of the cityscape and main environments. After editing the footage, we designed storyboards full of details of the execution of every shot. Next we created an animatic that included audio, footage, and storyboards. Finally, we put our animation team into full production.

AARON: Which artists created the look?

TEAM ROGER: The look was created in a collaborative effort between Nickelodeon, Liam Lynch and Roger. Our design team included Brian Gossett (lead designer) and Jake Portman (Art Director) as well as the (3) Creative Directors of Roger, lead by Terence Lee.

AARON: How was Flash a part of the production pipeline?

TEAM ROGER: Flash was used to animate specific elements we wanted to have a hand drawn feel.

AARON: Which elements of the spots were created in Flash?

TEAM ROGER: The Flash animations include the Splat type as Jack jumps out of the plane in the first shot, the letters Jack is Back throughout the motorcycle scene, and the birds circling Jack’s head on the end shot.

AARON: Did artists draw directly into the program, or were pencil sketches scanned into the software?

TEAM ROGER: For the Splat animation, we first created the type in Illustrator and worked backwards, re-drawing each frame with the onionskin feature until each letter was complete. In the point of the animation where the type turns into one big glob, we drew each frame in individually until it fell off frame.

AARON: We used the same technique for the Jack is Back letters: starting with vector type and re-drawing each frame with the onionskin feature.

TEAM ROGER: The birds began with a simple 3d bird animation as a guide. After illustrating the bird, we did a quick pencil sketch of the body and head then moved to the wing movements. From there we cleaned up the bird and drew it in frame by frame using a Wacom tablet.

PROJECT CREDITS:

Client: Nickelodeon
VP/Creative Director, On Air and Movie Promotions: Jay Schmalholz
Director of Production, On Air Promotions: Christina Augustinos
Supervising Producer, On Air Promotions: Mike Tricario

Production Company: Ignition Films
Live Action Director: Liam Lynch

Animation/Design Production: Roger
Creative Directors: Terence Lee, Vasil Hnatiuk, Mark Yamamoto
Art Director: Jake Portman
Lead Designer: Brian Gossett
Compositor: Erin Bosworth
Animators: Zack Nederlander, David Lewandowski, Jose Acosta
Lead Flash Animator: Kenneth Macy
Executive Producer: Sarah Cole
Producer: Elaina Porter
Sound design & Mix: Mike Barrett from Creative Bubble