Gary “Doodles” Di Raffaele recently animated this MAD short, which was designed by the mighty Jorge Gutierrez (El Tigre). It’s titled MAD’s Guide To Video Game Cheats:

After challenging the conventional album distribution system last Fall, Radiohead has turned its attention to how animated music videos are produced. On March 17th, the band announced that it had teamed up with Aniboom and Adult Swim for a groundbreaking music video contest. The concept of a user or listener-generated music video contest goes back to Madonna and MTV’s 1986 Make My Video competition, but when a band of Radiohead’s size is paired with the connective possibilities of the internet, we’re likely to see uncommon results.

Those results will arrive in 4 stages, starting with the April 27th deadline for the storyboard submission round. In this initial phase, animators, writers and other artists can submit a clip displaying their concept for a music video – using any song from Radiohead’s #1 album In Rainbows. The field will be subsequently whittled down to 10 semifinalists, who will each be awarded $1,000 to make a 1-minute music video. These 10 are culled to 5 finalists, whose work is then presented to the band.

Finally, on June 30th, the winner will receive $10,000 to make a full version of their video (complete schedule and rules)

The 4-step process is a clever approach to the ever popular world of user-generated content, or UGC. It lowers the bar for entry, allowing artists to dip a toe into the contest without committing a month of their life to a submission that may not even make the finals. It’s actually an analog of the traditional method employed at major animation studios: concepts are presented, a rough pass is produced and then the final work is revealed to scrutinizing executives. Only here, the “executives” are one of the coolest bands in the world.

And while we know Radiohead for their progressive approach to the music industry and their unique blend of sonic experimentalism and alternative rock power, they know a thing or two about music videos. Jamie Thraves’ music video for Radiohead’s 1995 track Just is often listed amongst the best music videos of all time, and another three, Fake Plastic Trees, Karma Police and Street Spirit (Fade Out), have received similar acclaim. Their music videos are simply legendary. It’s enough pressure to make an animator freeze up in fear.
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This past Friday, my wife and I attended the 35th Annual Annie Awards, which were held on the UCLA campus for the first time. As you may have read here a few months back, it was a proud night for Flash animation.

The big winner at Royce Hall was undeniably Pixar’s feature film Ratatouille – which wrapped up 10 awards. On the TV side, two series took home a pair of trophies – Robot Chicken and Nickelodeon’s Flash-animated series El Tigre: The Adventures of Manny Rivera. The show, which was created by Jorge Gutierrez and his wife Sandra Equihua, walked away with awards for Best Animated Television Production for Children and Character Design in an Animated Television Production, a category Gutierrez was nominated for two years ago. Congrats to Dave Thomas, Tim Yoon, Gabe Swarr, Roman Laney and the crews at Boulder Media and Six Point Harness. [read Cold Hard Flash interviews with Gutierrez and Yoon]

El Tigre was also nominated in two other categories:

• Monica Kennedy for Character Animation in a Television Production
• Shawn Patterson for Music in an Animated Television Production

Below is one of the El Tigre clips Patterson submitted for the awards. Its from episode 9, titled Yellow Pantera.

Sadly, it looks like this award-winning show will be ending this year, but it will surely go out on a high-note. Nickelodeon hasn’t picked up the second season, and as Patterson put it on his MySpace page “all great things come to an end.”In the Best Animated Television Commercial category, Acme Filmworks’ Powershares spot, titled Escape Average, took top honors. This weekend, I asked Dave Wasson, the director of the commercial, about the ceremony and production experience:

When Patrick Warburton announced that our Powershares spot had won I was completely caught off guard. At past Annie Awards, I’d been nominated quite a few times, but had ever won. So I had sort of given up on the idea of taking home a trophy. I tried to get Ron Diamond and Gwynn Adik to join me on stage but they wouldn’t budge (they’d decide to give me “my moment in the sun”). I hadn’t written anything down so I gave a short, rambling thank you speech and staggered off stage.

The schedule on this spot was crazy; three weeks total from the time I got the outline from the agency until the day we delivered the finished spot. That said, of all of the projects I’ve directed, it was actually one of the most fun. I really clicked with the agency creatives right from the start, and they were completely open to me taking their idea and running with it (incidentally, in case any agency executives are reading this, this is the best recipe for good commercials – I’m just sayin’). Dave Knott and I completed the storyboard in two days. The following day I made the animatic. Using Flash I was able to create the character designs and backgrounds in record time.

Even though our crew was small, they were super talented, which made it all the more enjoyable. I contacted Brendan Burch at Six Point Harness Studios and he hooked us up with a couple of his best guys. Saharat Tantivaranyoo did a beautiful job with the character layouts, and James Krenske’s animation is kick ass! Back at Acme Filmworks, I worked with Nic Mermet on After Effects to composite all the elements together and add all of the multi-plane parallax. All in all, it was really a great experience.

[Watch Wasson's Powershares commercial here at Cold Hard Flash]

Back at the Annie Awards, Flash animation continued to echo throughout the night. The creators of Flash, Jonathan Gay, Gary Grossman and Robert Tatsumi, were honored with the Ub Iwerks Award, which highlights excellence in technical achievement. I won’t go into much more detail on this, as a we’ll be posting a lengthy interview with all three guys tomorrow.

But in the meantime, here’s a clip that played just prior to their award. It’s a collage of various Flash-animated projects from the last 10 years. Antran Manoogian, the president of ASIFA-Hollywood, asked me to assemble the clip, and I was happy to oblige. It’s simply a hint at all of the great Flash animation out there – we surely left out some incredible projects. Thanks to Antran for the invitation, and to Les Perkins for helping me put this together.

Get the Flash Player to see the wordTube Media Player.

Alongside John Canemaker and Glen Keane, John Kricfalusi accepted his Winsor McCay Award, which honors “career contributions to the art of animation.” John K’s The Ren and Stimpy Show was credited with “reinvigorated television animation,” but he was also noted for his pioneering work on the internet’s first cartoon series – The Goddamn George Liquor Program, which was animated entirely in Flash.

There were also a handful of nominees on Friday representing Flash-animated projects:

BEST ANIMATED SHORT SUBJECT
Chip Wass’ short Mascot Prep – part of Disney’s Shorty McShorts’ Shorts project – animated at Boulder Media

ANIMATION PRODUCTION ARTIST
Natasha Liberman – Growing Up Creepie – Discovery Kids

BEST ANIMATED TELEVISION COMMERCIAL
Esurance Homeowners spot – W!LDBRAIN

BEST ANIMATED TELEVISION PRODUCTION FOR CHILDREN
Little Einsteins – Disney Channel
Peep and the Big Wide World – Discovery Kids

Lastly, I’d like to congratulate my cousin, Elizabeth Harvatine, for her nomination in the Character Animation in a Television Production category. She was honored for her stop-motion animation on Adult Swim’s Morel Orel, and her pal Eric Towner took home the trophy for his work on another stop-motion project – Robot Chicken. (inset photo credit – Tennessee Reid Norton)

On the eve of Día de los Muertos, or the Day of the Dead, there is some sad news to report from the Flash animation front. El Tigre: The Adventures of Manny Rivera has been canceled. While I haven’t seen any official news yet, I spotted two RIP notes on a pair of blogs, including one where I grabbed this image.

This series, created by Jorge Gutierrez and Sandra Equihua, featured an all-star crew that included Roman Laney, Dave Thomas, Gabe Swarr, Ben Jones, Ricky Garduno, Fred Osmond, Luke Cormican, Tod Polson, Katie Rice, Ray Morelli, Gerald De Jesus, Aaron Horvarth, Katrien Verbiest, Eddie Trigueros, Chris Battle, Sean Szeles, Steve Lambe, Tim Yoon and many others. From what I’ve heard, the crew has been plowing forward on a short 2nd season order, but it looks like the axe has fallen. The series pushed the boundaries of what Flash is capable of – with heaps of action scenes and kinetic, lush environments. Heck, it was perhaps the first Flash-animated series to get high marks from Cartoon Brew’s notoriously tough-critic Amid Amidi.

In keeping with Day of the Dead tradition, we shouldn’t mourn the end of the road, but instead celebrate a fantastic series. I’d love to read comments from fans and friends of the crew – as I’m sure you agree with me: El Tigre is an exceptional series. Congratulations to the entire team.

At the 2007 San Diego Comic-Con, I attended the 5th Annual Pitching an Animated Show panel, which was again hosted by animation writer/creator Jon M. Gibson. The panelists covered topics that I’m sure many CHF readers are interested in (myself included), so I took some notes and will regurgitate here.

Heather Kenyon, the senior director of development of original animation for Cartoon Network, said that a good pitch should have strong characters – the type that could hold our attention in an episode taking place in an empty room. Kenyon said her studio has even optioned a show after seeing only evocative drawings of characters in action – displaying their personalities with crystal clarity.

This type of advice sounds obvious, as Eric Coleman, VP of Animation, Development & Production at Nickelodeon, pointed out, but they assured us that unique, vivid and likable new characters are hard to find. The mantra repeated by all panelists seemed to be “know your characters” and avoid the common trap of the main character being the least interesting one in the bunch. Again, this sounds obvious, but Jill Stewart, manager of Original Series at Disney Channel Animation, said that she hears many pitches where the lead character is introduced as “just a regular guy.”

Kenyon also added that a good exec will be reviewing you as well as the pitch. Knowing that you’ll be a pleasant person to work with goes a long way for these buyers, especially when you consider that development can take 2 or even 3 years. This is exactly how long it took to launch Nick’s El Tigre: The Adventures of Manny Rivera which was created by Sandra Equihua and her husband Jorge Gutierrez – also a panelist at the event.

Other words of wisdom heard on the panel included:

1. Write complete episode synopses – don’t just set up the story and cop out with “and the gang has to get out of another jam.”
2. Eric Coleman offered another seemingly obvious thought – that if you’re pitching a comedy your pitch should be, well, funny. The development execs on the panel said that they hear countless pitches claiming to be “funny like The Simpsons” but unless you can illustrate that in the room, they “won’t buy the show to see if that’s actually the case,” said Kenyon. I couldn’t agree more – and feel that if you’re not the type of person who makes your friends laugh, you might want to team up with a writer who does. My good pal Heath Corson, a talented comedy writer, could read the want ads in the pitch room and leave the meeting in stitches (ironically the same reason he doesn’t need to read the want ads).
3. There seems to be an inverse relationship between the level of pitch bible “frills” and the quality of the idea. Meaning that if your pitch pack for a treasure hunter show is delivered to a studio locked inside an elaborate chest of gold coins – you should have spent less time mining eBay for miniature treasure chests and more time ensuring you’ve created unique, likable characters. And aim for a low page count – six or seven pages.
4. Know both who you’re pitching to and what the network is broadcasting. If you’re not up to date on their current slate, take in some episodes or at least read some synopses on tv.com or similar site.
5. Gutierrez suggested that getting a job in the industry is a great way to grow towards a successful pitching career. He claimed to have been turned down in hundreds of pitch meetings before he and his wife Sandra cracked through with El Tigre. Coleman chipped in adding that he personally watched Jorge’s pitches improve over time – so stick with it and invite feedback from your friends.
6. It was also suggested to those outside of California that you pick up stakes and move to LA. Not exactly what you want to hear as you’re readying your pitch materials out in Vancouver or Austin, and I’m sure there’s plenty of success stories that offer hope to those outside of the LA bubble.
7. Don’t pitch your “baby” that’s been slowly crafted over the last 7 years – something Mike Moon, VP of animation at Disney Channel cautioned against. Gutierrez likened the pitch process to a battlefront – fearless pitching of concept after concept while your ideas are bombed into submission along the way. Bottom line – if you have one idea, you might just want to make that one yourself.
8. If you have access to the network execs, ask what they’re looking for (see below). Or wrap up your meeting with a chat about their current “wants.”

On that note, I’ll list out what the three represented studios are looking for, which tends to change a bit from year to year.

• Nickelodeon – Eric Coleman said they’re looking for comedy and kid heroes with breakout personalities. He said the ideal show will have kid or kid-like characters – ala Spongebob, who flips burgers (a first job) and is seeking his boating license (driver’s license).
• Cartoon Network – Heather Kenyon is after 6-11 boy-skewing shows, both action-adventure (think Ben 10) and comedies (think Camp Lazlo) alike. CN is also launching a Primetime block filled with animated sitcoms – like an age-appropriate Simpsons. Some will be live-action, some animated, while others will feature a mixture of both. For more insight on Cartoon Network’s development plans, check out this great post on Fatkat’s blog.
• Disney – Mike Moon kept his needs short and sweet: gender-neutral, kid-relatable and no action shows.

I encourage anyone mentioned above to correct or elaborate on what I’ve written, as I paraphrased a bit. And remember that these “rules” are broken en route to success, but it can’t hurt to soak this info in before embarking on a pitch tour.