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It’s perhaps a bit early in 26-year-old Rodriguez’ career for him to earn this comparison, but the Mr. Coo series is reminiscent of Bill Plympton’s work. The drawing count is high; the subject material unique and challenging.

According to Rodriguez, he started this installment back in 2005, but added all together, the work he injected into this piece totals to about 1 month.

The short is also available for viewing at Newgrounds.com.

This year, ‘Bendito Machine’ took the first prize. This short by Jossie Malis is also up for an award at Annecy.

Several other Flash-animated films in the competition are worth a watch, including:

El naufragio del A4 by Javier Encinas

El provocador by Gabriel Ignacio Cortina

PLOK-The final David Berlioz

The NU adventures by Nacho Rodriguez

Fuggy Fuggy by the Brothers McLeod

Just Say I Didn´t Know by Joe Corrao

But don’t take my word for it – go and watch all of the 174 submissions at the competition’s website.

It’s as visually stunning, playful and fluid as his other work, and he’s already talking about the next episode.

Nacho no longer works at animaticos.com, and he’s gone 100% freelance, so get him while he’s still got some time available.

His latest short is simply beautiful. It’s hard to believe he’s doing it all himself – with so many drawings, clever camera moves and transitions. I’m sure this plays so well internationally, as it’s essentially without dialogue.

An interesting item to note is how Mister Coo has managed to place his link at the end of the ad. It’s so non-traditional, and great for both parties, I believe. The artists on TV spots would never get a nod or a credit, but here it’s appropriate and smart.

Mister Coo works part time for Animaticos.com, an animation site owned by Barcelona-based Publy Media, and the rest of the time he does freelance work like the above-mentioned spot. It’s easy to spot which work he does at Animaticos.com – have a gander at ‘Dupliman,’ a highly-entertaining series of shorts produced for a Spanish company called Duplicat.

And lastly – word is ‘Mister Coo Part 2′ is due out soon!

Learn Self Defense
by Chris Harding
Chris is a Cold, Hard Flash regular, and his career and techniques were chronicled back in February of this year. Chris offers this synopsis of the 5-minute ‘Learn Self Defense’ on his website – “After being brutally attacked in an alley, George decides he must learn to protect himself. A cocksure narrator walks him through five practical lessons of self-defense for the citizen on the go– or nation-state on the rampage!” This short is not available on the web, but Chris gave me an opportunity to watch the film and it’s simply excellent. ‘Learn Self Defence’ is slick, stylized and irreverently funny. Check out clips on Chris’ site, and while you’re there Coming into the Flash Film Festival, Chris is on a roll, having just won the Best of the Fest award at the 2005 Kansas City Filmmakers’ Jubilee.

The Adventures of Mr. Coo
by Nacho Rodriguez
Nacho lives in Barcelona, Spain, and he’s animated one of the most entertaining Flash shorts in recent memory. Mr. Coo, a large-nosed, shape-shifting blob, finds himself being chases by his own paper airplane, a savage chair and a toilet that acts more like a xerox machine. There’s an enormously high drawing count in ‘The Adventures of Mr. Coo,’ and it’s almost hard to believe it was all animated by one man. The 25-year old Rodriguez also has extremely strong timing and imagination – he’s essentially Spain’s answer to animation autuers like Don Hertzfeldt and Bill Plympton. I simply love this short, and I can’t wait to see the next in the series, which is reportedly under way.

Manege Frei
by Dyrdee
‘Manege Frei’ is a contemplative Flash short that acts as a metaphor for what we want and what we actually end up doing to get it. ‘Manege Frei’ was animated at the German Urban Design and Communicatiosn company Dyrdee. It’s beautifully designed, and animated quite elaborately. The painted bitmap grass texture adds a nice touch, and the linework is gorgeous. The lighting, the shadows, the color palette – there’s so much to love, I recommend you just stop reading this now and watch.

Taggerz
by Jamie Cason
‘Taggerz’ is an episodic Flash-animated project that follows the Ruffneck Crew, a group of UK graffiti artists. The website offers the following tag – “When your crew is your family, you better hope they’ve got your back.” ‘Taggerz’ is behind a firewall on the BBC site, but it only takes a minute to sign-up, and a working email doesn’t seem to be neccessary.

Now that you’ve watched them all, head on over to the Flash Film Festival site and vote on your favorite. Best of luck to all in the competition.