Anyone trapped in the nasty blizzard that’s encased the mid-Atlantic region of the US probably needs a good laugh. Simon Tofield has delivered a snow-themed Simon’s Cat episode that will surely deliver on that promise. It’s the entirety of Snow Business, which was teased back in December.
We all know that cats don’t like water, but snow… that’s another story. Here’s the latest episode of the wildly-popular, Flash-animated Simon’s Cat series, Snow Business.
The Los Angeles Times featured a piece today on Simon Tofield and Simon’s Cat, the wildly-popular, Flash-animated series. The article, titled Simon Tofield’s success comes in a Flash, was written by Charles Solomon, and it details his rise to fame and his new book that released last month.
In a recent article from Rob Sharp in the UK paper The Independent a prominent Flash animator has detailed his thoughts on the medium. Simon Tofield, the creator Simon’s Cat, is quoted in an article titled Internet animation: Draw it yourself. Here’s what he says:
“I do my films on Flash … and it would take me much longer if I were drawing them all by hand,” Tofield explains. “If I were doing what I do traditionally I would need to draw every frame by hand, then I would need to take them to a professional – a line tester – to photograph all of the images. Then I would need to take notes on them, make corrections over a light box and then shoot them again – it can be a very tedious process.” It is a tribute to the accessibility of the software that Tofield is a self-confessed “technophobe” – he says he knew nothing about computers before he started using Flash. Eighteen months later, Simon’s Cat has been turned into a book and Tofield’s cartoons have been seen online by an estimated 30 million people: far in excess of the audiences he would traditionally have reached. Many of his fans make their own “tribute animations” to his work. “I get a lot of these fan films,” he continues. “Some of them are really sweet. They are made by people who are very young and are very basic but it’s a nice compliment to have. I always try to reply when I can.”
Simon Tofield’s Flash-animated Simon’s Cat series has become a verifiable worldwide hit – with millions of YouTube views, a new book and a future in comics. You can see the influence this series has had on a new campaign for CalciYum, a children’s dairy snack. The reason for this similarity is that it that Colenso BBDO, the agency overseeing the campaign, called upon the same team to produce them – London’s Tandem Films. Below is the spot titled Cat, which includes many of the charming (read: vicious), feline quirks that make Simon’s Cat so appealing. The ads are directed by Daniel Greaves with character design by Helene Friren and animation by Jeroen Jaspaert, Ginny Robertson, Laura Nailor and Wip Vernooj.
