"Shaun the Sheep the Movie" – The Second Teaser Trailer.


Aardman Animations has a new teaser trailer out for its upcoming major feature-length animated film 'Shaun the Sheep the Movie.' Shaun is a character from the television series that premiered in 2007. Shaun is your typical anthropomorphic oddball 'black sheep,' and Aardman is your typical amazing stop motion animation outfit, so be prepared for a very entertaining time.


Studio Canal (G.B.) and Relativity Media (U.S.) will distribute the film to theaters next year - February 6th, 2015 is the date for the USA and Great Britain, other dates vary.


'Shaun' comes from Aardman, Great Britain's top animation studio and the creators of 'Wallace & Gromit.' and 'Chicken Run.' The film is Aardman Animation, co-written and directed by Mark Burton and Richard Starzack.


From the youtube page:

From Aardman, the creators of Wallace & Gromit and Chicken Run, Shaun the Sheep The Movie is coming to cinemas worldwide in 2015! In this new trailer, watch more of Shaun and The Flock’s hilarious adventures in the Big City as they search for the missing Farmer!

When Shaun decides to take the day off and have some fun, he gets a little more action than he bargained for! Shaun’s mischief inadvertently leads to The Farmer being taken away from the farm, to the Big City…

Join Shaun, Bitzer and The Flock on their hilarious, action-packed, big-screen adventure as they make plans to rescue the missing Farmer. A story about how we sometimes forget to appreciate the things we have in life, and the people who love us. Shaun the Sheep The Movie introduces us to two new Aardman characters; Trumper the animal warden who rules the city’s animal shelter with a rod of iron and Slip, an inner-city orphan dog who helps Shaun save the day.

2020

Hello Kitty x TADO 'Pomme Party'

Hello Kitty x TADO 'Pomme Party' from wearetado on Vimeo.
This is a cute Hello Kitty stop motion animation from TADO that was commissioned by Sanrio and the Japanese American National Museum. It commemorates Hello Kitty's 40th anniversary. TADO did the whole job in two months in its offices in Sheffield.


This was done using wooden figures, which required quite a bit of craftsmanship to create the final puppets. The final product looks awesome! Quite a professional job.


Others involved in the project were Alex Veitch (lighting advisor), Nick Hunter (wood-wizard) and Ben Ridley (music and sound design).

From the webpage:

Commissioned by Sanrio and the Japanese American National Museum to commemorate Hello Kitty's 40th Anniversary. Stop motion animation using hand made wooden puppets. Our first adventure into the world of stop-motion magic.
Special thanks to Sanrio USA, Japanese American National Museum and Jamie Rivadeneira / Japan LA.
Made in Sheffield, UK.
© TADO and Sanrio 2014. Hello Kitty and Sanrio characters used with the kind permission of Sanrio USA.




2020

Anybody who is a fan of Warner Brothers' Merrie Melodies or the Disney shorts of the past should find something to like about this compilation. The shorts are amazingly well done and still surprisingly funny.

This is a terrific assortment of Hollywood's animated shorts from World War II - and one from much later on the same subject. We have Mickey Mouse, Daffy Duck from Warner Brothers, and others all urging you to save that cooking fat to help the boys in the trenches.

Der Fuhrer gets it on der cranium.

It's kind of uncanny how live-action films from the period appear creaky, dated, and old, while animated shorts which deal with period themes appear fresh and practically new. The jokes are surprisingly sophisticated and assume an informed audience, with plenty of clever puns and subtle word-plays. Of course, there also are very broad stereotypes of the Germans and Japanese that would be considered offensive today, but there was a war on, you know. And, just between you and me - those wartime shorts which would now be considered the most offensive are the funniest of the lot.


The whole point of the wartime shorts was to help sell war bonds, as they make abundantly clear from time to time. So sit back and enjoy the work of the legendary Chuck Jones (in a 1957 training film) and other animation legends as they support the troops.



This compilation features some of the best propaganda-themed cartoons of the World War II era. Some of these were considered so scandalous for the time that they were actually censored in one way or another - see if you can spot which ones (it should be fairly obvious). Some are color, some have Superman or Daffy Duck or Popeye or other characters you may recognize. And these were done by the top talents of the day, there to help the war effort.

Thanks for watching!


2023

NASA released this superior educational animation about the origins of the Solar System. This is in preparation for various asteroid missions that the space agency has in mind over the coming years rather than doing something useful such as returning to the Moon or visiting Mars.

Specifically, this animation is about the asteroid Bennu. NASA has a plan to send a probe to it, 'Osiris-REx.' To be truthful, I keep an eye on NASA missions, but this one completely slipped by me. Apparently, Osiris-REx is a precursor to a later mission to actually capture an asteroid and put it in Moon orbit.

So, yet again, we get to wait years while NASA twiddles its thumbs and spends umpteen billions of dollars sending a probe to a big chunk of rock which all its sophisticated detectors and gizmos and drills and cameras will reveal to be, what do you know, a big chunk of rock. And that's if the whole thing works and isn't a total fiasco like the Philae disaster (I know, the ESA claims Philae is a huge success, which it certainly was relative to if it had blown up into a billion pieces before actually reaching its destination).

As usual with NASA videos, this one has quality animation, soothing music, and reassuring narration. The Osiris-REx mission is due to take place by 2018, but you know how deadlines in this field usually fare...




Credit: NASA Goddard

2020

Batman vs. Superman, Lego Style.


Here we have a short stop-motion animated film from BrickNerd Studios. It is a confrontation between Batman and Superman called, appropriately, "Batman vs. Superman." It is done using Lego bricks.

I know what you're thinking. 'Oh no, not another one.' Yes, these fan superhero shorts do get redundant after a while, and you kind of wish this kind of talented animators would us their superior skills for good (like, something that isn't just a throw-away?) rather than evil ('OMG not ANOTHER fan superhero confrontation animation.').

Yes, everywhere you turn on youtube there is another one, and the Lego genre is all but played out except by the big studios. But 'Batman vs. Superman' is done quite well, in a professional way. The stop motion animation by Tommy Williamson is seamless, the wit is sardonic, and the music by Kevin Macleod echoes the pompous strains of superhero flicks that we all know and love. You must sympathize with the animators, they probably secretly want to do 'My Dinner with Andre' but they know where the hits are.

'Batman vs. Superman.' And if you know where the shark repellent reference comes from, you're a true Batman fan.


From the youtube page:

November 19, 2014
BrickNerd Studios is proud to present Batman Vs Superman

Batman and Superman square off (for some reason) in this stop-motion animated short.

Produced and directed by Tommy Williamson

visit us at www.bricknerd.com/studios
follow @thebricknerd
Facebook https://www.facebook.com/thebricknerd

Big shout out to poster designer Paul Lee

2020

The Philae lander.

There is a lot of animation and many images being generated by the Rosetta Probe and the Philae Lander, so I have collected the details about its landing here for convenience.

The European Space Agency reported that the Philae lander from the Rosetta probe that we have been following the past few months successfully landed on the surface of comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko. The above photo is what it would have looked like to someone on the surface as it arrived.


Above is a picture that was taken from the lander itself as it approached the surface. The photo is from 40 meters above the surface.

This last animation shows three photographs taken from the Rosetta spacecraft which is hovering above the comet. The first photo shows the surface of the comet before the lander got there. The red circle indicates where the lander was headed. The second photo shows the area after the lander made its approach. The new dark spot within the red circle presumably is dust kicked up from the lander. The third photo shows a green box where the lander is believed to have touched down. Comparing this animation to the photo above, you see the same boulder that is very close to where the lander set down (good thing it didn't actually hit the boulder!).

A photo of the comet from Rosetta, which remains in orbit.

It appears the landing was a complete cock-up. Not only did the lander touch down about a mile from where it should have, but it apparently wound up on its side, with only two of its three legs touching the surface. That may be why the solar panels are having trouble, with only one operational at all, and that one receiving less than 2 hours of light during the 12 hour day. That is insufficient to power the lander to perform its scientific duties, though there may still be ways to use it anyway for some purposes. Of course, if it is on its side, there won't be much it can do anyway.

Below, the red area shows where the lander was headed, and the blue area shows where it wound up due to bouncing about. Naturally, there can't be much gravity on the comet so the lander wouldn't stay put until it was good and ready. Technically, it should be tethered to the comet because of the lack of gravity. Note the cliff near the blue triangle.


The ESA says that the lander now has some problems with power generation. This is because apparently there is a cliff over on the left of the animation that is barely in the frame in the lower left-hand corner. This cliff puts the lander into the shade. Without lots of sunlight, the Philae Lander will not be able to do much as the batteries do not hold much of a charge

Below are excerpts from the press conference.


Below is a first look - a composite of six photos - showing what the surface of the come looks like.

Below is an animation from Rosetta of the lander descending.


In the following frames, you can't really see the lander, but NASA or ESA or whoever is doing this research assures us that there is evidence of Philae bouncing and then apparently coming to rest in these shots.


Finally, here is an ESA animation of the whole landing process as they would like it to have gone. Apparently, they did get some work done, including drilling a hole but only for the 60-hours of time that was in the battery.


From the youtube page:

"Published on Nov 12, 2014
Animation video of Rosetta Mission for landing on a comet: Philae Lander.
Rosetta’s deployment of Philae to land on Comet 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko.

The animation begins with Philae still on Rosetta, which will come to within about 22.5 km of the center of the nucleus to release the lander on 12 November 2014.

The animation then shows Philae being ejected by Rosetta and deploying its own three legs and follows the lander’s descent until it reaches the target site on the comet about seven hours later. The animation is speeded up, but the comet rotation is true: in the time it takes for Philae to descend, the nucleus has rotated by more than 180º (the comet’s rotation period is 12.4 hours).

The final steps of Philae’s descent towards the comet are shown as seen by a hypothetical observer close to the landing site on the comet.

Finally, the animation shows Philae landing on the comet. Because of the comet’s extremely low gravity, the landing gear will absorb the small forces of landing while ice screws in the probe’s feet and a harpoon system will lock the probe to the surface. At the same time, a thruster on top of the lander will push it down to counteract the impulse of the harpoon imparted in the opposite direction. Once it is anchored to the comet, the Philae Lander will begin its primary science mission, based on its 64-hour initial battery lifetime. The animation shows a number of science instruments in action on the surface.

Acknowledgment: The background image of the sequence showing Philae closing in on the landing site was taken by Rosetta’s OSIRIS narrow-angle camera (ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA) on 14 September 2014 from a distance of about 30 km.

Philae was provided by a consortium led by DLR, MPS, CNES and ASI.

Acknowledgment: The background image of the sequence showing Philae closing in on the landing site was taken by Rosetta’s OSIRIS narrow-angle camera (ESA/Rosetta/MPS for OSIRIS Team MPS/UPD/LAM/IAA/SSO/INTA/UPM/DASP/IDA) on 14 September 2014 from a distance of about 30 km.

Philae was provided by a consortium led by DLR, MPS, CNES and ASI.
Video and images by ESA and NASA."

2020

Cold War History Animation.


Above is a quick animation showing the course of the Cold War.


This fellow rudthespud likes to post his own little summaries of world history. While his choice of material is broad, it isn't really comprehensive, so don't throw away your textbooks just yet. However, it should give you a feel for all the buzzwords you need to pass just about any test on the subject he covers. It might also fill a gap in your knowledge here and there - did you know what year NATO was formed? The Warsaw Pact? Find out by watching the video. He also makes a real mistake here and there - mis-spelling 'détente,' for example - but that just shows how difficult these things are to put together.


This animation covers the post-war period, which was the beginning of the nuclear era. This period devolved from a forced alliance between the Soviet Union and the western powers into armed neutrality. Neither side was too excited about continuing the relationship past the common goal of defeating the Axis powers and thus was born the Cold War.

These historical animations are of interest to history buffs. I previously have posted history videos about World War I and World War II, among other topics. These also allow me to pad the index with all sorts of important names and events, so it's all good. Anyway, you probably know everything that's in the animation, but it is quick and bouncy and the animation is fun.


The animation was made by Manny Man and narrated by John D Ruddy.

2020

Liberace on "Peacocking" and Politics.


Liberace, the flamboyant pianist, in this 1968 interview defines 'peacocking' and gives his ideas on politics - with some surprisingly charitable words about Ronald Reagan, then Governor of California. This is a wild interview that shatters any preconceptions anyone might have about how Liberace 'should' have felt about various issues.

Indeed, he reveals himself to have some astonishingly conservative attitudes toward folks who don't appreciate his success.

"I deserve what I get because I worked for it, and I was born and raised during Depression years, when we were on County Relief and we all went out and we hustled and we worked."

It's a real eye-opener of an interview in these days when there is considered to be an 'agenda' for certain folks from which they cannot deviate - but Liberace straddled all sides of the political spectrum and wasn't afraid to tell people about it. Of course, the whole idea that if you are one thing you must also automatically be 'liberal' or 'conservative' has never been true, not then, and certainly not now.

But what would Liberace do if he were President?

"I would spend the money that is spent on wars every 20 years and spend it on giving people work."

Fair enough. And then he gets worked up and goes on to deliver this chestnut:

"People who sit back and wait for somebody to take care of them are the people that I am speaking of. These are the people who if, shown a way, can be useful to our society."

But Liberace, what about those who are shown 'the way" and don't pay any attention?

"Well then I guess they are just basic criminal people who don't belong in our society."

This is another in the Blank on Blank | PBS Digital Studios series of animations connected to obscure interviews of famous people.


From the youtube page:

"Anyone that dares begrudge what I have today, just better get off their duff and do something about it"
- Liberace in 1968 as told to Jay Kent Hackleman

Get the backstory, GIFs and more @ http://blankonblank.org

Subscribe for new episodes every other Tuesday (it's free):
http://www.youtube.com/subscription_c...

Executive Producer: David Gerlach
Animator: Patrick Smith

2020