ACM SIGGRAPH's comprehensive collection of juried and invited screenings showcase the most recent advances in computer-generated imagery.  The festival expanded its general call for submissions to include Visual Music and Real-Time Rendering.  "SIGGRAPH continues to be the place to showcase the latest technical achievements and innovations in animations and computer graphics," stated Carlye Archibeque, SIGGRAPH 2009 Computer Animation Festival Executive Producer from Sony Pictures Imageworks. "Real time engines and visuals that interact with music are creating some of the most amazing graphics available today. Incorporating a larger focus on music and real-time rendering in animation will make the Festival a truly comprehensive example of the computer graphics industry and provide a stage for some of the world's best work."

The SIGGRAPH 2009 Computer Animation Festival (CAF) was one of the highlights of this year's SIGGRAPH Conference.   Enjoy this short preview video and be on the lookout for  upcoming screenings in October presented by our local chapter, Cascade SIGGRAPH.

With it's release earlier this year, "Coraline" received overwhelming good reviews and better than anticipated financial success as director Henry Selick was able to integrate the hand crafted technique of stop motion with cutting edge digital technologies. 

In between “Closed Mondays” and “Coraline,” Oregon has been home to many other impressive artists in the digital filmmaking world.  Today, Oregon has a deep pool of talented craftsmen and craftswomen who not only specialize in the hand-crafted art of stop motion, but also the most advanced CG animation and visual effects.  Recent critically acclaimed films “Milk” and “I’m Not There” have included effects and animation from the homegrown company Bent Image Lab.  Ironically enough, in my previous life as a TV production exec, two TV movies I worked on used Oregon visual effects talent and I didn’t know it.  A Los Angeles based visual effects producer had hired the group from Hive-FX and we never knew the difference.  The quality was there and the price was far below what we expected.  Thanks to the fact that so much of the work in animation and visual effects can be done on a powerful PC these days, talented artists are popping up in Portland and other parts of Oregon.

In this newsletter, we wanted to feature a few of these talented individuals and companies as the work being done in Oregon is on par with work found anywhere else in the world.  I’m sure as you look through the profiles above, and dig a little deeper into the industry, you’ll discover as I have that Oregon is indeed a hub for animation and visual effects.
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In 2002, BENT IMAGE LAB first sprang to life in the fertile soil of Portland’s internationally acclaimed Film and Animation community.  8 years later, this production house is still magic.

Groundbreaking for the industry, BENT integrates Special EFX/3D CGI animation, Motion Graphics, Stop Motion, 2D animation, Mixed Media animation, Studio/Blue Screen live action, Post/ EFX Compositing and production Finishing under one roof.

Classic Sculptors, Painters, stop motion Animators, and Cinematographers are busy on one side of the LAB’S facility, while Computer Sculptors, Technical Directors, Riggers and CG Animators are at work on the other.  In the center between them are the Producers and Coordinators, busily keeping projects on track.

A nearby blue screen cyclorama stage opens up to the motion control /SFX stages, which host an array of Red Camera and Stop Motion equipment.  BENT is often shooting actors a wall thickness away from the 3D CGI render farm that is busily producing of cine-magic frames each and every night.

In the southeast corner are savvy Designers and skilled Compositors.  They blend, shape and fine tune the diverse primary visual ingredients into final polished image sequences.

Editorial, 4K/2k/HD/SD Post, is west of the laboratory’s kitchen.  Cutting is king, along with Color Correction and final Mastering as Bent ships out finished projects to the waiting universe.

BENT Directors, scattered throughout the LAB, work with a pool of talented creatives, spending the long hours to push what is good, to become great.
 
Gus Van Sant has chosen BENT many times through the years for countless visual and invisible special effects shots, recently for the academy award winning ‘MILK’, and ‘PARANOID PARK’  Todd Haynes chose BENT to create a dream sequence for his Bob Dylan feature ‘I’M NOT THERE.’

At BENT, centuries of collective skill and experience in the art of EFX and live/mixed media animation storytelling are brought together under one roof.  Find a BENT solution for each new visual equation and test the outstanding results.

The IMAGE LAB is no longer a Cinderella upstart story, but a long trusted creative friend, always looking for the next combination of special ingredients to make the perfect BENT moving IMAGE. BENT IMAGE LAB's website...
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Brian McLean is Facial Structure Supervisor at LAIKA.  He is a traditionally trained sculptor in clay, plaster, and wood and has worked as a commercial sculptor creating themed environments and large-scale character sculpts for Warner Brothers and Disney. He was a model shop supervisor at California College of the Arts and taught model making techniques and introduced 3D printing technology to students.   Brian -- along with Martin Meunier, Facial Animation Designer at LAIKA -- was instrumental in the development of using 3D printer technology in the facial animation on Coraline.

How has the implementation of 3D printing technologies for animation changed the art of filmmaking?

With the 3D printer, we were able to push facial animation in a stop motion film to unprecedented levels, giving characters a wide range of expressions and personality normally reserved for computer generated films.

In the film “Coraline”, how many different facial expressions were created thanks to 3D printing?

The lead character Coraline alone had over 207,000 possible facial expressions.  We didn’t print 207,000 different faces; we achieved this level of expressions by splitting the face into two parts, the upper brow and the lower mouth.  The brow and mouth sections could then be replaced individually. 

How does this compare to other stop motion films in the past?

As a comparison, Jack Skellington, the lead character in TheNightmare Before Christmas, had about 800 different facial expressions.

Did the 3D printer save time in the film making process?

Yes and No.  Keep in mind, even though we could easily print a replacement face, each one still had to be sanded and hand painted.  Over 12,000 faces were hand painted.

On the other hand, before the advent of 3D printing, all facial expressions had to be hand sculpted.  If we tried to do that on Coraline, it would have taken 6 sculptors over 4 years to complete.

What 3D printers are the most effective on an animation project like “Coraline” and why?

There are advanced 3D printers for many different applications, from printing parts in metal to building flexible snap-fit nylon parts.  LAIKA chose Objet Geometries 3D printers not because of the material they printed, but for the surface detail, precision and repeatability of the parts printed.  We were taking machines that had been designed for creating one-off prototypes and we were turning them into tools of mass production. Parts may be printed hundreds of times and years apart but they all had to match perfectly.

Where do you see 3D printing taking the animation industry in the next five years?

I hope that advances in technology will help push stop motion to new levels while preserving the stop-motion aesthetic.

Clearly the technology is driving new directions for animation, but how does your classical training as a sculptor come in to play when you’re working on a project?

Everything we made ended up being a physical part.  We still had to look at these parts as little sculptures; if changes were needed we’d draw on them with a pen, take a little off here, push that in there but instead of doing it in clay we’d sit down at the computer and make the changes.

Have the lines between CG and stop motion blurred now that technologies like 3D printers are being used on stop motion projects?

I think there will always be a separation.   What we were able to do on Coraline is borrow some of the CG elements including facial expressions and lip-syncing.  I think we combined the best of both worlds by using the computer to create the mouth replacements and combining that with real lights, sets and puppets.
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Stop motion animation riggers are specialists who design and build mechanical devices (rigs) that keep puppets and props in place in precarious situations.  Stop motion animators often need a way to support and guide puppets or props when a shot calls for running, flying or jumping.  In situations like these, good rigging often saves the day.  Oregon animator Bartek Prusiewicz recalls a shot from “Coraline” in which a multitude of puppets were literally jumping everywhere, “I had 30 mice to animate and half of them were flying around, making me dizzy.  The riggers came in, accessed the situation and promptly built rigs that made the animation manageable.  I could not have portrayed what mice do without the amazing rigging crew.” 

Riggers provide practical solutions for animating in otherwise impossible situations, like when a puppet must perform in a tiny, enclosed space that is unreachable by human hands.  In the video “It Comes Down to Rigging”, I demonstrate one version of the portal tunnel that I rigged for Coraline.  One of the challenges in rigging the tunnel shots was in creating ways for the animator’s hands to enter the set, manipulate the puppet, and exit the set again without disturbing the delicate set-dressing.  For one particular tunnel shot, I built more than 20 precisely registered, moveable access points into the set to allow the puppet to chase the camera through an 8 ft. long tunnel section.

Oregon stop motion rigger, Brian Elliot describes rigging as, “the best work you’ll never see.”  Rigging is a purely functional art form whose supporting role is made invisible by vfx.  Academy Award winning visual effects supervisor and cameraman, Brian Van’t Hul explains, "Riggers spend a huge effort in putting rigs in and the vfx department spends a huge effort to take them out.  It seems crazy, but the end product allows an animator to create realistic movement and a great performance for a character…. The riggers are the invisible hands that help the animator defy gravity and physics resulting in an artistic ballet for the audience."

Oregon has recently doubled the number of experienced riggers available to deploy on feature films, TV shows and commercials.  Local rigger, Sarah Hall, has years of experience in feature films, TV series and commercials. Brian Elliot and Patrick Weinberg each have more than 2 years of intensive feature film rigging experience and longtime stop-motion innovator, Gary McRoberts, has recently been rigging and building armatures at Bent Image Lab in Portland.
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Just two years ago, Jim Clark and Gretchen Miller co-founded HIVE-FX - a boutique visual effects and animation studio. Their blossoming company offers creative film and television services in a variety of mediums, namely 3D CG. Just this month, HIVE changed their address and expanded their headquarters into a 4000 sq ft warehouse, set in the emerging SE waterfront district of downtown Portland. The new facility offers room for expansion and harbors a dozen-seat CG department, insert stage, Final Cut editorial suite with Red color grading and roughly half of the new space is dedicated to recreation and open space.

HIVE-FX has a strong client roster with major brands such as Nike, HP, Intel, Weiden and Kennedy, CMD Agency and Showtime Films. Currently, the HIVE team is carrying out various pre-visualization assignments for Nike and finalizing a series of 3x :30 commercials for agency R-WEST and First Tech Credit Union. For the spots, HIVE designed and animated a pair of photo-real, computer generated squirrels; each is covered with a million digital hairs and performs against live-action footage shot on the company's Red digital cinema camera. In addition to animation and visual fx, HIVE finds itself catering to a growing list of clients in need of creative live-action and 3D product/retail pre-visualization services.

Clark and Miller come from extensive production and development backgrounds and chose to exchange California for Oregon, finding Portland the ideal atmosphere to grow a company, access diverse talent, embrace the outdoors and find new inspiration to develop original content. The duo's previous entertainment project designed for children, "Firehouse Tales", was sold to Warner Brothers in 2006 and continues to play on Cartoon Network in 26 countries. Clark and Miller are now primed to go even bigger and they've set their sights on Oregon as the backdrop for their newest entertainment projects.

Currently, the team is finalizing the terms of a yet-to-be-named media company, in partnership with Paul Anthony of Rumblefish, for the creation of original content produced in Oregon and distributed via emerging web opportunities. Together they're laying the foundation in Portland for a sizable self-sustaining film and animation studio with the intent to create new jobs and bring more entertainment dollars to Oregon.
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Hinge Digital is made in Oregon. Located in Portland, Hinge Digital is ideally situated in Oregon's creative and commercial nexus. The studio specializes in developing high quality character animation and visual effects content for film, television, commercials, games, interactive media, branding and education.

Hinge Digital was founded in 2009 by three visual effects industry veterans - Michael Kuehn, Roland Gauthier and Alex Tysowsky - who together bring over three decades of knowledge and experience from their years at studios including Disney, Sony, and Laika. Their past body of work includes commercials for M&M's, Ben & Jerry's, Wrigley's, Honda and Cheerios, as well as feature films including Spiderman, Matrix, Surf's Up, Chicken Little, Reign of Fire, Dinosaur, Monster House and Harry Potter.

We play well with others. Utilizing industry standard techniques and tools, including Autodesk Maya, Mental Ray, and Adobe Creative Suite, Hinge Digital can easily integrate into most any creative project. Through industry contacts and associations with local universities, the studio founders have assembled a team comprised of experienced professionals and exceptional new talent.

Hinge Digital is establishing its presence in the entertainment industry through work with both national and local advertising agencies and by developing film and television properties based on original content from the graphic novel and creature feature worlds.
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Stepping into Fashionbuddha Studio’s Old Town, Portland office has been compared to falling down a rabbit hole. Visitors walk into a wide-open gallery, a museum-like space with original artwork from celebrated artists and illustrators including Alberto Cerriteño, Amy Ruppel, Linn Olofsdotter, Evan B. Harris, and Yellena James. The studio collaborates with each artist, bringing their illustrations to life through original animated shorts and interactive exhibits.

But that’s just the beginning.

Walk a bit further and you enter the workshop, to one side a green screen and set where several animators are filming a stop motion version of the original Star Wars. On the other several prototypes made of wood and glass - earlier versions of their DIY multitouch table. Just beyond is a massive metallic wall filled with storyboards, wireframes for complex programs, and blueprints for a custom touchscreen video wall.

The small studio has its hands in everything and intentionally so. Crossing disciplines is part of the culture and results in the award-winning concepts and designs for clients like Adobe, Intel, Nike, and Umpqua Bank’s Digital Innovation Lab.

Fashionbuddha is praised world-wide for stunning design and experimental (but useful) interfaces and one of only a handful of studios featured in Communication Arts 2009 Interactive Annual, Communication Arts 2009 Design Annual, How Magazine Interactive Annual, and honored at Webvisions 2009 with Best of Show.

The studio has gained an instant following for their work as ambassadors of the DIY multitouch scene, creating beautiful and affordable applications that respond to gestures  (think Tom Cruise and Minority Report). Fashionbuddha’s multitouch applications allow for revolutionary new ways to collaborate with artists, create music, watch videos and visualize complex data. The studio’s multitouch work has been featured at the Flash on Tap Conference in Boston, Ignite PDX, the Seattle Art Museum as part of the Decibel Music Festival, and an upcoming exhibit at Giant Robot 2 in Los Angeles.

Animation Reel
http://www.fashionbuddha.com/animation

Interactive Reel
http://www.fashionbuddha.com/interactive
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ADi is a full service animation studio specializing in 3D animation and visual effects.

At ADi, we are digital storytellers. We create stories that persuade, educate, train, and motivate. Our clients industries include high tech, consumer electronics, industrial manufacturers, and consumer goods. We regularly partner with advertising agencies and video production companies to deliver all or part of the finished product, be it for the web, for a live event or for broadcast. You’ll love our smooth process and road-tested workflow.

Our experience includes on-set shot supervision through to delivery of sophisticated visual effects. Our 3D animation team is adept at character creation, modeling, texturing and lighting for photo-real 3D as well as stylized 3D animations. From TV spots, to corporate videos, to infomercials, to game trailers, ADi is the studio to partner with for your project. We have our own render farm, so we have complete control over your digital assets. We also work closely with our clients to help you get the most from the digital assets we create, optimizing them for your web site, online ad campaign, or sharing through social media networks.

ADi is based in Portland Oregon and was founded in 1996. Visit our website, where you can see our reel, view case studies or read our blog.
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