TAIS nooze! April edition

Hookay, bunch o' stuff to cover here. Latest TAIS newsletter done be out (thank you Tara and Madi), but there's just too much goodness to post it all here. Honestly, it's huge. So, if ya wanna reads it, become a member! Come on, ya know ya wanna.

I finally managed to get the DEFINITIVE version of the ChickenJam trailer up...for a while there, we was going through sponsors like nobodies bidness. I originally wanted to get Toon Boom onboard, but them's busy folks...hopefully I'll get ahold of somebody there before the big date. And MyToons? Ah, alas, MyToons. Amid has posted about it, read it here. So, officially, our event sponsors are:

Channel Frederator: Eric Homan's given the green light to run the trailer in the April 21st episode of the big red cartoon show. Noice!

Line Boil: Aaron Simpson's sister site for all things animated. Aaron already gave us some of that there pimpage, and he's also shippin' us some shoits. My man!

NFB: Michael Fukushima over at the National Film Board got us 9 dvd's of chicken-flava'd short animated goodness, as well as a venue (The most awesome NFB Cinematheque here in Toronto) to host the event. Good on ya!

Finally, I've got a line on some prizing from afar...specifically, Honalulu. More on that later. Meanwhile, relax, sit back, watch a decidely green ep. of the Fred, and I'll be back with more nooze. Be sure to drop by the TAIS website and click on the links on the left...Tara's been updating like mad!

Da hardest workin' man in Flash-biz...

Gotta love that Aaron Simpson...dude not only takes time to give TAIS some serious pimpage on Cold Hard Flash, but now, he's a one-man employment site, tryin' to get his animation homies work in these troubled times. Check out da amination from Brittney Lee above. Then hire her, 'cuz Aaron sez to. Yep, he's a great representative of the online animation community.

Plus, I hear he makes one hell of a vodka martini.

O.k., 'nuff with the gush. Check out CHF and the sister site Line Boil for animation shtuffs that you will likes. More on the ChickenJam later...with possible mentions of Hawaii?

Black and White

Geez, talk about an excercise in minimalism. Everything you need to know about getting emotion out of a block of wood is here in Jon Izen's 'Black and White' series. More available on the Mondo YouTube page. Thanks to CHF's Aaron Simpson for bringin' this to my attention.

Two treats for Halloween

O.k., Aaron over at Cold Hard Flash just gave me the go-ahead, so here's yer two treats from this ol' pooch for Halloweenies. Aaron is going to be hosting three big shindigs across North America, sponsored by those magnificent vector-loving bastards over at Toon Boom Animation. Come for free drinks, free gifts (am I reading this right?) and the chance to nob and hob with some of animation's best peoples. Here's the dates and locations:

November 19th, 2008
*LOS ANGELES - 7 to 9pm*
Forbidden City
1718 Vine St
Los Angeles, CA 90028 (map here!)

November 21st, 2008
*NEW YORK - 7 to 9pm*
M1-5
52 Walker Street
New York, NY 10013 (map here!)

November 24th, 2008
*TORONTO - 7 to 9pm*
MOD Club
722 College Street
Toronto, ON (map here!)

The MOD Club theatre is like 2 blocks from casa de T-Dog, so you'll definitely feel my presence, barring a bout of the plague, er sumpin.

The second treat? I've gotten off my ass and authored up a DVD (with like, menus and everything) for the MONSTERJAM. Both MJ 1 and 2 have been compiled onto a widescreen NTSC DVD, with animated menus and buttons to jump to each individual animators work. I'll be workin' on packaging and cases this weekend. Once that's done, I'll letcha know what the plan is...chances are, I'll just be whippin' up copies by hand as we need 'em, but we'll see what the reaction is.

Well, there ya has it! Go eat some candy and watch some movies...animated scariness, of course. More next week.

When Candidates Attack

The most terrifying, and hilarious, thing I could find on the internets for y'all, courtesy of our homies at Pandemic. Man, looks like both Obama and Palin have that whole international diplomacy thing down.

Have a happy halloweeny of weeny goodness. Next week, nooze about a very cool event being held around and about by CHF head honcho Aaron Simpson, and some monster goodies just in time for that other holiday comin' up. Later!

Mike Geiger gets spooky on yer ass...County Ghost

Keeping up with his tradition of great characters and terrifically timed animation coupled with a swingin' score, Mike Geiger (Monsterjammer extraordinaire) has just premiered COUNTY GHOST, his new web series. You can watch the whole thang above, and be sure to drop by his YouTube page of Youtubeyness for more animated schtuffs of similar high quality. Special thanks to Aaron Simpson over at Cold Hard Flash for that there head's up.

Simon's Cat

A new cartoon from the catty Simon Tofield, a man who's really into his pussy. Cat. Courtesy of Aaron Simpson over at Cold Hard Flash.

Cold Hard Flash: Top 10 Flash Cartoons

Aaron Simpson and a cadre of his animation homies have got together and came up with a list of what they consider the best o' the best of flash animated films on them there interwebnets, and they're all available to view on the Cold Hard Flash site. Along with the shorts themselves, Aaron's serving up in-depth interviews with the creators. Go, watch, learn, enjoy. And big kudos to MyToons for continuing to support independent animation on the web!

Melons...

Good luck gettin' this tune outta yer head. Animated by Wonchop, music by Weebl...and if you happen to frequent the home of catchy nonsense Weebl's Stuff, you'd know of what I speak. Aaron Simpson recently interviewed head egg Jonti Picking over at CHF. Drop by, read up, then hit up Weebl's for more danceable looping nuttiness. Hey, Jonti, howzabout adding embed links to the site? And howzabout not verbally kicking my ass if you don't enjoy it when large hairy Canadian knuckledraggers surreptitiously grab the code from yer site and embed it in their blogs? Seriously, nothin' but love, dood.

Crash of the Titans intro by Atomic

Aaron Simpson, dark master of the Flash, just posted this over at Cold Hard Flash. Tipped him off to this lil' slice of puppet-styled goodness after playin' the game last week. The doods at Radical, the dev. co., did their level best...it's a great playin' game. But it's no where near as groovy as this lil' intro. Ah, well, it was a client job. Enjoy!