The Current State of The Web

Via The Oatmeal!

Zeitgeist: Moving Forward

A feature length documentary work which will present a case for a needed transition out of the current socioeconomic monetary paradigm which governs the entire world society.

This subject matter will transcend the issues of cultural relativism and traditional ideology and move to relate the core, empirical life ground attributes of human and social survival, extrapolating those immutable natural laws into a new sustainable social paradigm called a Resource-Based Economy.

Why I Charge More

Mark Cappello found this on Blair Enns' Win Without Pitching website, it's made to be an open letter to designers' future clients, and I find it applies well to freelance animation artists and illustrators as well:

Sometimes we do it for the money, don't we? The irony is that the less money we're paid, the more likely we are to be doing it for the money. When we're paid well, it's suddenly about something much bigger. Here's a letter you might take, modify and use in many forms and many ways.

It's yours if you'd like it. No need to attribute.

"The more I charge you, the more pressure I put on myself to perform for you.


The client who grinds me on price is the least satisfied. He gets less attention from me and is most likely to be pissed off at me. And I don't really care, because to be honest, I resent him. The very fact that he is on my roster reminds me that I'm part prostitute. For him, I'm doing it for the money and as it isn't very much money I'm not troubled by not doing it well. He pays me a paltry sum, I perform poorly, he gets angry and I resent him. We can have that type of relationship if you like.


The client who pays me the premium gets my best work. He's the one I wake up in the middle of the night thinking about, wondering if I'm doing all I can to earn his money. When he calls, I jump. Hell, I call him first. I take pride in moving his business. I try to make myself indispensible to him. I imagine that he winces when he opens my bill (he doesn't say), but he thanks me for all I do for him. He’s the one I worry about.


I’m great at what I do, but if someone hires me without giving me the resources (money, time, access) to do a great job, it’s easy for me to rationalize poor performance. When a client gives me everything I ask for, he removes all the obstacles to a high quality outcome. There’s no way for me to rationalize anything less than perfection.


There is no greater pressure than the pressure I put on myself, and the only way you can add to my own sense of pressure is to pay me well. Yelling won’t do it. Neither will threatening to pull your business. My deep sense of obligation comes from you paying me well enough to dispatch all of the excuses. Then I have to prove to you, and, more importantly, to me that I am as good as I say I am.


So, I've given you my price and it's the price that I need to charge to bring a deep sense of obligation to the job. Will I work for less? Probably. Can you negotiate with me? Sure. We can have that type of relationship if you really want me to be that type of designer and you want to be that type of client.


Let's just understand each other before we get started."

No Pets Allowed

Made by Headless Production

2010 Animation Mentor Student Work

Voice Actor - Frank Welker

Introducing the grand master of all voice characterizations!

Frank was born Franklin Wendell Welker on March 12, 1946. Welker's name is one of those that speeds by in the credits of animated films. He's a master at voiceovers, specializing in animal sounds that are both real and imaginary. He plays the creature Nibbler on "Futurama," is Santa's Little Helper on "The Simpsons" and ad-libs all the monkeyshines of PBS' "Curious George."
 
Welker constantly slips into a new voice; one moment he's the portentous evil Megatron of "The Transformers," Dr. Claw from "Inspector Gadget" or Abu, the sassy simian from "Aladdin."

His skill began in childhood, he says; "As far back as I can remember I could mimic, whether it was people or animals,  Bill Cosby, or Sean Connery, it's always so much fun. You know how actors love to get into a part? Well it's even more fun with voices."

He grew up in Denver, Colorado. Naturally, he became his grade school's class clown! He began his career as a stand-up comic in 1967, and opened for many famous musical acts, including Sonny & Cher and Diana Ross. 


Human, machine or animal. As his voice-over career was taking off in the 1970s, Welker continued to work on-camera, appearing in such shows as Love, American Style and The Don Knotts Show. But his experience as a stand-up comedian once again earned him a coveted role when, while he was performing his act at the Comedy Store, Paul Keyes, the producer of Rowan and Martin's Laugh-In, spotted him and asked him to appear on the opening show of the season with featured billing.

Even though he's not a house-hold name, he has now reached legendary status, well within the ranks of such famous voice actors as Mel Blanc. He has done hundreds of characters of hundreds of shows and films. See the astoundingly huge credit list on Voice Chasers.

Frank returned as the voice of Megatron and Soundwave on an episode of Robot Chicken. Soundwave finds out that being a cassette player in the 2000's isn't a very good disguise. He ends up in a very unlikely place that only Movie Optimus Prime or G1 Shockwave would think to look: eBay!

Exerpt from 'The Making of The Real Ghostbusters' Animated Series, 1990

Download here the full British-produced by Central Independent Television Special of Slimer Won't Do That! The Making of The Real Ghostbusters (1990), 19:19 length, 251Mb, AVI video file.

The Making of The Real Ghostbusters features Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis and many more people involved with Ghostbusters and The RGB. A Frank Welker/Maurice LaMarche voice recording session is shown at 10:09, followed by an interview with Frank. Here's a few audio files and screen shots below:

[Frank on Voice Acting, Part 1: frank-1.wav]   [Frank on Acting, Part 2: frank-2.wav]

Here's a low quality YouTube version, VERY fasinating seeing all the voice actors at work:

Frank's head was recently immortalized on Futurama:

 

More great footage and interviews.

Have a listen to the incredible range in his voice, it's unbelievable to think that it all comes from the same person: 

DEMO REEL # 1
DEMO REEL # 2

The Cinematography of “Terminator 2”

Cinematographer: Adam Greenberg