Gesture Drawing and Sketching on my iPhone

The other night I was waiting for my girlfriend to finish work in the city. I had nothing to do. I didn’t want to read, play games or shop. So I just stood at Flinders Street Station watching the world go by. Suddenly I wanted to draw! But I had no sketch book with me (bad artist , bad!). I did have my iPad stylus and my iPhone handy. So I opened up Brushes and got sketching, pumping out poses and gesture drawings as I waited around.

There were some distinct advantages to this that were immediately apparent. I always feel self-conscious drawing on a sketch-pad in public, I feel voyeuristic (creepy!). Drawing on the phone made me feel as if I was blending in, not drawing (puntastic!) attention to myself. Although my own internal issue, I think it did loosen my sketches up. Limitless paper by drawing on the screen removed my stingy preciousness of wasting paper! I tend to cram, scribble and overlap when I worry about how many pages I have left. The iPhone allowed me to just smack out as many pictures as possible.

There were a few limitations too. My accuracy was sacrificed with the pen and limited screen size. I didn’t have a pressure sensitive pen (in the process of purchasing, blog post to come!). I found the notification centre pulling down when I sketched in the upper quadrant of the screen. .Similarly I found the edges of the screen not sensing my pen touches. Zoom functions seemed appealing but pulled my focus from the whole pose and action itself but might assist me with details.

There may not be a real substitute to paper and pen, but this was accessible, easy and actually eliminated the need to scan and cataloge in my drawing collection. Feeling comfortable and drawing with ease without the physical limitations of materials made this a fun test. Being able to upload directly to my blog from my phone will all these images is proof of the merit of scribbling on your phone.

Check out the results below.

Distributing and Monetising Animated Short Films

The genre of Animated Short Films is one of the most explorative and innovative areas of animation because animators can develop self-contained and visually distinctive films. As it stands, the Short Animation genre is limited to the realms of Vimeo or Youtube uploads and festival screenings. Financial gain through creating short animations is limited to the likes of initial funding, festival prizes and Youtube Partnership or other advertising partnerships requiring hefty views.

Compared to Animation, both the Publishing and Videogame industries have a very different approach to the distribution of independent and short content. Short Fiction Publishing, one of the oldest creative distribution industries, makes use of both magazines and short story almanacs combined with small readings and large scale writing festivals. Additionally, it has been a smooth transition to the digital platform, capitalising on the eBook market and online-based ’zines. Although sometimes perceived as limited in appeal, short fiction has become a staple for innovation and exploration in established and new writers, similar to how short animation appeals to animators. The almanacs and ’zines format could be applied to animation. We have blogs (bless you cartoonbrew.com) but beyond exposure they can provide only so much. If the editorial control of the almanacs or ’zine style of packaging a curated selection of works that could then be sold as a whole is applied to short animation (rather the segmented and poor quality uploads on Vimeo or Youtube), this could lead to a small point of revenue for short animated content.

Excitingly, Indie videogame developers now have viable, strong and well-received distribution networks for independent content on multiple platforms. With the like of Valve’s Steam platform, users are allowed to purchase independent content in a safe, social and quality store. With Valve’s new Greenlight scheme, independent developers have a greater opportunity to see their content hit a wider audience. humblebundle.com is providing an exciting alternative distribution method: Selling a ‘bundle’ of independent games and allowing the user to choose how much they want to pay and how much goes to developers, the website and the allocated charity. With USD
$1,296,562.94 in payments already received, we can see that all benefit from the rewards of an innovative and honest distribution method.

Could animators group together and sell half hour ‘bundles’ of their films using a method similar to humblebundle.com? With a lot of existing content online or the ability to watch for free on Vimeo or Youtube, it would come down to price (or flexibility in price), quality (High Definition, good renders or conversions) and extra content and/or exclusive content. The shorts could be glued together with exclusive shorts that were developed by the bundled film-makers. Alternatively, the film makers could introduce each film to add a personal touch. Imagine seeing the animatic and the final product side by side, or perhaps even the original sketches or some interviews. I’m not talking about throw-away DVD bonus feature content, but something that reveals the magic that goes behind these often forgotten shorts. Themed bundles based on similar subject matter or tone would create a diverse range of packaged content.

The Animation genre has dabbled in experimental animated shorts on television before with the successful Cartoon Network’s What A Cartoon! And Nickelodeon’s Oh Yeah! Cartoon and Random Cartoons, which have established iconic animated series including Dexter’s Lab and Fairly Odd Parents. A web-based solution, tuned into the animation community, could also be the key to establishing reoccurring Intellectual Property for a wider animation audience.

The Animation Show is an independent, curated animation program by award-winning animators Mike Judge and Don Hertzfeldt in which they licensed a series of shorts for the release of a different collection each year. The show is highly valued by the animation community and, as it combines quality animators and original content, its audience deemed the collections worthy of purchase. With today’s technology, this concept could be shaped into something even stronger and more accessible to a world audience through a dedicated app or a digital download.

Such a scheme might not end up making animators rich, but it would give them an opportunity to capitalise on their hard work, reach a larger audience and receive some kind of greater and long-term gratification for their efforts. A home for paid, quality, independent animation in the digital world seems to be an achievable goal given other creative industries’ persistence in establishing a method of selling their content to a dedicated audience. There will always be a place for festivals full of pretentious, moustached hipsters screening their experimental, non-linear, rotoscoped soap animations. But good animators, new and established, creating good animation and being able to sell and share their work with the world? That is a truly exciting concept for animators and animation fans alike.

Written by Daniel Steen
Edited by Rebecca Bryson