The Prophet

If you haven't already heard about it, I'm involved in a very cool project.

There is an animated feature film being produced about Kahlil Gibran's famous book "The Prophet", with chapters being animated by different directors from around the world.  One of the producers of the film is the great actress Salma Hayek.

And I was honored to be invited to contribute a section of animation. 

At first, I volunteered to animation the section about pleasure - I got very excited about that, then the producers decided I'd do a better job on the section about eating and drinking.  So I started doing lots of sketches about food and booze.

In fact, the esteemed director Roger Allers ("The Lion King", "Open Season"), who is directing this compilation, was in town and he was kind enough to stop in at my studio for a visit.  He gave me notes on my section and hopefully soon I can begin coloring the short segment.

Anyway, it will be out soon in theaters, so watch for it.  There are some great animators involved in this glorious project.

--Bill

Man

Man woman

Man str

Man side

Laugh

Lady

Graham

Between wars

Flight att

Face

Cool

ASIFA EAST NY awards

Again this year Linda Beck was the Seth Mcfarlane of the awards show. I had a film in competition called "Drunker Than A Skunk" that I had high hopes for.

It was a packed audience, everyone in the animation industry was there.

As to the winners, They are... (via ASIFA East's website)

Best In Show
Based on a True Story/Jacob Kafka

Independent Films:  First Place
Sidewalk/Celia Bullwinkel

Independent Films:  Second Place
There Must Be Some Other Cat/Greg Ford Company/Mark Kausler

Independent Films:  Third Place (tied)
It Took A While To Figure Shit Out/Arthur Metcalf

Independent Films:  Third Place (tied)
Drunker Than A Skunk/Plymptoons Studio/Bill Plympton

Excellence in Animation:
It Took A While To Figure Shit Out/Arthur Metcalf

Excellence in Design:
Christmas Day/Ace & Son Moving Picture Co./Richard O’Connor/Kelsey Stark

Excellence in Writing:
A Knock On More Door/David Chai

Experimental Films:
The Productive AniJam/The Productive/Katie Cropper

Commissioned Films:  First Place
TEDed: Sex Determination/Buzzco/Candy Kugel

Commissioned Films:  Second Place
Quiet Loud/Sesame Street/Bob Boyle

Commissioned Films:  Third Place
Sniffles/David Cowles & Jeremy Galante

Student Films:  First Place
Tule Lake/Michelle Ikemoto

Student Films:  Second Place
Chasing Unicorns/Deena Beck

Student Films:  Third Place (tied)
The Crawler/Seth Brady

Student Films:  Third Place (tied)
Good Night Guard/Janice S. Rim

Student Films:  Honorable Mention (tied)
Mirror/Q-Hyun Kim

Student Films:  Honorable Mention (tied)
Register Rap!/Josh Weisbrod

 

 

The Party afterward is always the high point because one gets to talk to all the young animators and find out whats going on in the industry. I gathered my whole award winning crew for a rave group portrait. 

 

Left to right: Kirby Allen (artist), Jonathan Rosen (music), Maryam Hajouni (composting), Ilana Schwartz (editing), Sandrine Plympton (producer), Bill Plympton (me), Lucas Plympton (son), Leo Guzman (artist).

 

The "Drunker Than A Skunk" film is going to Annecy where we hope it does well and makes lots of business.

At the ASIFA party I got to chat with the famous Vaccese twins, Amid Amidi, (winner) Celia Bullwinkel  Debbie Solomon and Signe Baumane.

So please next year enter your animated film in the ASIFA NY competition, You'll be glad you did.