The Forbidden Planet International Blog Log » animated

Doctor Who Dreamland conceptual art

Joe — Wed, 25 Nov 2009 00:04:01 +0000

Over on the Bad Librarianship blog Mark Kardwell is discussing the animated Doctor Who serial Dreamland currently to be found on the official BBC Who site (sorry, I think it may not play to folks outside the UK). Like me Mark’s not entirely convinced by the style of animation, but the story (by Phil Ford) is good. That’s not the main thrust of Mark’s post though – he’s got a look at some of the conceptual artwork for the character designs for the animated Who and it turns out its by 2000 AD and Judge Dredd Megazine contributor Tiernen Trevallion. (tip of the hat to Declan Shalvey’s twitter for the tip)

(one of the conceptual sketches for Tennant’s Doctor for Dreamland by Tiernen Trevallion, (c) presumably the BB of C, borrowed shamelessly from Mark’s blog)

Futurama back on track

Joe — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 23:02:05 +0000

The BBC reports that the possible stumbling block to the new series of Futurama has been overcome – the voice cast were in dispute over their pay, with Fox not only refusing to meet their desired wage level but threatening to replace the dissenting actors. Which, let’s be honest, would have been utterly bloody stupid – what point is there in finally relenting and bringing back a popular show (that shouldn’t have been axed in the first place in my opinion – and repeat viewings and DVD sales bear that out) if you use a different voice cast? Pointless. Now it seems like the dispute has been resolved and we can look forward to a full 26 episode season of Futurama next year.

Doctor Poo

Joe — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 23:01:36 +0000

Viz, Britain’s great repository of delightfully vulgar, childish comics (bless ‘em) offers us up this cartoon riff on our favourite Time Lord with Doctor Poo. Crossing time and space desperately in search of a quiet loo where he can park his bum before the sanctity of his trousers are violated. Its crude (both the theme and the simple animation) toilet humour but its funny and it does actually riff on a number of Who aspects -- Sea Devils, Cybermen, Jamie and I love the ‘handicapped’ emblem on Davros’ personal toilet. And the farted version of the classic Baker-era Doctor Who theme. I’m suddenly reminded of Blackadder goes forth, when the fiendish Prussian officer holds our plucky heroes captive and remarks how for Germans the toilet is simply a necessary bodily function, “for you British -- the basis of an entire culture”. (via SF Crowsnest)

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZahysN2sIIw

Animated Owly!

Joe — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 08:51:00 +0000

Top Shelf’s Chris Staros tells us that Andy Runton‘s wonderful Owly comics characters (solid favourites with a number of us here) has been animated by Sprite Animation Studios and the cartoon will debut at the San Diego Comic Con later this month, where fans will be able to drop by the Top Shelf booth to see it and also to get Owly books signed by Andy who will also be there. The animated Owly is directed by Moto Sakakibara, from storyboards created by Andy, and features Andy’s ‘Pictomation’ , which is a method of expressing his character’s thoughts and emotions using icons and images rather than text, which makes them especially good for younger fans and also means they can travel rather well since there is no language barrier. Top Shelf also announced they were working with Simon & Schuster to create some new Owly picture books due to appear in 2011.

“I’m absolutely overjoyed to be working with the entire Sprite team. Over the past months, we’ve worked very closely to make sure Owly was faithfully translated to 3D. Every little detail was important to them, and the end result blows me away! They’ve created an animation that captures the pure essence of Owly in ways I never thought possible. It’s amazing to see Owly and Wormy come to life like this. The level of artistry at Sprite is incredible,” Andy Runton.