Tag: animated shorts

Meet Your New Favorite Sidekick In The Pixar Short ‘Dante’s Lunch’

by Natalie Kipper

Disney-Pixar’s upcoming film, Coco, celebrates the culture of Mexico and Dìa de Los Muertos, the Day of the Dead.  And while the story follows the young Miguel and his adventure in the Land of the Dead, I get the feeling Dante, Miguel’s dog, will be the one stealing the show. Yesterday, Pixar released an animated short, “Dante’s Lunch – A Short Tail,” and I am smitten. The pup is so darn cute! The entire short runs just shy of two minutes and is embedded below. You have no excuse not to watch. Trust me, you will thank me later.

https://youtu.be/2GCzyZexnNE

The team behind the movie did their research, too. According to director Lee Unkrich, Dante is modeled after Mexico’s national dog, the Xolo. This breed of dog dates back to the Aztecs, who believed they were needed for spirits to make the transition to the afterlife. Even Dante’s lolling tongue is characteristic of the Xolo.

Coco is scheduled to hit theaters November 22 of this year. Are you excited for the movie? I know I am!

[source: Yahoo!]

Team Fortress 2 ‘Pyromania: Day 3’ Meet the Pyro and Source Filmmaker

by Shane O'Hare

Well it’s over. The Pyromania three day event is done, and it finished with flourish. Haaaaaave you met Pyro?

Well, that was…interesting. I can safely say that was the best “Meet The” video hands down. Today not only marks the end of Pyromania but it introduces the newest tool from Valve. The Source Filmmaker.

Source Filmmaker (SFM) is the tool Valve developed inside the source engine that it used to animate all nine of the TF2 shorts. It takes an entire animation studio and puts it inside a single gaming PC. From the Press Release.

The goal of the SFM was to develop a story telling tool that allowed us to create computer animated movies more efficiently, and with greater creative freedom,” said Bay Raitt, designer at Valve. “Over the past five years, we’ve produced more than 50 animated shorts with the SFM. The Source Filmmaker will allow our community to create their own movies in Team Fortress 2 and in their own Source SDK-created mods.

SFM is currently in a closed beta, but Valve is going to release it FREE OF CHARGE later this year.

I don’t like to throw this word around too often, but this is fucking AMAZING! What Valve is bringing to gamers and machinma artists alike is nothing but astounding. I cannot wait to see what groups like Lit Fuse Films will be able to do with this tool.

For more info on SFM check out the official page.

Day 2 of Pyromania is HERE.