It’s been 2 years since the film was released and it’s really nice to still receive recognition.
Thank you RiverRun. It’s been a fun and happy festival ride.

I’ve heard that the ideal situation to release an independent film every 1-2 years so your name and work are constantly circulating.
Well… I am envious of those filmmakers who can do that.
We are slow, like snails.
But we’re in middle of a production so a new film is coming, not this year, but next year.

We’re very happy to receive the best animation award from Queens World Film Festival!

“Something Left, Something Taken” is on the last stretch of the festival circulation.
Our plan is to start posting more pictures of our new film. Stay tuned…

For a little less than a week, we enjoyed the one of the most unique festival experiences at Abu Dhabi Film Festival.
I was not sure what to expect since I have never visited the middle east but there was no way we were going to say “NO” because the festival offered to pay for the flight. This never ever happens since most festivals cannot afford to pay for the directors’ travel expense. (especially for shorts!)

Huge thank you to Abu Dhabi Film Festival and their wonderful staffs. We have never experienced such hospitality. Everyday, they served all directors some delicious Arabian food. So so so delicious, I can definitely eat this every day. Of course we stuffed our faces every meal.

This is the view from our hotel room.

We were welcomed with this note that made us smile.
Max Kuwahata & Ru Porter.
And yes we did stay in a beautiful room.

This is one of the outdoor screenings. Most of the screenings were inside at the Marina Mall, approx 30 min away from the main hotel.
The programming was quite different than any festivals we attended. I realized that most of the information I received is just one side of the story and it was quite educating to learn that there is more to the world.
I really wanted to see the new film, “Poulet aux Prunes” by Marjane Satrapi & Vincent Parannaud (Persepolis) but we missed the screening dates. Hopefully it will come to the near by theater.
My favorite feature was “I wish” by Hirokazu Kore-eda. If you ever have a chance to see this, it will make you happy and sad at the same time.

2nd day, a volleyball game was organized.
UAE filmmakers vs International filmmakers. Not sure which won, but it was a good game.
Me? I stayed under the tent because I don’t like the sun.
Max? He was the photographer.

A trip to Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque was organized on the 3rd day. Women had to wear hijab, which I thought was an interesting experience. I kept tripping over, the head scarf kept falling off my head, and it was really hot underneath.
One of the festival staff was telling me that once he saw some girls taking a group pictures but they were wearing burqa. (all covered) I kept imaging this situation. How do you know which one is you?

A doc filmmaker, Joao Marcelo Gomes was trying to film a little frog in front of the mosque and was stopped by the security guard.

Erik Rosenlund (picture on the left) was taking a picture of the chandelier. (picture on the right)

A day before the visit to the mosque, the festival organized a private Q&A with Terry Gilliam just with short filmmakers. This was one of the most inspiring talks I have ever attended. Then at the mosque, there he is again. More private time with Terry Gilliam! I wish when and if I ever become an accomplished filmmaker, I will still be passionate about filmmaking.

Black Pearl Award Ceremony for the shorts! Congratulations to those who won prizes!
Animation award went to “Luminaris” by Juan Pablo Zaramella and “Specky Four-Eyes” by Jean-Claude Rozec! Well deserved!!

The next day was the unbelievable Black Pearl Award Ceremony for feature films.
Short film directors also got to walk through the red carpet with tons of paparazzi.

Maybe as test shots? Not sure why we had to walk through.
But it was fun, it made me feel like an A-list celebrity when the truth is I’m just a short animated film maker.
Then we sat in front of …

There were many ambassadors. When the directors were not there to receive the prize, an ambassador from that country received the prize. What a luxurious festival it is.

At 3:30 am. As we were leaving the hotel, friends were coming back from the closing party.
The best part of the festival was that we had lunch together every day so all shorts directors got to know each other really well. I am hoping that we keep making films that we like so we can see each other in other festivals soon. Feeling very inspired and encouraged to move forward with our film.

We are very happy to announce that we received the best animated short award from Palo Alto International Film Festival !
Receiving an award from the Bay Area means a lot since the film is about Northern California.

Unrelated to the festival but an interesting incident that happened early this year.
Max and I went to Parsons as guest lecturers. One of the students, a very charismatic and pretty girl name Ciara Hughes came up to me and said “I was Darlene in the movie, Zodiac.”
Darlene is the girl who gets shot with her boyfriend, Michael, by the Zodiac Killer in their car.
It’s the opening shot for the Zodiac movie directed by David Fincher.

It’s the black-and-white scene in our movie. A couple is making out and they are shot by the Zodiac Killer.

So what I found out after a few minuets of Ciara explaining is that she played the role of Darlene in David Fincher movie. What a strange and amazing coincidence! She also happened to be quite an artist.
The world is so small and there are so many bizarre connections.

We’re very excited to receive the golden Italian bleak from cortoLovere 2011!
Thank you so much to cortoLovere!

“Something Left, Something Taken” has entered its 2nd year of festival circulation.
We haven’t been able to attend any film festival since Annecy (France) in June due to focusing on our new short film. But in 2 weeks, we’ll be attending Abu Dhabi Film Festival in UAE.

As for our new film, it has taken many turns and I supposed it will still change a whole lot until it’s completed. But we have finally moved on from storyboard stage into animatic. We’ll be post some concept art soon on the blog.

We’re very happy to receive the best American Spectrum award for “Something Left, Something Taken”!

Our first Annecy trip was overwhelming, inspiring, frustrating and wonderful. As a follow up to our blog post “Why We Released Our Film Online”, it is worth noting that the short films that won the Annecy Cristal and the Special Jury Award, “Pixels”, and “Big Bang Big Boom”, have been online for quite some time and enjoyed considerable internet ubiquity.

We didn’t go to all of the student screenings and missed the TV screening, but here are some of our favorites from the festival:

Studio AKA’s Grant Orchard plays an absurd New York moment over the course of 100 years. Three distinct graphic stylings and a peppy score.

I was charmed by Patrick Doyan’s funny and poignant day-in-the-life of a bored little boy. The beautiful, illustrative animation sets a warm tone for the piece. Very nice use of scale and graphic representation to conceal and reveal story elements.

Juan Pablo Zaramella’s pixilation masterpiece was clearly the crowd favorite. The photography is controlled and the animation feels lively and expressive. Not easy to pull off with pixilation. What I enjoyed most was the fact that Zaramella used a natural byproduct of the pixilation process, light moving across the frame, as a storytelling device. He really breathed new life into an old technique.

In Tor Fruegaard’s “Venus”, a couple with sex problems visit a swingers club in an attempt to salvage their relationship. While the premise begs for loads of juvenile jokes, “Venus” never veers too far in that direction. Instead, Fruegaard uses the experiences to show a very real relationship. Terrific dialog performances and understated animation.
Warning: The trailer below is NSFW and may be inappropriate for younger audiences.

Directed by Polynoid from Filmakademie Baden-Wurttenberg, “Loom” depicts a dramatic moment when a moth is trapped in a spider’s web. While the photorealistic realistic rendering is a remarkable achievement, what I responded to most was the abstraction of insect inner-space and the brilliant sound design.

We just came back from Annecy and it was loads of fun!
It was about 10 hours drive from Tilburg, the Netherlands, where were are currently living.
Erik was the only driver because Max quickly realized that most cars in EU are manual.
First night, we went to an amazing Italian restaurant with NIAF friends. The owner wanted to put our postcards on the restaurant sign. After some arguments with his wife..
“it should be straight”
“nono, slightly tilted works better”
** something along that line because I don’t understand French **
our post cards are displayed in Annecy! We went back to see if he didn’t take them down, and sure thing! Until the last day, I saw those post cards shinning from this delicious restaurant.

The screening went well. I was nervous with the heavy dialogue but I think most people enjoyed.
Thanks to the Zodiac movie, it seems like the Zodiac Killer is quite famous in EU, too.

The old town area was absolutely charming. This is exactly what non-french people thinks as a French country side town. I just had to scream “oh so cute!” about 1000 times.
Not sure if you can see from this photo but there is a bright orange bakery. I must say it is the best I have ever had. I wish I had gone back one more time…. but hopefully we can go back to Annecy again.

Reunion with Mikey Please (from Sundance). This is my favorite part of the festivals to see old friends and to know how well they are doing.

Sami & Mohamed took us to a nice French meal and treated me for a delicious ice cream. Look how happy I am. If I ever lived in France, I will gain 10 kg in a month. Everything was delicious.

To burn off some of the sweets in the system, I went boat paddling.
Max, the adult, decided to watch our bags. Sorry.
See the arrow? That is me. I didn’t want to get any sun on my skin so I covered myself most of the time. Japanese people do not like to get any tan but Europeans love getting tans. Cultural difference is interesting.

Last day, before the award ceremony, NIAF friends took us for a meal. Although they gave us lots of “good lucks” we didn’t win anything. But we made tons of friends and that is the best part.
So inspired and ready to get back to work!