You heard the bee correctly! Im doing a little research into what other countries are doing to pull their animation weight, lazy buggers. Anyway, arm yourselves with knowledge.
Hey Holland whatcha sayin'?
I've chosen Holland to study animation in. This little european country has a pretty good reputation for art (lil Vincent van Gogh) So you'd expect it would be blossoming with a love of all art forms such as animation. You know what kids, you'd be right. Animation has been around si
Some Dutch Animation
Would be daft of me not to start with the very obvious choice of Father & Daughter, made in the year 2000 by the rather marvellous Michaël Dudok de Wit. It won the acadmey award for short film the very same year. Its now gone on win a bucket load of over twenty awards. Shall we give it a peak?
Festivals!
It's only gone and got the Holland Animated Film Festival!. Which is massive! It was founded in !985 and has been an annual event since 2009.Ccheck it out via this link http://www.haff.nl/en Though it has many international awards in it it also keeps home grown talent acknowledged and encouraged by having awards just for its host country.
Oh Willy (2012, Emma de Swaef)
Here's the trailer for the stopmotion Grand Prix HAFF Shorts winner.
Farmer Jack/Boer Jansen (2012, Arjan Wilschut)
And here's the winner of the Dutch animation audience award, I really want to see all of this!
From my research It's still hard to tell whether the Netherlands has a preferred style of animation both commercially and independently. They seem pretty diverse but so far i've seen far more 2D animation than any other form.
So how long have the Dutch been animating?
Ages to be honest. Ive found all sorts of old Dutch animations dating back to the 50's but I wouldn't be surprised if it went even further back. Forexample heres a link to A site which talks about A 1950's stop motion peice by Dutch animator Joop Geesink http://www.rnw.nl/english/video/new-life-nostalgic-dutch-animations
UK Success for Dutch Animaton
Despite the language barrier some shows made it to english speaking countries, this one for example a re dubbed version of this was shown on Nickelodeon
Doctor Snuggles
This is what happens when the Netherlands team up with England and Germany! We have Doctor Snuggles! A 1979 animation about a friendly inventor with a bunch of animal friends. its debuted on ITV in England and Nick Jr. in the United States. It also got showings in Canada on TVO. It ran for 13 whole episodes... wow! The name makes me wince but its a got a cult following even today.
Paul Driessen
Here's a dutch animator I knew of before this project. a personal favourite of mine who specialised in 2d. he not only did a lot of work for his own country but his stuff is seen worldwide. He was a very crucial animator in 'the yellow submarine' Two of his films have been included in 'the animation show of shows'. He animated for TV commercials in Holland without any training in the art form. His style is easily noticeable with his unique drawing style and squiggly animated lines. He's taught animation before and it still creating to this day. I'll give you guys some links.
He is the nicest guy ever.
I emailed Paul just to get some tips about making it in the industry and he replied really quick. shows the fame hasn't gone to his head. Here's our conversation; On 2012-04-28, at 12:38 PM, Sam Shaw wrote:
'Hey there Mr. Driessen.
My name's Sam and I'm an animation student from Bristol in the UK. You're animations have been a huge inspiration to me ever since my step dad showed me 'the water people' when I was young. I now have my heart set on becoming a 2D animator.
I'm currently doing a blog site about some Dutch animation and animators and thought this was a perfect excuse to try and get in contact with you. Any tips and advice i could pop on there from you would be amazing if you ever have a spare minute.
Best wishes
Sam Shaw'
...and he replied;
Hi Sam (fellow 2D animator),
I found an article I wrote a while ago (I think for China) about how I approach ideas for my films, which I updated and rewrote a bit.
You might be interested in some of those thoughts, so here it is:
Take care,
Paul Driessen
Interesting someone who persues 2D aimation
'Hey there Mr. Driessen.
My name's Sam and I'm an animation student from Bristol in the UK. You're animations have been a huge inspiration to me ever since my step dad showed me 'the water people' when I was young. I now have my heart set on becoming a 2D animator.
I'm currently doing a blog site about some Dutch animation and animators and thought this was a perfect excuse to try and get in contact with you. Any tips and advice i could pop on there from you would be amazing if you ever have a spare minute.
Best wishes
Sam Shaw'
...and he replied;
Hi Sam (fellow 2D animator),
I found an article I wrote a while ago (I think for China) about how I approach ideas for my films, which I updated and rewrote a bit.
You might be interested in some of those thoughts, so here it is:
Take care,
Paul Driessen
Interesting someone who persues 2D aimation
And here's the article
My approach to Story writing in Animation
When I think of the sources which I dip into in order to make animated films, many contributing factors come to mind: my own history, upbringing and choices in life (by which I mean the choice of creative environment and the kind of film making I pursue).
I personally feel that, next to being the son of my parents, the circumstances in which I spent my early years contributed strongly to whom I am now. Throughout my childhood I always drew cartoons. When I was 24 years old, my experience with inventing funny cartoon ideas got me a job at an animation studio in Holland.
In 1967 George Dunning invited me to come to London to work on the "Yellow Submarine".
George, who was Canadian, also told me about the National Film Board of Canada and showed me films of the Film Board's animators.
Excited about the inventiveness and quality of what I saw, I decided to continue my quest in Canada.
In the subsequent years I made my personal films at the NFB and, later, independently in Holland.
Since my usual schedule is a restless one (moving between two countries, teaching overseas, plus the occasional workshop and festival visits at various places in the world, I trained myself to live quite a disciplined life in order to work on the films I like to make.
I learned to concentrate on film ideas in places I find inspiring. As long as the environment gives me peace and pleasure I can be very productive.
What makes the process easier for me is that generally I don't draw my story ideas, but write them down. I can more or less picture in my head what it will look like while I write, but there is no definite image yet, writing is abstract, I'm not hampered by design. And writing goes much faster than drawing.
The next step is to make a coherent story-board, of course, to explain these ideas to potential producers.
A good example of this process is a typical cartoon I did in the early 80's in Holland. I was between productions; my independent producer/friend Nico Crama had some money, I had a couple of months before going back to Canada, and I 'wrote' my film "OH WHAT A KNIGHT".
Cartoons like this you really have to write. You start with the ending of a traditional situation, in this case a knight coming to the rescue of a princess in danger.
Then, and that's very important, you give the ending a twist, do the unexpected, but make it funny, of course.
And when you have found a good joke for the end, you work your way back, think of where the knight is when the princess calls for help and think of funny obstacles the knight has to overcome before he gets to the princess.
While you're writing, you do visualize of course the images, come up with funny visual situations.
Another way for coming up with film ideas is by looking at an interesting image. In my case, since my films are always stories, I try to come up with ideas which could possibly tell the story behind that image.
One of my early films at the NFB is called "AIR!" and it illustrates very well what I mean.
I started out with a very simple graphic image, a horizontal line in the middle of the screen. Then, by looking at it the story came very easy to me:
the line became the ground surface on which flowers struggled to stay alive; it became the water surface where fish were grasping for air; it became a wire on which an exhausted bird sat down; and it became the ground again in which a man dug a hole, trying to escape the polluted air, the topic of the story.
I did story exercises like this with young children, I remember, let them design simple shapes and make stories around them; it worked very well.
Another example of a visual idea is "HOME ON THE RAILS".
I made a drawing of a room in which a railroad track passed from one door to another.
Then I looked at it for a long time and started to write down ideas inspired by that strange situation.
Like why does the track go through the house? (Maybe the house was there before, sitting in a narrow valley where they planned the track). And what is typical of railways? (America opening up their West, or land taken away from its original inhabitants comes to mind; but also morbid associations like people being killed on the tracks and so on).
It proved to be a source for all kinds of stories.
Interestingly, although the film has a very American mid-west atmosphere as you can see, it was produced in Holland. Apparently the Dutch found it very romantic. Normand Roger, who is a Canadian, wrote the music, though.
Another film story I wrote, "AN OLD BOX", had a very European look. This time the Canadians found that very appealing and it was produced by the Canadian Film Board.
Again, it was a typical writing exercise, starting out with what traditionally "Christmas" is all about. I came up with Celebration, Music, Cosiness and Getting together. But also being poor and cold and lonely.
An Old Box is really two films, the way I set it up: the world of the Old Man and the part where the Old Box itself takes off, where I changed the design & colouring and animation style of the film. Since most of the time I do all the animation of my films myself (and animation is a long process), I find it a little tedious if I have to animate the same thing for months on end.
Therefore I usually try to write stories in which I can break-up the design or ideas, like composing two or three stories inside one film idea.
Split-screen, triptychs and multi-screen projects are of course the answer to that. My first "graphically" broken-up film was "ON LAND, AT SEA AND IN THE AIR", in which three independent stories unfold within their own panels, but in the end they appear to be part of a larger scheme.
A split-screen film I made many years later is "THE BOY WHO SAW THE ICEBERG".
In this case there are two stories being told next to each other in two panels on screen.
In the panel on the left we see the "real" story of a lonely child of rich parents who is bored by his life. However, to compensate for his boredom he wanders off in his own fantasies and these fantasies are shown in the panel on the right.
When something important or very noisy happens which disturbs him, like his alarm clock going off, or a big ship looming up, the boy wakes up from his reveries and both panels jump to the same disturbing image.
It's a sad story (like most of my stories; I seem to like drama) and it's made even sadder by the beautiful music of Normand Roger.
When I was teaching in Germany in the nineties I gave the old "Knight"-story formula (starting with a twist at the end of a traditional story, then working your way back) as a story writing exercise to my students.
Later, when I was looking for ideas for a new film, I thought of maybe using my own exercise. But instead of using only one of the examples I had given to my students, I took three of them and compressed these three stories through parallel editing into one film.
The way I wrote it was, I started with story number one; then, when I would arrive at a point where I could cut (preferably some kind of "cliff-hanger") I would start the next story, cut again at an appropriate moment and so on, until I brought all three stories together at the end.
Again, all of the stories started out with a twist at the end of each of them and then I worked backwards, throwing in funny obstacles and giving them proper beginnings.
The film is called "3 MISSES" and it did quite well at the festival circuit (including an Oscar nomination).
I wrote a film "THE 7 BROTHERS" which was partly live action, partly animation. My son Kaj directed the live action (the Grimm brothers prowling the streets of an old town at night), I did the animation. It's about the 7(!) Grimm brothers and the process of coming up with ideas for their tales. Very much like the process I go through each time I'm faced with a new project.
I did a lot of writing and pondering for "OEDIPUS", a mostly backwards animated film. To make people understand backward action forward, i.e. reconsider the action they've just seen in reverse is an interesting challenge for an animator.
I interspersed it with some forward action when Oedipus goes into group therapy amongst a bunch of NFB cartoon characters; after all, he has a complex and wants to trace his life back.
Right now I'm working on two new projects; the first one is called "CATS & DOGS" in which I divide the screen in four equal parts: on the left side top and bottom are the activities shown of a Cat and its alter ego; on the right those of a Dog. However, they're not in action all at the same time. Timing again is crucial.
The other project is "DISGUSTING SOUNDS PEOPLE MAKE". I came up with more than 20 very short, very disgusting cartoons, which will be executed in different styles and techniques mainly in Belgium. I'd love to also do some myself, of course.
The cartoons are set in a live action/pixillation context.
-----------------------------------------------
When I think of the sources which I dip into in order to make animated films, many contributing factors come to mind: my own history, upbringing and choices in life (by which I mean the choice of creative environment and the kind of film making I pursue).
I personally feel that, next to being the son of my parents, the circumstances in which I spent my early years contributed strongly to whom I am now. Throughout my childhood I always drew cartoons. When I was 24 years old, my experience with inventing funny cartoon ideas got me a job at an animation studio in Holland.
In 1967 George Dunning invited me to come to London to work on the "Yellow Submarine".
George, who was Canadian, also told me about the National Film Board of Canada and showed me films of the Film Board's animators.
Excited about the inventiveness and quality of what I saw, I decided to continue my quest in Canada.
In the subsequent years I made my personal films at the NFB and, later, independently in Holland.
Since my usual schedule is a restless one (moving between two countries, teaching overseas, plus the occasional workshop and festival visits at various places in the world, I trained myself to live quite a disciplined life in order to work on the films I like to make.
I learned to concentrate on film ideas in places I find inspiring. As long as the environment gives me peace and pleasure I can be very productive.
What makes the process easier for me is that generally I don't draw my story ideas, but write them down. I can more or less picture in my head what it will look like while I write, but there is no definite image yet, writing is abstract, I'm not hampered by design. And writing goes much faster than drawing.
The next step is to make a coherent story-board, of course, to explain these ideas to potential producers.
A good example of this process is a typical cartoon I did in the early 80's in Holland. I was between productions; my independent producer/friend Nico Crama had some money, I had a couple of months before going back to Canada, and I 'wrote' my film "OH WHAT A KNIGHT".
Cartoons like this you really have to write. You start with the ending of a traditional situation, in this case a knight coming to the rescue of a princess in danger.
Then, and that's very important, you give the ending a twist, do the unexpected, but make it funny, of course.
And when you have found a good joke for the end, you work your way back, think of where the knight is when the princess calls for help and think of funny obstacles the knight has to overcome before he gets to the princess.
While you're writing, you do visualize of course the images, come up with funny visual situations.
Another way for coming up with film ideas is by looking at an interesting image. In my case, since my films are always stories, I try to come up with ideas which could possibly tell the story behind that image.
One of my early films at the NFB is called "AIR!" and it illustrates very well what I mean.
I started out with a very simple graphic image, a horizontal line in the middle of the screen. Then, by looking at it the story came very easy to me:
the line became the ground surface on which flowers struggled to stay alive; it became the water surface where fish were grasping for air; it became a wire on which an exhausted bird sat down; and it became the ground again in which a man dug a hole, trying to escape the polluted air, the topic of the story.
I did story exercises like this with young children, I remember, let them design simple shapes and make stories around them; it worked very well.
Another example of a visual idea is "HOME ON THE RAILS".
I made a drawing of a room in which a railroad track passed from one door to another.
Then I looked at it for a long time and started to write down ideas inspired by that strange situation.
Like why does the track go through the house? (Maybe the house was there before, sitting in a narrow valley where they planned the track). And what is typical of railways? (America opening up their West, or land taken away from its original inhabitants comes to mind; but also morbid associations like people being killed on the tracks and so on).
It proved to be a source for all kinds of stories.
Interestingly, although the film has a very American mid-west atmosphere as you can see, it was produced in Holland. Apparently the Dutch found it very romantic. Normand Roger, who is a Canadian, wrote the music, though.
Another film story I wrote, "AN OLD BOX", had a very European look. This time the Canadians found that very appealing and it was produced by the Canadian Film Board.
Again, it was a typical writing exercise, starting out with what traditionally "Christmas" is all about. I came up with Celebration, Music, Cosiness and Getting together. But also being poor and cold and lonely.
An Old Box is really two films, the way I set it up: the world of the Old Man and the part where the Old Box itself takes off, where I changed the design & colouring and animation style of the film. Since most of the time I do all the animation of my films myself (and animation is a long process), I find it a little tedious if I have to animate the same thing for months on end.
Therefore I usually try to write stories in which I can break-up the design or ideas, like composing two or three stories inside one film idea.
Split-screen, triptychs and multi-screen projects are of course the answer to that. My first "graphically" broken-up film was "ON LAND, AT SEA AND IN THE AIR", in which three independent stories unfold within their own panels, but in the end they appear to be part of a larger scheme.
A split-screen film I made many years later is "THE BOY WHO SAW THE ICEBERG".
In this case there are two stories being told next to each other in two panels on screen.
In the panel on the left we see the "real" story of a lonely child of rich parents who is bored by his life. However, to compensate for his boredom he wanders off in his own fantasies and these fantasies are shown in the panel on the right.
When something important or very noisy happens which disturbs him, like his alarm clock going off, or a big ship looming up, the boy wakes up from his reveries and both panels jump to the same disturbing image.
It's a sad story (like most of my stories; I seem to like drama) and it's made even sadder by the beautiful music of Normand Roger.
When I was teaching in Germany in the nineties I gave the old "Knight"-story formula (starting with a twist at the end of a traditional story, then working your way back) as a story writing exercise to my students.
Later, when I was looking for ideas for a new film, I thought of maybe using my own exercise. But instead of using only one of the examples I had given to my students, I took three of them and compressed these three stories through parallel editing into one film.
The way I wrote it was, I started with story number one; then, when I would arrive at a point where I could cut (preferably some kind of "cliff-hanger") I would start the next story, cut again at an appropriate moment and so on, until I brought all three stories together at the end.
Again, all of the stories started out with a twist at the end of each of them and then I worked backwards, throwing in funny obstacles and giving them proper beginnings.
The film is called "3 MISSES" and it did quite well at the festival circuit (including an Oscar nomination).
I wrote a film "THE 7 BROTHERS" which was partly live action, partly animation. My son Kaj directed the live action (the Grimm brothers prowling the streets of an old town at night), I did the animation. It's about the 7(!) Grimm brothers and the process of coming up with ideas for their tales. Very much like the process I go through each time I'm faced with a new project.
I did a lot of writing and pondering for "OEDIPUS", a mostly backwards animated film. To make people understand backward action forward, i.e. reconsider the action they've just seen in reverse is an interesting challenge for an animator.
I interspersed it with some forward action when Oedipus goes into group therapy amongst a bunch of NFB cartoon characters; after all, he has a complex and wants to trace his life back.
Right now I'm working on two new projects; the first one is called "CATS & DOGS" in which I divide the screen in four equal parts: on the left side top and bottom are the activities shown of a Cat and its alter ego; on the right those of a Dog. However, they're not in action all at the same time. Timing again is crucial.
The other project is "DISGUSTING SOUNDS PEOPLE MAKE". I came up with more than 20 very short, very disgusting cartoons, which will be executed in different styles and techniques mainly in Belgium. I'd love to also do some myself, of course.
The cartoons are set in a live action/pixillation context.
-----------------------------------------------
Education in Holland
Theres seems to be a rich number of animation courses in the Netherlands, everything from studying all techniques in animation in TOPCAD university or specialising in a certain are, for example the Utrecht School of The Arts. Another thing i found was 'The Netherlands Institute for Animation' This link will show you That in 1993, the government opened up this institute to help animation thrive in Holland. They do a two year intensive animation course among other things. http://www.awn.com/mag/issue2.10/2.10pages/2.10netherlands.html