Wang Film productions or as its also known as Cuckoo’s Nest is one of the most prolific and oldest Taiwanese-American animation studios. The company is based in Xindian, Taipei and Los Angeles. The company was formed by James Wang in 1998 as an overseas facility for the animation company Hannah-Barbera. The company started with 50 employees but quickly became 300. In their first year they produced 17 episodes for Hannah-Barbera. They have contracts with Disney, Universal and Nickelodeon. They’re known for much of their overseas work working on shows like Nelvara’s Care Bear series, Garfield and Friends, and the first season of Rugrats. They’ve also worked on the original 1988 Tron.
blog post 13
Te Wei was an animator who specialized in ink wash animation in China. some of his most notable works include titles such as The Proud General, Where is Mama? and The cowboys flute. Ink wash animation is a technique unique to China. Influenced by Qi Baishi, it combines traditional inking techniques and modern animation techniques. Around the 1990s ink-wash went out of style due to the extensive amount of time and money that it cost to produce. That’s really a shame because animation like The cowboy’s flute is beautiful. The way that the bull and the boy interact is incredible. The boys movement are daintier, more loose and free flowing while the bull has tons of weight and exaggerated movements. Especially when the bull is stuck in the mud towards the middle. The music was really good too.
Blog post 9
I find it very intriguing how Mary Ellen Bute is able to so smoothly blend alternative animation and music. Shapes flow, swoop around, change disappear kinda just like waves crashing. It’s even more impressive how alternative animation still follows the animation principles even though at first glance it may not seem very substantive. Even pose to pose is followed because it’s not a persons movements that we observe when Synchromy no 4 its the movement of shapes according to the music cues. Syncing animation up with music is no easy feat especially when it’s done by hand back in 1938. Creators like Mary are very important because they layed the groundwork for alternative animation. They showed some of the first examples of animation being a medium where anything can happen.
ANIM223 - HISTORY OF ANIMATION - FALL 2019 