X-Radiation

CGTantra, the Indian computer graphics web portal, just published an interview I did with them while visiting Mumbai and Pune in September. You can check it out here:

http://tinyurl.com/xraytantra

You could also get to it from the main page at http://www.cgtantra.com

There’s an AnimationMentor.com student named Chaitanya Limaye who attended my presentation in Pune, India. After the presentation, Chand and I viewed his work from the Mentor program. As it turns out, my friend Joe Mandia is his mentor. Small world!

Link to Chaitanya’s blog

This is an earlier short piece of animation from the team that’s working on Hey Krishna. It was done at AniRights before Reliance bought them and they became Big Animation. For a behind the scenes look at the production, check out the link over at CG Tantra

L to R: Chand, Kamlesh Pandey, Ashish S.K., Xray, Pratchi, Nupur

Chand took me to visit a really amazing animation studio in Pune called “Big Animation”. We were treated to lunch by CEO Ashish S.K. and I was honored to meet one of Bollywoods most well known writers Kamlesh Pandey. We had a spirited discussion about Indian literature, Joseph Campbell and Bollywood film making. They’ve really got it together. Big Animation is working on both 2-D and 3-D animation. They have several hundred employees and their studio is totally state of the art. They showed me some previews of their work on a project called Hey Krishna. There are two versions of it and both look very good. They aren’t cutting any corners. One is a 3D animation for broadcast televsion and the other is a traditional 2D version for theatrical release. The 2D animation looks every bit as good as Dreamworks Prince of Egypt. Big Animation uses Flash as well as several proprietary systems and according to Vikram, the director n of Hey Krishna, they are torturing Flash in ways it was never intended. The artwork is stunning.

Animation Express posted an overview of my presentation at Whistling Woods in Mumbai. A few things got lost in translation and it leaves the impression that Bee Movie was done with Massive while it was really done using Dreamworks/PDI’s “Mob” system but overall it captures the gist of things.

Animation Express article

My last day in India. Got a late start today after last nights celebration. Chand picked me up at the hotel and we headed over to Fabindia to do a little shopping. Nupur helped me pick out a bunch of clothing items for Rie and a few things for myself including a pair of kurtas and churidars. It was a little too bulky to fit into my luggage so I also bought a nice cloth and leather bag to hold the extra goodies. Fabindia is a great department store with some very nice things. You can actually get some of it on-line in the U.S. at fabindia.com but it’s about 3x the price of buying it in the shop.

After the presentation Chaitan (sp?), a former Digital Domain artist who now runs a facility in Pune, took us out to celebrate at Post 91, a very cool restaurant/bar/banquet hall in Pune. I tried the local whisky called Blue Antiquity. We were joined by the owner Saurabh and he extended his hospitality to us for the evening. It was a great time filled with wonderful food and drink.

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After the presentation one of the participants introduced himself to me and gave me a great gift – A picture he’d drawn of me at the podium. His name is Harsh and he’s got an impressive web site up at http://www.inkbrushme.com. Somone should hire this guy as a concept or boards artists or something.

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Flew from Mumbai to Pune this morning and met up with Chand on the flipside. He drove up with his sister, as well as Pratchi who is a modeler and Nupur who is a lighting lead on a Disney project in India titled “Roadside Romeo”. There was a last minute change of venue but the theater we presented in at MCCI media tower was very nice. The audience was a little smaller than in Mumbai but no less enthusiastic and the intimate setting was a nice change of pace. There were three guys I met who came from a small village outside Pune. (5th row, left side). I have not seen their work but I’m told they are amazing painters. They have very limited access to digital technology. Chand, Chaitan and some of the other folks I’ve been meeting are working on an initiative to get these disenfranchised artists access to the gear and training needed to nurture their development into the digital age.

This evening is the Idil Fitri (or just ID) celebration that marks the end of Ramadan. It’s a big celebration in Muslim population centers around the world. In India, all the Muslim neighborhoods are out partying and celebrating. There are throngs of people on the streets. Chand and I had a late dinner near a muslim area behind the Taj hotel consisting of liver curry, butter chicken and seekh kabobs with roti. The place was a little crazy. It’s the Indian version of car-hop service. You pull your car up to the curb and a waiter pops the hood and puts a bottle under it to keep it level. He puts some newspapers on the hood to act as a table cloth then takes your order. Pretty soon lots of small dishes come from the general direction of the streetside BBQ and are placed on the hood of your car, serving as a picnic table. Quite a scene. Afterwards Chand challanged me with a beetlenut and beetle-leaf desert called Pan. It was all delicious.