Got an email from Ian Timothy yesterday. If you don’t recognize the name he’s the young man from Kentucky who brought us the Beaver Creek Series. After a highschool of successes, he’s just moved into his dorm at CalArts for the animation education of his dreams. He said they had encouraged him to bring personal items so he sent me a pictures of these.
Just got to CalArts. The paper said to bring ‘personal decor’ and now I am all set up and decorated!
Excellent! Although I’m thinking someone needs a castor canadensis care package. That black beaver looks a lot like a bear! Ian we wish you ALL the luck in the world, and I know for a fact you will need none of it. His face book page has a blow by blow of his parents checking on his flight to California last weekend. With a birthday celebration that must make him 19? Good lord, I can’t imagine. The world can’t wait for what he’s bringing to the ‘design’ table. In fact they’re so eager that his most recent film, Raptor Blues which he did for our friends at Raptors Are the Solution, is heading to Amsterdam for the animated film festival called “KLIK”. His first overseas success! He posted a picture of the creatures he made for that smart film and it turns out he had to make the rats in two scales, large for closeup and tiny for scenes with the birds.
Well Ian, when you get famous(er) don’t forget the little beavers of the world. I’d hoping to see a Pixar production on our Water saving friends soon! If Mickey Mouse got famous, why not Benny Beaver?
For a fully animated morning, check out this fun article on Andrew Grantham who was the voice behind the ‘talking beaver on the highway’ among other things. Mind you it was a Russian gentleman who shot the footage, and we’ve exchanged emails and he sent me stills about the event. He promised me that he made sure the beaver got across the road safely, and he got bit in the process by one scared disperser. But he lived and it was Andrew who adopted it to his own creative talent.
The name Andrew Grantham might not ring a bell, but you have likely viewed, delighted at, and shared his work online. He is the guy behind the Talking Animals channel on YouTube, home to viral videos like Ultimate Dog Tease (you know, the one with the pup who asks: “covered it with what?”); Re: Cats Talking, Translation, which lets us in on an illuminating conversation between two TV-watching felines; and the self-explanatory Talking Beaver on the Highway.
Oh and one more treat this morning from our friend Greg Kerekes who’s keeping an eye on the beavers in San Jose.
Good Luck Ian! And Mom and Dad, who must be having strange empty places around their house right about now. Maybe we should send you a bottle of beaver wine so you can toast the first leg of a job well done and start to relax into the new normal.
