So on one fateful day last may, two of the worlds greats came together to create one of the most absolutely spectacular half hours of television ever created. These two greats are The Simpsons, and LEGO, and they bestowed upon us the masterpiece that is "Brick Like Me". This is the LEGO episode and the 550th episode of The Simpsons.
The episode is set in the idealistic and basically perfect world that is the LEGO universe. All is well until Homer starts to see visions of his other life back in the Springfield that we all know and love. Throughout the episode more and more of his old life leaks into his new one in the LEGO world, and in the end, he must decide to stay in this new near perfect brick world, or to return to his old 2D classic world.
This episode took two year to get on air, and took over twice as long as a normal episode would to make. I would say that it was definitely well worth the wait! This episode is so beautifully crafted it almost hurts. The LEGO version of Springfield is so bright and brilliant, but still has the hilarious vibe of the Springfield we've know for over 500 episodes. It also added some new comedy to the show when dealing with things that only LEGO people have to deal with; like the water,
and being able to mix the two kinds of animation that LEGO and The Simpsons both are giants in.
From animation, to story, this episode is absolutely brilliant, and I loved watching it on its premiere last summer, as well as over and over again after that. 10/10 would recommend
The longest running American sitcom and longest running animated show, The Simpsons has still got creative juice left. While many viewers believe that the show has lost it's steam years ago, the show (now in it's 26th season) paid some fan service last week during there annual Halloween episode. The family morphed into some of the most classic animated characters of days past. Take a look at it below.
From minions, to adventure time, to kids from South Park they really brought out all the animation stops! Regardless of how you currently view the quality of the Simpsons, this is definitely a cool little ode to the best of the best in the world of animation.
Looking at some of the title sequence tutorials on videocopilot.net had me thinking of the art of the title sequence in general, especially because I know we're going to have to make one soon for class. I YouTube'd "best title sequence" and came up with this video. This guy sums up pretty well some of the best TV title sequences we've seen:
I agreed with a lot of what he had to say. Mad Men, Dexter, Fresh Prince, The Simpsons, etc. all have title sequences I would call "iconic". They take the quality and creativity of title sequences in TV to another level. Fresh Prince does it mostly through catchy music, but how can anybody deny a title sequence where almost everybody knows the lyrics to it's song front-to-back.
Mad Men in particular is a fantastic example of how a title sequence can use motion graphics and animation to display themes of the show beautifully. This video I found does a great job explaining just how much of Mad Men's themes are telegraphed in the intro:
although i tend to post about a current event or something from class, this week I am deciding to write about the Simpsons. I know that the show is created by designers, drawing out each and every frame of an episode; yet this process of digitally animating and creating the on-screen image is a lengthy process, at least according to Wikipedia (ha)!
i think the most interesting part of the now 23-year, 500+ episode series is that the style of animation -- the characters, storyline, sound FX, props, background layouts, timing, etc -- has stayed the same over the years. the characters never seem to age, never grow older, and never leave the original lifestyle -- obviously, if something drastic were to happen to any of the main characters, the whole premise of the show would change.
this video is, supposedly, the first ever episode of the series
now, this link is the most recent episode (from Feb 19). I could not find it out YouTube, therefore it is only a link -- not embedded. as we can see, there is not TOO MUCH that has changed in the series -- besides the voices (very slightly), opening intro (which includes various past episode clips and changes each week) and the HD-ness (from 1989 through 2009, it was 4:3 SD format), nothing has really changed.
lastly, this clip is of the producers and directors and characters speaking about their surprises, reactions, comments, and thoughts on the show -- from the past 23 years and 500 episodes
I thought i would go ahead and post my first project. I used the arrested development title sequence and changed the characters to those of the simpsons. For some reason when i uploaded it to the blog the sound quality wasn't as good as on my computer...not sure why..
It was just released yesterday that negotiations between the voice actors and studio of Fox's longest running, prime-time comedy, The Simpsons, had come to an end after a week of major discrepancies that led the public to believe the hit show was abruptly going to end. The actors were asked to take a 45% pay-cut and in response, claimed they could take a smaller pay-cut if they could have a share of the show's considerable profits. However, a deal was made and everyone's favorite dysfunctional family will be back for not one, but two more seasons.
This news got me thinking, if The Simpsons has been on the air for 23 seasons (and I don't watch the show enough to really take notice), the quality of Matt Groening's original animation must have changed drastically over the years. It wasn't until I looked up The Simpsons 1987 until I realized just how much the show has improved since its creation:
I also found this chart, that not only shows the improvement in the design, but also outlines the character development everyone but Maggie has gone through since the shows beginning.
Finally, I found this video that is seemingly unrelated, however I found it to be pretty interesting, not only because it offers an insight into Homer's life before his family (that we very rarely get a glimpse of on the show) but because I think it would be fun to make in after effects. I couldn't embed it without it telling me I had to download Adobe Flash, so I just put it up as a link.
