Lehmann Family Picks -- 2008 Edition

Every year we send an email to our family sharing some of our favorite online movies and shorts from the past year. Last year I put the list online for all of my readers and it was a big hit. So, once again, I am sharing our top 10-ish hits! I do want to note that not all of these shorts premiered in the last year. There are actually a few picks on here that are several years old. However, they either didn't make the list last year because of space limitations, or because we simply only recently discovered them. We try to pick family friendly movies for our list, so assume it's safe for family viewing unless otherwise noted. Oh, and feel free to post in the comments and let me know which ones were your favorite.

• THE SAGA BEGINS - I love Weird Al Yankovich, and this song is incredible. Can't believe I never heard it until I stumbled on this video during a late-night YouTube junket. How Weird Al manages to tell the story of the first Star Wars movie using the song is amazing. And what is even more amazing is this filmmaker who did the whole thing using stop motion Legos (far surpasses Weird Al's own video which is kinda boring). I should mention that "American Pie" is one of my all time favorites song. Though I will also readily admit I've never seen the movie and have no desire to.



• ZOEY - Last year we featured another Apple Nikki pick, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star. Zoey is an amazing short utilizing Flash and 3-D animation. The song is great too. Our kids go around singing it, and I can honestly say I get it stuck in my head too! If you like this, be sure to check out "Starry Night" which is a super-short pick, but worth a watch.



• SPEED MONKEY - This is actually the continuation of the Code Monkey/WoW video we featured last year. There is some slight profanity in the song, so be warned.
  



• WIZARDS IN WINTER - HOUSE DISPLAY - This one has been going around the internet for years, but it is still worth another watch. Despite rumors, this was a real house that put on this display in 2004. Sadly, the display had to be taken down because it was causing traffic problems from people stopping to watch it. The music is fantastic, and I never tire of seeing the house light display. Honestly, it's amazing to me the 40th time watching it as the first. This is also the favorite of our autistic son.



• DON'T ANSWER ME - One of my favorite songs at the time it came out, and still a great example of the awesome storytelling of 80s videos. What is probably more amazing is the fact that this was done far before we had Flash Animation. In current days the cut-out comic affect would have been pretty easy to do. In those days you had to do it the hard way, which is really incredible.



• POLAR-OID - Great animation from Meredith Gran, a fellow webcomicker (that's how Jim found this pick). It's a great watch, with a bit of a twist. This video also led us to discover the site Songs to Wear Pants To.



• THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS TRAILER - LEGO - A shot-by-shot remake of The Dark Knight trailer done using lego. This is incredible to watch. What is more incredible is if you load up the original in another window and watch them side by side. This totally fed the geek in me. It was also a very last minute addition to the list--one my 13 year old daughter showed me literally as I was compiling our top-10! Here is the second trailer that was also made into Legos. You can see that the animation and sound quality are better in this one.



• CHAD VADER TRAINING VIDEOS - I have to admit that the next wave in this series is slipping a bit. These are not as funny as the original series, but still worth a watch. That said, I will admit that training video #4 is hysterical and had me ROFL. Chad Vader has quite a bit of profanity and really has a PG-13 rating, so keep that in mind. Episodes: 2 - 3 - 4 - 5



• ANDREA ROSE - WE WISH YOU A MERRY CHRISTMAS - Andrea Rose was featured on last year's list. This is actually a short that features Andrea and her brothers singing a Christmas song. It was created as a greeting card for the kids' father's company, Mudbubble. Cool name for a company, isn't it?



• POTTER PUPPET PALS - The name says it all. This is a short featuring puppets of the Harry Potter characters. This is the one titled "The Mysterious Ticking Noise." The people who do these have several out, but this is the one that pretty much anyone can enjoy, even if they are not familiar with the story and characters. Not to mention it's pretty catchy and funny.



• MONKEY NINJAS - An all-time favorite. We discovered Monkey Ninjas several years ago while having a birthday party for our kids at Chuck E. Cheese. We tracked down the website and have been avid fans ever since. Be sure to check out the site. There are 6 videos in all, but the site is currently going through a very cool renovation Only 2 videos are available, but the rest will be up again soon.



• THERE SHE IS - This is a video in Korean. The song is catchy and the story is really cute. This was just meant to be a one-time movie from the creator, but it was so popular that he created several more and turned it into a serialized story. Episode/Step 1 and Step 2 make our list this year. Step 2 is great and has a catchy song too!

Pixelating

Well, as the title of this blog says, I love pushing pixels. That means, I love pixel-art. Pixel art is different than traditional art in the fact that it truly is a series of dots. Drawing with a pen is actually more forgiving than pixel art. Particular working in a small area. In a drawn picture, if there is a slight imperfection, it's rarely notice. In pixel art, one "dot" off can actually be a significant thing to a picture.

Most of the art in Bitmap World is original art, but not all of it. As I readily admit, we utilize sprites and other pixel art from various source. There is nothing I love more than to sit on site, drooling over the pixelated masterpieces of others.

Here are a couple of examples of some of the art that I encounter when I am on my pixel-watching journies. These were not made by me, but this kind of work certainly stands as a great inspiration to me.





I often laugh to Jim that I kinda hate going to look for a particular picture to use for the strip, as I usually end up spending hours gazing at the wonderful graphics (most which I could never work into BMW).

I was working on 2 strips today, both of which needed new art. Meaning, I didn't have any pre-existing sets or sprites to use. I needed to create a high school theater, including the stage, the seating, and the entryway. I do take a minimalist attitude for a majority of the strip. Much of this has to do with my history in community theater. My husband and I owned a theater company, and we produced plays that had some pretty impressive sets, and we also did plays where literally there was a couch, a table, and a chair, and the acting was center stage. Believe it or not, we got more compliments about the minimalist sets.

I did want to do something a little more dramatic for the stage, since it would be the centerpiece for this storyline and would be used in several strips. I will readily admit that the stage was a graphic I found, but which I had to heavily modify. I love the shading and depth that many of the pixel artists put in their work, but as I have mentioned before, particularly in Bitmap World, the spaces are so small that sometimes that kind of detail actually takes away from the art. So, often times I need to "dumb down" a picture. The seating was all my original art. After all of that, I truly just didn't feel inspired about how the entry to the auditorium should look, so I went surfing for inspiration.

I often talk about editing pixel art, and when I was creating the entryway I thought it would be a good way to illustrate what I do. Most art I find is wonderful, but very little is perfect for the strip. A big part of that is perspective. Most pixel-art and makers create scenes from an angel. Our comic is "shot" from a frontward perspective. Even when I do use an angled item, it is not nearly as exaggerated, but a subtle slant.

After poking around, I found this door that gave me an idea of how the entryway should look. The color was wrong, but that was a small detail. The more prominent problem was that it was way too big. The smilies I work with would be drown next to it. Here, see for yourself...

Also, it is at much too steep of an angle. So, I had to modify it accordingly. It meant cutting it down, altering the angle, and cleaning up the coloring. Granted, not really that hard, but work nonetheless. Of course, some would argue that I could have easily drawn it myself, and they are right. But, at this particular moment, it was quicker to do it this way. I also like doing this, as it helps keep my skills sharp. As with most things, those kind of exercises make me a better artist, and my original art ends up being better as a result.

Here is the original with the finish product:



Again, they look similar, but it *is* different, and my version fits into my comic, where the other really wouldn't. Cool, eh? Granted, I probably could just use the other one if I wanted to, and I know some people who do. But I have a particular way I want my strip to look, so I try my best to create or modify art so it works.

Now, again I want to stress that I am in no way saying pixel art is harder than drawn art. I think the bottom line is that certain people have talent in one or the other (though I do know some wonderful artists that can do both). There are just particular challenges to drawing in this fashion.