Pitch
The quintessential independent animator will tell you "How To Make It On Your Own".
He hand-painted 30'000 cells all by himself to make his first feature-length animated cartoon, THE TUNE (1992). For his second, I MARRIED A STRANGE PERSON! (1997), a budget of 200'000 $ allowed to hire some helping hands. With MUTANT ALIENS (2001), the staff grew to 20 or 25. While doing his fourth, HAIR HIGH (just released), you could watch him at work via web-cam, in a kind of ‹Instant Making-of›.
Starting out with animated shorts in the mid-eighties, he hit an Oscar Nomination in 1988 with YOUR FACE, only his third attempt, and caught the attention of MTV, where his stuff went on heavy rotation. Winning prizes like mad at festivals the world over, he then decided to take on a new challenge and go for the features, all the while continuing to produce shorts, venture into web animation, and squeeze in a commercial here and there. (Never mind the two live-action features and the one-hour documentary, or his comic and illustration work for print...).
Who is this man who decided that this was what he wanted to do when seeing DAFFY DUCK at the age of 4? Who, after two decades in the trade, has close to 40 films under his belt? Yet who, by no choice of his own, has remained fiercely independent, financing all his animated ventures out of his own pocket?
Meet Bill Plympton, considered by many to be the quintessential independent animator, and ask him everything you ever wanted to know about How To Make It On Your Own.
Starting out with animated shorts in the mid-eighties, he hit an Oscar Nomination in 1988 with YOUR FACE, only his third attempt, and caught the attention of MTV, where his stuff went on heavy rotation. Winning prizes like mad at festivals the world over, he then decided to take on a new challenge and go for the features, all the while continuing to produce shorts, venture into web animation, and squeeze in a commercial here and there. (Never mind the two live-action features and the one-hour documentary, or his comic and illustration work for print...).
Who is this man who decided that this was what he wanted to do when seeing DAFFY DUCK at the age of 4? Who, after two decades in the trade, has close to 40 films under his belt? Yet who, by no choice of his own, has remained fiercely independent, financing all his animated ventures out of his own pocket?
Meet Bill Plympton, considered by many to be the quintessential independent animator, and ask him everything you ever wanted to know about How To Make It On Your Own.
Guest
Bill Plympton
Born 1946 in Portland, Oregon/USA, he credits Oregon's rainy climate for nurturing his drawing skills and imagination. He studied art and graphic design, moved to New York in 1968, and served a long tenure as an illustrator and cartoonist for advertising and many publications. In 1983 he was approached to animate a film, Boomtown, and following its completion began to produce his own animated shorts.
Host
Rolf Bächler
Animation filmmaker and teacher
Bill Plympton
Born 1946 in Portland, Oregon/USA, he credits Oregon's rainy climate for nurturing his drawing skills and imagination. He studied art and graphic design, moved to New York in 1968, and served a long tenure as an illustrator and cartoonist for advertising and many publications. In 1983 he was approached to animate a film, Boomtown, and following its completion began to produce his own animated shorts.
Host
Rolf Bächler
Animation filmmaker and teacher
