Killara

When our daughter started to crawl she used to marvel at the colourful parrots on the eucalyptus branches in our backyard in Killara, Australia

My Lego Friends in Incredible India

Two years ago I spent a couple of month drawing and supervising the storyboards for an original LEGO friends movie (which is coming out on DVD in the US today). During that summer the project brought me to London in the UK and Mumbai, India. London actually seemed to me much more crowded and busier than Mumbai.

We had a small Preproduction Crew over in Mumbai, where we did the first draft of the movie. Looking at the trailer I can see that a few of the early shots have made it, although lots of the story changed (you can see the trailer here http://bit.ly/1P2mrxI )

I also got to see a tiny bit of the surroundings and culture while I was there despite being in Mumbai during the monsoon season.  I will never forget all the happy faces walking through the rain.

On my last day the in-house story-board crew gave me a this framed picture. It shows my indian Lego friends. Very cool!!!  We had a great little crew over there. And there were many more artists and story-boarders helping out also during the tight preproduction schedule. Thanks again for all your hard work and hope to see you again soon!

Spring

we had a last hailstorm last sunday here in northern germany. finally time to loose the snowflakes in the blog header.  It took me quite a while to get back to my birthplace Munich where I have been spending the past months working on an animated feature about knights and castles. I took the opportunity to visit some real castles also while I was there ; like the stunning  castle neuschwanstein.

I had a great time in Munich and looking forward to spending some more time there. But first I will be back to Augsburg next week teaching storyboarding for a few days. see you there.

Pain Frites

....December already. Snow and freezing temperatures. Finally done with my travels for this year and hoping to squeeze in some personal work before the year is over. Not looking too promising though for the lack of spare time. On my last day in Brussels I stood in line for 30minutes to buy some frites. A friend from Vancouver recommended the stand (Thanks Michael!). I had to get the "pain frites" and as you can see even took a picture. You, who have met me, probably remember that I am no huge fan of the potato. I survived  2 years in Dublin where even the chinese take out served chips with their meals and tried eating french fries with chop sticks in Korea. Back in Sydney, our belgien friend Cris was always talking about  "crusty cross bread". Finally I know what she was talking about. Great baguette (even without frites)!

Next posts. back with some drawings and less talking :)

floating along

I was not only working, but also enjoying myself lately. Sorry for the lack in posting. I took the weekend and, among other things, finally floated in the Dead Sea and visited Masada. A memorizing experience and just wishing my family would have been here with me.

During times of an economic crises it seems to be good to invest into animated films when you chack out last weeks US box office success of Madagascar.

Short North Koreans

While watching the first Presidential Debate on you tube I took notice of this stunning argument Senator McCain had about why the North Korean Regime is evil. I could be wrong, but now I am almost certain that he will be the next American President (even though he is shorter than Obama).

Mornings

I just realized that I did not have to use an alarm clock for quite some time now. Usually my kids would wake me up, or my dogs. Far away from home I have a whole battery of noise that currently takes care of waking me up very early. Around 5.30 there is usually the garbage truck or the street cleaning car (as pictured) taking turns. At 6.00 the grocery store downstairs will start his truck to go to the market right underneath my window. After that it will be a concert of cars using their horns to the full extend to get to one of the 3 daycare centers and 1 school, which are right opposite my window. On the odd day the neighbors dog is barking all night or some of the countless cats are having a fight ( I swear I have not ever seen as many stray cats as around here).
But I have to admit that the sunrises are truly magnificent here in Jerusalem.

Bomb Shelter

Yes, so I sleep in a bomb shelter. Could come in handy.
But I still can`t get a life insurance that would cover me in Israel.

While Looking At German Real Estate...

The English must have a toaster for bread, most asian countries at least one rice cooker and the germans love to own a bread slicing mashine (the more advanced models are able to slice ham and sausage too...remember that "Seinfeld" episode "The Slicer"?)

Having not been back to Germany for quite some time the memory took us by surprise. I remember having one while growing up and the constant reminder from my parents : Dont`t ever touch it and watch your fingers!

Double Toby

This was quite an ackward moment, because we both did not realize the other persons name at first...and really, I have not met that many people with my first name.

sorry for the lack of posting lately, life has taken over for the moment.

Sushi

But great fish and cuisine they had! Even though I have to say that I would hate to be a squid in Korea. They seem to be used in almost every second dish. ;)

Simple Descending Life Line

I gave up counting the different hotel rooms I have been living in, but this is the first one, that requires me to squeeze through a tiny window and jump off the window, trusting this who-knows-how-old-rope to catch me in time, before hitting the litter filled piece of back lot from the 9th floor. Just the other night the alarm went off a few times during the night and I almost feared I would be time to test my climbing and abseiling skills ( learned in the beautiful mountains of Arizona years ago). But nothing happened, except for me to loose my sleep.

Power Center

After a few days in GwangJu one of the talented animators came up to me with an exited question about Power Centers. It took me a minute to understand that he wanted me to explain, what Power Centers work in acting and especially applied to character animation. Unfortunately our translator was away for the day and we did not get very far to say the least....(We had Ed Hook giving a lecture on this a few years back at Disney and he has a chapter in his book "acting for animators" about this)

Floor Heating

No scanner yet, but my digital camera...I guess that will do for the time being. Floor heating is such a great thing, especially in winter and when you sit on the floor while eating. Works well for sleeping on the floor on these thin pads they have here, unless you forget to turn down the temperature. It took a few hours before I could get back to sleep and cool down again.

Noooooooooooooo! Just plain old text. Well, I am back in Seoul and I am still on the lookout for a scanner (only a matter of time). Meanwhile I wanted to share this link with you about

Chinese Culture vs German Culture

Of course I am not in China (and do not want to comment on the terrible things that are happening there at the moment) and maybe I am not the perfect representative for German culture, but do have a look!

And thanks for stopping by everyone. Its great to be connected to all other parts of the world.

What Is A Director

I realize that this is a tricky one. We had a translator helping out the other day who had never worked in the film industry before. H e went through a very steep learning curve during that first day...and so did I. Little did I know that there are a few different ways, of how you could translate this into Korean, but it was the least I expected at that very moment.
And I must add my admiration to my translators. It is such a exhausting job to translate all day in a business where it is difficult to find the right words in even one language.

Chop Stick Chips

Maybe this is the most normal  thing in the world - but it did seem extremely odd to me, when a korean colleague of mine and I went out for a beer and we ate the chips ( = french fries in some parts of the world) with chop sticks. It is surprisingly easy and makes total sense...e.g. no grease on your fingers... and I will never forget this moment!

A-Ju Jo-a

Who would have ever thought that language
is such a difficult thing to learn. After years of learning the subtleties of
English (with more or less rate of success) I now have to adjust to a completely different set of language skills, working with translators. Its is so true, learning never stops.

Scooter

I thought I make this post a little bit more colorful.
The pink is a little bit much. But the last days we were covered in "the asian dust ".
Not so much fun for breathing. Nevertheless I am shocking everybody with my little red scooter. Some merchants at the market already wave to me when they see me scooting along. Here comes the crazy German!

40 Minutes

to be fair, the book is called "Yes you can learn the Korean language structure in 40 minutes". 2 days later I can say that I have a brief understanding. What can I say, I am a slow learner when it comes to languages.