Friday, August 06, 2010

Ray Harryhausen and Chuck Jones exhibitions closing soon

Just a reminder for those in L.A. the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has a special exhibit on Ray Harryhausen that opened in May and will be closing Aug 22.  Free.
More info on the exhibit here.

If you don't know, Ray Harryhausen was the master of stop motion visual effects and worked on many films including Jason and the Argonauts and Seventh Voyage of Sinbad among others.
He inspired most of my generation of vfx artists to do what we do. (and Peter Jackson and other filmmakers)  Sony Imageworks recently named a theater after him and many of his films are being released on Blu-ray.  There was a large birthday party for Ray a few months ago.

The exhibition has quite a number of the stop motion models on display along with artwork, video from the films, interviews with and about Ray.   If you want to see some beautiful models and fantastic artwork, check it out.

While you're there be sure to check out the Chuck Jones exhibition that is going on at the same time in the same building (2 different floors).  Plenty of great artwork and sections from scripts.  If you don't know Chuck Jones he was the mastermind of many of the Warner Bros. cartoons - Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, Wile E. Coyote, Elmer Fudd, etc.  More info here.

If you're in visual effects you really need to make sure you're up on film history and the artists that created it.  Even with the newer tools we have today we can still learn a lot about the actual artistry from these artists and apply them to our own work.

Below are a few of the books and videos but there are plenty more.


 


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