Future works

After "The Secret of Kells" received so much support from it's audience and critics alike, it was clear that the world was eager for more. They already have a second feature film in production, called "The Song of the Sea". Not much has been said about this film yet, but a conceptual trailer tells us that it will be made in a style resembling "The Secret of Kells".

The little girl is described as "the last of the seal-people", and when her mother one day disappears, it makes her life quite difficult. "Song of the Sea" will premiere in april 2014.

They also have another feature film in development called "Bluebeard". Very little is known about this production, other than it will be directed by Nora Twomey. 

A conceptual picture from the film "bluebeard". It seems the style in this production might be darker and more sinister, maybe like Nora Twomey's short "From Darkness".

Another big project coming from the studio is their animated TV-series "Puffins Rock", which is aimed towards preschool-children. This too is set on an island off the coast of ireland. With help from Dog Ears and Penguin, the series will be turned into both a TV-series, a book and an iphone-app. Not much is known about the series yet, but pictures and concept art has been published:

The story follows a family of Puffins, with main focus on a little puffin called Oona.

Another TV-series is in development, like "Galaxy Boyz"which is aimed towards a bit older audience.

The storyline for this series is as follows; Holly rescues an alien boy band on the run from the Secret service. She tries to keep them hidden, but these boys love to sing loudly, rescue kittens from trees and go shopping for white clothes. So, this might be one of the studio's more humoristic productions, maybe more along the lines of "Skunk Fu!".

These are just their biggest future plans, and there might possibly be more feature films in the making. Since "The Secret of Kells" was such a different and artist-driven film, the studio had some trouble finding distributors brave enough to take them under their wing. Hopefully the success it had will help future projects get distributors more easily. 

Cartoon Saloon is one of those few studios today who want to keep traditional, hand-made 2D-animation with all it's energy and charm alive, while still making it new. 

As a review written by a mother, found on their website says: 'My son (6) and I went to see this movie today. It was a great relief for me not to be watching the usual computer generated animation of children films. The Images were beautiful and the story held both of our interest as well as providing for interesting future discussions.' 

Information sources:
http://www.cartoonsaloon.ie/category/tv/
http://www.cartoonsaloon.ie/category/filmfeatures/

Video sources:
http://youtu.be/Y2aDh05nqMI

Picture sources:
http://www.cartoonsaloon.ie/category/designs/

http://www.cartoonsaloon.ie/category/tv/
http://www.cartoonsaloon.ie/category/filmfeatures/

The First Main Feature Film

Ten years after the studio had been founded, they finally reached their main goal, creating their very first main feature film. "The Secret of Kells" premiered in the Berlin film festival february 8th in 2009. It was very well received, it has received an average of 7.5/10 on IMDB, with the selected Top Critics giving it 88%. Later the same year, it was nominated in the category of best animated feature in the academy awards.

The movie is based on irish folklore, with main focus on The Book of Kells, an illuminated manuscript gospel book. In this clip from the movie, you meet the main character, an orphan called Brendan, who has been forbidden by his uncle to go into the forest. Yet he eventually ventures into it to find some special berries to make ink for the book of Kells. He then meets Aisling, a forest-spirit. Although she is sceptical, she agrees to help, and shows him her forest. The influence of traditional celtic art is clearly apparent:

The story itself seems very real, with relatable and charming characters. One might feel that some parts of the story is somewhat vague, the ending could have been better strung out, and you don't really learn why the book is so important. However this is the only lacking part of the film. The characters and the world they live in is so complete and believable, and even though the style is intentionally flat (like in a medieval illustration), their existence and story is by no means one-dimensional. 

The characters are constantly surrounded by exquisite details, often you can see spirals and intricate patterns, often laced, which irish art is well known for.  

Their world may be flat, but that does not take away the energy and force from the animation.

Although the style is simple, through colours, lighting, shapes and contrast the film is a collage of a wide range of moods and strong emotions. In this screenshot, we see the villagers of Kells flee in terror from the vikings, who are the main villain in the film.

Director Tomm Moore and his friends started development already in 1999, inspired by Richard Williams' "The Thief and the Cobbler" and Disney's "Mulan". They where both films that used the respective traditional art as a basis for their style. They decided to do something like it with irish art. Another inspiration outside medieval art came from Genndy Tartakovsky's "Samurai Jack", who uses multiple international sources of inspiration.

A screenshot from Richard Williams' still unfinished piece "The Thief and the Cobbler"

Walt Disney's "Mulan"took their inspiration from traditional chinese art.

Although based on traditional japanese folklore, "Samurai Jack" has created a new modern, almost futuristic look, and blended well.

A big part of irish culture is their traditional folksongs. And what would a film which is so well-rooted in irish history as "The Secret of Kells" be without music with an irish feel to it? In this final clip, Brendan is locked inside the tower, and needs Aisling's help getting out. With the help of the cat Panger Baum and with a lullaby-like song, this scene is one of the most magic and memorable scenes in the movie:

Information sources: 

http://www.cartoonsaloon.ie/2009/06/feature-film-the-secret-of-kells/

http://www.awn.com/articles/2d/secret-kells-what-remarkable-animated-feature/page/1%2C1

Video sources:

http://youtu.be/Q7m1E0l-SZg

http://youtu.be/xFhd8RfCqVg

Picture sources:

http://www.cartoonsaloon.ie/2009/06/feature-film-the-secret-of-kells/

http://www.impawards.com/1998/mulan_ver1_xlg.html

http://veryaware.com/2010/07/terrible-thursday-the-thief-and-the-cobbler/theif_cobbler/

http://www.comicvine.com/myvine/deadcool/all-images/108-304719/1300594725638/105-1764148/

Tv-series, ads and other work

In an interview in with Tomm Moore in 2009 at the Invest Kilkenny launch, he claimed that their main aim was to produce a main feature film. However since that is expensive and a painstakingly long process, they adapted the work-process of "doing work for other people while trying to develop and create your own projects."
So the studio did a lot of work creating advertisements and doing services for other companies. They have worked with Disney, Cartoon Network, TG4, CBBC and many more so far, and have this way expanded their economy and their work-force little by little, enough to eventually create their first feature.

One of their first personal works that were more than a short film, was their animated tv-series "Skunk-Fu!" which first aired on Cartoon network in 2007. It's not nearly as artistic and sophisticated as their other work, but as it's aimed towards a young audience, it is suitably charming, humouristic and simplistic. So far there are 26 episodes, each being 13 minutes long.

Skunk Fu! - promotional trailer from the Cartoon Saloon's official website

Their most recent series is the "Anam An Amhráin"-series, where 12 old irish song are reworked and animated. The songs are made in different styles, so the mood changes with the style of the song.

Here are three examples from this series:

"Poc ar Buille" has the typical Cartoon Saloon-style, with a humoristic story along with colourful and cheery art.

This one, called "Cailleach an Airgid" is darker and more sinister, yet has the typical shape-inspired stylization. The black-and-white with the crosshatching and patterns resembles illustrations from old folklore-books. 

(Sorry about the watermark. It's possible to skip the first half, as most of the animation is repeated in the second half.)

This one, called "Bean Phaidin" is more like the first one, colourful and cheery. This is also possibly the one work from Cartoon Saloon that most resembles the classical Disney-style. 

They have also produced adverts for a range of different companies like: Invest N. Ireland, Cadbury, Tom Tom, Dept Environment, SEAI and many others. In some of these we see very differenet styles of animation, for example in this one for TomTom:

Or in this one, for Recruit Ireland: 

Although they have different styles, some of the humour, body-language and animation carry resemblance to their better known works. 

Making illustrations and designs for different companies and occasions is another important part of their work. A quick look on such works can be seen here: 

Like most companies, Cartoon Saloon had to start small, and work theur way up. Luckily for them, they have been quite successful on their way, and really made a wide range of very different and impressive works. 

Skunk Fu!-sources:

http://www.cartoonsaloon.ie/2009/06/tv-series-skunk-fu/

Anam an Amhráin-sources:

http://youtu.be/-KsMIJAn5PM

http://youtu.be/sAE-8SGYgrs

http://youtu.be/tTOSx7W1wOQ

http://www.cartoonsaloon.ie/2009/12/tv-series-siog-na-ran/

Advertisement-sources:

http://youtu.be/Ede4SBtRjJU

http://youtu.be/NumFH4eJkDk

Illustrations: 

http://www.cartoonsaloon.ie/category/illustration/

Short films

"From Darkness" was produced in 2002 and Directed by Nora Twomey, and is probably the Cartoon Saloons earliest notable work. The story is based on an inuit folklore about a skeleton woman, with a cruel, sad backstory. The short itself is downright horror-like to begin with, but with a truly touching ending. The short was screened at many international film festivals, and received four awards.

We can see already in this early short, the simplistic, shape-based stylization that we now know from their more recent works. One can tell from this short that the makers are dedicated to both storytelling and animation, and they are not scared to step out of the mild and child-friendly box that cartoons often are put into. 

Later, the studio would continue to look to european folklore to find inspiration for their stories and designs. They do this with much grace, and the environments and people they recreate from history often end up being very believable and makes the products much deeper. 

The characters personality is reflected in their design, the man is made up of sharp and strong square shapes, the girl of soft, gentle curves.

The design suggests that the skeleton is dangerous and maybe even evil, yet it's body-language tells you it's curious and careful.

This short does not have as complex backgrounds as later works, but they still bring in a clear temperature and mood into the animation.

"Cúilín Dualach" from 2004, also directed my Nora Twomey, is much more light-footed and humorous. Based on a short story by Jackie Mac Donacha, it's about a boy who is born with his head facing backwards. This won a couple more awards than "from darkness", but is also longer and had a larger crew working on it.

(This is just a promotional trailer, you can see the full short here: http://www.cartoonsaloon.ie/2009/06/short-films-cuilin-dualach/ )

This short has a more playful and experimental style to go with the story, but the clean lines and the expressive animation is still recognizable. The irish folk-music goes well with the story and adds to the story, and even if you don't understand the language, the visuals makes it easy to follow the story.

Screencaps:

The characterization makes it easy to read the mood and personality of the different characters.

Simple, yet effective and imaginative humour.

The characters wearing glasses have realistic eyes, which is an entertaining feature. The style isn't as simplified here as in their other works, which allows for more emphasised movement and expression.

"Old fangs" was directed by Adrien Merigeau's in 2009, and was his first short as a member of the Cartoon Saloon. It is still having great success in film-festivals, and has also received a number of awards. The mood is different in this short, not as expressive and obvious as their other works, but more subtle and even more abstract in it's stylization. However that doesn't make it less powerful. 

The family-themed storyline is thoughtprovoking, heartbreaking and mysterious, and the beautiful, atmospheric artwork enhances the experience greatly. The music, which often tells half the story, is what is making this so different. The weak-voiced, almost monotone voice-acting is what's making the characters deeper and more life-like. It's easy to tell from this that the makers have become even more self-confident and their work more sophisticated.

Screencaps:

The scenery is loaded with beautiful lighting, colours, patterns and textures.

Contrast and a flat perspective makes it more surreal. 

Symbolism also plays a big role in telling the story.

The characters are often based on shapes, round, sharp, square, and it makes them easy to recognize. The three boys are clearly not like the big, scary wolf-dad, but one can still see that he could be the father of the wolf-boy.

"From Darkness" sources:

http://youtu.be/e1H_Nc2hDkE

http://www.cartoonsaloon.ie/2009/06/short-films-from-darkness/

http://nora-twomey.com/category/short-films/

"Gúilín Dualach" sources:

http://youtu.be/G3WpOvvAPgQ

http://www.cartoonsaloon.ie/2009/06/short-films-cuilin-dualach/

http://nora-twomey.com/category/short-films/

"Old Fangs" sources:

http://youtu.be/e1H_Nc2hDkE

http://www.cartoonsaloon.ie/2009/09/short-films/

Introduction

In 1999, Tomm Moore and Paul Young was studying animation at Ballyfermot senior College, Dublin. They started an informal partnership, and when Nora Twomey joined not long after, the foundation of the Cartoon Saloon studio was set.

The founding members of Cartoon Saloon, Tomm Moore, Paul Young and Nora Twomey

Since then, the studio have grown into a multiaward-winning studio, producing anything from feature-length films to illustrated books. Their work has earned a reputation of being beautiful, imaginative and carefully thought through, with designs that are simplistic, but yet eye-catching, energetic and expressive. The most notable production of theirs is their mammoth-project "The Secret Of Kells", a 75 minute, fully 2D-animated film, which was nominated in the category of best animated feature in the academy awards 2009.
In this blog, we will look at the works of this studio, from their earliest shorts, to their feature films. What did they do to earn such a good reputation, and has it had any effect on the animation industry?

Picture sources: 
http://www.heanet.ie/conferences/2009/speakers.php
http://www.cartoonsaloon.ie/services/directors/
Text sources:

http://www.cartoonsaloon.ie/about/

http://www.cartoonsaloon.ie/services/directors/

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0485601/