On multiple occasions we have posted about the personal short film Leonardo, by Pixar story artist and director Jim Capobianco. After ten years in production on this pet project, the finished product has garnered numerous accolades and screenings at various festivals across the globe. [watch a trailer here]

With the recent DVD release of the film, Leonardo: The Complete Codex, and in conjunction with his upcoming appearance at the CTN Expo in Burbank this weekend, Jim was kind enough to send us a copy to check out. If you haven’t seen it yet, it’s a great short about Leonardo daVinci’s creative quest to explore his dream of flight. Animated traditionally on paper, the film takes inspiration from daVinci’s very own notebooks, complete with rough, and sometimes even unfinished, animation, timing and drawing notations, and subtle color variations of the parchment-like background. Through accurate depictions of flying inventions daVinci himself drew, we are treated to a number of gags, some of which have a Warner Bros. feel to them, as the film’s hero makes several failed attempts to test fly his inventions, and leads to a conclusion that often alters the lives of many great men, even today.

If you’re a fan of traditional animation, and collect DVDs for the sole purpose of checking out the DVD extras, then you don’t want to miss out on getting a copy of the film. In my opinion, it is what every DVD should come packaged with. Inside the well crafted packaging made from recycled materials and images from the film, you are treated to a bunch of cool extras, including 4 versions of the film with commentary at various stages in production, stills of preproduction sketches, as well as final designs, descriptions and facts about various inventions that can be seen throughout the film.

And if that weren’t enough, the DVD also comes with a blank notebook, Leonardo pencil, and a flipbook with an animation cycle of Leonardo flapping a pair of his homemade wings.

Jim will be screening the film and selling the DVD exclusively this weekend at the CTN Expo. You will be able to find him at booth T-49 and talking in Theater 3 at 1:30pm on Friday about making the film after hours and on the side from work at Pixar, as well as going through some of the things he learned while making the film. If you can’t make it this weekend, you will have to wait until Monday to order the film from Jim’s website.

And as promised on several occasions, we were able to catch up with Jim, and ask him a few questions about his career, the film, and his website, Aerial Contrivance Workshop, where you can find more information about his various side projects. Enjoy!

DAN: First off, tell us a little about yourself, and how you originally got into animation, and where you are now in your career.

JIM: I grew up at the other end of I-80 due east of San Francisco in a town called Saddle Brook, New Jersey, just a few exits from NYC. In high school, I took a class called Graphic Arts in which you made t-shirts, silk screen printing, photography etc. It was the class all the potheads attended to blow off school. Not being a pot head but an art nerd, I knew one of the assignments was animation and I wanted to do that assignment. Everyone else did paper cut-outs or clay but when the assignment came around I asked to do 2D, hand animation. My teacher, a wonderful guy named Mr. Schmaltz, didn’t know how to teach me that so he gave me a book and since I was the only kid who actually did anything in the class he just let me animate even after the assignment was due. In fact, since I didn’t finish it by the end of the year, when I took graphic arts 2, my senior year, he let me keep right on animating. So, I kind of created my own animation class in high school. Then I knew I had to do this thing. So I applied to Cal Arts and based probably on that still unfinished film I got in.

After I finished Your Friend the Rat in 2007 I decided I would finish one creative project a year from now until I’m too feeble to do anything but be a vegetable and catch up on all the TV I missed doing all this stuff. So In 2008, I directed Wall-E’s credits and even a little animation, How to be a Good Bagger, for a friend’s documentary called Ready, Set, Bag! I finished Leonardo in 2009, which, in fact, plays in front of Ready, Set, Bag!, and is probably the only documentary you’ll see that has a short in front of it.

These creative things I’m aiming to do may not all be films, so the public might not see everything. One year it may be a screenplay or a children’s book. But if I could make a film every year that would be pretty awesome. You know, I realized this when I watch my daughters grow in their first year of life that humans are programmed to do so much in that single year. You figure out that you have a hand, that it can go in your mouth and it will help your gums feel better. How to become mobile, crawl, maybe even walk and talk all in a year. This stuff is hard to figure out and takes tons of practice. And more importantly all of it is rewarding and an accomplishment. Then I thought about adults and how most don’t do anything in a year except complain and I thought, holy shit, if every adult accomplished just one amazing thing like learning to walk in a year what a better place this would be. You see we all have the potential.

DAN: Tell us about your website Aerial Contrivance Workshop.

JIM: Aerial Contrivance Workshop is a place I set aside to kind of play. It’s a virtual studio to showcase my outside work as well as friends (the Contrivers) and people we are interested in. Eventually, I would like it to be a gathering place for artists (animators, writers, filmmakers, cartoonists, photographers, musicians) to talk about the latest goings-on about their disciplines via the Libro di Bottega (the workbook). ACW promotes learning and cross pollination of ideas and I hope that a visitor to the site would get more out of the projects posted then just a trailer and some info (though that is what’s there now about Leonardo). Eventually they can get interconnected with scientists, intellectuals, teachers and artists revolving around a particular subject matter and learn more about the subject as well as filmmaking and creativity. It is very embryonic right now. It would be great if it generated an income or through the projects and properties it did but that isn’t important right now. I do hope to have a proper store on the site where you can buy original artwork and prints, t-shits, the films, whatever, but also some free stuff too. Right now there are some Leonardo-based activities for kids that parents can download.

DAN: What was the inspiration for creating a film about da Vinci?

JIM: Well I have always found people trying to fly with homemade wings funny and the dichotomy of reaching for something impossible wonderful – it is really the human character. It occurred to me I had never seen Leonardo da Vinci animated well or even running around trying to fly and I wanted to see that. And being in animation we have the unique opportunity to make what we want to see come alive and be reality.

DAN: The film has been in production since 1999, roughly. Can you break down the timeline of its production over the 10 years, from script to final?

JIM: Prior to 1999, I worked on the idea for maybe 3 or 4 years. Doodling, drawing up storyboards, thinking about it.
In 1999, on my 30th birthday, a wonderful guy, Chris Vallance, who worked at Pixar with me, told me he had just been promoted to assistant editor and he needed something to cut to learn the Avid. I told him I had something for him to cut, although, I really didn’t have it all at the time. But now I had an interested editor so I seized the opportunity and we worked after hours, some weekends and assembled the story reel. Which was a very immediate process. He would put together what I had and when something needed fixing or adjusting I would just draw it up and we would look at it right away. In about two months we put together a complete blueprint for the short that changed very little in 10 years. I planned everything in it. Every BG, every camera move I could even use the boards for my character layouts. This saved a whole lot of pain down the line. After the story reel was done I thought I would enlist a bunch of friends to animate it and be done in oh about a year. But only a couple of animators came through for me and a fellow by the name of Herriman Maynard, who thought he couldn’t animate, came along and animated about 75-80% of the thing.

DAN: Can you describe the process used to make this hand drawn short, and did the pipeline change, or evolve in any way as new techniques/software became available?

JIM: I was very thorough in organizing the thing and thinking about it like it was a real production, which is very important if you are going to take on such an enormous task. At first I had a hard time finding a pencil test system that was cheap enough and I would use a scanner and adobe premiere. This took forever. Eventually I found a pencil test system called Toki line tester from France. It saved my sanity. Incidentally we used it on Your Friend the Rat but the animators hated it so we moved to (Flipbook?). But I kept using Toki at home. Until they upgraded it and it literally killed my computer. But by then I had finished animation. After Effects played a major roll in the final assembly. And I would not have been able to finish the film before 2007 because I didn’t know the man pretty much responsible for finishing the film – Craig Foster before then. Craig, I met on YFtR and we became good friends. He designed and animated the Canadian Mountie bit, the American Revolution moment and some other scenes on YFtR. He jumped on to Leo and took on the Art Direction and composting of the entire film. And it lived with him. A film that I had complete control over for ten years in this last stage I had to rely on Craig to put together with After Effects because I don’t know the program like he does. And I ran him through the ringer asking for fixes and adjustments. So much so I felt I strained our friendship but we’re good now. I am definitely indebted to him.

DAN: I imagine over the past 10 years, your views and or perspective on the film has changed as far as its story direction. Does the finished film differ from the original script? If so, what were some of the obstacles that influenced the changes?

JIM: Nothing really changed in any big way. As Herriman animated it things changed slightly if it would help the flow. There is one series of shots of when Leo is going to jump off the cliff in his initial run. It was boarded slightly different, more static then what is animated. When it was animated, the shots, 4 of them, were animated straight ahead one right into the next in a week and they have a nice energy I think because of that. Only two animated shots where cut form the final film.

DAN: Was there a specific point where you finally decided to stop making changes to the story or design? If so, what helped you to move on and stay on course?

JIM: The storyreel. I worked that thing up until it played as good as I could hope the film would. It allowed me to show the film to anyone at anytime too and this was a huge source of positive reinforcement. People would watch it and really respond to it. This kept me going for ten years. I would also replace the boards with animation as it was finished so I could see the film getting done.

DAN: Was it difficult to stick to the original story?

JIM: Around year 5, I would play around with a scene here or there, restaging it or re-conceiving it. I think because I was getting slightly bored with the film. I would show my friend, Ronnie Del Carman, who was helping me with some art direction at the time, he would just give me a look and a shrug, and into the trash it would go. The change wasn’t necessarily better or worse it was just different. He kept reminding me to stick to my initial instincts.

DAN: How has working at Pixar influenced the production of Leonardo?

JIM: Of course it has. It’s all interrelated. I didn’t really think I could animate. The only time prior to making the short was at Cal Arts 10 years before and even then I never thought of myself as an animator. I figured I would get my animator friends to each animate a handful of scenes. As it turns out they weren’t as excited about animating at home and on the weekends when they had done it all day. So I started one scene, showed them to get a critique. These experienced animators then told me I could animate. So I did another and another and found I kind of liked it. I kept going or rather Herriman did and in the end animated 80% of the film. I think what had helped me develop as an animator between school and actually sitting down to actually animate was storyboarding. We basically work in clear storytelling poses when we storyboard Also structuring and planning the scene.

DAN: Now that it is finished, is there anything you wish you could change?

JIM: There are a lot of little things in the film I wish we had more time on or could go back into. Overall though I am happy with it, Leonardo is close to what I had in my head but also as reality it isn’t either. The short became it’s own being. You give birth to creative things like this but then environment and who they meet along the way shape them into the beings they become.

DAN: Your series of blog posts about the 10 things you learned in making a short film, you stressed the importance of making mistakes, and learning, along with a bunch of other helpful tips for aspiring filmmakers. Now that it’s all finished and you are beginning your next film , is there anything you would add to those 10 things you originally posted about that you hope to apply with the next film or pass on to other filmmakers?

JIM: Well for one I never realized how much work there is to do after making the film. Promoting the film is something you don’t learn in film school and it really takes a lot of pavement pounding and money. I probably spent more money after the film was finished then during making the film. With festival submissions, tape coasts, travel to the festivals, promotional materials like posters, postcards, etc.

Another thing is you realize how much junk is out there and getting shown in these festivals. So, if you can make something half decent you’ll get it seen.

Another thing I learned is that it is hard to get the next one started. Well for me it has been. Picking the thing to do, especially since you aren’t as naive about the time it will take anymore, it is daunting. If I go with this one it will take years then I won’t be able to do this one. It is hard. But I am getting there. Just got to pick it and do it. It always is just the doing of it that matters.

DAN: Who or what have been some of your major influences in your approach as a filmmaker?

JIM: I have this book called 101 Things They Never Taught You in Film School and in it they say, “Always approach your film as if you are 15 years old.” Meaning that like a 15 year old you would have tons of energy, you will blunder into it, make mistakes, you really don’t have any inhabitations. You are naive and full of possibilities. I really like reminding myself of that. We get so self-conscience of ourselves as creators and got to let that go.

I am very much influenced by artists who just get out there and do their thing for the sake of their art not just for themselves but to make something beautiful or moving to touch people. Like Jim Jarmush, Stanley Kubrick, Charlie Chaplin even Walt Disney. I truly believe we all have the right, the responsibility to bring something wonderful to the world. When we use or powers, so to speak, in a cheap way or untruthful way, when it isn’t about the creation but the driver is money or ego then we are committing a crime. There are a lot of crimes being committed out there.

Also, here’s some soundbites from Toy Story 3 director Lee Unkrich:

The animation community doesn’t seem to respect this DreamWorks Animation series in quite the same way, and I’d say the visual appeal, which is mediocre, and the abundance of what you might call “cheap” pop-culture gags combine to create that dischord. Plus, the 3rd movie was pretty awful, tallying a 44% on RottenTomatoes.com, further irritating the animation community. With Shrek Forever After releasing on May 21st, do you think it will live up to Mitchell’s lofty praise for the original, or will it fall into the sequel garbage heap?

Mike Mitchell

…and here’s a clip featuring Puss ‘n Boots and Shrek

Anyway, have a watch and learn why “South Park matters.”

Back in February, Lineboil highlighted this traditionally animated short currently in production by Dean Kalman Lennert. I loved the little bit that I saw online, and because Dean is a fellow NY’er, as well as that fact that I have a soft spot for almost anything traditionally animated, I thought it would be great to interview him about the film and share it with all of you.

Also, recently, I had the unique opportunity to see a full WIP of the film without sound, and with some rough animation, and it’s all coming together very nicely and on it’s way to becoming a beautiful film.

As a bonus, Dean was kind enough to share 2 exclusive clips from the film including a completed rough shot that was done by Stewart Shaw. So check them out and then continue on to read more about Dean’s film, Dear Anna Olson.

Shot 15

Shot 28

DAN FORGIONE: First off, tell us a little about yourself, and how you originally got into animation.

DEAN KALMAN LENNERT: I started working professionally in 1986 when a fellow stop-motion animator recommended me as a model fabricator for a Diet Slice commercial. By the end of that project, I had moved onto the animation team doing both stop-motion and 2-D effects. But I first got bitten by the animation bug at the age of 9 when I watched a segment on the PBS show Zoom about how to create your own cartoons using paper cut-outs and the family home-movie camera. I substituted some model dinosaurs for the cut-outs, made that first film and have been hooked ever since.

DAN: Can you give us a brief synopsis of the film, Dear Anna Olson?

DEAN: Dear Anna Olson is a parable of how small, positive actions can have profound impact on peoples’ well-being. In this film, Anna Olson is living in a nursing home. Lonely, she sends out notes tied to balloons. One of these notes travels from person to person, each of who are moved to share their stories. When the note returns to Anna her world is positively changed.

DAN: With over 20 years in animation working in a variety of styles and mediums (stop motion, traditional, CG), what challenges have you faced in adapting from one medium to the next?

DEAN: Aside from getting used to the different tools and work practices that each medium requires, there really weren’t too many immediate challenges in moving from one technique to another. The challenges usually occurred after I was acclimated to the new working environment and, as Murphy’s Law dictates, popped-up in the midst of a production. But I feel, that for any animator, this is where the real learning begins.

I remember during my time at J.J. Sedelmaier Productions having to adapt to the wide variety of drawing styles and techniques of some very well known illustrators doing design work for the studio. Whether it’s the intricate cross-hatching techniques of David Levine, the bold graphic line of Douglas Frazer, or even the looser style of Gary Baseman, you had to be able to place your work next to theirs and have J.J. not be able to tell the difference. And I’m not talking about just copying each illustrator’s work. You had to understand how they thought about and approached their art. And usually had about a half a day to master each style and then the animation would begin. It was one of the most valuable learning experiences of my career and helped to make me a very flexible animator very quickly.

DAN: With a wide variety of animation experiences under your belt, what experience most influenced your production process for this short?

DEAN: While this doesn’t actually come under the heading of production process, per se, I would have to say that, stop-motion’s ability to move in and around a space inspired how I thought about and designed many of the shots in this film. I really like to explore the z-axis in my hand-drawn work. And while this can be easily achieved with a variety of computer software, I feel that doing the work by hand brings a little something extra to these shots. Maybe the imperfection makes it more human?

DAN: When you first started the film, did you have any idea it would lead to asking for donations and financial support?

DEAN: It had always been my intension to seek outside funding to cover the production costs for the film and expected this money would come from arts grants. And while the production has received some support from this quarter, the vast majority of our funding, thus far, has come from many very generous individual donors.

DAN FORGIONE: How and when did you finally realize you would need to take this route?

DEAN: About four years ago I decided that, if I was ever going to finish this film in any reasonable amount of time, I would need to have a proper budget in order to hire extra help, pay for the supplies and professional services and, perhaps most importantly, free up my own time. At that point I had a pretty regular stream of freelance coming in and that left very little time for the film.

DAN: Despite higher costs and delays in production, you have stuck to your guns with more traditional methods of production. What is your approach to creating an animation budget?

DEAN: Start by generating a list of everything you think you’ll need for the production: crew, equipment, supplies, services, studio space, travel, insurance, legal fees, etc. Then begin contacting vendors and getting price quotes. I would typically call several vendors offering the same service to get a price range and average these to get my final figures. I would also use these opportunities to discuss the project and find out how to best prepare my work prior to delivery so that things will go as smoothly as possible on their end. These conversations often yield information about items and/or services that may have been overlooked in the initial budget outline.

The crew salaries were based on what I was getting paid as a freelancer. I chose to go with a footage-rate (X number of dollars for every 16 frames) for the animation and a per-piece-rate for the final production art rather than with a day or hourly rate. This helps to control overages, especially when your crew is working off-site, as all of mine are.

Very important: don’t be afraid to pay yourself a living wage! In my case I just needed enough to supplement my pay from teaching. However, I get the impression that many independent artists feel a little guilty when it comes to paying themselves a reasonable rate for doing their own work. To that I ask this question, would you work at a studio that wasn’t paying you enough to at least cover your basic living expenses? Probably not as that kind of distraction, and the imminent need to take on a second job (if you had any extra time to do so), would be completely counterproductive. Then why should you have that stress when working on your own production? Your salary must be included in the budget.

Dear Anna Olson’s budget has the start-up costs for the distribution launch figured in. This includes prints, screeners, festival fees, postage, publicity materials, travel expenses, etc. I also added in a 5% contingency fee to the total, because you never know… And finally, on top of all that, the 6% fiscal sponsor’s administrative fee to maintain our not-for-profit status. And that’s the whole budget “soup to nuts!”

DAN: What have been some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced in raising the money and justifying the budget to potential donors, other than the troubled economy?

DEAN: I’d have to say that the first big challenge I faced was just to keep myself from throwing-up at the idea of directly approaching people for money. When I decided to pursue this film as a full-time endeavor my producer, Jennifer Kirby, and I sat down to discuss how to best go about raising the cash for the budget. She pointed out that I would be more effective than she at raising the funds simply because potential donors want to meet directly with the artist instead of the perceived businessperson on the production. It took a little time (I almost blacked-out in the middle of Broadway & 26th Street in NYC on my way to asking for my first major donation) but I eventually got used to (I won’t say comfortable with) this new title of ‘fund-raiser’.

As for the budget, I have never had to justify that to potential donors. If they ever had any questions about it I would simply let them see the complete itemized budget and that seemed to put the issue to rest. The main thing is selling them on the idea of the film and why it should be made. The story-reel and my natural enthusiasm for this project usually helped in this regard.

But, without a doubt, the biggest challenge currently hampering our fund-raising efforts is the troubled economy. And while we’re always keeping an eye out for those larger contributions, the new strategy is securing a lot of smaller donations. When my first television interview promoting the film cleared 1,000 views on YouTube I couldn’t help but post “If each of those people (watching the clip) just made a $40 donation I’d have the rest of the animation budget taken care of! Perhaps one of the toughest challenges I face as a fund-raiser isn’t so much trying to secure that large individual contribution but convincing the vast majority of people, whose gifts may be more modest, that their support is just as important.”

DAN: How has the above influenced the production in terms of getting animators to help out on the film?

DEAN: Having a budget and being able to pay people is a good incentive for getting them interested in the project. And now, with the economy so bad, I have more artists who are available and willing to work than the budget can handle.

DAN: In regards to the film’s style and design, what was your biggest source of inspiration when you started?

DEAN: When I started the project animators like Paul Driessen, Caroline Leaf, the Hubleys, Bill Plympton, Richard Condie, John Canemaker, were all influencing the look of the film in one way or another. But it wasn’t until I saw Frederic Back’s film CRAC! that it all started to gel. Then I saw a bootleg copy Richard Williams’ The Thief and the Cobbler and really went nuts over how far the principles of hand-drawn animation could be pushed.

DAN: Has it changed or evolved since starting it?

DEAN: Some of the color design has changed but the overall look of the piece has remained pretty much the same. To insure this, I’m constantly referring back to the earlier animation so that the work doesn’t become slick all of a sudden.

DAN: In an interview, you mentioned you wrote back to Anna Olson. Have you met her in person, or continued any correspondence? If so, has she had any influence on the look and feel of the film, either directly or indirectly?

DEAN: I did write to her initially but have never received a reply.

Early on in the production I had arranged to spend a day in a nursing home recording ambient sound and some of the residence. In speaking with one of the facility’s administrators about the film, and how it was inspired by my actually finding the note from Anna Olson, I was told that it is a fairly common practice at nursing homes to send notes out via balloons so residents, who may not have many visitors, will (hopefully) receive some mail from the outside world.

DAN: As far as getting animators to help, do they need to meet certain requirements?

DEAN: In general, they need to be familiar with hand-drawn animation techniques, have solid drafting skills and a strong understanding of the principles of animation, as well as a willingness to fully explore the performance potential within their assigned shots.

DAN: And what can they expect in return if brought on board production?

DEAN: Well, they’ll be getting paid a reasonable footage rate for one thing. But aside from that, what sort of experience will they come away with? I think that I’d rather have one of the animators from the project, Stewart Shaw, answer that question:

For me, it was a tremendous growing experience as an aspiring animator as far as working under a director for the first time, and the challenges of creating a performance that fits within a larger whole as seamlessly as possible. I was tested in my willingness to “fully explore the performance potential” in a shot, but my labors were understood, appreciated, and my work respected in whole.

It was a chance to be part of a unique personal statement, something beautiful and poignant, and in this digital age, incredibly rare. As a lover of animation, the opportunity to participate in a labor of love, even one other than my own is rewarding in and of itself. (Stewart is now an animator working at Blue Sky Studios.)

DAN: If you were to start from scratch, what would you do differently in terms of production, if anything?

DEAN: During the many years that Dear Anna Olson existed as a side project I was learning so much at the studios about how a professional production is run. Having that information from the start would have saved me a lot of grief and wasted time.

But, if I had to choose one thing I’d do differently it would be to draw smaller. This is a lesson I learned when I had a chance to meet Frederic Back and see some of his production art for The Mighty River. The first thing that struck me was how small the drawings were. Much of the artwork for that film was drawn within a 6 field. I asked him about this and he replied, “If I drew any bigger I would never finish my films.” This rationale was echoed a couple of years later by Richard Williams when he was lecturing about a Shell Oil commercial he had done. In this case they had a very short schedule for completing the job so the decision was made to speed up the production by working within a 6 field. The epilogue to this latter story is they were awarded a second commercial in the same style with a more reasonable schedule. They decided to work in an 8 field and it wound up taking twice as long.

DAN: With the recent delay in production, what is the new goal for completing the film, and what will it take to reach that goal?

DEAN: The new goal is to raise the full balance of the budget. After that has been attained I will be able to hire back some artists and animators and have the film wrapped-up in ten months. For the immediate future, however, I’m looking at becoming a crew-of-one to make the remaining funds last as long as possible and keep the production moving forward as best I can. While I still intend to spend as much time as possible at the animation table, fund-raising will be taking up a greater share of my time.

So, if anyone reading this would like to make a tax-deductible contribution remember, no amount is too small! During our 2006/2007 Challenge Grant Campaign individuals, not unlike like yourself, helped to raise a total of $5,125 above our $25,000 target with gifts ranging from $25 to $4,986. So each and every donation counts!

Dear Anna Olson speaks to how small, positive actions can have great impact on the lives of others. Now it’s your chance. Take your own action to make a difference, and consider a tax-deductible gift in support of Dear Anna Olson today:

There you have it, and I hope you enjoyed it. Dean is currently the Acting Executive Director of Animation at the Maurice Kanbar Institute for Film and Television, and teaches Advanced Animation Production and Stop-Motion Animation at NYU. To read more about the film, donate time or funds, or to just check in on the film’s progress, visit the website or the Facebook page. I wish the best to Dean, and can’t wait to see what I’m sure will turn out to be a great looking film.