Thanks from a Little Girl

The young lady who won our character design contest a while back sent us this letter in appreciation. We mailed her a few Yam Roll pins, a t-shirt, a production still of a shot featuring her character "Poppy" and a DVD of the episode. We're very honored to receive this letter in return. Children's drawings are the most creative and honest on the planet and we were happy to have had the chance to show her character to our audience.

Another Screening?!

Wow! 2 blogs in one day?! Is this HEAVEN?! Yes. Yes it is. Turns out that bus that hit you wasn't just a dream. Umm.. where was I? Oh, Yam Roll is being screened at another festival! Any more of these and Tamago's gonna have a heart attack! Here's the link:

http://aaff.asianartsandmedia.org/schedule.html

It's about half way down the page. As always, if any of you are in Chicago between Sept 28 and Oct 1 be sure to check it out!

Yam Roll of Arabia

Looks like Yammy's been doing a bit of travelling! Here's a pic of him "on his bike" at Black Rock Desert. You may know it as Burning Man. Carry on my wayward Yam!

Yam Roll's Shoes are Made of Red Carpet

Looks as though Yammy'll be taking yet another walk down the red carpet. "Honey, I Shrunk the Tamago" has been accepted into The 2006 Australian International Film Festival. If anybody happens to be heading down to Australia (or up if you wanna take the long road...) between October 21-30 be sure to check it out! I wonder how many winners will ask for a moment of silence for Steve Irwin during their acceptance speech... G'day, Mates! Let's put another shrimp on the barbie! Crikey!!

Isaac Izen

Hello everybody! It's been a couple of months now since the birth of Jon's son Isaac so I thought I'd show you a couple of new pics. Cute little bugger, ain't he?

Wiki-wiki-wooo-di-wiggidy-wooooo

Hey Folks! Looks like a lot of you woke up early this morning to get yourself a fresh cup of blog. For those of you potential American fans/haters, Yam Roll will be airing on Cartoon Network this fall. In the meantime, here's a little clip from one of our favourite 11-minute episodes. Have a look and judge the animation and design for yourself! (we recomend that you view the clip before commenting, but as you can see from previous posts, that is not mandatory) Basically, all we are saying...is give peace a chance!

Tamago Dancing Clip

Stuffed Yam

Wazzzzuuuuup? The Yam Roll plush doll was actually created quite a while ago but I'm just now getting around to posting pics of it. Here is Mr. Izen cuddling with his new best friend. I'll let you know when these become available to the public. Unfortunately, Emslie bought the entire first batch leaving none available for the children :( . WON'T SOMEBODY PLEASE THINK OF THE CHILDREN?!
Oh and we'd just like to give a quick thanks to Aaron and Cold Hard Flash for all of the shout outs. Here it is: "Thanks, Aaron at Cold Hard Flash for all of the shout outs."

Behind the Backgrounds... How Oxymoronic!

Wait... or do I mean Ironic? I don't know. But it sure is weird. Anyway, how's everybody dooooin?? Good. As implied by the title of this post, I have a rough BG drawing to show you. This is the kind of large BG you will find in the rough storyboards. AUsome huh? (See last post to understand spelling error) See how the scale of the drawing captures the terrifying peril that Tamago is faced with? Try to keep from peeing your pants as you look at it. Or at least throw down some towels first...

Preliminary Storyboard Designs

Hey hey! Thursday, September 7th, eh? That's gotta mean something to somebody... I'll just toss a "happy birthday!" and maybe a "happy anniversary!" or even a little "sorry about your dog :(" out there in case. In the case of option #3, maybe this will cheer you up. I give to you a scanned image of a sticky note showing very early and rough sketches of episode 39A: "Par for the Course". Absolute AU! (AU is, of course the chemical symbol for gold. You kiddies are gonna want to go ahead and start spreading that slang around. Drop it like it's hot, ya know?) This will give you a pretty good sample of what peaking into Jon Izen's ear with a microscope will display. Ditto for our storyboard director, Billy Zeats. These guys literally think in storyboard panels! Isn't that wild?! And don't you love when people use the word "literally" in the context of an obviously implausible situation? Meh. Just try and stop me!