Awesome Animation

VFX artist Ian Hubert put together this short but impressive animation which drops us into a sci-fi race filled with insane rocket bikes. He created the clip using Blender and After Effects, and data from a Rokoko mocap suit for the pilots’ movements. This is so much better than the pod racing sequence in The Phantom Menace.

On the surface, Joseph Bennett’s animated short film is just two guys gabbing about nothing while birdwatching. But it turns into a deep existential discussion as the duo starts thinking about their place in the universe and their own mortality. Comedian Joe Pera did a fantastic job with the voice acting too.

Animator Omozoc has entertained us with his delectable stop-motion meals. But in this clip, he uses the technique and 1667 individual still images to show some artful but physically impossible ways to deal cards. We’re a little surprised that he didn’t literally cut any cards.

Monitogo Studios’ stop-motion LEGO brickfilm follows the story of two brothers and a son who take a dramatic risk to save a commuter train from crashing when a bridge won’t stay down and the warning signal fails. It’s a surprisingly moody and dramatic turn for a medium usually reserved for silly stuff.

This animated short film follows a lonely backpacker as he struggles with changes to his body. As he wanders the world, he encounters a mysterious figure in the walls of a concrete building. An outstanding graduation film by Nicolas Roth, Pirmin Bieri, Luca Struchen, and Aira Joana of the Lucerne School of Art and Design.

Wearing nothing more than a pair of tighty-whities and basketball socks, a rollerskater heads out into the universe without a care in the world. But when an evildoer tosses a banana peel in their path, things go from weird to weirder. Enjoy the latest CG animated short from Cool 3D World, the warped minds behind Bicycle.

If you’ve never seen Who Framed Roger Rabbit, load up Disney+ right now and watch it. We’ll be here waiting. Then come back and watch Fun Fact Films’ video about how the filmmakers so effectively blended live-action and animation, and why it’s unlikely that the same quality will ever be achieved again.

Like many of us stuck at home during the 2020 quarantines, hehimboredlol got really bored. So they scribbled down their thoughts in the iPhone Notes app. After they got bored with that, they turned their repetitive ramblings into an animation. It’s also possible that they were lazy and just copied the text from this website.

Animator and concept artist Euni Cho created this heartfelt and beautifully-illustrated short film about a bunny rabbit living in a city of bears. She keeps to herself and struggles as a street musician until she embraces the strangers around her. The track is Tourniquet by Hem.

Rick and Morty season five arrives in June 2021. While we wait for the premiere, here’s a little something fun to fill your eyeballs with. Paul Robertson created this amazing 17-minute pixel art animation that envisions the duo battling an endless stream of baddies in an epic side-scroller video game. thE sIMuLAtioN iS coRruPt!

Animator Kaspar Jancis’ somber and emotive short film follows the story of an aging Russian Cosmonaut and the struggles of everyday life he experiences in his dying days. As he reaches his final moments, his actions on earth mirror his time in space.

Anyone working in a creative line of business can relate to the emotions you feel when your pitch for a concept falls flat on its face. Giant Ant’s animation and accompanying tune should serve as the official theme song for failed pitches.

Taehoon Park’s awe-inspiring science fiction short film envisions a universe where machines have replaced by humans. A lone character survives by grafting his body with technology and attempts to escape in a human body he cloned. It’s only a tease of a bigger story, and we’d love to see this evolve into a feature film.

Created by Tentacle Media Ltd., the Mini-Mutoscope is a 3D-printed replica of a 19th-century mechanical flipbook. The display works like an animation flipbook, only its movements are smoothly controlled by a crank. It holds up to 42 squares that you can load with your own animations, or one of the samples provided by Tentacle.

Game studio Kong Orange and Wired Fly Animation are working on this co-op puzzle game that puts players in the roles of Karla and Kurt, two friends on the verge of expressing their love, but who lose their ability to speak. Each character and background will be hand-animated using traditional stop-motion techniques.

Patton Oswalt stars in and co-created this limited-run animated series based on Marvel’s M.O.D.O.K. (Mental Organism Designed Only for Killing). The show offers a fresh take on the freakish villain as he deals with a crumbling marriage and bankruptcy after years of losing against our heroes. Premieres 5.21.2021 on Hulu.

Animator Trent Shy created this fun and gory little claymation sequence. It drops us into a scientist’s laboratory, where they create entire humans by adding their secret formula to a pile of bones. And when their little creations talk back, they don’t live for long.

Producers Phil Lord and Chris Miller (The LEGO Movie) are behind this fun-looking animated feature about a wacky and dysfunctional family who find themselves in the midst of a robot apocalypse. Naturally, they end up becoming humanity’s only hope for survival. Coming to Netflix 4.30.2021.

This animation follows the story of two people living under the same roof, but one of them is missing their head. When their partner leaves the house to go exploring, the headless one struggles with anxiety about the world they cannot see. We love the minimal line-art style of Ala Nunu Leszynska’s award-winning short film.

As we’ve seen before, Kevin Parry loves his visual trickery. He’s also quite good at making stop-motion animations. In this short clip, he fools us into thinking he’s pulling off jumps and flips on a trampoline, when in fact, he’s just wriggling around on his floor. We’d be covered in dog hair if we tried the same on our hardwood floor.

“You need to be a little more drained of life… like you’re crushed by the monotony of existence.” Joel Haver’s latest clip hilariously imagines what it might be like if fantasy characters or aliens made movies about people living ordinary lives here on Earth.

Ksawery Kirklewski used Processing to create this intriguing computer animation that manipulates outlines of virtual humanoid figures. The interactive version on the project website automatically selects a random assortment of vignettes in sync with the music’s rhythm. The track is from wh0wh0’s debut album.

Skadoosh! Sure, Kung Fu Panda was formulaic and filled with clichés and fat jokes, but it was still incredibly entertaining. Screen Junkies looks back at the star-studded flick, and how it managed to rise above the rampant mediocrity of other non-Pixar animated movies.