Awesome Animation

The 1929 Disney Silly Symphony animation The Skeleton Dance is a Halloween classic. But modern copies of the clip are grainy and filled with flicker. Adam Maciaszek used a mix of AI tech and his own intelligence to dramatically improve the quality of the footage. Watch at 2X speed on YouTube, or a regular speed on Bittube.

While on his way to a date with his girlfriend, a man carelessly destroys a mysterious creature’s nest, which then invades his body. But that’s not the worst thing that happens to the guy in this extraordinarily creepy and atmospheric animated short film by Stas Santimov.

“Killing two birds with one stone is actually harder than murdering them one after another.” Grant Kolton’s snarky animated short pokes fun at common English idioms like “You can’t judge a book by its cover” and reminds us that they’re not all to be taken as gospel.

To celebrate the 35th anniversary of Back to the Future, Universal Pictures enlisted the help of eight talented artists and fans to create their own visualizations of the classic sci-fi comedy. We can’t decide which animation style we liked best, but the knit version of “Darth Vader” from the planet Vulcan was pretty great.

Joe Sill’s animated science fiction short envisions a future where a corporation runs a massive network of autonomous vehicles, and those who drive themselves are hunted down as criminals. The proof-of-concept thriller follows a gang of motorcycle couriers who must deliver a mysterious package.

Filmmaker Natalia Mirzoyan’s animated short depicts a brief moment in time at the beach, where people of all ages come to enjoy the sunshine and saltwater. While painting an evocative portrait, the film explores the different ways that people perceive time throughout their lives.

Rogier Wieland Studio created this captivating stop-motion promo clip for Trombosestichting, The Dutch Thrombosis Foundation, who is distributing a free e-book to help educate people about the dangers and warning signs of blood clots, wrapped up in the guise of a noir thriller.

After the gods of Olympus defeat the titans, a group of terrifying giants rises in their place. Can Heron, the half-human son of Zeus, help save humanity? Its man versus monster in this upcoming Netflix anime series, inspired by ancient Greek mythology. Drops 10.27.2020.

Robert Kirkman’s celebrated comic Invincible is coming to Amazon Prime in 2021 as an animated series. It follows a young man whose father is the world’s most powerful superhero and his journey as he develops his own powers. Stars Steven Yeun, J.K. Simmons, Sandra Oh, Seth Rogen, and Mark Hammill, among others.

Using narration based on an actual Craigslist “Missed Connections” ad, animator Patrick Dias imagines what actually happened when a man dropped his prosthetic arm while running to catch a train. The captivating voice acting by Tiana Asperjan helps bring depth to the story. We’d love to see a whole series of these.

Back in the day, there was this great video game called Battle Chess, in which chess pieces fought to the death on the board. This clip from CGI animator lotsalote envisions what a next-gen version of that game might look like, as individual chess pieces explode violently on impact with their opponents.

Animators Michał Socha and his brother Jakub previously worked on The Simpsons’ Inside Homer’s Brain and the Build Your Own couch gags. Their latest creation is this low-fi animation which envisions The Simpsons as a family of extreme action stars in an all-digital world.

Increasing frame rates in games is usually a good thing, but the same can’t be said for animation. Someguy14201 shows how strange and unappealing things can look when upscaling an old 24 fps Tom & Jerry cartoon to 60 fps using AI interpolation tech. We wonder if an original 60 fps animation would look so weird.

In this silly and slightly demented animated short from Super Dope, a little girl gets way more than she bargained for when she orders a strawberry cone from her neighborhood ice cream truck. Everything seems to be going wrong in 2020. Does dessert have to get ruined too?

Director James Molle and students from Gobelins animation school take us along for a boy’s journey of discovery, as he struggles with worry and seeks answers from a world occupied by strange, anthropomorphic characters. The low-res pixel animation style and lack of speech compliment the mystique of the short film.

“A once proud city has descended into a den of crime, sin, and misery. A corrupt police force and criminal underworld make every day a savage struggle… Yet one man will attempt a daring escape…” It sounds like quite the premise, but Mark Butchko’s animated short film is basically a modern tribute to the video game Zaxxon.

In this silly animated short, a man tries out one of those capsule toys that expands when you add water to it, and gets way more than he bargains for. At least he has a new friend for a little while. Directed and animated by Emma Ehrling for Animade .

BrickBros Productions is back with another episode of their stop-motion LEGO in Real Life series. This time, a man heads into the office only to find that everything around him is gradually turning into bricks. Was it all a dream, or is he stuck in the LEGO Matrix? The T.Rex game was a nice touch.

As we previously saw in Fest, filmmaker Nikita Diakur has a trademark “ugly” CGI style, which replaces normal characters with blobby-looking humanoids with exposed wireframes and scraggly bits of hair. His latest animated short takes to the skies with a particularly unattractive group of parachuting enthusiasts.

This silly animated short pokes fun at a sci-fi trope, as a floating vessel is stopped by the authorities and asked to provide their information. Its creators Karl Poyzer and Joe Roberts did a great job making us laugh with their minimal approach to movement and focus on cheeky dialogue.

A man struggles to get his underwear to dry, but an unexpected rain shower pops up every time he hangs them outside. Why does it rain every time he tries to get his laundry done? Writer/Director Cliona Noonan’s animated short film blends a quirky style and a charming story.

PoChien Chen’s animated short film uses a lighthearted style to paint a devastating picture, as a chef serves up a variety of deadly dishes to his animal customers while his human patrons destroy their habitat and gorge on sushi, oblivious to the harm they’re doing to the planet.

Sander Joon’s cacophonous animated short film is best experienced with headphones or nice loud speakers. As its vignettes play out, each object on screen makes a familiar, but very different sound than you’d expect it to make. It turns out that mushrooms are especially noisy little dudes.