I love this little animated short by Mike Stern, and I'm delighted to see that he was part of the online school Animation Mentor, which I've reported on before. Watch: Distraxion, more at sternio.com (thanks, Joaquin Baldwin!).
Animated short about the plague of "smooth jazz" in offices: "Distraxion."
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Red stapler!
Wow. That office would be the death of me. Scary!
That was awesome!!
I thought we got rid of "smooth jazz" in the 80's.
I could remember complaining to my mother about going to the doctor's office.
She thought it was because I was afraid of needles. It was actually, because they used to play "smooth jazz" all the time. Getting the needle was a relief, because it meant you were getting out of there :D
Hehe. That was wonderful!
Note to Pixar: Hire this guy!
haha, definitely one of the best AM shorts.
So, the cartoon was pretty decent, but everything I've seen from AM uses identical characters and style. It's horrifically dull visually. What's the deal there?
I don't get it. I love smooth jazz.
In my day we called it elevator music or musical wallpaper.
Much of today's music I find boring. There must be a special hell for drum machines and other rhythm generators.
A few years after World War II there was some hope when big bands started playing be-bop charts. Check out Woody Herman 1947, 1948.
I'm not stuck in that era. There's been plenty of interesting rock and jazz since. I'm just glad I was a kid when clever catchy lyrics were still being written.
The hardest thing on my ears is to hear a modern singer do an old lyric. Music is bound to its time. When the song was new, what was going on then impacted the singer.
It would have been better if he had played some actual Jazz - put in some Coltrane or Miles.
The best revenge on crap Jazz is real Jazz.
Does this actually happen in offices? Is it legal? I would die.
everything I've seen from AM uses identical characters and style.
It's called a style. It separates the work of actual artists from randomly generated artifacts.
Niiice: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MsQYzpOHpik
> The best revenge on crap Jazz is real Jazz.
Amen.
OT: I just clicked through to the AM site (some colleagues have used it) and looked at the price chart.
Is that really what you would expect to pay for tertiary education in the states? I'm shocked, shocked! And I thought your healthcare system was borked*.
I'm paying ~UK£3000 a year for the TOP UK computer visualization/animation school (3 year BA). And if I was a native, I'd be eligible for a grant on top of that. How does it cost so much to be educated in the US?
*No, that isn't the conversation we are having. Don't follow it up.
Love the fact that the guy behind the movie is called Mike Stern
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fT4clGilSow
I love this so hard. There's a woman at work that near me who listens to smooth jazz all day and it drives me insane. So I put on headphones and listen to hard rock to drown it out. Just once I'd like to play my music as loudly as she plays hers.
@Arkizzle:
"Specialist" schools here are ridiculous for how much they charge. They usually try to justify it by claiming focus on a lot on industry partnerships so that one has good opportunity for employment afterward (some even claim guaranteed positions), whether that actually materializes or not for the student is another matter.
"Traditional" universities here vary. Most of the private institutions are insanely pricey, but more often than not they are able to offer a lot of financial support through their vast network of donors and internal grants, so it comes out to practically nothing for those most in need financially. Public universities are quite reasonable, and if the student is a resident of the state that the school is in, yearly tuition is comparable or less than the figure you're paying. The quality of these school vary much, though "branding" aside, if due research is done, one can find that individual colleges and programs of study within public universities can be at top of the nation for a particular discipline, despite average rankings for the rest of the school overall.
Anyone know what's the name of either the smooth jazz or metal pieces playing?
They use the same character rigs, but the focus is on the animation part itself (you know the movement)... which was nicely done here, btw.
Anonymous17, thanks for that. Makes sense, but still seems too rich for my blood :)
everything I've seen from AM uses identical characters and style
It's an 18-month online course. I'm guessing most of the stuff that comes out of there is done with variations on a pre-made stock character. Either that, or the design-a-character part of the course tells you how to make a specific character, and most of the students stick with that basic form.
@18, we'd tell you, but then we would have to kill you.
The perfect companion piece: Pat Metheney's rant on Kenny G -
http://www.jazzoasis.com/methenyonkennyg.htm
odd, he sounds prejudiced in some manner:
"spewing his lame-ass, jive, pseudo bluesy, out-of-tune, noodling, wimped out, fucked up playing"
Yes, he does, doesn't he.
I did think about whether I needed to take my great respect for Metheney down a notch, but then it is Kenny G so I gave him a pass.
BTW, classic CD: "Like Minds" Metheney, Chick Corea, Gary Burton, Roy Hanes, Dave Holland.
Uncle Geo: That article gave me much MORE respect for Mr. Metheney, actually. Thanks for linking!
Most work out of AM looks identical, a cute short - but the guy really needs to work on his own style, and not AM's cookie-cutter.
mmmmm.... anyone else going to the "Smooth Jazz & Mayonnaise" festival this year? DELISH!
AwesomeRobot,
I'm not sure if you are talking about the look or the animation-style, but in the former case, I believe the point of the school is character animation, not design. Designing, modeling and rigging a character are all fields in their own right, with their own separate, or combined, courses. This is not that.
"The program lectures feature famous animators from leading studios who illustrate key principles of animation and provide content, demonstration and assignments."
The content is given, and you are assigned a task. Also, having generic models probably makes it easier, and fairer, to assign marks.
In the latter case, animation-style, I would say only this: Any stable (Disney/ENSAD/Bournemouth/whoever) will have a certain hallmark of style that will shine through in it's students. Learning a certain school's method is a great way to learn how to animate. Upon that base (the common rules and techniques: refined or discarded), styles are built.
I guess this Mike Stern isn't the jazz guitarist I'm familiar with, although that would be really funny if it was.
Great animation! I loved the expressions on the sax player's face!
At my last job, we had 8 people in a smallish office, and it was hotdesking to grab whichever computers were available. The rule was: whoever sits next to the stereo has complete control during their shift.
This and the stack of 200 CDs next to it kept things interesting. Most people opted for generally liked music, and on the occasions somebody put on generally hated music, they'd find something like a bad electro-pop song being looped for three hours the next morning in retaliation.
Overall, it was a fun system and got tension out in the open. I'd recommend it for any office where it might work.
Most work out of AM looks identical, a cute short - but the guy really needs to work on his own style, and not AM's cookie-cutter.
AM is a school, not an animation studio. So you're saying he should have spent less time learning to animate and more time becoming a modeller, rigger, lighter, and compositor as well? (He works at Dreamworks now, by the way.)
Anyway, congrats, Mike!
Back to Jazz now - "smooth" jazz is what I call a thin style, like big hair music -just how many bands do we need doing it? Real Jazz, of course is probably the broadest category of music, with astonishing depth and virtuosity; smooth jazz is confined to non-threatening rhythms, relentlessly reverbed soprano sax, a milquetoast, quasi funky beat and a wood block here and there.
It is a step above "soundscapes" or John Tesch but only because it has some basic logical structure. It serves the function of chamber music (which, unlike smooth jazz, is quite listenable on it's own) which was designed to be played as background atmosphere for soirees in the salons and courts of Europe. That would be OK except smooth jazz is ubiquitous. Elevators, offices, subways, bathrooms (puleease!) -it's like Chinese water torture.
With friends like this Jazz doesn't need enemies. Real Jazz simultaneously requires the technical skill of the best classical musician plus the ability to compose on the fly. It is rich and broad with something for everyone. It is not easy -you need to bring something to it; through long exposure you learn more and more that helps you appreciate it.
Unfortunately this truly indigenous North American music occupies a few small bins (if any) in music stores and is rarely played on the radio. For many people Jazz is either the Orchestra Hall version (a select few artists) or the Ken Burns Jazz mini series version which perpetuated the notion that Jazz died somewhere around 1967 and hasn't been heard from since.
Jazz is complex and sublime, soft and kick ass, sweet and nasty, familiar and unexpected. There are rich rewards for the brave musical soul.
Red stapler! Plus the guy at the end looks like a character from Guitar Hero.
any one notice that the main guy and the jazz guy is the same guy just without hair
"Note to Pixar: Hire this guy! -- schmod"
Mike works at Dreamworks Animation and if you have watched Kung Fu Panda, you've already some more of his animation :)
That sax player will give me nightmares.
lemme see.
the moral was:
smooth jazz (soprano sax) sucks,
hard rock/metal rules,
right?
some high school topics
never die.
ZZZZZzzzzzzzz............
Not really, I would say the moral is. What is music to you may be noise to someone else.
Can someone tell what is the name of the smooth jazz song in the animated short?
Thanks