24fps: An Animation Blog

     Craig "Spike" Decker and Mike Gribble, known as "Spike & Mike" started a film festival  in the 1970s as a means of promoting rock bands, horror films, and classic movies. Around 1977 they started airing very popular anaimtion shorts from the local area, and these became so popular that it spawned it's own Festival of Animation. Soon, Spike and Mike were getting so many requests from filmmakers all over the country, it became obvious that they needed to expand. Soon they were taking the festival on a 50-city tour.     Responding to the social demands at the time, Spike and Mike started the Sick and Twisted Festival of Animation  in 1990. There were alot of R-rated animations being produced in the states and overseas, that could not get distribution in the states. These film makers were looking for a way to show their films to a more open-minded audience, and the Sick and Twisted Festival of Animation was a great way to do that. These were ...

      In the early nineties, the world of television animation was experiencing a boom. Theatrical animation was changing direction to new and refreshing directors and artists, and the world of television decided to go in a new direction as well. It decided it was time for some more provocative, experimental, and adult-oriented material. It was time to push the boundaries of animation and test the audiences consuming it. It was time for Liquid Television.     MTV was the home for music throughout the eighties. With almost nonstop music videos, paired with music news and talk shows, MTV was the place for the young and hip. The young MTV audience was growing up a little, generation X was pushing into other mediums and MTV wanted to jump on that train, so they started offering other shows like Real World, Road Rules, and other youth-centric programming. They also began airing more isolated and specific content late at night on weekdays, when kids were up and parent...

     Ralph Bakshi was a trailblazer in animation, even if most people in the modern era have never heard of him. He was one of the first directors in animation who saw the art form as it truly was, an artform and didn’t think it should be limited to entertainment for children. Animation was a chance for any artist to express themselves in any way they wanted, and sometimes that included adult-oriented material.      In the last fifties, Bakshi got his start in animation working for TerryToons. He was a cell polisher, he cleaned up animation cells before they were filmed, the lowest rung at the studio, but a solid foot in the door. He was soon promoted to cell painter and then began training in animation.      While struggling to get his animation career moving, he worked on comic strips, Dum “Dum and Dee Dee” and “Bonefoot and Fudge” trying to focus on his own style. Over the next several years he worked with companies like CBS, trying to pit...