Young
Edd Gould always enjoyed drawing comics of himself and his friends. Growing up in the internet age, his
doodles evolved into Flash animations of increasing complexity, and in time Edd and pals
Tom Ridgewell and Matt Hargreaves teamed up to produce an
"Eddsworld" series of online webtoons and
comics.
At first crude and halting, the group's
"eddisodes" progressed from
surreal shorts and
one-shots into full-fledged productions that pushed the boundaries of amateur web animation, with
expressive characters,
full soundtracks, complex effects, and a fast-paced, off-kilter sense of humor:
MovieMakers -
Spares -
WTFuture -
Rock Bottom -
Hammer & Fail (
2).
At its height, the college co-op was producing shorts for
Mitchell & Webb and the
UN Climate Change Conference,
fielding offers from Paramount and Cartoon Network, and racking up
millions of hits on YouTube.
Work slowed, however, when Gould was
diagnosed with leukemia -- a relatively survivable form, though, and Gould carried on
working gamely through his hospital stays. So it came as a shock last week when Matt and Tom
announced that Edd had passed away, prompting an
outpouring of
grief and
gratitude from
all the
fans he'd
entertained and
inspired in his short 23 years.
posted by Rhaomi
on Apr 2, 2012 -
5 comments
On a Friday in the waning months of the 20th century, a Macromedia employee was getting ready to meet with the creator of
Beavis & Butthead the next Monday to demonstrate Flash v.4's new feature, synchronized audio tracks – a feature he needed to learn over the weekend. So he put together the simplest model he could: a floating skull
sans lips, tongue or physique. The meeting was postponed, so the employee continued to spitshine the animation and put it on his website. His friends e-mailed their friends, and soon, everyone met a heavy-metal animated floating skull demon and his adorable little devil pal. Sparks had created
Radiskull, who will kill you one by one.
(Atom) [more inside]
posted by MikeHarris
on Dec 22, 2009 -
38 comments
Tales of the Beanworld ("A most peculiar comic book experience") recently resumed publication after a long hiatus. It's a strange and abstract mix of Native American mythology and culture, with a strong ecological focus, into an wonderfully charming cosmology. While it certainly invites, uh,
overthinking, it's also entertaining on a purely casual level.
A sample
short Beanworld story is on the Dark Horse Comics Myspace page.
If you have questions about it, the
BeanWeb just may have answers, along with illustrations from the comics. There is now a
Beanworld Wiki to supplement it, and creator Larry Marder keeps a
blog where he talks about things bean.
Okay, now that it's properly introduced... the
real point of this post is to link to
this awesome Beanworld Flash cartoon, animated by Fashionbuddha and with music by They Might Be Giants!
posted by JHarris
on Dec 20, 2008 -
17 comments
I Am Babycakes , created by Creased Comics'
Brad Neely (who did that "
Washington" video seen
some time ago), is the good-natured, incredibly dark musings of a man-child who lives with his dad/wizard, roleplays ("I had described to my friends the most beautiful demon"), writes songs, and fills both his diary, and his days, with emptiness. Alternating funny, then sad, then cool as one turns it over in the mind. Or I think so anyway.
Part 1 -
Part 2 -
Part 3 (All links NSFW due to language.)
posted by JHarris
on Feb 23, 2007 -
15 comments
Sakupen is the online name of a musician/artist who made two of my favorite flash music animations (warning: first link goes to artist's myspace page w/audio). The first one, "Dad's Home" is a mayhem filled coffee buzz set to Cab Calloway's
Reefer Man, and the second, "Walk, Smash, Walk" is about a robot whose job is to Walk and then Smash and then Walk some more. Wildly different styles, but both are captivating;
large versions of both cartoons can be viewed here.
posted by jonson
on Aug 4, 2006 -
8 comments
Yet another political flash cartoon! Anyone else getting tired of hearing the same bland crap about the upcoming election?
This flash cartoon somehow manages to be funny anyway, even though its subject has been done to death. It's brilliant, and definitely worth a look.
posted by Veritron
on Jul 12, 2004 -
27 comments
The new oddtodd cartoon I don't think that anyone has posted this yet. Oddtodd has released his newest cartoon. Man, I love that guy. He is da tits. (For those of you unfamiliar with that saying that means he is good/great/cool... you know, da tits.)
posted by aj100
on Apr 5, 2002 -
18 comments
