Luxo Sr.

The Norwegian lamp-manufacturer, Luxo asked Storm Studios to do an homage to Pixar’s classic short Luxo Jr. (which is actually an homage to the original Luxo lamps). The story was to be a meeting between the old lamp and Luxo’s brand new desk light “Ninety”. They wanted it to be a short film, not an ad. I directed it, fleshed out the story, did the animatic and the design. It was cool to work with Daniel Flehner Heen who is an amazingly dedicated animator. I think he did wonders with those lamps within the very limited time he had available. Dancing the tango with stiff metal objects is not easy! El. Tango premiered in a packed DogA at Pecha Kucha Night Vol. 10 in Oslo May 28. You get to see it here.

Sadly, Luxo is now suing Pixar for using their lamp-design in merchandising. Hope they can come to an agreement…

Designing the next Elias animated feature

The production company Filmkameratene has started working on a new film about the little rescue boat Elias. The TV-series has been successfully running for years, and was nominated for an Emmy in 2007. This’ll be the second animated feature, following Elias og Kongeskipet from 2007. The new story takes place in some huge new locations, and introduces a dozen original characters. The whole story is taking place in wintertime, so the familiar locations like Lunvik will also look very different from what people have seen before. In close cooperation with director Lise Osvoll I designed all the new stuff in three hectic months. There was no art department in addition to us. The film will premiere Christmas 2010. I’ll post some artwork once the trailer is released.

MoCCA Festival NYC 2009

This summer I was in New York at the annual MoCCA Festival. It’s a cartoon festival, with visitors and exhibitors from around the globe. I was representing Storm, exhibiting some of our work. But I was also there to learn about the industry and look for talents. Before I went, I thought I was a cartoon-geek, but being there, I felt kind of misplaced. Some of those people really live for cartoons! It was a great experience, and I met very friendly, interesting, strange and talented people. You can see sketches of some of them here. I also took time to see a lot of NY - that city takes my breath away! This night-shot is from the top of The Empire State Building. I’ll be posting more NY-photos in my PhotoFun-gallery.

Kutoppen Theme Park

After years of planning, Kristiansand Zoo finally opened the Kutoppen/Cattle Hill park summer 2009. 8000 People attended the opening! Kutoppen/Cattle Hill is a Norwegian 13×7 min animated TV series. I was art-direcing and co-directing the show, and also led the group that developed the plans and designs for the theme park. It’s the first time I’ve designed actual buildings. We had to take into consideration issues like ventilation and access for wheelchairs - unusual limitations for me. Here you can see the result for yourself.