August 2019

Ostfalia Hochschule für angewandte Wissenschaften
I am excited to be joining Ostfalia University of Applied Sciences as professor in the Media Design programme!


 

 

 

April 2019

FMX 2019
Come and listen to the super creative and awesome guests I have assembled in the presentation track "Games - Art & Play" at this years FMX.

We will hear about the painterly style of Aardmans' Game "11-11: Memories Retold", the innovative integration of art creation and game design in Media Molecules' upcoming game "Dreams" and about the hand painted style of the soon-to-be released "Knights and Bikes" by Foam Swords.
I am very excited, see you there!

And many thanks to FMX for giving me the opportunity to be on this years Program Board!

 

 

 

February 2018

Hochschule der Medien
I am joining Hochschule der Medien in Stuttgart as professor in their Audiovisual Media program!


 

December 2017

"Animation: From Concept to Production" out in English

The English translation for Hannes Ralls' fabulous book "Animation: From Concept to Production" is out, including my chapter on 3D computer animation :-)
The cover looks even more exciting than for the German version!

Have a look inside it over on amazon.


July 2017

animago jury
What fun and honor to be a jury member for the animago award 2017 and see all the amazing work that was submitted this year!

 



 

December 2016

Robbi, Tobbi und das Fliewatüüt in cinemas
I did a little bit of animation work on this one.



 

July 2016

Smaragdgrün in cinemas
The last installment of the gem stone trilogy by Kerstin Gier hits cinemas - featuring more appearances by my favorite water gargoyle Xemerius! It was great to be back at ARRI to lead the animation for this fun 3D character.

Smaragdgrün



June 2016

Dance Experiments at ANIMAFEST Zagreb
What an honor, my site specific animation "Dance Experiments"  is being screened at the media façade of the Museum of Contemporary Art Zagreb MSU

MSU

May 2016

Magnum "Release the Beast"
The spot "Release the Beast" for Magnum is now in cinemas and online. I animated on this with the team at BaconX. Guess which 3 of the animals are CG.

If you don’t want to guess, but see a breakdown of the work, have a look here:


 


October 2015

Animation book
My dear friend Hannes Rall has published his book   "Animationsfilm: Konzept und Produktion" (German only at this time), with a chapter by myself on 3D Computer Animation. Here is a link to the flyer  - or have a look inside at www.animationsfilm-buch.de

Buch



September 2014

Back to teaching
I have been appointed as Professor for 3D Computeranimation at Mainz University of Applied Sciences in the department of Time Based Media.   
Let’s get things animated there!

HSM_Logo_G_rot_SC.jpg


September 2014

The 7th Dwarf

I worked on this baby a while back at Trixter and it’s finally being released now!
This German animated feature film is the follow up to the 2 live action ‘Zwerge’ comedies. 


7th_MPBurnerBobo_vP032.jpg



August 2014



Saphirblau
in cinemas

The German feature film Saphirblau has been released to rave reviews from its fans. I had the chance to work on the 3D character Xemerius as lead animator in collaboration with the lovely team at ARRI in Munich.
I’m keeping my fingers crossed that the directors Felix Fuchssteiner and Katharina Schöde will get the chance to complete the trilogy with Smaragdgrün. 

Klo_still.jpg



January 2014

Iron Man 3 gets Academy Award Nomination for Visual Effects!
Uh, there haven’t been any updates here from me in a while, even though I have been busy with quite a few projects over the last couple of years.

Well, Iron Man 3 definitely deserves a shout out! I am super proud of the work of everyone at Trixter and really happy that I had the opportunity to be animating on the show with them! Here is a pic of one of my shots.

IM3_TRIXTER_VFX_05

 

 

November 2011

Happy Feet 2 is released!
1 ½ years of work from me are in this baby. Now go see it in cinemas!
Happy Feet 2 website and trailer

HF2_1280x1024.jpg

 

June 2010

CG Overdrive

Talk time at CG Overdrive in Singapore on June 20, my topic is ‘Character Animation – From the 12 Principles to Advanced Concepts

 

May 2010

Festivals and Awards for ‘There’s Bliss in the Kiss’

I’m so excited, my animated short film 'There’s Bliss in the Kiss’ has been screened at many festivals around the world in the last few months and received a couple of awards already, among them a Anima Mundi Web & Cell Contest 2010 - 18 Years Special Prize by the Public Jury, a Gold Remi Award from the WorldFest Houston, a FilmOneFest 2010 - Jury Award, a Seoul International Extreme-Short Image & Film Festival 2010 - Seoul Metro Choice Award, a Best Film Award at Forster Film Festival 2010, a Certificate of Appreciation from the AniMazing Spotlight! and First Place at the Reno Film Festival in the One-Minute Movie category – bring out the champagne! *and many thanks to everyone who helped me realize it!

 

February 2010

Photography on the cover of Itch e.05

My ‘Floating Series’ has been selected for the cover of the online magazine Itch e.05.

 

October 2009

View Conference

I’ll be at View Conference in Italy giving a talk on character animation.

 

October 2009

SIGGRAPH Asia 2009 – Mascot Animation

My mascot animation ‘Do The Robot’ will be screened at the SIGGRAPH Asia 2009 Computer Animation Festival in Japan. You can see it here in a tiny version as the opening of the CAF trailer.

Or watch it full size on youtube.

 

dotherobot_fin_wire

 

 

September 2009

Workshop at ReAnimania – Cancelled

Unfortunately the workshop on 3D Character Animation at ReAnimania in Yerevan, Armenia had to be cancelled due to organisational problems. Wishing them a great festival.

 

June 2009

Annecy Animation Festival

I will be in Annecy! Finally again after a few years of abstinence…

 

May 2009

It’s time for fmx again – fmx/09

In addition to presenting my school and my student’s work, I was part of the panel I got a Job Abroad [elation]... Now What [panic]? which was put together and moderated so well by Jan Sjovall. Here are some of the slides and additional information Jan assembled, useful if you aspire to world travelling in animation.

And I had the honour to present a screening of the fantastic SIGGRAPH Asia 2008 Computer Animation Festival Electronic Theatre program. 


December 2008

Read my article about SIGGRAPH Asia 2008 on AWN / VFXWorld

The inaugural SIGGRAPH Asia 2008 in Singapore was great. Read interviews, reports and my take on it on AWN / VFXWorld

 

November 2008

Real Eyes on Stop Motion Puppet

As there has been a revived interested in the technique of combining stop motion puppets with live action eyes, I have decided to post a video of my process. The video shows the pipeline of creating a 3D character extension for stop motion puppets. I developed this work flow in 2002-03 for the graduating project "Puca" at the Institute of Animation, Visual Effects and Digital Postproduction at the Filmakademie Baden-Württemberg.

At SIGGRAPH 2004, I presented the character extension process with film excerpts in the Sketches program, uploaded here.

 

 mbeisswenger

 

 

October 2008

SIGGRAPH ASIA 2008 Computer Animation Festival

It will be a great show, I am working hard on it as Computer Animation Festival Producer.
Check out the CAF trailer here.

SA08_logo_CMYK_left_s


May 2008

fmx
I will be at fmx in Stuttgart, Germany. Drop me an email if you’ll be there as well.

fmx08_Speaker_Logo


December 2007

Mel @ Byteme!

I was invited as guest speaker at Byteme! Digital Content Festival in Perth, giving a talk about my experiences working on Happy Feet and the BioShock TVC.

I met many great and inspiring artists down under, check out the amazing work by VJs and live cinema performers Solu and Jean Poole.

 

 

October 2007

Bioshock made it onto the Stash 37 DVD

There is even a making of included!

 

September 2007

The Bioshock TV commercial went on air

It was great fun animating with the guys and gals in New York.

lil_sis_coming

 

July 2007

Moved to Singapore

I took on a job as Asst. Professor at the School of Art, Design and Media at NTU. I am teaching 3D Character Animation there.

 


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