The Art of Monsters University Gets a Bright New Cover

We've got a steady stream of information, clips and images from Monsters University over the past couple of weeks and one conclusion we can clearly and confidently draw from them all is this: it's going to be a beautiful film!

Given the vibrant colours, the hilarious character designs and the inventive worlds on display, The Art of Monsters University looks set to be a must-buy. Amazon today updated their listing for the art book - which will be released by Chronicle Books in June in the US and on 1st July in the UK - with some great new concept art from the film. I just love the cartoony, fun shapes and the wide mix of colours. Noteworthy: like the trailers and clips, this cover seems to put just a bit more focus on Mike than on Sulley.

The Art of Monsters University is written by Karen Paik (The Art of Ratatouille), with prefaces by executive producer John Lasseter and Monsters, Inc. director Pete Docter, and a foreword by director Dan Scanlon. UK readers can pre-order it below.

Via The Pixar Daily.

The Art of Wreck-It Ralph Review - A Wreck-Tacular Art Book

I actually received Chronicle Books' latest accompanying Art of book when Wreck-It Ralph was released Stateside in November, but I thought it would probably prove useful to have something left to hype myself up for the film's inevitable UK release. And it has. So, with Disney's Wreck-It Ralph finally hitting UK cinemas tomorrow, I'm very happy to present a review of its wonderful, vibrant and quintessentially cartoony companion, The Art of Wreck-It Ralph.

The Art and Making of ParaNorman Review - A Spookily Different 'Art of' Book

Confession: I only watched Coraline fully a few days ago. I'm not often a fan of spooky films, but I am a fan of Henry Selick, and adored The Nightmare Before Christmas, so I wanted to see Coraline, I just never got round to it. A couple of days ago, though, I decided to finally do it, and am very glad I did. Coraline is a fantastic, nuanced and refreshingly original film, with stylish direction and gorgeous animation; I only wish I could've seen it on the big screen. I watched it in anticipation of the latest film from Laika, the studio behind it, ParaNorman.

Coraline's animation was amazing, but ParaNorman's is apparently even better. Factor in that I've heard nary a bad review about it, and you end up with a film I'm pretty damn excited for (it's not out over here until 14th September). So, I was very excited to check out the accompanying 'Art of' book, The Art and Making of ParaNorman, which Chronicle Books were kind enough to send me a review copy of.

The Art of Brave Review - A Deep, Rich and Brave Art Book

I have been privileged to get the chance to read some great 'Art of' books over the past week, starting with Insight Editions' The Art of Madagascar 3: Europe's Most Wanted, and continuing now with Chronicle Books' The Art of Brave. Pixar's thirteenth feature film, Brave, looks set to be another classic, with great characters, great story, and a fantastic, gorgeous visual style. The Art of Brave reflects this. Always in these 'Art of' books, the artwork on display is fantastic, reflecting the unparalleled amount of work that goes into creating an animated film - regardless of the studio from which the film emanates - and The Art of Brave is just another utterly fantastic example of this.

Christmas Thoughts - 2011

I hope you've all had a wonderful Christmas and that you all had a wonderful day yesterday. I thought I'd, as I did last year, share my thoughts on some animation related gifts I received.

At the top you can see the vast majority of them, I was incredibly overjoyed to receive these presents, as you can see, and as you can probably tell from reading my blog, I quite like animation, so these presents were fantastic for me.

To go through the presents one by one, I got, which is probably my favourite present, 'The Art of Pixar: The Complete Color Scripts and Select Art From 25 Years of Animation'. The book which touts colour scripts from all of Pixar's 12 feature films, as well as from some of their shorts and includes several pieces of art made for each film, is fantastic. Authored by Cartoon Brew co-founder, Amid Amidi, the book is rather scarce on text, but what there is is rich in detail and history. However, as it should be, the main focus of the book is the fantastic, jaw-dropping, beautiful artwork from the artists of Pixar; and if they included the level of detail in the text we see in the individual 'Art of' books, this one would be substantially larger than the 300-odd pages it is at the moment. The book is a brilliant read and I would definitely recommend it. I will likely publish a full review of the book in the coming week.

In terms of DVDs, I got a decent amount of animated films this year, including Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs (a fun and quirky animated film that was one of my favourites from 2009), Rio (which isn't pictured, as the box is somewhat trashed, as the security stopper wasn't removed for some reason, so we had to pry the box open) and Kung Fu Panda 2 (which seems even more awesome than it did when I first saw it). While I loved these films and would have been more than content with these, two of the best presents I got were in the form of the Disney classics, Peter Pan and 101 Dalmatians, two of the films that helped form my childhood; utter classics in every form, it meant even more as a present, given that they had to be, not cheaply, purchased second hand as they're in the Disney Vault at the moment.

In terms of other knick-knacks and whatnots, I also received official Wallace and Gromit slippers and an alarm clock, and Muppets socks and a T-shirt (not pictured), all of which were just brilliantly fun and quirky presents to receive.

As I'm sure you can tell, I loved these presents and this is just the animated portion of them, it was a great horde of gifts to receive this Christmas and one that I fully appreciated.

Feel free to share your own lists of presents and what you're thankful for this Christmas, I hope the season treated you all well.

The Art of Cars 2 Review - A Work of Art

The first thing I have to say is that I’m insanely grateful to Abrams&Chronicle for the free copy; however, it won’t influence my review in any way shape or form. Now this is not to say that it needs the help; the book is fantastic and another great addition to the already strong ‘Art of’ range. The book is written by Ben Queen (the Cars 2 screenwriter) and Karen Paik (who wrote the Art of Ratatouille book) and they’re previous professional writing experience shines though, as they do a great job of it. I’m still inclined to say the Art of Toy Story 3 is better, as it felt more special, like a legacy of the franchise of Toy Story, whereas this book deals specifically with Cars 2, not the original Cars. The book is also decidedly less wordy for the aforementioned reasons; however this is somewhat of a good thing, as it brings more attention to the fantastic artwork. The book is still extraordinarily detailed and is just a bit easier to get into, whereas with the previous instalment, you had to sit and read it for a while, whereas here you can dip in and out, yet you will still want to commit to it, which is to be commended.