animate

Nikki is into crochet. She's also into anime and video games like Final Fantasy XII, Halo, and BioShock. Not one to lead a segmented life, she weaves her geeky and craftsy interests together, and makes crocheted dolls of video game, anime, and manga characters.

Totoro, Sackboy, and the knights from Castle Crashers have never been so cute.

Nikki--a nursing student who goes by the Facebook handle "Fullmetalpiglet," a takeoff on the manga series "Fullmetal Alchemist"--doesn't sell her dolls, but she does explain how to make them in detailed online video tutorials for crafting … Read more

It's not always easy to argue with an artist. Somehow, everything that's said ends up being so, well, subjective.

Still, how can one not at least listen to the words of the great Japanese anime director Hayao Miyazaki on the subject of the iPad?

Miyazaki, 69, is an artist of legendary proportions in Japan. He directed "Princess Mononoke" and "Ponyo," as well as the first anime movie to win an Academy Award, "Spirited Away."

He was voted one of Time magazine's 100 most influential people in 2005 and some have called … Read more

Note: This is an update of a post I wrote last October, which focused on the iPhone version of this app.

Do you like indie films? Documentaries? Animation? Then I'm about to make your day: NFB Films for iPad lets you watch over a thousand movies on your tablet. For free.

"NFB" stands for National Film Board, a bona fide Canadian treasure. The app taps the NFB's mammoth library of documentaries, features, animated films, trailers (for upcoming NFB releases), and more.

All the movies are streamed to your iPad (via Wi-Fi only), but there's also … Read more

Soccer Superstars is a unique and fun soccer game for iPhone with cartoony, anime-style graphics, RPG elements that let you level-up special players, and challenging gameplay. Unlike most 3D soccer variants you find in the iTunes App Store, Soccer Superstars has a much more arcadelike feel. At the beginning of every match, you're able to choose a special character who plays as a striker with super moves for scoring goals. This arcade style is particularly apparent in the My League mode, which lets you play as your own special player you can level-up and comes complete with special moves … Read more

EMERYVILLE, Calif.--In Hollywood these days, the push to put out movies in 3D is on. In part, it's a way to get some additional marketing buzz about a film, but it's also a source of additional revenue because theaters charge a premium for showings in that format.

At Pixar Animation Studios, those rationales are not lost on executives, and when "Toy Story 3" comes out on Friday it will be offered both in 3D and the traditional 2D format. Indeed, last year Pixar worked to build up interest in the new film by promoting a … Read more

At Pixar Animation Studios, which will release "Toy Story 3," its 11th feature film, on Friday, each new movie is an opportunity both to notch huge box office numbers and to break new ground in the technique of using computers in digital animation.

To veteran Pixar watchers, the latter dynamic should by now be very familiar. With "Finding Nemo," the studio had to figure out how to use its technology to craft believable underwater scenes. With "Monsters Inc.," the challenge was animating the characters' lush fur. In "Cars," it was determining how … Read more

VIP attendees of the annual Design Miami/Art Basel art and design showcase in Switzerland Monday are being treated to a new interactive light sculpture from London design studio Random International.

Comprised of hundreds of LEDs that are physically linked with polished brass and electronically linked by micro controllers, Swarm Light takes audio visualization into the real world using three 3D grids of lights.

Interactivity is based around embedded microphones that pick up nearby sounds. The audio is processed in real time by software and transformed into corresponding light animations that float above you like swarms of choreographed fireflies. The … Read more

A group of University of Michigan students has brought the old-school flip book into the 21st century with the Scribble, a handheld touch-screen toy that turns digital drawings into animations.

With a plastic-tip pen, users hand-draw and save a series of consecutive images, which the Scribble then plays back in sequence to create the illusion of movement (once saved, drawings can be edited). A functional prototype of the device recently netted first place in a toy design competition co-sponsored by the University of Michigan College of Engineering's Center for Entrepreneurship, and Giddy Up Toys.

To make their product, University … Read more

The bottom line: Photoshop CS5 greatly expands the toolset that Adobe offers in its flagship product, charting new ways to make image manipulation easier while making older tools work better than before. Don't worry about the lack of a new interface, the new ways to get your project done make this version a must.

Photoshop has been in the English lexicon as a term to edit images for a long time, but the latest version of Adobe's flagship program stretches the canvas of manipulation much farther than ever before. The look of the program has changed so little … Read more