"In 1744 a simple experiment was conducted in Sweden to reproduce the underlying cause of the Aurora Borealis in a laboratory, what we would now think of as a room. A small hole in a shade "the size of a large pea" let through a ray of sunlight that then was refracted through a prism. The small patch of light broken into a spectrum of colours then traveled through a medium of turbulent air directly above a warmed glass of aquavit. The resulting image landed on a screen a few short feet away and looked like what was seen dancing in the sky on many long Swedish nights, nature's sublime entertainment in the real pre-history of cinema."

Continued here. An Animate Projects commission for Channel 4 in association with Arts Council England. Awarded Best Film at Cutting Edge at the British Animation Awards 2008. Thanks FMG.

Muto is a rather neat stop motion graffiti in Buenos Aires and Baden, by the artists collective BluBlu. Thanks Ann, for forwarding, it seems a cross between Rinpa Eshidan and that Mark Ronson video, with a whole life of its own.

We were chatting the other night about how the Death Star, for all its evil genius as a total killing machine, was really badly designed. I mean from a defensive point of view – a huge open port, with no gun turrets inside, leading to a big self destruct button. And Darth, despite all his Jedi training, is a pretty lousy pursuer of Luke.

So we wondered if, at the end of Episode 3, aware that the Emporer is set to win, and that not much can be done about this, he reisgns to a life inside a giant gimp suit while secretly making plans to allow it all to come crashing down when the time comes, knowing that his son would one day come to avenge his death.

I await the calls of derision from proper fans, but meantime, keep this thought in your mind as you watch the latest Darth Vadar film doing the rounds.

Have a slightly madver 2008

As the season finally closes in on us, for those tired of the same old re-runs on TV or wanting to avoid the family warzone of the living room and watch TV on a computer under your bed - or better still are looking for films to share during the post-dinner web video show-off - I've pulled together some of our favorites of the year.

In the first bundle I've focussed on animation and stop motion, with no shortage of inventiveness from France to Japan, Sweden to America. As well as a particularly strong set of films using stop motion, there's a special look at one of YouTube's first punk-star filmmakers, Lasse Gjertsen, who was ignored while studying at the Kent Institute but now, back living with his parents in Norway, gets millions of views for his no-budget yet most finely cut flicks.

Of course this is but a tiny selection - do link to your favorites in the comments, and more to follow soon.

Animation 

走れ！(Life in 30 seconds) 

Backspace Float

Le Grande Motion

Music in the City by James Sandifer