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A Scanner… Slowly

The pace of animation on Richard Linklater's A Scanner Darly has lead to budget over-runs and contentious layoffs:

Most of the animators were hired locally in Austin. Sabiston signed a glassblower and a photo lab technician, a comic book illustrator and a sculptor. Only a few of the original 30 or so animators had moviemaking experience. "I told them, you are making a living as an animator, that's the good news. The bad news is that it's hard work," Linklater says. "It was more of a factory and less artists expressing themselves."

That message apparently did not sink in. Roughly six weeks into animation, with Sabiston in charge and Linklater off shooting The Bad News Bears, only a few animated segments were in the can. It took weeks just to get a single body part drawn for one sequence. Sabiston had divvied up the work among five teams, with a leader for each. But communication was poor between the groups, and the uniform animation style Linklater wanted gave way to freestyle drawing. When Linklater saw one rendition of Reeves' beard, he complained to the lead animator that it reminded him of Fred Flintstone.

--Wired 14.03: Trouble in Toontown

About J. Ott

John Ott is a writer, filmmaker and futurist. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook and Google+.