Scanimation strikes

Part of the avalanche of Peanuts books landing on my doorstep this week is Peanuts: A Scanimation Book. This is one of those books where when you turn the page, a picture animates, like the Peanuts Moving Book I reviewed a few months back. The ten scenes in this book are mostly (completely?) taken from the animated Peanuts specials, so there are some very recognizable moments included. (Forgive the food in the background of the video; my iPad camera was taking a wider image than it showed.)

What this also means are that the images are full-color… which sounds like a good thing, but when combined with the black-striped overlay that makes the animation work, it makes for a very dark image. All in all, I liked the look of the Japanese book better… but I sure liked buying this US book better; it’s not-imported price was a lot easier on the wallet. (Well, the book is actually imported; most books are printed overseas, and an assembled, mechanical book like this one definitely would be.) Get one for yourself here.

Animated Peanuts
We finally know how Charlie Brown did at the Super Bowl!

If you’ve never seen the 1994 Peanuts special You’re in the Super Bowl, Charlie Brown, well, you’re not alone. It aired only in 1994, linked to that year’s Super Bowl, on NBC, which had never before and has never since aired a Peanuts special. It has never been rerun, never …

New releases
A different kind of coffee table book

If you have a coffee table, you should have a “coffee table book”, a large, heavily illustrated color volume that your guests can easily and casually flip through, (Charles M. Schulz: The Art and Life of the Peanuts Creator in 100 Objects is a good choice, of course.) But you …

New releases
Review: Snoopy (Classic Cartoon Character Bios)

The Abdo Kids : Classic Cartoon Character Bios books are blatant stuff-to-fill-school-libraries material. Sturdy hardcovers, lots of pictures, 24 pages, little text – about 250 words. The Snoopy volume uses Snoopy images from just about anywhere: strips (appropriately licensed), animation, photos, The Peanuts Movie publicity materials. And the simple facts it …