Today Heartstrings is screening in competition at the 2D OR NOT 2D festival in Seattle. It is by far the best named animation festival I've found, which is reason enough to enter, but the awards are called 'Golden Pencil Awards' and they are, as you'd expect, giant pencils. With most festivals I'm happy just to get a screening and the awards, although great, aren't the reason for entering. This festival is different. I want a giant pencil.
I'm sad not to be going. It's one full day of animated shorts and features, Sita Sings The Blues and The Secret Of Kells, with a couple of talks by the film makers. The screenings take pace in an IMAX theatre so my little film will be enormous! Knit and Purl will look like something Godzilla should be fighting and I expect it will be the only chance I get to see that. Last year the festival played host to a talk by Michel Gagne. I'm such a fan that if he were there this year I would've posed as the pilot to get my flight over. I've seen Catch Me If You Can, it looks easy.
I'd love to see Seattle, home of grunge, Bill Gates, a monorail, a space needle, Bruce and Brandon Lee's graves, a walking tour of clocks, lots of gardens, a hammering man statue and the Fremont Troll. It's also the only city in the world where I would feel that a coffee in Starbucks was justified.
