For all of you in the LA area, remember ASIFA/Hollywood is hosting it's big STOP MOTION EXPO at Woodbury College today. From their press release:

ASIFA-Hollywood will raise the curtain on a timeless art form by hosting the Stop-Mo Expo, a daylong event celebrating the art of stop-motion animation at Woodbury University on Saturday, April 21, 2007.

The expo will be comprised of two distinct events: beginning at 9 a.m. panel discussions and seminars with animation professionals and at 6 p.m. a film festival that will showcase classic and current stop-motion animated films, including rare 16 mm stop-motion films from the collection of animation director Mark Kausler. Running concurrently with these two events will be a stop-motion animation jam, a unique feature where professionals, students and members of Movies By Kids will combine their talents to create a stop-motion film.

Special guests for the panels will include:
Academy Award and primetime Emmy Award winning director/producer Will Vinton
Three-time Academy Award winning animation designer Randy Cook
Members of the special effects animation company Chiodo Brothers Productions
Animation producers Mark Caballero & Seamus Walsh of Screen Novelties
Lighting and visual effects animator Jim Aupperle
Robot Chicken and Moral Orel animator Tennessee Reid Norton
Visual effects supervisor Gene Warren, Jr.
...and many more!
"Once again, ASIFA-Hollywood will celebrate an art form that is still relevant today as it was forty years ago," said animation professor and ASIFA-Hollywood board member Larry Loc. "From King Kong to Tim Burtons Corpse Bride, stop-motion animation took audiences to places they've never been before and still excites the imagination of twenty-first century movie-goers."

Admission Information
Reservations are not required and tickets for both events can be purchased at the door together for $50 or separately: $25 for the panel discussions and seminars and $35 for the film festival. Members of ASIFA-Hollywood can enjoy a $10 discount on each separate admission or $15 off an all-access ticket. Parking is free. Woodbury University is located at 7500 Glenoaks Blvd., Burbank 91510-7846.

The original armature of King Kong from 1931.

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Birthdays: Edwin S. Porter the first movie director, Charlotte Bronte', John Muir, Freiderich Froebel the inventor of kindergarten-1782, Anthony Quinn, Patti Lupone, Iggy Pop, Charles Grodin, Anna Mangnani. Andie MacDowell, Tony Danza, Elaine May, Queen Elizabeth II is 81

1911- LENIN WANTS A LIBRARY CARD. Russian communist revolutionary Nikolai Lenin was living in exile in London. In a letter dated this day he applied to the British Museum Library collection to study it's documents. His letter was in perfect English and he signed his name under the pseudonym Jacob Richter.

1910- Mark Twain died of congenital heart failure at 75 as Haley's comet appeared overhead. He once wrote: " When arriving in Heaven feel free to ask all the questions you want of Saint Peter. You may ask for his autograph however don’t take any Kodak photos or bring your dog. Admittance to Heaven is based on favor, not merit, else the dog would be allowed to go in and you kept out."

1918-THE RED BARON SHOT DOWN- In the wild duels in the air above the World War One trenches Baron Manfred Von Richtofen was the best of the best. The Red Knight had shot down more planes than anyone -80 confirmed. When other squadrons were disguising their planes with the new camouflage paints ("cubism gone to war"-Picasso), Richtofen had his men paint their planes bright colors to show their contempt of the enemy, hence the name-"the Flying Circus". On this day during a dogfight he got onto the tail of one plane and was preparing to add #81 when Canadian Roy Brown got behind Richtofen and put a burst of machine gun fire into him. Mortally wounded, The baron still managed to land his red fokker triplane before slumping over dead. Von Richtofen was 26. The plane was later torn to pieces by Australian soldiers seeking souvenirs. Recent scholarship contends he was killed by Australian ground fire, but Brown got the credit.. Roy Brown couldn't handle his celebrity status and committed suicide after the war. For the remainder of the war Richtofen's staffel (squadron) was led by a young pilot named Herman Goring.
courtesy United Press Media.

1921- The Coconut Grove nightclub opened in Hollywood.

1938- Disney animator Bill Tytla married artists model Adrienne LeClerc.

1961- Two groups of British teenage rock bands meet each other for the first time- The Beatles met the Rolling Stones.

1964- British TV viewers double their pleasure- BBC 2 goes on the air. The first program is Play School.

1989- Oil executive George W. Bush became part of a ownership consortium that bought the last place baseball team the Texas Rangers." As soon as I knew they were for sale I went after them like a pit bull on a pants leg….It doesn’t get much better than this…"

1997-The first Intergalactic Funeral. The ashes of Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry and 1960's drug guru Dr. Timothy Leary were shot into space.

2000- Scientists discover the fossilized heart of a dinosaur in South Dakota. It had four chambers and an aorta like a mammal. This all but proves the theory that Dinosaurs were not reptiles but warm blooded.