Join +Bassam Kurdali Saturday at High Noon in a Google hangout to chat about the Tube production (May 12 at 12pm EST)

Alexandre Prokoudine published a great, funny interview with Bassam and me over at Libre Graphics World: Tube Open Movie Founders on Art, War and Blender

LGM Talk about the Tools of Tube: Libre Graphics Meeting is a great conference well attended by developers of free/open source software–all the programs we use in the making of Tube. Since we weren’t able to be at the meeting in Vienna this year, we prepared a short remote talk for the group. It’s mainly about some of the tools we’ve written as part of the Tube Open Movie production, and we thought it would be nice to share!

Summer internship applications are open until the email deadline of Thursday May 17, at 5pm (EDT).

In the 3 days left on Tube’s Kickstarter campaign, can we reach full production funding?! You can help by getting the word out to your people, and we’ll finish in a massive success — thanks for your support!

Calling all students (18+), recent graduates, and professionals wanting to ply their 3D skills in libre software:

Join Bassam and the URCHN crew this summer on the Tube Open Movie production, hosted by the Bit Films animation incubator at Hampshire College, Massachusetts. Helmed by Chris Perry, formerly of Pixar and Rhythm & Hues, the program draws together a lot of talent, so although the internships are unpaid, it promises to be a very stimulating and fruitful space. These positions offer an opportunity to improve your skills, develop your reel, and make useful contacts in the industry. There is a possibility that housing can be offered.

The official internship period runs from Monday June 4, 2012 through Friday August 31, 2012. Applications are due (via email) no later than Thursday May 17, 2012 at 5pm (EDT). We understand that this may be short lead time for those needing to make visa and travel arrangements. Because the project is ongoing, the internship period is flexible; if in doubt, apply!

Although it may not provide as immersive an experience, we are open to considering very strong applicants to a remote internship. Remote interns would join the already global team using web-based project management software, SVN, video calls and IRC.

Please read carefully the open positions announcement and FAQ! Have more questions? Email us: internships@bitfilms.com

Here we have a Tube Open Movie postcard / A5 suitable for printing! Rather than ship them all over the world, we offer the print-ready files [front, back] (in CMYK with bleed margins in place). We hope anyone who wants to help promote the project and campaign knows of a few spots to post them or pass them around. If you want to show the image on the web, better to use the ones displayed. Thanks for helping us get the word out!

Heya folks, Fateh and I just posted a video update, it includes a small behind the scenes peak at production during the past week. Check it out!

At officially 1:27pm EST Saturday, we heard the BOOM that pushed us over the threshold to achieve real funding. Since Kickstarter pledges are not guaranteed until the target is met, it feels in a way like this is the real beginning. Looking back over the slog of reaching the production mid-point by keeping a low overhead, trading lots of favors and putting anything earned back into Tube, I can only say what a fine day indeed! Mega-thanks to our earliest supporters for their solidarity and incredible backing.

Tube is designed to scale with the resources we have. You can see from the project video that we are hard at work making the movie, in tandem with running its campaign — and we want the result to be amazing. Crucially, further funds will allow us to focus on Tube without interruption, give commissions to our valiant crew and make new hires. Budget permitting, Bassam made this sketch of what other passengers on the train might look like:

In the next few days we’ll post a video update about this week in production, showing some of the cool tools we’ve developed to help us (and you!). Let’s keep momentum building, and make this a totally awesome movie under the clock we’ve set ticking.