This week I had the chance to talk with Simon Otto, the Head of Character Animation on "How to Train Your Dragon." He's been an artist at DreamWorks for nearly 13 years and spent the past 3 1/2 years working on "Dragons".

LCJ: What were your duties as Head of Character Animation on "How to Train Your Dragon"?

Simon: My job was split into two: the first half of my experience with the movie, which was basically the first two years on the film, I helped the designers develop the characters and brought their designs into the 3D world. And then we were able to create digital puppets that we were able to play with as characters in the movie. Then, maybe a year and a half ago, we took these puppets and started playing, scene by scene. I worked together with a team of about 50 animators and was the right hand of the director.

LCJ: How challenging was it to come up with the animated look for the Vikings and the dragons?

Simon: The difficult part was coming-up with dragons that looked and felt realistic, because dragons don't exist. We had to find a way to make them look like real animals. So we came up with this game of mix and match, where we exchanged the body, the head and the legs on all of the dragons until we came-up with something we liked. Toothless, the main dragon, became a mix of an eagle and a panther. We went out and collected all this footage of real animals and studied them in great details. Then when it came time to animate the scenes we knew what we were drawing.

LCJ: The 3D of the movie is fantastic. My favorite scene in the movie is when Hiccup and Astrid are riding Toothless through the fog on their way to the dragon's nest. You see them in the middle of the screen and then one at a time all of these other dragons start popping-up around them and becoming clearer, all in the same shot. It's incredible 3D filmmaking.

Simon: Thank you very much. It was quite a challenge to get to animate so many dragons in the same shot. We really needed a lot of help on the computers to get so many different dragons all together. And we had to make sure that each of the dragons flies different, because they all have different body shape and wing span and we had to be sure that was reflected on the screen.

LCJ: It's an amazing scene. Did you get to work with the voice actors - Jay Baruchel, America Ferrera - at all?

Simon: Yes. What we lead animators do is go to the recordings and sit in the corner. The actors sometimes don't even know that we're there. And we observe them and sketch them, especially the great actors, to see what gestures they're doing over and over. They give us a tremendous amount of ideas of how we can perform certain scenes. In the case of Gerard Butler, who plays Stoick, he always had this great gesture with his right hand when he was doing a scene. And if you watch the movie you can see that gesture coming into play with the character all the time. We create these characters in computers, so our job is to make the audience think that these are characters are real people.

LCJ: You've worked on many of DreamWorks animated films, including "Bee Movie", "Over the Hedge" and "Flushed Away", is "Dragons" your favorite of them all?

Simon: I'd have to say yes. I grew-up watching the great Disney animated films such as "Jungle Book" and "The Aristocats" and making animated movie is what I wanted to do all of my life. And "How to Train Your Dragon", to me, is the film that comes the closest to the classic Disney movies in terms of how the characters perform. They're funny, but at the same time they look and act like real human beings. This movie allowed my to be very realistic with the humans and be very inventive with the dragons.

 More with Simon coming-up.

In honor of the release of "Toy Story" and "Toy Story 2" in High Definition, Disney, the Boys and Girls Clubs of America and Lego Systems, Inc. got together in Hollywood for a special event: the creation of a one-of-a-kind "Toy Story" mural.

Kids from Boys and Girls Clubs from Washington, D.C, Philadelphia, Chicago, Houston, Denver and L.A. each put together parts of this amazing mural and then met in Hollywood to put it all together.

Disney has been a partner with Boys and Girls Clubs for over 50 years. In fact Walt Disney was an honorary member of the Boys and Girls Club board of directors way back in 1963. I think Walt would be proud of this Lego creation.

I hate to say "I told you so", but I predicted that this would be a problem months ago - too many 3D films, and not enough 3D theaters.

"Alice in Wonderland" is still going strong, "How to Train Your Dragons" is coming-out Friday and then "Clash of the Titans" will be released a week after that. And they're all in 3D. And there just aren't that many 3D screens to show them all.

Fortunately, the theater where I saw a screening of "Dragons" on Saturday (it's spectacular, by the way. I'll have my review later this week) has added a 2nd 3D screen. Hopefully that's happening at other theaters around the country. But there still aren't going to be enough for all the 3D films coming out this year. Heck, if "Avatar" was still showing in 3D it would be raking in a lot more money than it is right now in 2D.

Reportedly, studio are battling with theaters owners (and each other) trying to secure 3D screens for their new releases. But theaters with only 1 3D screen are going to have to move "Alice" Friday to make room for "Dragon" and then move out "Dragon" after only one week to make room for "Titans". This is crazy.

Theater owners should have seen this coming so they would have been prepared for all these 3D films, instead of having to scramble and bump popular films because they don't have a place to show them.

The great Hank Azaria has signed-on to do the voice of Gargamel in the upcoming "Smurfs" movie. So I guess we now know that Gargamel will be an animated character. There had been rumors that the Smurfs' enemy would be real-life in this movie, which is going to be a combination of live-action and animation.

Azaria is best known for his work on The Simpsons. "Smurfs" is schedule to be released on Aug. 3, 2011.

 UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE

According to Neil Patrick Harris, who is also in the "Smurfs" cast, Azaria will be PLAYING Gargamel, not just voicing him. So Gargamel will be at LIVE ACTION character. I think it's good this way, because villains work better in animation/live action combo films when they're real people (such as in "Alvin and the Chipmunks").

Disney has decide to close the studio used to create Jim Carrey's Scrooge in last year's "A Christmas Carol". The film was a disappointment at the box office and so the studio, looking to save money, has announced that the studio, near San Francisco, will be shut-down.

The studio was built by ImageMovers Digital, a company co-founded by "A Christmas Carol" director Robert Zemeckis. I got to see how the motion-capture process works when I visited the "A Christmas Carol" touring train last fall. It's too bad that the studio will be closing.

However, Zemeckis and his crew will be allowed to finish the film they're working on now, "Mars Needs Moms", which is schedule to be released next March.

Fox and James Cameron may re-release "Avatar" this Summer in 3D...with 40-minutes of new footage? NOOOO!

First of all, there are already so many summer blockbusters coming-out in 3D, where are they going to get the screens?

Secondly, hasn't everybody who wanted to see "Avatar" seen it (over and over and over). And by adding 40-minutes Camerion is simply looking to grab more money from fans of the film. Not very nice. Why not save the extras for the DVD release, which will already be huge.

Finally, I can't imagine the extra scenes are going to make the story any better, so it's just going to be more effects. Even diehard fans don't need that.

Just sound like J.C. is trying to get "Avatar" some headines following the Oscar disappointment.

The newest "Shrek Forever After" trailer is out (you can see it below) and, unfortunately, it doesn't look that good. Not a lot of funny scenes. Hopefully, it's not a preview of how the film is going to be.

It's official! There will be an "Alvin and the Chipmunks 3". And it'll be called "Alvin and the Chipmunks 3D." Release date: Dec. 16, 2011, which is only one week before Steve Speilberg's own 3D animated film, "The Adventures of Tin Tin: The Secret of the Unicorn."

Hopefully by then there will be more 3D screens in theaters around the country. The problem of too many 3D movies coming out back-to-back is going to become a hot issue this summer (IMAX films, too), and it'll get worse next year. In fact it won't be long until most movies are made in 3D.

If I was planning to build a new movie theater, I'd make it so EVERY auditorium could show 3D films.

"Alice in Wonderland"'s $116+M opening weekend was a major shocker. That was the highest March opening of all-time, by $45M ("300" made $71M back in 2007). It even beat "Avatar"'s first weekend. As you know I didn't like either of those films. And, remember "Transformer 2" (another bad film) and it's big opening weekend last year.

I think it's become clear that the early box office success for movies has a lot more to do with the hype and marketing campaign than it does with the quality of the film.

A film I'm hoping is both good AND popular - "Smurfs", is starting to put it's cast together. Reportedly, Katy Perry and Geprge Lopoz will be doing voices in the film and Neil Patrick Harris wll be playing the main live-action character. Live-action characters in "Smurfs"? That's not too Smurfy!

It was an interesting Academy Awards. The hosts - Steve Martin and Alec Baldin - were funny. The show moved along, even though it went past midnight (ET) and actually was longer than last year (even without the Best Song performances).

All the major categories went as expected - Bridges, Bullock, Weltz, Mo'Nique, Bigelow , "The Hurt Locker", "Up". The biggest surprise for me - "A Matter of Loaf and Death" losing to "Logorama" for Best Animated Short. The three previous Wallace and Gromit entries had all won Oscars. But "Logorama" is amazing. Try to catch it online if it's out there.

Big Losers: "Avatar" (only three wins), James Cameron, "Inglorious Basterds" (only one win), "Up in the Air".

Big Winners: "The Hurt Locker" (of course), "Prescious", "Crazy Heart", "Up", Sandra Bullock.

And ME!  I went 17 for 24 with my picks, including 4 for 4 in the biggies (for the second year in a row) and 4 for 4 with my picks on TV (local and national). Maybe "Fox and Friends" will have me back again next year!

More tomorrow - I've got to get to bed.

Happy Oscar Day! This Is My Super Bowl!

Enjoy the show! I heard that rehearsals went well and that Sandra Bullock won a Razzie last night and may become the first person to win a Razzie and an Oscar in the same year.

It looks like it will be a big weekend for "Alice". More on that later.

Follow me tonight on Twitter during the Oscars!