Today (Feb 8), on Google’s search engine page, the animated Doodle celebrates the late Malaysian cartoonist and pioneer in animation, Kamarudin Ismail.
Kamarudin was born in the small seaside town of Pengkalan Balak, Melaka, on Feb 8, 1956. As a child, he fell in love with drawing and aspired to be a comic artist.
Kamarudin, also better known as Kamn Ismail, was the person who was responsible for creating Malaysia’s first animated television series, Usop Sontorian, and the country’s first superhero, Keluang Man.
Usop Sontorian launched Kamn’s career in digital animation, and it nearly took three years and as many as 94 dedicated employees to produce a total of 49 episodes. The television series was aired on RTM’s TV1. His success also boosted confidence in the local animation industry.
The Keluang Man, based on DC Comic’s Batman, rose in popularity from its first appearance in 1998 on RTM1.
The Keluang Man, a popular character, is the story of Borhan, a Tampoi mental hospital patient who transforms at night into a superhero fighting crime with the help of his trustworthy sidekick Tiong Man.
Keluang Man was the first local animation to ever combine both two-dimensional animations with a three-dimensional background.
Due to the challenges of making animation motion and camera motion more fascinating, Kamn chose to integrate both methods.
His work was recognised with multiple awards, including Best Animated Film at the Malaysia Film Festival. He was also a Malaysian Animation Icon.
Kamarudin passed at the Universiti Malaya Medical Centre on Dec 8, 2019.
Source: FMT, New Straits Times
