Our friend Anthony Tollin called the other day to point us to a short animation by the Digital Animation and Visual Effects School at Universal Studios; seems these kids have created a CGI animation, Batman: New Times, starring the voices of Adam West as The Batman, Mark Hamill as The Joker, Courtney Thorne-Smith as Catwoman, and Dick Van Dyke as Commissioner Gordon. Oh, did I mention everything in the film is built out of virtual Legos? It’s quite an impressive undertaking, and there’s a version specifically for your Video iPod.

But it’s my opinion that this isn’t the best film produced by the students, although it may be the most ambitious and certainly has the most star-power. Spend some time there watching the many student-produced films and be amazed; check out Ghostbusters in LA for their exercise in merging live action with CGI animation, Runners to see a comic book brought painstakingly to life, panel by panel, and B-17, an aerial WWII adventure.

But my personal favorite is DragonFellow, a charming film about a dragon with no wings, and what it would cost to get them. Seeing the wide-eyed wonder of my seven-year-old daughter as she watched this musical fairy tale actually brought a tear to these old, wizened eyes. If you can, find a child to join you in this short story made real by computer animation. You won’t be sorry.

(If you want to view these films, but aren’t in the mood to install Apple’s QuickTime which is now bundled with the annoying and unnecessary iTunes software, consider installing the QuickTime Alternative.)