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T H E B U S I N E S S , T E C H N O L O G Y & A R T O F A N I M A T I O N
October
2007
w w w . a n i m a t i o n m a g a z i n e . n e t
Tak and the Power of Juju:
Nick's CG Tribe Has Spoken
Fall TV Preview
[adult swim]s Lucy,
Daughter of the Devil
Skunk Fu! debuts
on Kids WB!
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Volume 21, Issue 10, Number 177, October 2007
4 Frame-by-Frame
October Animation Planner ... Books We Love .... Aaron Augenblick discusses his toon studios work
on David Wains indie feature, The Ten. [by Ryan Ball]
8 Gaming
8 Channeling Chuck Jones. Looney Tunes fans get Daffy with Duck Amuck on DS. [by Ryan Ball]
10 Shorts
10 So, Whats Next, Dude? A young London-based animator discusses the mysterious ways you can
take control of your career. [by Ian W. Gouldstone]
12 Home
Entertainment
12 The Samurai Critic: Reviews of the
latest anime titles on DVD. [by Charl es
Sol omon] 14 Familiar Faces in New
Situations. New animated TV shows and
movies on DVD.
16 Television
16 One Helluva Gal! [adult swim] has a
date with Lucy, Daughter of the Devil.
[by Ryan Ball] 18 A Different Kettle of
Fish. Sushi Pack promises to be one of
the most original new toons of the fall
season. 20 Wild at Heart. National
Geographic Kids, BBC and King Rollo Films offer a delightful new preschool show which combines
2D animation with live-action wildlife footage. 22 Fall TV Preview Section 26 Smells Like A Hit!
Skunk Fu! kicks into action on Kids WB! this fall. 28 New Faces and Classic Icons. Kids WB!s new
fall lineup. 30 Time for Terric Tribal Magic. Nicks rst in-house CG toon, Tak and the Power of Juju,
delivers awesome visuals and memorable characters. 32 MIPCOM Jr. Snapshots. Eight projects to
look for at the Cannes market. 36 Meet the Buyers! Everything you need to know about MIPCOM
Jr. TV execs. 39 The ABCs of Reading. A new PBS animated series has crafted a clever way of
teaching preschoolers how to read. 40 Cartoon Forum Preview. What to expect at the event in
Catalunya. 44 Heroes with Lasting SuperPowers. Our guest columnist looks back at the origins of
the rst animated Fantastic Four show. [by Stuart Fischer] 45 Hungarian Rhapsody. Whats new at
Budapests Studio Baestarts.
46 New Media
46 Waiting for the Right Phone Plan! Animation industry insiders are wondering how much longer they have to wait for the
toon revolution to take off on cell phones in the U.S. [by Chris Grove]
48 VFX
48 Alice in Zombie Land. How the crack team at Mr. X delivered digital zombies, killer crows and Milla Jovovich clones
for Resident Evil: Extinction. [by Ron Magid] 52 Cause & Effects. Two new CG-animated ads put humans in impossible
situations. [by Barbara Robertson] 54 Digital Magic. [by Chris Grove] 56 Tech Reviews. [by Todd Sheridan Perry]
58 Opportunities
58 London Calling Digital Disciples. The London Film Academy launches a state-of-the-art digital vfx program. [by Ellen
Wolff] 60 3D Pete. Mysteries of the Jedi mind. [by Mike Fisher]
On the Cover: Nickelodeons new CG-animated series Tak and the Power of the Jujus got game. Also, [adult swim]s Lucy,
Daughter of the Devil and Kids WB!s Skunk Fu! are part of our annual Fall TV Preview issue.
MIPCOM Junior Cover: Captain Flamingo: Breakthrough Animation, Heroic Film Company, Atomic Cartoons and PASI Animation. Produced in
association with YTV Canada. Atomic Betty: Breakthrough Animation, Atomic Cartoons and Teleimages Kids. Produced in association with Teletoon
Canada, M6 and Teletoon France. Miss Bg: Breakthrough Animation and Ellipsanime. Produced in association with TVOntario and France 5. Jimmy
Two Shoes: Breakthrough Animation. Produced in association with Teletoon Canada and Jetix Europe.
Cartoon Forum Cover: Studio Baestarts new animated series, Huhu, brings its classic silent comedy sensibilities to Cartoon Forum.
16
Corrections: In last months issue, an article stated that The Simpsons Movie was animated at Film Roman with overseas work from Rough Draft
Korea. The movie was actually split 50/50 split between Rough Draft Studios U.S. and Film Roman--with overseas work from Rough Draft Korea.
Comic-Con issue: Dan Povenmire and Jeff Swampy Marsh are co-creators as well as co-executive producers of Disney Channels
Phineas and Ferb.
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ANIMATION MAGAZINE
October 2007
Vol. 21, Issue 10, No. 177
Info@animationmagazine.net
President Jean Thoren
Publisher Jodi Bluth
Accounting Jan Bayouth
Webmaster Eric Brandenberg
EDITORIAL Edit@animationmagazine.net
Editor-in-Chief Ramin Zahed
Web and Gaming Editor Ryan Ball
Contributing Editors Chris Grove, Ron Magid,
Barbara Robertson
Editorial Assistant Mercedes Milligan
Copy Editor Roberta Street
Animation Art Advisor Ron Barbagallo
Digital Reviews Editor Todd Sheridan Perry
Contributors Mike Fisher, Stuart Fischer, Ian
W. Gouldstone, Robby London, Thomas J.
McLean, Charles Solomon, Ellen Wolff
ADVERTISING SALES
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Animation Magazine
2007 Animation Magazine
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Printed in the U.S.A.
T
he summer of 2007 is over, folks! That means all the number crunchers
in Hollywood are looking back at the ticket sales and celebrating the
fact that a new record was set at the domestic (and possibly) global box
ofce. As we went to press this month, we got word that despite all the
early doom and gloom reports, audiences spent over $4.003 billion at the
movies between May 1 and August 26. This beats last summers $3.633
billion (revenues are up 10.18% and attendance increased 5.35%) as well
as the big record summer of 2004 which was $3.95 billion by Labor Day!
Sure, these numbers denitely need a little footnote to remind everyone of ticket price
inationaverage ticket prices were $6.21 in 2004, compared to $6.85 in 2007. Nevertheless, in
the animation and vfx universe, folks should be ordering up the bubbly, as nine out of the top
10 blockbusters of the season were either animated or heavily reliant on visual effects.
The amazing performance of DreamWorks Shrek the Third, Disney/Pixars Ratatouille and
Foxs The Simpsons Movie should give everyone renewed hope in the future of animated
features. Homer and his spider pig also proved that you dont have to rely on happy shiny
CG projects to win the hearts of audience all over the world. Some even argue that the
heavyhitters in the vfx realmSpider-
Man 3, Pirates of the Caribbean 3,
Transfomers and Harry Potter and
the Order of the Phoenix had more
in common with cartoons than
actual live-action movies.
Ramin Zahed
Editor-in-Chief
rzahed@animationmagazine.net
Quote of the Month
Two frames later, Bourne
dispatched his aardvark
enemy with a crushing
elbow to the throat.
Michael Slezaks winning entry from an EW.com write-a-photo-caption contest, in con-
nection with last months news that Matt Damon will make an animated guest appear-
ance on the long-running Cookie Jar/PBS series, Arthur.

Rank Title Studio U.S. * Intl. *
1. Spider-Man 3 [Sony] $336.5 $553.6
2. Shrek the Third [DreamWorks/Paramount] $321 $417.8
3. Transformers [Disney] $308.8 $367.2
4. Pirates of the Caribbean 3 [Disney] $308.1 $649.7
5. Harry Potter & the Order of the Phoenix
[Warner Bros.]
$283.8 $612.2
6. Ratatouille [Disney] $199.3 $174.2
7. The Bourne Ultimatum [Universal] $187.4 $52.6
8. The Simpsons Movie [Fox] $174.2 $270.2
9. Knocked Up [Universal] $147.8 $25.5
10. Live Free Or Die Hard [Fox] $133.2 $215.3
Source: www.boxofcemojo.com 8/28/07 * Gross in Millions
Lets just hope that the splendid report cards for these
movies translate to better pay and more respect for the
talented men and women who work long hours to deliver
our favorite animated lms. To paraphrase that old saw
from Field of Dreams, if you build an awesome toon, they
will comeand happily cough up their hard-earned
moneyto see it on the big screen!
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T he Ani mat i on Pl anner
October
2
You
may have to take a big duffel bag
to the DVD store today to carry
out all the cool new animated
releasesA Flintstones Christmas
Carol, Disneys The Jungle Book:
Platinum Edition, Tom & Jerry:
A Nutcracker Tale and The Year
Without a Santa Claus: Deluxe
Edition.
2-3 Brand Licensing
Europe brings toy and
licensing execs to London
this week (http://show.
brandlicensingexpo.com).
6-7 Its time to buy or sell
the next big animated TV
show in Cannes at the annual
MIPCOM Jr. market (www.
mipcomjunior.com).
5 Immortal warriors try to
save the world from forces
of evil in the faux-medieval
fantasy movie The Dark Is
Rising, which stars Deadwoods
Ian McShane, opening in
theaters nationwide today.
8-11/12 Catch some
cutting-edge Flash-animated
and motion graphics projects
at Albuquerques Best in the
SW Festival (www.bestinthesw.
com). Also starting today in
Cannes Palais des Festivals is
the annual TV confab known as
MIPCOM (www.mipcom.com).
9 An odd trio of new
animated DVD releases
arrive today: Ben 10:
Season 2, Bratz Super
Babyz and VeggieTales:
The Wonderful Wizard of
Has. Its all about
what oats your
boat, baby!
11-18 The 8th Annual San
Diego Asian Film Festival of
Animation offers a 90-minute
compilation of animated shorts
(www.sdaff.org).
16 The more impressionable
audiences may get a kick out of
the new Charlie and Lola: Vol.
6 DVD, while the
older, slightly
disturbed fans
will denitely
eat up every
minute of
Squidbillies:
Volume One!
18-28 Chances are youll
nd some quality animated
projects at the 24th edition of
the Chicago Intl Childrens
Film Festival (www.cicff.org).
18 Disney re-releases The
Nightmare before Christmas
3D in theaters today.
19 A husband-and-wife team
track down vampires in a small
Alaskan town in the feature
adaptation of the graphic novel
30 Days of Night, which stars
Josh Hartnett, Melissa George
and Ben Foster.
26 Jigsaw is supposedly
dead, but that doesnt mean
the sadistic games wont
continue in Saw IV, directed by
Darren Lynn Bousman.
31 Youll nd
plenty of feature lm buyers,
sellers and nanciers at the
American Film Market in Santa
Monica, Calif., this week (www.
ifta-online.com/afm).
30 Just in time for Halloween,
Warner Bros. unleashes Shaggy and
Scooby-Doo Get a Clue Vol. 1. Life
is also sweeter today thanks to the
studios two other hot releases, Looney
Tunes: Golden Collection Vol. 5 and
Looney Tunes:
Spotlight
Collection
Vol. 5.
To get your companys events and products listed in this monthly calendar, please e-mail mercedes@animationmagazine.net
24-28 The nights are
pretty long in Helsinki this time
of year, but youll have plenty
of chances to see some cool
shorts at the citys Animatricks
Animation
Festival
(www.ani-
matricks.
net).
18-21 Check out all the
cool new videogames being
prepared for upcoming months
at the E for All Expo 2007 at
the L.A. Convention Center
(www.eforallexpo.com).
23 Entourages Vinnie Chase has
nothing to do with The Adventures of
Aquaman: The Complete Collection DVD
that comes out today. Other top home
entertainment choices today
are Disneys early spring
fun-packed CG-animated
movie Meet the Robinsons
or Super Powers Team:
Galactic Guardians.
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Books We Love
The lazy days of summer may be ofcially draw-
ing to a close, but that doesnt mean we have to
give up on reading about our favorite animated
projects and people. This month, we have three
excellent book suggestions that should get ani-
mation fans drooling like Pavlovs pooch:
Halas & Batchelor Cartoons: An Animated
History
By Vivien Halas and Paul Wells (Southbank Publishing, $35)
J
oy Batchelor and John Halas are widely known as the
team behind the 1954 adap-
tation of George Orwells Animal
Farm, which was considered Britains
rst feature-length animated movie.
However, true animation fans know
that their legacy goes far beyond
that one feature. Between 1940
and 1995, Halas & Batchelor was one of the U.K.s most
inuential animation studios, and this book, penned by
their daughter Vivien Halas and other experts, looks at its
inner workings and critical inuences. Animation professor
Paul Wells also provides viewers with well-researched com-
mentary on works such as The Tales of Hoffnung, Buttery
Ball and Autobahn. The tome includes a chapter by Jim
Walker on the teams commercial work, a lovely intro by
Aardmans Nick Park and several scholarly essays penned
by the likes of Karl Cohen and John Canemaker. In the
words of animation expert John Canemaker, If there were
a king and queen of British animation, those crowns would
surely belong to the estimable husband-and-wife team of
Halas and Batchelor. Looking at the beautifully designed
and richly illustrated pages of this book (which comes with
a DVD sampler of their projects, including Magic Canvas,
The Figurehead, The History of the Cinema, Automania
2000, The Symphony Orchestra and Know Your Europeans
UK), were sure youll have to agree.
The Ofcial Price Guide to Disney
Collectibles
(House of Collectibles, Second Edition, $29.95)
F
inally, a book that will come in handy for those of us who
nd ourselves wondering about the true value of, say,
a Steamboat Willie ceramic magnet or Cruella De Vil hair
roller mug. Thousands of Disneyana itemsfrom
comic books and movie cels to music boxes,
dolls and snow globesare featured in this info-
packed volume that will come to your aid when
youre making your bid on eBay or cleaning out
Aunt Harriets dusty old attic. The publishers are
promising over 28,000 items listed within more
than 125 sections (and 1,040 pages) with full-col-
or photos and current values for every darn list-
ing! And were not just talking about classic 2D characters
from the Golden AgePixar characters and live-action
items are also invited to this price guide parade!
Stan Lee: Conversations
Edited by Jeff McLaughlin (University Press of Mississippi, $20)
P
erhaps no other living gure in the world of superhe-
roes and comic books receives more well-deserved
admiration and attention than Stan Lee, the creator
of such timeless characters as Spi-
der-Man, The X-Men, The Fantastic
Four, Iron Man and The Incredible
Hulk. Unlike many comic-book mas-
ters, however, he is also incred-
ibly friendly, press-savvy and an all-
around charming man. Edited by
Jeff McLaughlin, the new collection
of interviews is a great way to learn
about his creative process, his views
on the role of superheroes and mythology in our cul-
ture, the evolution of the comic biz, and to simply get a
sense of this charming and talented man. The interviews
(1968-2005) are culled from his conversations with the
likes of cartoonists Jack Kirby, Harvey Kurtzman and Roy
Thomas, talk show legend Dick Cavett and DC Com-
ics head Jenette Kahn (who is Marvels main rival!).
Die-hard fans will want to get their hands on this book
especially because it includes Lees never-before-pub-
lished 1970 poem titled God Woke. Overall, a great
way to celebrate the legacy of this ebullient genius and
all-around great human being.
Ramin Zahed
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A
lthough most of the reviews of THINK-
Films indie comedy The Ten have men-
tioned the offbeat humor and quirky
cast list, many failed to point out that one of the
best sequences in the feature was animated by
New York-based Augenblick Studios (best known
for its raunchy contributions to MTV2s cult hit,
Wonder Showzen). The Ten is currently playing in
limited release in the U.S. and is well worth the
trip to the nearest art house.
The Ten is co-written and directed by the tal-
ented David Wain, director of Wet Hot Ameri-
can Summer and one-third of the comedy
troupe Stella, which had a brilliant, but short-
lived, series on Comedy Central last year. Wains
Stella cohorts, Michael Ian Black and Michael
Showalter, appear briey in the lm as part of an
ensemble cast that includes Paul Rudd, Jessica
Alba, Winona Ryder, Famke Janssen, Liev Sch-
reiber, Adam Brody, Gretchen Mol, Rob Corddry,
Oliver Platt and Ron Silver. Also making appear-
ances are a number of former members of
comedy collective The State, including Ken Ma-
rino, who co-wrote the lm with Wain.
Following his role in the hit summer comedy
Knocked Up, Paul Rudd introduces each of The
Tens silly, pseudo morality tales, which are
based on the Ten Commandments. About half-
way through, we get Thou shall not bear false
witness, which is illustrated by the story of an
animated Rhino (voiced by H. Jon Benjamin
fromDr. Katz and Home Movies fame) who wins
friends and inuences people by making up lies
about others. Like the boy who cried wolf, he
soon nds that all the animals soon disbelieve
every word he says, even as he warns them of
impending doom.
The animation by Augenblick Studios is a col-
orful and cheery mix of Flash, PhotoShop and
After Effects that harkens back to the early days
of animation as it depicts gruesome cartoon vi-
olence and animal fornication. Aaron Augen-
blick served as animation director and charac-
ter designer, leading a team of six artists that
spent about four months creating the sequence
basically as a labor of love.
Wain, who wanted to tackle a lot of different
genres in the movie, contacted Augenblick be-
cause he was a fan of the work the studio did on
Wonder Showzen and asked if it was even pos-
sible given the lms small budget. I was like,
Yeah, yeah, lets do it! Augenblick tells us. I
was so excited because I was also a big fan of
Wet Hot American Summer, and it was the same
people working on it. Other than my own festi-
val projects, I havent gotten to do 35mm, so I
was just really excited to do something in a lm.
Right from the beginning, David Wain and
Ken Marino were referencing old Fleischer car-
toons, which I think is one of the things that they
were sort of attracted to in our stuff, Augenblick
continues. We do stuff thats pretty apprecia-
tive of 30s-era cartoons. They wanted a multi-
tude of characters all sort of bouncing along
and dancing and that kind of stuff. Fleischer car-
toons have always been my favorites, so my ap-
proach was to try to do it in a style that was
evocative of Betty Boop and Popeye, without
trying to make it look old. I didnt want to try and
do some faux-retro piece like in [our web series]
Golden Age, as if it were an old cartoon. I want-
ed to do it in a style that was evocative of those
cartoons, but still really vibrant with bright colors,
dirty humor and disturbing, gross visuals. The ap-
proach was to imagine what Fleischer Studios
would do if they were around today and they
were animating an all-animal orgy.
Augenblick tells us that working on The Ten
was probably the most fun he and his crew
have had to date, though it was a lot of hard
work making the piece look really traditional.
Even though we drew it in Flash, every single
frame is hand-drawn, and we did all traditional
in-betweening, he notes. We tried not to
cheat as much as possible by staying away
from doing computer moves and stuff like that.
It was denitely a hand-drawn, labor-intensive
piece. We knew that the movie was going to be
so good that we just kind of went all-out on it.
After all that work, Augenblick says hes a bit
disappointed that the animation hasnt been
showing up in any of the lms marketing efforts.
One of the things the promotional team de-
cided was that theyre trying to keep the ani-
mation almost like a secret, he says. They kind
of want people to be surprised when it comes
on, so theyre trying not to put it in most of the
ads. Were sort of like this unfortunate, hidden
secret in the movie.
Augenblick Studios is currently working on a
new series titled Superjail for Cartoon Networks
[adult swim]. The team is starting production this
month on 10 episodes of the show, which Au-
genblick says is about a jail that operates as if it
were run by Willy Wonka. Its a hyper-violent,
psychedelic, really cartoony jail and theres ba-
sically non-stop action from beginning to end,
he explains. Were denitely trying to push do-
ing a really, really fully animated show on TV. Its
pretty wild. Were writing the scripts right now
and its going to be great! Q
Tips on Animating an
Animal Orgy
Aaron Augenblick chats about his studios work on David
Wains indie feature, The Ten. by Ryan Ball
You can watch a clip from Superjail
and learn more about Augenblick
Studios at www.augenblickstudios.
com. The ofcial site for The Ten can
be found at www.thetenmovie.com.
Ken Marino (left) and Aaron Augenblick
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A
n y o n e
who has
e v e r
wanted to reach
into a Warner Bros.
cartoon and take
part in the fun now
has a chance to
do exactly that as
Warner Bros. Inter-
active debuts
Looney Tunes:
Duck Amuck for
the Nintendo DS
handheld game
system. Using the
devices unique
stylus and micro-
phone, players can interact with Daffy
Duck just like the unseen animator
does in the classic 1951 Chuck Jones
cartoon, Duck Amuck, on which the
game is based.
These days, its not that often that
Daffy appears as more than just an
icon, says Duck Amuck designer Rob
Buchanan of WayForward Technolo-
gies. In Duck Amuck, Daffy is alive
and is even aware hes in a video-
game. For those of us who loved
watching Daffy Duck cartoons grow-
ing up, its a real treat!
While Buchanan believes there is still
a lot of potential to unlock in the DS
platform, he feels Duck Amuck takes
advantage of its ca-
pabilities by giving
Looney Tunes lovers
a whole new way to
enjoy the madcap
fun the cartoons are
famous for. For in-
stance, players can
pick Daffy up and
toss him around or
poke him in the
head, then listen to
him gripe about it.
At one point in the
game, the stylus can
even be used to erase his
body and draw him a new
one.
It was important for Way-
Forward and Warner Bros.
Interactive to make the
game feel like a real Loo-
ney Tunes cartoon, com-
plete with authentic prop
designs, dialogue and
character poses. They even
went so far as to dig up
Daffys character model
sheet from 1953 to use as a
reference for the anima-
tion.
Basically, we channeled
Chuck Jones
the whole time, Bu-
chanan remarks.
Buchanan tells us that
they adopted a devel-
opment process that
was more akin to an ani-
mation production than
a video game, creating
the scripts in storyboard
form rather than just writ-
ing dialogue. Too many
cartoons rely on dia-
logue now, I think. In
those days it was all
about the visual gags.
Animation for the
game was created in
Adobe Flash by Ghost-
bot. Buchanan says he
and his team were initially
hesitant to do it that way
because if it came out
looking too smooth or too
limited, it wouldnt mesh
with the iconic Looney
Tunes style. In the end, it
was pulled off brilliantly,
he states. The advan-
tage to doing it all with
Flash was that fewer ani-
mators could create the
same volume of work,
making it easi-
er to keep Daf-
fy consistent
from one
scene or reac-
tion to the
next. It also
gave us exibil-
ity to use the
animation in-game at whatever size
we needed it, since the vector-based
images that Flash uses can be scaled
up or down perfectly. It saved us a lot
of technical headaches.
Players get to be the headache in
Duck Amuck as they prod and ha-
rangue Daffy to see just how angry
they can make him.
Buchanan thinks
gamers will nd this
aspect of the game
most satisfying, espe-
cially after the wacky
quacker makes
enough snotty re-
marks. If the title is
successful enough,
perhaps fans will get
to torture other Loo-
ney Tunes favorites in
the future. Personal-
ly, Id love to see
more of this concept
on the DS! Buchan-
an enthuses. Maybe
a Messin with Marvin or a Fiddle with
Fudd game!
All joking aside, there was a 1955 se-
quel to the Duck Amuck cartoon
called Rabbit Rampage, which Bu-
chanan feels would make a perfect
follow-up to the game. Itd be fantas-
tic to see some classic Bugs Bunny ani-
mation and humor brought back the
way we did for Duck Amuck DS. Q
Channeling Chuck Jones
Looney Tunes fans get Daffy with Duck Amuck on DS.
by Ryan Ball
Duck Amuck will be released for
Nintendo DS on October 9, along
with the Warner Bros. Interactive title
Looney Tunes: Acme Arsenal for
Xbox 360, Wii and PlayStation 2.
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10
I
ts always a popular question from the
audience during Q&As. Sometimes it
feels a bit like a padding question to ll
up an embarrassingly quiet interview along
the lines of Who are your inuences? or
What software did you use? But often-
times theres a genuine interest (at least from
me). Indeed, ever since my last lm, guy101,
started doing the rounds, So whats next?
has been the question that makes me sweat
bullets. I love that it puts me on the spot and
gives me a snapshot of where I am in time,
but I hate it for the same exact reasons.
Back when I graduated from the Royal
College of Art in 2005, I thought I knew how
to answer it. I had heard other fresh-meat
animation directors in similar positions to
mine declare, Im going to make another
lm or Im going to direct a music video
for this emergent indie electro band. I was
so impressed and I wished that I could be
saying the same few words implicit of being
caught up in that whirlwind of activity and
racing toward my animation directors des-
tiny. So I started to allude nonchalantly to
personal work, writing and even a few
of the projects I was working on as a Maya
or After Effects monkey.
I was really obsessed with the idea of be-
ing busyor at least being perceived to be
busy. The truth was that I was ghting with a
gazillion other super-talented people in order
to work overtime as a nomadic freelancer
earning minor pay for projects that were re-
ally offering little personal gratication. And
as much as I genuinely enjoyed bringing the
super-stylized anthropomorphisms spouting
non sequitur humor to life, I could never real-
ly get behind using them as tools for people
to forget their lives. It often made me think
of a quotation from Albert Einstein: Perfec-
tion of means and confusion of goals seem,
in my opinion, to characterize our time.
Indeed, this personal dissatisfaction car-
ried on for a couple of years as guy101
worked its way through loads of festivals.
It picked up some huge awards, too: An
award from the Royal Television Society,
a few animation festival Grand Prix, a Best
Short from a festival called Cinekink (you
work that one out for yourself) and even a
BAFTA back in February Undeniably, the
lm was a success. But I still wasnt. And as
the prizes piled up, I became more aware
of the creative space between where I was
when I made the lm and where I was at
every one of those prize ceremonies. As for
the Q&A sessions, I pined for questions about
my lm and my background, while I secretly
loathed my answer to So, whats next?
So one day, I decided to change the
answer. I ditched all the nomadic freelance
work, the brutal competition and the whole
red sea marketwhere the blood of all the
ghting animators and studios had stained
the water. I decided to nd the much more
tranquil blue seas.
Right about now, Im
very conscious of the
fact that I havent told
you where the blue
seas are. And I wont,
because everyone has
their own. Just realize
that animators are in-
credibly marketable
not because of their practical skills, but be-
cause of the careful balance of emotional
and intellectual intelligences that drive those
skills. Where else can you nd people who
are both technical savants and emotional
empaths? That symphonic combination is so
rare, and yet so important these days. Con-
sider any emergent complex social technol-
ogythe web, government, games, etc. As
these offerings stray further away from what
people can traditionally grasp, they require
immensely capable people not only to un-
derstand them, but then repackage them
so that other people can (Maybe even as
a super-realistic anthropomorphism?). So,
take a step back, Im sure you can nd your-
self a blue sea.
Of course, in theory, it all sounds very sim-
ple. Well, it sure isnt. On the blue sea, the
future is unknown. The path is undetermined.
And it is incredibly lonely. I go to sleep at
night trying to gure out whats going to
happen next, where my next paycheck is
coming from, and thinking about all the stuff
I need to learn the next day, the next month
and the next year. But I do sleep. And I do
it well because although I am uncertain of
where my life is going, I am condent that
Im steering it.
Nowadays, I really enjoy Q&A sessions.
Maybe its because I am more secure. Or
perhaps its because I feel less pressure to
perform. Or it could just be that I love the
look on peoples faces when I get to tell
them what is actually next. Q
Ian W. Gouldstones guy101 recently won
the top student prize at Platform Anima-
tion Festival. If he tells you about his su-
per-secret follow-up project, he may have
to kill you. Find out more about his work at
www.iwgouldstone.com.
So, Whats Next, Dude?
A young London-based animator discusses the mysterious
ways you can take control of your career after winning
truckloads of festival prizes. by Ian W. Gouldstone
Ian W.
Gouldstone
I go to sleep at night trying to gure out whats going to happen
next, where my next paycheck is coming from, and thinking about
all the stuff I need to learn the next day, the next month and the
next year.
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12
A
lthough its generally regarded as an
innocent medium, animation has
been linked to politics since the sec-
ond decade of the 20th century. Colonel
Heeza Liars African Hunt, a partial spoof of
Theodore Roosevelt, was released in 1914;
Quirino Cristiani lmed his satirical El Apstol in
1917; and Winsor McCay made The Sinking of
the Lusitania in 1918. In recent years, Japanese
animators have tackled ecological crises, pol-
lution, the problems of an aging population
and the threats posed by an unregulated mili-
tary-industrial complex. But the controversy
surrounding the Japanese governments re-
fusal to acknowledge crimes committed dur-
ing WWII makes the bold handling of the sub-
ject in Tetsujin 28 a surprise.
During the latter days of the Pacic War (A
truly terrible time for Japan), ace scientist Dr.
Kaneda created the prototype Tetsujin, a gi-
gantic robot-soldier that would be used against
the Allies. (Articially aged footage shows how
Tetsujin robots would attack San Francisco.)
Appalled at what he had done, Dr. Kaneda
leaked the location of his laboratory to the
Americans to ensure its destructionand his
own death. A decade later, Tetsujin arises from
the ruins of the lab and comes to Tokyo, where
it encounters Dr. Kanedas son, Shotaro, and
Dr. Shikishima, his former apprentice.
At 10, Shotaro is already a top-notch boy
detective. Like his European counterpart, Tin-
tin, he notices clues the police overlook and
makes connections that escape others. Al-
though he drives a car, Shotaro is less indepen-
dent than Tintin and less of a ghter: Dr. Shiki-
shima and Police Chief Otsuka have carefully
overseen his upbringing. When Tetsujin reap-
pears, Shotaro immediately establishes a bond
with his fathers other son. Like other robots
of the pre-Gundam era, Tetsujin is an indepen-
dent entity that Shotaro directs by manipulat-
ing the knobs and levers on a small control
box.
Tetsujin brings Shotaro into contact with his
fathers old associates, many of whom have
been trying to escape their pasts. Dr. Furanken
(whose name suggests the Japanese pronun-
ciation of Frankenstein) performed experi-
ments on corpses, including the
body of his own son. When he
learns that the cyborg-monster
that once was his son still lives, Dr.
Furanken does Lady Macbeth
one better and sees blood owing
from his hands.
Guilt haunts many of the char-
acters in Tetsujin 28. Although the
scientists insist, We had no choice,
they regret creating things that should never
have been brought into this world. Not all the
villains are scientists, or even Japanese. Using
a corporate shell as a cover, the international
PX Syndicate plots to use robots to take over
the burgeoning Japanese economy. In one
multi-part adventure, American mobster Thrill
Suspense steals the control box and uses Tetsu-
jin to commit robberies.
Suspenses actions precipitate a debate
over Tetsujins nature that runs through the rest
of the series: Is the robot a weapon or a tool?
If Tetsujin is essentially a weapon, it must be
destroyed before it can do any damage; if it is
inherently a tool, its actions depend on the
users intent. Suspense might use Tetsujin for il-
legal activities, but Shotaro never would. The
ongoing discussion becomes a metaphor for
atomic energy, which can also be used as a
weapon or a toolas the Japanese know only
too well.
The Tetsujin 28 series (2004) is a remake of
Gigantor (1963), the mecha series that aired in
syndication in America during the late 1960s.
The original manga, Tetsujin 28 Gou, was cre-
ated by Mitsuteru Yokoyama (1934-2004) in
1956. Ironically, Yokoyama said the Tetsujin ro-
bot was inspired by the American B-29s he saw
bomb his native Kobe when he was a boy.
Since its initial publication, Tetsujin 28 Gou has
been adapted to two other animated series,
an animated feature and a live-action lm.
Yokoyamas reections on the war and its af-
tereffects clearly struck a chord in Japanese
audiences.
For the 2004 remake, the lmmakers were
careful to preserve the Tezuka-in-
uenced look of 50s manga
and animation. Tetsujin has a
nose like a carrot stuck in a
snowmans face, a round body
and thick, heavy limbs. With his
large eyes, wide face and
chubby legs, Shotaro suggests a
cross between Astroboy and
Linus Van Pelt. Dr. Furanken and
many of the other scientists sport
the stiff cockscombs of hair Te-
zuka often gave his characters.
At the end of the series, Chief Otsuka calls
Tetsujin a ghost from the war sent back to
remind us, to keep us from forgetting our
crimes. Dr. Shikishima replies, We have to fully
acknowledge our crimes Perhaps a time will
come to be punished for them.
Thats not the sort of conclusion audiences
expect from a cartoon show. Q
by Charles Solomon
T h e S a mu r a i C r i t i c :
Re v i e ws o f t h e l a t e s t a n i me t i t l e s o n DVD
Tetsujin 28: The Complete Set
[Geneon: $39.98, four discs]
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14
SpongeBob SquarePants:
Season 5, Vol. 1
[Paramount, $36.99]
Two of Nicks highest-rated animated
seasons will compete for your eyeballs
this month. First up, theres the rst col-
lection of episodes from the fth (and
current) season of the yellow absor-
bent hero from Bikini Bottom. The two-
disc release kicks off with the one-hour
ashback special which looks at why
the friendship between Plankton and
Mr. Krabs turned sour.
Among other highlights:
Squidward installs an
electrical fence to
keep SpongeBob
and Patrick from
sneaking into his
room; Mr. Krabs de-
cides to sell SpongeBob
merchandise; Squidwards
ventriloquist dummy becomes
more popular than Squidward;
and SpongeBob blows off his
friends when he falls in love with a
Krabby Patty! [Release date: Sept. 4]
Avatar Complete Book 2
[Paramount, $64.99]
Nicks other popular 2D showAva-
tar: The Last Air Benderwill have all
the episodes of Book 2 (thats over
eight hours) released on a collectors-
dreamve-disc set this month as well. In
the second season opener, which aired
in March 2006, our 12-year-old hero is
plagued with nightmares resulting from
his powerful Avatar State. Aang and
the gang meet an Earth Kingdom gen-
eral who has big plans for defeating
the Fire Nation, while Princes sister has
some seemingly good news from Prince
Zuko and Uncle Iroh. Two fascinating
new characters are introduced in Book
2, and youll love the epic-type nale of
this season which is beautifully mount-
ed, fast-paced and thrilling to watch.
[Release date: Sept. 11]
Josie and the Pussycats:
The Complete Series
[Turner Home Ent., $26.98]
If you watched Saturday morning TV
shows in 1970 (or caught up with them
on Boomerang), you can probably
hum the opening theme song to this
silly, formula-driven and ultimately very
addictive Hanna-Barbera series. Based
on one of the Archie Comics charac-
ters, the toon follows the adventures of
globe-trotting band members Josie,
Valerie and Melody; Alan the roadie;
Alexandra (his scheming sister); and
Sebastian the Cat who manage to
save the world from evil forces through-
out the 16-episode run of the show (be-
fore they all take off in
a runaway spaceship
in the absurd spinoff,
Josie in Outer Space).
The two-disc set also
includes a docu about
Josies creator, Dan
DeCarlo. Trivia note:
Melodys singing voice
was provided by none
other than Charlies Angel Cheryl Ladd!
Far out! [Release date: Sept. 18]
Robot Chicken: Season 2
[Cartoon Network, $29.98]
Seth Green and Matthew Senreichs
stop-motion toy comedy spoof hits
new heights in this two-disc collection,
which features
19 glorious epi-
sodes plus the
much- l ov ed
Star Wars-
themed spe-
cial half-hour outing (with a voice cast
which includes George Lucas, Mark
Hamill, Seth McFarlane, Conan OBrien
and Malcolm McDowell). Here are
some of the episode descriptions that
crack us up: The Six Million Peso Man;
Leader of the Thundercats suffers as a
pet; A Very Dragonball Z Christmas;
Old dancing guy from the Six Flags
commercials saves and ruins the day;
Lindsay Lohan enters the world of High-
lander; My Little Ponies of the Apoca-
lypse; Senior Mutant Ninja Turtles;
George W. Bush discovers his Jedi pow-
ers; Care Bears care a lotabout eth-
nic cleansing; The ugly side of Rainbow
Brite; Beastmaster takes Broadway by
storm; Vince Vaughn Bangs Your Mom;
Meet Caspers brother Jasper, the
Douchebag Ghost! Seriously, folks, it
doesnt get better than this! [Release
date: Sept. 4]
Tekkon Kinkreet
[Sony, $26.96]
American born director Mi-
chael Arias (The Animatrix)
injected an almost Europe-
an sensibility to some of the
anime traditions in this beau-
tifully drawn tale of two
street urchins who
battle with traditional
assassins and hostile
aliens in a decaying
metropolis of the future. Critics
praised Arias vision as well as
the humanity of its storyline and
the deep friendship between
the two lead characters (The ti-
tle Tekkon Kinkreet is a play on
the Japanese words for concrete, iron
and muscle.) The DVD includes a con-
versation with Arias and British band
Plaid who provide the soundtrack, au-
dio commentary and The Making of
Tekkon: Director Michael Arias 300 Day
Diary. Its denitely an original and visu-
ally remarkable trip. [Release date:
Sept. 25] Q
Familiar Faces in New Situations
Say good-bye to summer by planning marathon viewings
of some of todays top TV toons and a fresh anime
journey from an American director.
by Ramin Zahed
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T
here comes a time when every adolescent nds
it necessary to rebel against his or her parents,
but what happens when the parent is the ulti-
mate rebel himself? Thats more or less the premise
behind the new [adult swim] offering Lucy, Daughter
of the Devil, an animated series created by Home
Movies exec producer Loren Bouchard. Produced at
Fluid Animation in San Francisco, Calif., the show has
been given a 10-episode order and will begin airing
on Sunday, Sept. 9 at 12:15 a.m. (ET/PT).
In the series, Lucy is living in San Francisco and dat-
ing a great new guy who just may be the Second
Coming. The only problem is that her dad, Satan,
keeps meddling in her life and uses her relationship as
an excuse to hasten the apocalypse. Bouchard got
the idea for the show while watching Damien: Omen
II. I though it would be so funny to do a show
that just picked up there with this teenage
son of Satan, he tells us. I pitched that and
said we should get the rights to The Omen II
and would have called it Damien: The Omen
II, The Cartoon.
Rights to The Omen franchise were tied
up, so Lucy was created to ll the Damien role and
Satan became a horned beast with a closet full of Bill
Cosby sweaters and an itch to dispatch the four
horsemen. Cartoon Network was less hasty to unleash
the show on its viewership. The pilot rst aired in 2005
and were just now seeing where things go from
there.
The development went very quickly in the begin-
ning, Bouchard recalls. I had worked with [adult
swim] for a long time and we have a very good rela-
tionship, so I pitched the idea and we quickly did a
demo 11-minute pilot. Then it was an unfortunate kind
of series of events. It was terrible while I was in the
middle of it. It felt brutal working on a pilot for two
years, but then I actually became really glad it took as
long as it did. It ended up working out really well and
Im glad we did the work we did on the show. I think
its a much more satisfying show now than if it had just
gone into production after the pilot in 05.
Bouchard isnt one of these guys who went to art
school and worked his way up the ranks at various
animation studios. In fact, hes upfront about the fact
that he didnt even nish high school. I was sort of a
lost youth, he remarks. I had a lot of bartending ex-
perience by the time I was in my early 20s and I was
really thinking that was going to be it for me. I was
thinking maybe Id work my way up to management
and maybe own a bar, and I was not happy about
that. I always wanted to do something more like this.
Struggling with his life choices, Bouchard was at-
tempting to jumpstart his stalled ambition by purchas-
ing art supplies in Bostons Harvard Square when he
ran into his 6th grade science teacher, who had gone
on to start up a successful software company. He
asked, Do you still draw? I got this thing, its probably
nothing but were going to do some shorts for cable
TV and maybe you can come and help me,
Bouchard recalls. I knew in the very moment he was
telling me this that I had just gotten lucky. I went to
work for him for $10 an hour and that was the
beginning of Dr. Katz: Professional Therapist. It
was really like winning the lottery.
Bouchard served as a producer on Dr.
Katz, which enjoyed a four-year run on Com-
edy Central. When that show wrapped, the
Soup2Nuts crew went on to make Brendon
One Helluva Gal!
[adult swim] has a date with Lucy, Daughter of the Devil.
by Ryan Ball
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Smalls Home Movies,
which Bouchard co-cre-
ated and exec produced
for [adult swim]. Lucys
CG animation is quite a
departure from the
Squigglevision style of
animation that marked
Dr. Katz and early epi-
sodes of Home Movies,
but one common thread
woven through all three
shows is the unmistakable
voice of H. Jon Benjamin.
Jon Benjamin is the
reason I have a career,
you can absolutely put
that in print, Bouchard
states. Hes simply the engine that pulls everything
Ive ever done and I honestly dont know how to do a
show without him.
Benjamin, who was recently heard on the big
screen in an animated segment of director David
Wains absurdly comedic Decalogue, The Ten, pro-
vides the voice of Satan in Lucy, Daughter of the
Devil. Lucy is played by Home Movies alum Melissa
Bardin Galsky and the cast is rounded out by popular
New York comedians Jon Glaser, Sam Seder, Todd
Barry and Eugene Mirman.
While actors on most animated shows record their
lines individually to accommodate varying schedules,
members of the Lucy cast always have someone else
there to bounce lines off of.
I dont want to be a lazy writer, Bouchard com-
ments, I like becoming good at that job, but at the
same time theres something about an actor improvis-
ing that lights up the room. When an actor is goong
around and is right on the edge of breaking charac-
tercracking up or trying to crack somebody else
upthat, I nd, is often the highlight of the whole epi-
sode.
Unlike the majority of [adult swim] shows animated
with After Effects by Williams Street in Atlanta, Lucy
features Maya CG character animation on top of
photographed backgrounds that have been heavily
doctored in PhotoShop. Bouchard says he was greatly
inuenced by the classic Rankin/Bass puppet anima-
tion movies and wanted to bring a hint of that style to
the series. Theres almost a stop-motion thing, but
then we also kind of atten it out using toon shaders to
make it look really graphic and pretty. He adds that
his main design principle was to make the characters
to look like little toys, what he calls the Kidrobot aes-
thetic, named for the popular toy and merchandis-
ing brand.
Lucy is the rst television series for Fluid Animation, a
boutique shop founded by former Pixar artist Seth Pie-
zas, who serves as co-exec producer along with [adult
swim] veterans Nick Weidenfeld and Keith Crofford.
Having worked on huge crews at Pixar, Piezas now
manages a team of about ve artists dedicated to
Lucy. With a series of shorts and commercial spots un-
der their belts, they were able to set up a fairly simple,
low-overhead pipeline that allowed them to cost-ef-
fectively turn around animation for each episode in
about six weeks without running everyone ragged.
Patty Jordan, Bouchards assistant director at Fluid,
says the traditional storyboarding process was thrown
out the window when Loren got the idea to do blocking
by taking digital stills of little Fisher-Price toy people.
They look similar to some of our characters, so that was
helpful, Jordan explains. He just thought it was easier
to represent things in 3D space using real 3D things.
Being from San Francisco, Jordan is familiar enough
with the city to go around with art director Albert Tru-
ong and photograph locations for the backgrounds.
We usually have to sneak around and lie about what
were doing, she admits, but doubts that anyone will
be able to recognize their establishments in the show
after Truong and his team nish wonking them in
PhotoShop.
Truong adds, Ive done a lot of layout drawings in
the past, doing Disney-like buildings and stuff like that,
and I gured its the daughter of the devil and every-
things hellish and nightmarish so lets see what it looks
like if we make buildings look evil or like some weird,
funky guy built this Tim Burton-esque building.
While wonking with reckless abandon is encour-
aged on the show, the animators had to repress their
desire to create uid animation to give Bouchard the
snappy, stop-motion look he wanted. Animation di-
rector/CG supervisor Erik Shepherd says he sold it to
the animators by telling them theyre more like sculp-
tors than anything. A lot of Pixar animation is how you
get to the pose, how the arm arcs and all that, he
remarks. With this style of animation, a pose that
reads really crisp and clear is much more important.
Its probably just a step up above animatics, but its
just as expressive and allows us to convey the story in
an efcient manner.
Shepherd, who comes from a visual effects back-
ground, also had to put Calamine lotion on the itch to
make things look perfect when he started work on
Lucy. The best thing Ive learned through my experi-
ence was what not to do, what not to get bogged
down in and keeping it simple, he notes. Like with
using dynamics, if you animate something and theres
not perfect gravity or whatever, a lot of people, I nd,
will say Oh, thats not realistic. But telling a story is all
that matters. I think everyone here is a really good sto-
ryteller and we can step back in a shot and say, We
really dont need that to tell the story. Thats where
we let go.
One special effect the uid crew doesnt skimp on
is re. Jordan says she will never forget a quote
Bouchard delivered during the making of the pilot.
He said, I learned from this process that if you love it,
set it on re. She recalls. We do tend to live by that.
I think something catches re at least once per epi-
sode. Our background people are so cute and simple,
and even when they are on re, getting stabbed or
dying some horrible death, theyre still cute. Some-
thing tells us a real teenaged child of Mephistopheles
would love this show! Q
Loren Bouchard
Lucy, Daughter of the Devil pre-
mieres on Cartoon Networks [adult
swim] block Sunday, September 9,
at 12:15 a.m.
I dont want to be a lazy writer. I like becoming good at
that job, but at the same time theres something about
an actor improvising that lights up the room.
Loren Bouchard, creator of Lucy, Daughter of the Devil
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G
ood ideas for new animated shows
are so rare these days that when
you nally hear one, you cant help
but imagine a bright lightbulb popping
above the lucky creators head! That is cer-
tainly the case with Sushi Pack, the new se-
ries premiering this fall on DIC Entertainments
KEWLopolis block on CBS. Written by toon
veterans Tom Ruegger and Nicholas Hol-
lander (Animaniacs, Tiny Toon Adventures,
Pinky and the Brain) the zippy series centers
on ve crime-ghting, uh, sushi pieces.
The origins of the mostly 2D toon go back
to the 2005 edition of the New York Licensing
Show, where Jeffrey Conrad, senior VP of
American Greetings creative studio, dis-
covered the concept created by Laura and
Leo Espinosa (Studio Espinosa). Here is a
show about four pieces of sh and a condi-
mentWasabi! says Conrad. They are all
the size of a soda can, so we play up the
diminutive size of our heroes; its the David
and Goliath thing.
With development work from L.A. studio
The Hatchery, Conrad took Sushi Pack to
DIC Entertainment. We knew right away
that the property had real potential, says
Mike Maliani, DICs chief creative ofcer.
We were looking to add more boy-target-
ed shows to our Saturday morning block,
and with the right development work, we
knew that the show would be a perfect t
for us.
As Kaaren Lee Brown, DICs senior VP of
creative, explains, the show also makes a
great pairing with the studios other new of-
fering for the season, Dino Squad. We can
go from the smallest heroes on the market to
the absolutely largest ones in one hour, says
Lee Brown. They are both action comedies
and hit the older boy demographics, be-
yond that they complement each other by
being so different. Its not just another cos-
tumed action hero show!
The bulk of the
shows 2D anima-
tion is done in
China by Suzhou
Hong Yang Car-
toon Co., and
some anime vfx is
added by the
team at Ameri-
can Greetings/
Hatchery. The
shows eye-pop-
ping design is
certainly inspired
by some of the
more popular
anime hits of the
past 10 years,
and the 11-minute length of the shows
segments help move the action
alongpardon the punswimmingly.
The show moves like a bat out of
hell, says Lee Brown. It has this erce
pace without feeling rushed. In addi-
tion, Sushi Packs unique music is cer-
tainly what you dont usually hear in
your kiddie toons. Its scored by
Phofo, who is a lawyer by day and
deejay by night! says Conrad. Hes
creating music that isnt typical of a
Saturday morning show.
At the end of the day, what will make or
break a new show are the concept and the
writing. When all is said and done, its sim-
ply a funny concept, notes Maliani. The
characters, as small as they are, take them-
selves very seriously. They know theyre little
sh in a big human pond. The comedy
works on many different levels, and its the
kind of show that actually plays better the
fourth or fth time you watch. You pick up
something new every time you watch it. In
other words, youll probably never look at
seafood the same way! Q
A Different Kettle
of Fish
Sushi Pack, the new animated series from the teams at
DIC Entertainment and American Greetings, promises
to be one of the most original new toons of the fall
season. by Ramin Zahed
Sushi Pack premieres on the CBS
KEWLopolis block at 9 a.m. on
Saturday, Nov. 3.
The New KEWLopolis Lineup
on CBS: [Beginning Nov. 3]
7 a.m. Care Bears:
Adventures in Care-A-Lot
7:30 Strawberry Shortcake
8:00 Cake
8:30 Horseland
9:00 Sushi Pack
9:30 Dino Squad
Jeffrey Conrad
Mike Maliani
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I
f you set out to create a series that
mixes beautiful European-style 2D ani-
mation with actual wildlife footage,
youre lucky if you get your hands on a
single source of nature documentaries.
You know youve hit the jackpot when you
are granted full access to two of the
worlds most acclaimed and richest re-
sources in the eld, National Geographic
and the BBC. That was the case with the
beautiful new preschool show Mamma
Mirabelles Home Movies, which premieres
this month on PBS Kids.
The idea for the show came about sev-
eral years ago, when the team at National
Geographic Kids, led by president Donna
Friedman Meir (also Mamas exec produc-
er), set out to create a project that would
utilize the companys fantastic footage
vaults. When I rst got to National Geo-
graphic, I recalled that there was a show
called Really Wild Animals that had aired
on CBS some 14 years ago and had stood
the test of time, notes Friedman Meir.
Our goal was to create memorable char-
acters and stories around this idea that
would mix animation with our footage, so
we put it out there to the creative com-
munity.
After various development changes, an
original concept art work by illustrator Eric
Brace became the inspiration for U.K.-
based King Rollo Films director Leo Nielsen
(Spot, Maisy, Paz), co-exec producer Tara
Sorensen (Dragon Tales, Rolie Polie Olie)
and story editor Andy Yerkes (Bear in the
Big Blue House, House of Pooh).
The premise of the show should delight
both parents and their impressionable pre-
school kids. Anchored by the voice of
Vanessa Williams, who also sings a few
numbers for the series, Mamma Mirabelles
Home Movies centers on a kind and sassy
elephant/maternal gure who cares for a
group of baby animal characters from the
African Savannah. The wide-eyed ele-
phant calf Max, the
know-it-all cheetah Bo, the
sweet-natured zebra Karla
and the three hyper mon-
keys Kip, Flip and Chip
gather around Mirabelle
in each episode to learn
about the wonders of the natural
world.
Part of what makes the show unique is
that it combines the best of what our divi-
sion promises, which is wrapping the best
of what National Geographic does around
something new for kids, notes Friedman
Meir. You have this gorgeous, informative
footage which provides young viewers
with information about the natural world
and these loveable animated characters
which they can relate to.
The task of creating the subtle soft-hued
animation of the show fell into the hands
of well-known British animator Leo Nielsen
and his team at King Rollo Films. Using the
popular CelAction software (created sev-
Wild at Heart
National Geographic Kids, BBC and King Rollo Films offer
a delightful new preschool show which combines 2D
animation with live-action wildlife footage.
by Ramin Zahed
Donna Friedman
Meir
Leo Nielsen
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eral years ago by Andy Blazdell and Simon
Lipowicz), King Rollo based the look of the
show on that one single drawing by Eric
Brace. I think one of the great things
about the show is that it looks hand-
made, says Nielsen. It doesnt look
like something created by a huge
production company, and it feels
very European. From a production
standpoint, CelAction helps us get this
hand-drawn feel with shad-
ows and crayon work,
without having to send
the work to Poland or
Prague as was the
case years ago.
Although the show is
premiering this month stateside, it
began its run on BBC CBeebies earlier
this summer. Audiences seem to like it
here, says Nielsen, whose studio is lo-
cated in the West Country of England,
about a three-hour drive to London.
Weve been able to deliver one episode
per week for the past nine months. We
have a strong crew of about 24 people,
which can be a good thing. When you
have 200 people involved in a show, you
lose control and the intimate feel of the
show.
Another challenge for King Rollo was
working with the live-action
nature footage from the BBC,
which was created in the standard British
PAL, then converting it again to the NTSC
format for the U.S. version. This cross-cul-
tural mix also impacted the voice cast for
the series. Besides Vanessa Williams, who
does the lead voice, all the other charac-
ter voices are recorded in the U.K. by Brit-
ish actors. Even the U.S. version of the show
utilizes a cast of voices from the other side
of The Pond.
Apart from the technical idiosyncrasies
of the production, what seems to make
the show a natural winner is its gentle mes-
sages and arresting visuals. Weve tested
the show in three different stages of pro-
duction, notes Friedman Meir. We got
feedback from both kids and parents and
each time we learned a lot. One question
that we had was whether we could jump
back and forth between animation and
live action. We found out that the kids
didnt miss a beat. The accents werent an
issue, either. All the detail work that went
into the research helped us. With the
unique color palette and the world music
[the show has 10 original songs], I think
Mamma will be a real signature show for
all the networks that air it. Q
Mama Mirabelles Home Movies
premieres on PBS Kids on Septem-
ber 8. For more info, visit www.pb-
skids.org/mamamirabelle.
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4KIDS
Name of Show: Dinosaur King
Synopsis: Max and Rex stumble across some
ancient stone frag-
ments and cards,
that when activated
bring dinosaurs to
life. An evil organiza-
tion called the Al-
pha Gang, led by
Dr. Z traveled back
in time and brought
the dinosaurs here to the 21st century. Its
now up to Max and Rex to take control of
the dinosaurs and save the planet!
Production Companies: 4KIDS Productions
Premiere Date: Sept. 8, 2007
Name of Creator: SEGA
ANIME
NETWORK
Name of Show: Red Garden
Synopsis: An odd string of suicides surrounds a
private institution on Roosevelt Island. On the
night a classmate dies, Kate, Rachel, Rose and
Claire wake with no memories of the evenings
events. The next night, the four girls are drawn
together by mysterious red butteries only they
can see. Converging at Central Park, the girls
are approached by a strange woman who
tells them they are dead. Now, the four girls
must work together to
learn the secrets of their
deathsand the means
to return to their previous
lives.
Production Companies:
GONZO Studio
Premiere Date: Sept. 13,
2007, available on demand.
Directed by Kou Matsuo (Rozen Maiden)
CARTOON
NETWORK S
[adul t swi m]
Name of Show: Lucy, Daughter of the Devil
Synopsis: Lucy, the Daughter of the Devil
is about the devil, his daughter and their
complicated relationship. Shes 21, she lives
in San Francisco, and shes dating a DJ
named Jesus
(pronounced
HEY-soos)
Production
Companies:
Animation by Fluid Animation, San Francisco
Premiere Date: Sept. 9 at 12:15 a.m.
Creator: Loren Bouchard (Home Movies)
CARTOON
NETWORK
Name of Show: Out Of Jimmys Head
Synopsis: Re-Animateds zany characters
are back in this brand-new series. When sev-
enth-grader Jimmy Roberts (Dominic James)
requires an emergency brain transplant, doc-
tors give him the frozen brain of the famous
cartoonist Milt Appleday. Now wherever
Jimmy goes he sees all of Milt Appledays
cartoon characters in the real world.
Production Companies: Brookwell McNa-
mara with animation produced at Cartoon
Network Studios
Premiere Date: Sept. 14
Creators: Adam Pava
and Tim McKeon
Name of Show: The Grim Adventures of the
Kids Next Door
Synopsis: When Billy gets stuck in his dads
favorite lucky pants due to a scythe-related
mishap, only the Kids Next Door can save him
from the grounding of a lifetime. But when
a freak accident turns Billy and the Delight-
ful Children from Down the Lane into lucky
pants-powered Delightful Reapers, its up to
Numbuh 1 and Grim to join forces and stop
it. To compound matters, Mandy has taken
over the Kids Next Door complex and is using
its resources for her own nefarious plans.
Curious Pictures
Premiere Date: Nov. 12
Name of Creator: Mr.
Warburton (Codename:
Kids Next Door) and
Maxwell Atoms (The
Grim Adventures of Billy
& Mandy)
Name of Show: Chowder
Synopsis: This new comedy series chronicles
the magical misadventures of a young chefs
apprentice as he enters into the fantastic city
of Marzipan. Chowder is faced with amazing
and surreal chores, like baking a ying pie or
stewing up a pot of singing string beans. Un-
fortunately, Chowder is inclined to eat every-
thing in sight and his
days are lled trying
to avoid one disas-
ter after another.
Production Com-
panies: Cartoon
Network Studios
Premiere Date: Nov.
2007
Name of Creator: Carl Greenblatt (veteran
animator at Cartoon Network Studios; voice
of Fred Fredburger on The Grim Adventures
of Billy & Mandy.)
COMEDY
CENTRAL
Name of Show: Drawn Together: Animation
Masturbation
Synopsis: Catch four uncensored episodes
of the rst animated reality-series, Drawn To-
gether! Its two unpredictable hours of shock-
ing television that will leave you laughing
hysterically...and scarred for life!
Production Companies: Rough Draft
Fall Forward:
TV Toon Preview
Its not easy keeping track of all the hot new animated shows
debuting on the networks and the cable outlets this month. We
know our readers dont want to miss a single thing, so we did the
leg work to track down some of the top new shows premiering
on the small-screen in the next couple of months:
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Premiere Date: Sept.
22, 1-3 a.m. ; The new
season of the show pre-
mieres Oct. 4 at 10:30
p.m.
Name of Creator: Matt Silverstein, Dave Jeser
and Jordan Young
DIC Ent. s KEW-
Lopol i s on CBS
Name of Show: Care Bears: Adventures in
Care-ALot
Synopsis: The familiar ursine charac-
ters from the 1980s are back for new
adventures: Cheer Bear, Funshine, Share
Bear, Grumpy and Oopsy live in the beautiful
cloud world of Care-a-lot. They use caring
hearts and their powerful belly badges to
help each other and to thwart the evil plots
of Grizzle, a bad bear with his
own ying lair.
Production Companies: DIC
Ent. and American Greetings
Premiere Date: Sept. 15 at 7
a.m.
Name of Show: Strawberry Shortcake
Synopsis: Strawberry Shortcake follows the
good-hearted and lovable adventures of
Strawberry Shortcake and her friends who
live together in the berry sweet world of
Strawberryland.
Production
Companies: DIC
Entertainment
and American
Greetings
Premiere Date:
Sept. 15 at 7:30 a.m.
Name of Show: Sushi Pack
Synopsis: The new show introduces ve
crime-ghting pieces of sushi that protect
Wharf City from over-the-top diabolical vil-
lains. The humor-lled, action-packed TV
treatment for Sushi Pack was written by ani-
mation veterans Tom Ruegger and Nicholas
Hollander, the Emmy-winning writers/produc-
ers behind such animated hits as Animaniacs
and Tiny Toon Adventures.
Production Companies: DIC
Entertainment and American
Greetings
Premiere Date: Nov. 3 at 9 a.m.
Name of Show: Dino
Squad
Synopsis: Dino Squad
features ve quirky teens
who suddenly gain the
power to transform into
dinosaurs. Their science teacher, the mys-
terious Ms. Moynihan, guides them as they
learn to work together and use their unique
abilities to protect Earth from an anthropo-
morphic Velociraptor who is creating mutant-
saurs and accelerating global warming in his
quest to bring back the Age of the Dinosaurs.
Oh, and yes, they still have to get their home-
work done.
Production Companies: DIC Entertainment
Premiere Date: Nov. 3 at 9:30 a.m.
DISCOVERY
KIDS
Name of Show: Wilbur
Synopsis: Wilbur and his pals are joining Dis-
covery Kids Ready Set Learn! block with
all-new episodes that promote learning and
fun! Tune in for the premiere episodes Get-
ting into Shapes and The Wright Stuff and
learn how to play the Great Shapes Game
and watch Wilbur attempt
to take ight like the Wright
brothers.
Mercury Filmworks, in as-
sociation with Chilco Pro-
ductions, EKA Distribution,
Canadian Broadcasting
Corp. and Discovery Kids
Premiere Date: Sept. 10 at 11 a.m.
Name of Creators: Characters and concept
by Tracey Hornbuckle, Kim Anton and Jill
Luedtke
DISNEY
CHANNEL /
TOON DISNEY
Name of Show: American Dragon The Hong
Kong Longs
Synopsis: Jake, Trixie, Spud, and the whole
Long family head to Hong Kong for summer
vacation. But when Grandpa is taken by the
Dark Dragon, Jake is forced to re-establish
contact with Rose in order to help him ght
the evil dragon.
Production Companies: The Disney Channel
Premiere Date: Sept. 1 at 8:30 p.m. (ET/PT)
Name of Creator: Series created by Jeff
Goode
Name of Show: Emperors New School Em-
perors New Musical
Synopsis: Kuzco Academy is broke and in
danger of being shut down, much to Yzmas
delight. The kids decide to put on a musical
to save the school, and they get teen idol
Dirk Brock (voiced by guest star Joey Law-
rence) to star in it. This makes Kuzco just a
little jealous, especially when he learns that
Dirk will get to kiss Malina in the nal number.
For once Yzma and Kuzco are in agreement:
Dirk must be stopped.
Production Companies: Disney
Name of Creator: Series based on The Emper-
ors New Groove
Name of Show: Kim Possible Graduation-
Parts 1 & 2
Synopsis: Its graduation day, and Ron is anx-
ious about leaving high schooland Kim.
Production Companies: Disney
Premiere Date: Sept. 7 at 8:00 p.m. (ET/PT )
Name of Creators: Series created by Mark
McCorkle and Bob Schooley
Name of Show: Phineas and Ferb
Synopsis: Phineas Flynn and his step-
brother Ferb Fletcher happily set out to
conquer boredom and make every day
of summer vacation count for something.
Throughout their fun-lled escapades,
theyre accompanied by Perry the Platy-
pus, the family pet who has a double life
as Secret Agent P. Meanwhile, older sister
Candace makes it her lifes work to tattle
on them to Mom and Dad,
but somehow she can never
seem to catch them red-
handed.
Production Companies: Walt
Disney Television Animation
Premiere Date: Sneak
Peeked in August, premieres
Jan. 2008
Name of Creators: Dan Povenmire, Jeff
Swampy Marsh
Name of Show: The Replacements Lon-
don Calling
Synopsis: When Ks father shows up and
takes CAR back to Britain with him, Riley
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and Todd decide they need to nd CAR
and bring him back to America. They
both get accepted to the British Spy
Academy, where CAR is now working as
a professor. When K and Dick come after
the kids, it soon turns into a Daring family
adventure to get CAR back and save the
Spy Academy from an evil villain who has
stolen the top secret spyclopedia. Guest
voices Hugh Bonneville as Clive, Michael
York as Agent G, and Ginny Wright as
Vanessa.
Production Companies: Disney TV
Premiere Date: Saturday, Oct. 6 at 4 p.m.
(ET/PT)
Name of Creator: Series created by Dan
Santat
KIDS WB!
Name of Show: Eon Kid
Synopsis: Marty, an enterprising 11-year-old,
unexpectedly becomes the human exten-
sion of the Fist of Eon, which
endows Marty with amazing
ghting powersbut puts him
at the heart of a centuries-
old struggle between good
and evil.
Daiwon C&A Holdings Co.,
Design Storm Co., BRB Inter-
national and Manga Enter-
tainment. Distributed by Starz Media.
Premiere Date: Saturday, Sept. 22 on Kids
WB! on The CW
Name of Show: Magi-
Nation
Synopsis: Tonys world is
forever changed when
he is mystically trans-
ported into a beautiful
world far beyond imagi-
nation, created millennia
ago by a powerful race
known as the Magi. Here
he meets two young
Magi heroes in training,
who help him discover his vast new magical
environment.
Production Companies: Cookie Jar Entertain-
ment and Daewon Media (Korea)
WB! on The CW
Name of
Show: Will &
Dewitt
Synopsis:
Will is an everyday little kid with an
endless thirst for big kid adventure, but he
needs direction. Enter Dewitt, his talking frog
and personal life coach, who is able to
shape-shift and guides Will toward his destiny
of discovering that all things are possible.
Where theres Will, Dewitt is the way.
Production Companies: Cookie Jar Entertain-
ment
WB! on The CW
Name of Show: Skunk Fu!
Synopsis: Skunk, a rambunctious martial
arts student under the tutelage of wise old
Panda, is training to become the hero The
Valley ultimately needs to fend off the evil
Dragon, and end a centuries-old battle. He is
joined by a diverse gang of animal pals; from
the combat-ready Rabbit and the skillful Fox
to the adroit Turtle and cowardly Tiger, who
help Skunk along
his heros journey
of enlightenment
(with amusing
results).
Production Com-
panies: Hoek,
Line and Thinker; Telegael; Cartoon Saloon
Premiere Date: Saturday, Sept. 22, 9 a.m.
Name of Creators: Adrian Harte, Paul Young
NBC/
Tel emundo s
qubo
Name of Show: Post-
man Pat
Synopsis: Join Postman
Pat and hi loveable
sidekick, Jess the Cat,
as they sets off each
morning to make deli-
veries to his neighbors.
Will it be a letter? A package? A postcard?
Production Companies: Entertainment Rights
Premiere Date: Oct. 6 at 10 a.m. (ET/PT)
Name of Creator: John Cunliffe
Name of Show: My Friend Rabbit
Synopsis: As Mouse says, his friend Rabbit
means well but some-
how just cant avoid
getting into sticky
situations. This series
follows this duo on
adventures that
might include a topsy-
turvy game of Follow the
Leader with geese friends, the Gibble Girls,
or a rainbow chase to see where they might
end up.
Production Companies: Nelvana
Premiere Date: Oct. 6 at 11 a.m. (ET/PT)
Name of Creator: Based on the book by Eric
Rohmann
NICK JR.
Name of Show: Yo
Gabba Gabba!
Synopsis: DJ Lance
Rock (Lance Robert-
son) brings to life four
friendly monsters and
a robotMuno, Foofa,
Brobee, Toodee and
Plex- in a colorful land of music and laughter.
Production Companies: The Magic Store and
W!LDBRAIN
Premiere Date: Aug. 20, 2007
Name of Creator: Christian Jacobs and Scott
Schultz
Executive Producers: Jon Berrett and Charles
Rivkin
Name of Show: Ni Hao, Kai-lan
Synopsis: Kai-lan Chow is a playful, adventur-
ous bi-lingual preschooler with a big heart
whose world is infused with Chinese culture.
Her grandfather YeYe
plays a major role
in her life as do her
best friends: Rintoo,
a rambunctious tiger;
Tolee, a friendly and
loyal koala; Hoho, an
energetic monkey;
and Lulu, a happy
pink rhino. The show helps preschoolers
explore Mandarin language and Chinese
culture, as well as their emotions and how to
deal with their feelings.
Production Companies: Nick Jr. Productions
Premiere Date: Oct. 22, 2007
Name of Creator: Karen Chau
Executive Producer: Mary Harrington
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25
NICKELODEON
Name of Show: Tak and the Power of Juju
Synopsis: Teenage jungle-boy Tak (voiced by
Hal Sparks), and his fellow villagers are the
unluckiest tribe in the world. Their lives are
sometimes helpedand
frequently made more
complicatedby the
magical Jujus with whom
Tak has a special bond
thru the Power of Juju.
Nickelodeon Animation
Studios
Premiere Date: August 31
Executive Producer: Nick Jennings
Name of Show: Back at the Barnyard
Synopsis: Picking up a few years after the
feature lm left off, the series chronicles the
animal shenanigans
that take place in
the barnyard when
the farmers back is
turned.
Production Compa-
nies: Omation Anima-
tion Studio
Premiere Date: Sept.
29 at 9 p.m.
Name of Creator: Steve Oedekerk
PBS KIDS
Name of Show: Super WHY!
Synopsis: Featuring a team of superhero
characters with literacy-based powers who
jump into books to look for answers to ev-
eryday problems. The home viewer is the
superhero sidekick, who is empowered to
participate in the adventure by playing fun
literacy games.
Production Companies: Out of the Blue
Enterprises in conjunction with
Decode Entertainment
Inc. and C.O.R.E. Digital
Pictures Inc.
Premiere Date: PBS KIDS on
Sept. 3, 2007 (check local
listings)
Creators: Angela C. Sant-
omero and Samantha Free-
man Alpert, Out of the Blue
Enterprises
Name of Show: WordWorld
Synopsis: Each episode of WordWorld is a
fun narrative built around a wacky troupe
of WordFriends, who are characters rst and
words
second.
They
invite the
preschool
viewer to
join them
on comic adventures, where problems can
only be resolved by building the right word.
Production Company: WordWorld, LLC
Premiere Date: Sept. 3, 2007 on PBS KIDS
(check local listings).
Name of Creators: Don Moody and Jacque-
line Moody
Name of Show: Mama Mirabelles Home
Movies
Synopsis: A warm-hearted show about a
sassy, soulful elephant host named Mama
Mirabelle (voiced by Vanessa Williams) and
the young animal characters she cares for on
the African savannah. The series combines
an animated world with stunning wildlife
movies from the National Geographic and
BBC award-winning archives.
Production Companies: National Geographic
Kids Entertainment, BBC/CBeebies and King
Rollo Films
Premiere
Date: The
weekend
of Sept.
8 (check
local list-
ings).
Name of Creator: Based on an original con-
cept by Wild Brain and George Evelyn.
PBS KIDS GO!
Name of Show: WordGirl
Synopsis: The ongoing adventures of mild-
mannered fth-grader Becky Botsford, who
transforms at the rst sign of trouble into
superheroic WorldGirlghting for truth and
justice one word at a time!
Production Companies: Soup2Nuts
Premiere Date: Sneak
preview Sept. 3, 2007.
Begins Sept. 7.
Name of Creator:
Dorothea Gillim
TELETOON
(Canada)
Name of Show: Ricky Sprocket
Synopsis: From the Oscar-winning team behind
Bob and Margaret, this brand new comedy
takes a look behind the scenes with Ricky
Sprocket, the worlds biggest child movie star,
as he lives the life of the rich and famous but
still needs to deal with everyday kid quandaries
like an annoying sister and
too much homework, as
well as the paparazzi!
Studio B (Canada)
Premiere Date: Sept.,
playing Saturdays at 12:30
p.m. and Sundays at 5
p.m. (ET/PT)
Name of Creator: Alison Snowden and David
Fine
Name of Show: Futz!
Synopsis: These 3 minute shorts will air
throughout fall and
are sure to entertain
kids as they watch
the part genius, part
idiot get up to antics
including becoming
a ninja with a
exibility problem,
and a medieval
knight with iron boxers.
Production Companies: 9 Story Entertainment
Premiere Date: Beginning the week of Sept. 3.
Name of Creator: Vadim Kapridov
TV ASAHI
(Japan)
Name of Show: Master Hamsters
Synopsis: An exciting action-com-
edy anime about ordinary ro-
dents who must transform into the
Master Hamsters in order to solve
problems in the human world.
Production Companies: Toei Ani-
mation Co., Ltd. (Japan)
Premiere Date: Oct. 7, 2007 in Japan
Name of Creator: Toei Animation Co., Ltd.
(Japan)
Compiled by Mercedes Milligan
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26
W
hat if a stork mistook a baby
skunk for a panda and
dropped him off in China?
That was the inspired premise behind
the new Flash-animated series Skunk
Fu! which makes its U.S. debut this fall
on Kids WB! As the shows director Aid-
an Harte recalls, Seven years ago, I
was watching a lm shoot in Toronto
with our agent Hyun-Ho Khang. Film
sets are boring most of the time, so we
started talking about Kung Fu lmsWe
were both fans and began talking
about how cool it would be to make a
Kung Fu show. Hyun-Hos company
was calledwait for itSkunk!
Mixing in his love for pop culture phe-
noms such as Star Wars, Kung Fu and
The Matrix, Harte created some visuals
and showed them to Paul Young, co-
founder of Irish outt Cartoon Saloon.
Paul really liked it from the start, says
Harte. I made a trailer and we pitched
it in 2003 at the Cartoon Forum [annual
European TV event]. Paul and I spent a
couple of fun weeks guring it out and,
along the way, Tom van Waveren set
up his new venture Hoek, Line and
Thinker which became our co-produc-
er [along with Telegael].
Harte says he looked at hit ensemble
shows like Cheers and came up with
ways to make each one of the toons
characters offer something different to
the writers. We badly wanted a drag-
on as a villain, but Chinese dragons are
lucky, so we had to nd a reason for
him to turn bad. We always knew we
wanted a tough-guy Rabbit. The back-
story, where Panda and Dragon were
old friends once upon a time, and
Skunk as the chosen one, was gener-
ally there. We had characters like Ox
and Bird, who are both kind of dumb,
but in unique ways. We gured out
what shades of dumb they were! Get-
ting money together takes a long time,
but it gave us a period to do detailed
pre-design.
Veteran script editors Andy Rhein-
gold (SpongeBob SquarePants, Cat-
Dog) and Amy Jackson were then
brought on to hammer out the details
and to shepherd various ideas into
Smells Like A Hit!
Skunk Fu!, Cartoon Saloons colorful new series
about a martial arts-practicing skunk and his
panda guru, kicks into action on Kids WB! this fall.
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27
script form. The
production was also
lucky enough to attract a killer
voice talentJules Dejongh as Skunk,
Paul Tylak as Panda, Rod Goodall as
Dragon, Paul McLoone as Baboon and
Tony Acworth as the voices of Pig,
Mantis, The Ninjas, Bird, Ox, Turtle, Fish
and the Killer Bees!
Vancouvers Studio B handled the
key posing
for the
s h o w ,
while Top
Draw Ani-
mation in
the Philip-
pines did
the bulk of
the shows
animation.
In addition,
M o n -
k e y P a w,
Toon City,
F a t C a t
and Rock-
et Fish all
helped out with service work.
The backgrounds were
mostly made in Cartoon Sa-
loon, along with the compos-
iting, notes Harte.
Harte says there are sever-
al reasons Skunk Fu! is poised
to make some waves. I love
the voices; I think the actors
really grew into their charac-
ters and the writers started to
write for them toward the
end, he says. I also love
the quality of the anima-
tion, which is hard to do on
a TV budget and largely
thanks to Jesse Cote, our
dogged animation di-
rector.
What makes the
show stand out for
Harte is the utter lack
of irony in the tone.
We dont wink at
the audience, he
says. A lot of kids
shows have a layer in
between the characters and
the audienceyou know, lots of pop
culture references and one-joke char-
acters. Skunk lives and dies on the
characters, on whether kids get in-
volved with them and their world. I like
that you really have to fully enter
Skunks world to enjoy the story.
When pushed to tell us about his per-
sonal animation inspirations, Harte re-
plies, The high-brow answer is early
Disney and Miyazaki. The sordid truth is
He-Man and The Smurfs!
Yet the smoothly Flash-animated
world of Skunk and company is a far
cry from the stiffer-looking Smurf Vil-
lage. Im forever saying that Flash is as
much 2D as paper animation is, says
Harte. Under pressure from shrinking
budgets TV animation had gotten
pretty bad in the last 20 years. With
good design and intelligent use of
Flash, shows like Fosters Home for
Imaginary Friends, El Tigre and (we
think!) Skunk Fu! are showing that TV
animation can be high quality!
Cartoon Saloons Paul Young, who is
also producing the eagerly anticipat-
ed 2D feature titled Brendan and the
Secret of Kells (directed by Tomm
Moore and slated for a late 2008 re-
lease) adds, In Ireland, the industry is
very healthy, especially when it comes
to Flash animation, with studios working
on high-prole properties for Cartoon
Network, Nickelodeon and Disney. I
guess Ireland is at an advantage to
going all the way to Asia for work as we
have the language and sensibilities of
a North American audience. It very
much depends on peoples budgets,
level of quality needed and balancing
that with how much trust you can in-
vest in a studio. Its a shame outsourc-
ing animation is such a part of TV ani-
mation at the moment: We try to do as
much as possible in house, as some-
times its a false economy to send work
to the cheapest studio around.
Young admits that its still a great
challenge to be an independent ani-
mation producer. Every crew member
must really work hard and thankfully
we got that dedication from everyone
on both projects, he says. We were
extremely lucky to have Jordan Gau-
cher on board to produce the series as
he took on the responsibility of the
show as if he created it himself. Both
projects [Skunk Fu! and Brendan the
Secret of Kells] kicked of at almost ex-
actly the same time and we had to ex-
pand rapidly. It would have been easi-
er to handle if one started slightly after
the other! But its like the old joke of
waiting ages for one bus and two ar-
rive at the same time. Q
Skunk Fu! premieres Saturday, Sep-
tember 22, at 9 a.m. on Kids WB!
Paul Young
Aidan Harte
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28
F
amiliar Toon Town heroes such as Scooby-
Doo, Tom & Jerry, Superman and Batman are
joined by a colorful new stable of characters
on Kids WB!s highly eclectic line-up this fall. Mean-
while, some viewers may be celebrating the fact
that Loonatics Unleashed, which featured the fu-
turistic spawns of the Looney Tunes folks (Ace Bunny
and Danger Duck, anyone?), wont be coming
back after two years on the air.
The new Saturday morning block includes two
new half-hour shows from Cookie Jar that will qual-
ify for The CWs educational requirements: Will &
Dewitt, a toon about an adventurous kid and his
optimist life coach/frog; and Magi-Nation, a series
loosely based on the card game, which follows
three young heroes as they navigate the Internet
and battle environmental obstacles.
We start our programming block with this hour of
educational programming, which is new to us, says
Betsy McGowen, senior vp and general manager of
Kids WB! Will & Dewitt is a fun series about a boy who
discovers things for the rst timelike how to ride a bike,
or buying something from the store.
Another new offering is Eon Kid, which was known as
Iron Kid internationally before being dubbed and re-
packaged this year. The show lets viewers learn all
about Marty, an adventurous 11-year-old who be-
comes the human extension of the Fist of Eona pow-
erful force that helps him battle the dark armies of an
adversary known as The General. The CG-animated
show is produced by Daiwan C&A Holdings, Design
Storm, BRB International and Manga Ent, and distribut-
ed by Starz Media. Nicole Dubuc (Kim Possible) and Ben
Townsend (Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles) are two of the
shows writers. Eon Kid is paired with another sharp
kidCookie Jars Johnny Test. Introduced in 2005, the
show continues to chart the trials of Johnny and his su-
per-pooch Dukey, who test gadgets and gizmos creat-
ed by Johnnys genius twin sisters.
Kids looking for more familiar faces and places will
be happy to know that both Shaggy & Scooby-Doo
Get a Clue and Tom and Jerry Tales are back for their
sophomore year on Kids WB! Produced by Warner Bros.
Animation, these two shows ranked No. 1 against the
broadcast competition (in the boys 6-11 demo cate-
gory). As McGowen points out, Those classic charac-
ters continue to attract new audiences and we pay
attention to what the viewers like to see on the air. Its
because of that same reason that were adding the
new Spectacular Spider-Man series to our lineup this
January as well.
Cartoon Saloons clever and visually stunning Flash-
animated series Skunk Fu! serves as the perfect bridge
between Tom & Jerry and the Scooby show [See article
on page 26.]
In the classic DC Comics territory, fans are anticipat-
ing the fth season of The Batman and the second year
of Legion of Super Heroes on the network. Superman,
Aquaman, The Flash, The Hawk and various other Jus-
tice League buddies of Batman pop in to help him in his
ght against Gothams worst enemies in this season.
Prepare for a lot of new developments on Legion.
Not only do we get two incarnations of Superman (a
new and improved 21st century Classic Superman and
a Future Superman created by mixing Classic Supe with
some alien DNA), the new season also deals with a
powerful new 41st century villain called Imperiex. Plus
are you ready for this?the whole series looks different!
Thats right, our heroes have a new, more grown-up
design in Season Deux.
McGowen explains, We felt that the series was a
little too soft and there wasnt enough action included
in the rst season. So we are really pushing everything.
The villains are more threateningand we see Super-
man returning from the 21st century to better help the
Legion in the 31st Century.
McGowen says the demand for faster-paced and
edgier shows seems to be one of the dominating forces
in kids TV these days. We learned a big lesson from our
rst season of Legion of Super Heroes, she notes. Both
action and comedy shows need to be quicker paced.
This is a direct result of kids spending so much time on
video games. You really need to have an action se-
quence before the main titlea teaser to grab their
attention. Gone are the days where TV showsespe-
cially a lot of what we see from international produc-
erscould have slow set-ups and save the action for
the third acts.
So how do the programming folks at Kids WB! decide
which shows make the cut each new season? Dont
look for a specic look, 2D or CG style! When we pick
up a show, we dont do it based on any specic site.
We base our decision on what
works best for the stories and
for the characters. The tough
part of the job is having to
wait for everything to get
ready to air. The deals take so
long. Sometimes you see
something that you love and
you want to put it on the air
right away, and then you have to wait for the deals to
go through and then wait for the nal animation. Its all
about playing the waiting game! Q
Kids WB! Mixes and
Matches New Faces
and Classic Icons
by Ramin Zahed
The new season of Kids WB! kicks off
on Saturday, September 22.
The Fal l 2007 Ki ds WB!
Li neup
7 a.m. Wi l l & Dewi tt
7:30 Magi -Nati on
8:00 Tom & Jerry Tal es
8:30 Tom & Jerry Tal es
9:00 Skunk Fu!
9:30 Shaggy and Scooby-Doo
Get a Cl ue!
10:00 Eon Ki d
10:30 Johnny Test
11:00 Legi on of Super Heroes
11:30 The Batman
Betsy McGowen
Legion of Super Heroes
Tom and Jerry Tales
Magi-Nation
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30
I
f youre looking for signs of change in the
TV animation business, you need to look
no further than whats premiering on Nick-
elodeon this fall. The home of such 2D heavy-
hitters as SpongeBob SquarePants and The
Fairly OddParents is taking a big leap offering
two new splashy titles relying entirely on the
magic of CG animation.
Based on the popular THQ game, Tak and
the Power of Juju is the rst show out of the
gateit launched on August 31 and settles in
for a Sunday morning timeslot on the cabler
this month. Billed as Nickelodeon Studios rst
in-house CG animated series, it centers on a
teenage jungle-boy from the Pupununu tribe
(voiced by Hal Sparks of Talk Soup and Queer
as Folk fame) who has a special bond with
unpredictable magical beings known as Ju-
jus. Helping Sparks bring the cast of charac-
ters to life is a team of ace veteran voice ac-
tors, including Maurice LaMarche, Lloyd Sherr,
Kari Wahlgren, Patrick Warburton and John
DiMaggio.
Although movies based on popular games
have had a dismal history on the big screen,
TV animation seems to be a better play-
ground for characters such as PacMan, Sonic
the Hedgehog and the Super Mario Brothers.
Tak rst appeared as a CG-animated video
game and had we developed the show in
2D, it would have been disappointing, says
Marjorie Cohn, Nicks exec vp of original pro-
grams and development. Weve created a
richer world for the characters and re-invent-
ed the way they look. In the game, players
can control their destiny, and we bring the
same randomness in our storytelling by add-
ing elements of surprise. The magical charac-
ters in the showthe Jujusare unpredict-
able, and you can never know what prompts
their actions. Thats what we call random
acts of comedy!
To bring these random acts of comedy to
CG life, Nickelodeon originally tapped exec
producer Nick Jennings (Rockos Modern
Life, The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie) to
work on the shows pilot back in 2005. In Jan-
uary of 06, the show got the greenlight. Nick
had been a 2D studio up to that time, and
the idea was to produce the studios rst in-
house CG show [The Adventures of Jimmy
Neutron: Boy Genius was animated by Texas-
based DNA Productions]. We had to gure
out a CG animation pipeline and set up a
template that would work for this specic
production.
Using Maya-based
software, the produc-
tion team (which bal-
looned up to 70 people
in house) was keen on
taking the 2D sensibility
and applying it to the
3D animated universe. In the beginning,
working through this transition was very dif-
cult, says Jennings. We are learning a lot
about what are the best stories to tell in CG
in 2D, you can have broader, more exagger-
ated things, while in CG you can exploit more
subtleties of motion and expression. Then you
have to remember there are some things you
cant doyou cant do crying, he cant
blow his nose in his handkerchief, etc.on a
creative level, it makes you come up with
new ways to tell the story. The challenges
make you come up with more interesting so-
lutions. We have built a great relationship
with DQ Entertainment in Hyderabad in In-
diaand in a way, it reminds me of the time
Hanna-Barbera used to send shows over-
seaswe are starting that relationship in CG
and thats kind of exciting.
Jennings says he is a huge fan of tradition-
al animation, but he also believes that there
are certain things you can really do well in
CG. Its a different aesthetic. And I have to
admit theres something very infectious
about CG. Its a little bit closer to reality, but
you have complete freedom for it not to be.
I think when the animation is more stylized in
CG, you have a more successful recipe.
Time for Terric Tribal Magic
Nicks rst in-house CG toon, Tak and the Power of Juju, delivers
awesome visuals and memorable characters. by Ramin Zahed
Marjorie Cohn
Nick Jennings
Josh Book
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Josh Book, creative director of Nicks CG department,
was also involved with Tak from that early pilot stage. We
took the project as far as we could within the time frame,
he says. We saw the things that we wanted to tweak, so,
when we had the time to take it further, we did our best to
make it look spectacular.
According to Book, the CG team used the original
premises and characters from Avalanche Softwares Tak
game as a springboard. The characters texture map-
ping is painted and very stylized, he notes. The environ-
ments are also hand-painted, so that puts the burden on
the texture artist.
A self-taught animator with a B.A. in Fine Arts from U.C.
Santa Cruz, Book worked at Electronic Arts in the mid 90s,
then gravitated toward commercials and game cine-
matics work and had his rst CG series experience at Film
Roman on Tripping the Rift. We spend a lot of time on the
performances and aimed for getting lots of subtleties out
of them, he notes. What makes the show stand apart
from other TV shows is that you dont get quick and snap-
py movements. Typically, you get a lot of over-the-top
animation in TV shows. What makes Tak stand out is the
fact that its more sophisticated.
Of course, the shows organic tribal setting and magical
elements can sound like a CG animators nightmare. Its
set in a jungle and you can ask anyone who worked on
DreamWorks Madagascar how CG-unfriendly that can
be, admits Book. Then there are all the magical effects
and the huge cast of characterswe have 180 charac-
terslots of villagers, lots of magical beings. They are a lot
of fun, but they each have their own complexities.
In addition to Indias DQ Entertainment, Nick also gets
service help from CGCG Inc. in Taiwan and Cinepix in Ko-
rea to produce the 26 half-hours required in the rst season
of the show. Regardless of the complexity of the animation
or the number of studios involved, Book believes that after
all is said and done, CG is simply another tool. Its just like
picking up a paintbrush or pencil, however, its much more
challenging to bring CG up to the quality level we all ex-
pect from professional projects these days. What you have
to be conscious of is that CG isnt right for all kinds of proj-
ects. For example, I know SpongeBob wouldnt work the
same way in CG. Complex doesnt always equal funny.
When you want to sell a funny drawing, you can work for
months and months to make it work in 3D.
Both Book and Jennings note that despite all the chal-
lenges and tribulations, theyre thrilled to be part of Nicks
big CG maiden voyage. Jennings adds, I like the show
because its very rich visually, and, from a story stand-
point, we have a lot of great material to work with: A very
strong, likable main character who is caught between his
tribal world and his abilities to manage magic. We can
get our main character in lots of trouble! Q
Tak and the Power of Juju airs on Nickelodeon
Saturdays at 10 a.m. Episodes of the show are
also available to download on www.nick.com.
The Partys Still On at the Barnyard!
In addition to Tak and the Power of
Juju, Nickelodeon expands its CG pro-
gramming this fall with Back at the
Barnyard, a spin-off series based on
Steve Oedekerks 2006 hit movie, Barn-
yard. The new toon will follow the ad-
ventures of Otis, the fun-loving cow
(Chris Hardwick takes over the role from
Kevin James) and his party animal
buddies. Wanda Sykes, Jeff Garcia,
Tino Insana and Rob Paulsen reprise
their roles as Bessie, Pip, Pig and Peck.
We recently cornered the brilliant and
uber-busy Mr. Oedekerk to answer a
few questions about his new project and he kindly obliged:
Animation Magazine: Its great to see Otis and the gang get their own weekly
toon. Tell us how the TV series is going to be different from the movie?
Steve Oedekerk: In the Barnyard feature lm, we were tracking the story of
Otis, his need to accept responsibility and his relationship with his father. All of
the other characters, plot elements and action were supporting this core sto-
ryline. In the series we have the opportunity to really meet the other characters
in the barnyard, explore the environment and have fun with multiple storylines
and crazy situations the animals get themselves into. As there isnt always a
dramatic through-line as we had in the lm, the focus is even more comedy-
based, which were all having a blast with. The series can really explore the
world of animals standing up on two legs and having their own society when
humans arent around.
The bulk of the animation for the show is handled by your San Clemente, Calif.-
based studio, Omation. What was the biggest challenge you had to face in
creating the TV show?
O: Much less time for much, much more animationjust like when we took
Jimmy Neutron from lm to TV series, its really important to us to retain the
same look and feel we established in the feature lm. Thats a big challenge,
and we have a beyond awesome, creative staff that is really rising to the oc-
casion. The show looks really cool.
What type of CG software did you use to animate the show? How did you use
the assets from the movie?
O: We animated the feature with SoftimageIXSI, and are now using Maya for
the TV series. The assets are a combination of models and textures ported from
the feature and originals created for the series. As the episodes continue,
were constantly building new environments and assets to accommodate the
various storylines.
What do you think is going to be the shows most appealing aspect for kids?
O: The Back at the Barnyard series has this real fast, fun pace, with a lot of ex-
tremely funny characters. Our Snotty Boy is such a stand-out in the movie that
for the series I made him the nephew of the nosey neighbor, Mrs. Beady. Hav-
ing so many funny voice actors being able to interact with one another at the
records creates some really hilarious moments even beyond the script. The
characters in the Barnyard are really like a big, fun family. Otis is in charge and
needs to keep order, but at the same time hes really the biggest kid of all.
Theres a bit of Otis in all of us, and its a fun ride living in his shoes ... Ah, hooves,
I mean. Q
Back at the Barnyard premieres on Nickelodeon Saturday, September
29 at 9 p.m.
Steve Oedekerk
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Junior Freeze Frames
A quick sampler of some of the new childrens toons
created for the global market place.
As many of the TV buyers and content creators are at the MIPCOM Jr. market in France this month (October
6 and 7 at the Cannes Carlton Hotel), we bring you a quick taste of some of the shows that will be up for
grabs at the event. Heres a sampler of what some animation producers are bringing to the table:
TV-Loonland
New Show: Raymond
Format: 26x7
Animation: 2D Flash.
Target Audience: 7-10.
Co-Produced by: Everybody on Deck, TV-Loonland, Gulli and Canal+ France.
Budget: Less than a million euros.
Whats It About: The show centers on a kind-hearted eight-year-old boy who is sometimes
worried and paranoid! Despite all the challenges he faces day-to-day, he never loses his
optimistic attitude.
The Back Story as Told by Romain Adiou, Show Creator: It is very much inspired by my
childhood memories. I wasnt quite aware of it at the beginning. It was only when friends
of mine told me that Raymond sounded very much like my rst name (Romain) that I
rst realized this. I didnt even do it on purpose! I wanted to tell all the little miseries of a
child of eight years of age, without being completely realistic about it. For instance: The
feeling of being different, not popular, but still trying to assert your personality. It is a very
strong feeling when you are a child, and it is still there when you grow up.
On the Animation: The 2D style was both an economic and an artistic choice. With a small budget we knew we couldnt
have too complex an animation. At the same time, it was very much in tune with the spirit and the graphic style. It brings a
touch of youthful naivet to the project. As we animate with Flash, it gives a certain liberty of fabrication which is unique and
very useful when you have to work as quickly as we did on Raymond.
Inspirations and Idols: I have always been a big Tex Avery fan, although it has nothing to do with Raymond. I loved The
Muppet Show and Charlie Brown specials when I was a child. Then, of course, for me, Brad Bird and John Lasseter are the
best examples of combining a profound artistic know-how with generosity towards audiences.
Granada International
New Show: Boowa & Kwala
Format: 52x5
Target Audience: Preschool.
Whats It About: Two inseparable friends (Boowa, a big blue dog and Kwala, a small, inquisitive, yellow koala bear) share
adventures and are helped by their families: The Wawas who are modern and tech-savvy and the Koalas who are more
traditional and down-to-earth.
Produced by: PMMP.
Standout Qualities: The characters have already won the hearts of
fans around the world in 200 territories through the colorful website
BoowaKwala.com, which is part of the uptoten.com platform. Over 1,100
interactive features are available in multi-language formats.
Bonus Goods: If you fall in love with the cute critters on the show, you
can buy the nifty book/CD combo titled Around the World in 12 Songs
with Boowa and Kwala. This cool little tie-in offers world music, a cracking
narration by British actor Tony Robinson and 32 pages of colorful stories,
and it can be yours for $16.95 on the website.
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Flying Bark Productions
New Show: Jonny Pops
Creators: Joni Pollard, Simone Reist, Avrill Stark.
Format: 52x11
Animation: Flash and stop-motion.
Whats It About: An action-packed magical adventure that takes children around the
world.
Standout Qualities: According to Stark, its a mixture of a live presenter and children,
green-screen technology, Flash animation and stop motion. This combination of media
helps children look beneath the surface of things to discover worlds beyond what they
normally see.
Stark on This Years Trends and Outlook for Animation: Unique and strong character-
driven preschool shows or formats with educational elements as well as action/comedy productions with a strong visual look for pre-teens
and strong humor will continue to dominate and be in demand. The main trend we see this year is production of unique shows that lend
themselves to multi-platform. There is growing demand from media companies for productions suitable for new media with the potential
to be marketed across the entire value chain. For the small screen, shorts are perfect for the consumption-pattern of platform users and
mobisodes are becoming hugely popular.
How to Survive the Highs and Lows of the Business: Be persistent. Be in the same zone as your audiencewatch what theyre watching on
TV and online. Be exible and never lose sight of why you started in this business.
Entertainment Rights
New Series: Guess with Jess
Format: 52x10
What Its About: A delightful new contemporary interactive CGI show centered on Jess the
Cat (from the famous Postman Pat series) and his animal friends as they embark on a quest
for the answers to all of those questions that burn in every curious preschooler. The website,
GuesswithJess.com, also forms a vital component of the content package and mirrors the
shows interactivity.
Target Audience: 18 months to four-year-olds.
Producers Notes: Annika Bluhm, the series producer and script editor points out, The animals are brought to the front of the action in the
show. Its a world seen purely from the animal point of view, giving us a glimpse into the secret life that everyday animals live when the
humans are not around. All the animals can talk to each other and music and song are integral parts of the series.
Standout Qualities: Guess with Jess provides a unique 360-degree multi-platform offering for preschoolers.
Market Trends: Increased targeting at an older audience (6 to 12-year-olds) and more humor-based, comedy-driven shows.
Artistic Inuences: The artistic inuence derived from mirroring high budget CGI lms such as Monsters, Inc. and being able to interpret
this within the connes of a standard TV animation budget. For Jess and the other animal characters in the series, each lament of fur has
been rendered to move with the body so that the computer generated model simulates the movement of a real cat. The total effect
gives the characters a warmth and tangibility, making the kids watching at home want to reach out and stroke them.
Iconix Entertainment
New Series: Chiro
Package: 52x5
Target Audience: Preschool.
Co-Produced by: Iconix, Roivisual, Hanaro Telecom, EBS.
Whats It About: Brightly designed animal charactersthree cute chickens, a pig, a
monkey and a crocodileteach youngsters about life, or as the tagline explains: its all
about the delightful adventures of curious, square friends. By square, of course, theyre
referring to the geometric shape of the characters, not their unhip nature!
Standout Qualities: Fans of the Korean-based studio behind Pororo and Taichi Chasers can
vouch for the companys top-notch animation standards.
Awards and Airdates: Chiro won the Best Audience Prize at the 2006 Cartoons on the
Bay event in Italy. In June, the rst six episodes of the series aired on Koreas EBS channel
in conjunction with its anniversary celebration. It ranked as one of the top ve programs
which aired on the countrys terrestrial TV channels in the rst half of the year. Last month,
the show began its regular run on Mondays, Tuesdays and weekends at 9 a.m. on EBS.
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Jetix Europe
New Series: Combo Nios
Format: 26x30
Co-Produced by: Jetix Europe, SIP Animation, TF1.
Target Audience: Kids 6-10.
Animation Style: Flash animation, includes richly detailed landscapes and scenery, with inspirations from a
mixture of different ancient Latin American civilizations. The vibrant colors and imagery of the Nova Nizza city
make for fun and magical settings.
Whats It About: According to Marc Buhaj, senior VP of programming at Jetix Europe, the show features four
kids with secret superpowers: the Combo Nios, who can transform themselves into animal-inspired superheroes.
Serio turns into a jaguar, Paco turns into a bull, Pilar turns into an iguana, and Azul turns into an eagle. Using
their magical skills together with Capoeira-inspired moves they must protect their beautiful ancient city from the
mischievous, madcap Divinos, immortals from another dimension who are intent on wreaking havoc in Nova Nizza.
Standout Qualities: The series has kid superheroes with animal-inspired powers, features Capoeira (the Brazillian martial
art of fast cartwheels and high-ying kicks) and offers colorful transformations and collectible baddies! Plus, it gives kids
a familiarity with the Spanish language and the Latin American culture without being too schooly.
On This Years Trends: Buhaj says, It seems everyone is chasing comedy. Thats easier said than done, so if you have a
great comedy series you will be a very popular person.
BRB Internacional
New Series: Papawa
Format: 104x7
Animation Style: High-Def cut-out style with photographic textures.
Created by: Screen 21 Studio.
Produced by: Catalonias Screen 21 Animation Studio in conjunction with Televisin de Catalunya and 2 Minutes.
Whats It About: The series is inspired by the intelligent humor and strong visual elements of the Catalonian theater group Tricicle and pays
special tribute to sitcom narrative structure while playing with sound and music. The show is set in the magical island of Papawa, where
anyone can see their dreams come true. However, the odd residents of this island have the uncanny ability to turn any dream into the
worst of nightmares. Led by their green leader, the islanders each have a special power and although they dont speak human language,
they emit their own peculiar Papawian sounds.
Standout Qualities: According to Carlos Biern, BRBs head of co-productions and new technologies, The show is a promising new project
from the creators of Bernard and Angus & Cheryl. Papawa has a unique and original cut-out look featuring holidays, islands and dreams.
The setting is also very interestinga holiday resort set on an island hosted by monsters straight out of your wildest nightmares.
Senor Biern Looks at the Big Picture: The key to be successful now is even harder. We still have to nd the best creators, but now we also
need to know well how to market the property directly to the audience using the digital platforms and licensing instead of just using the TV.
In the near future, we also have to lead the ght against piracy just like feature lms, music and videogame producers have had to do in
recent years.
Alphanim
New Series: Hairy & Scary
Package: 52x13
Whats It About: Based on an original idea from Jan Van Rijsselberge, the CG-animated
series focuses on the lives of two very different civilizationsthe peaceful Hairies and the
stressed-out, technology-obsessed Scaries! Straying from the intolerances of the older
generation, the Hairy and Scary kids band together to launch a resistance that tries to block all
homogenization attempts. Alphanim has developed the pilot with Swedens Happy Life and
the series was presented at Cartoon Forum in 2003.
Standout Qualities: The series is based on an unusual and interesting premise. Yes, you can
read it as a thinly veiled parable about cultural differences in our troubled world, and you can enjoy its bright animation style that really
pops out of the screen!
The CG Frontier: Alphanims studio head and director of operations Jean-Pierre Quenet tells us: Our creative projects are often
technology challenges as it is one of Alphanims repeated trademarks to set new visual standardsthe rotoscopy on Delta State to name
just one. As we increase our experience in CG production, we look to this media to reach new creative opportunities to better enhance
our storytelling. Q
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Meet the Buyers!
Youll see them mingling, screening and drinking (heavily) at the MIPCOM JR. and
MIPCOM TV markets in France in October. Heres your chance to learn a little bit
about some of this years top TV suits before you make your big pitch for that amazing
animated show youve been working on for years!
Michael Carrington
Exec Creative Director, CBeebies, BBC
Years in the biz: 20 years.
Hometown: London, England.
Favorite animated show of 2007: Charlie & Lola (series 3).
Recently acquired titles: Pinky Dinky Doo, Finley the Fire Engine,
ToddWorld.
Things I look for in a show: Strong narrative, distinctive visual style, a
great sense of humor.
What I hate to see in a show: Copycat concepts.
Favorite vacation spot: Loire Valley, France.
Favorite restaurant on the Riviera: La Colombe
dOr (Saint Paul de Vance).
The Movie/Book/TV Show that changed my
life: Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach.
Favorite rock band/performer: The Sofa Club.
Shows I always TiVo: Numberjacks, In the Night
Garden, Tommy Zoom.
What I love about my job: The pitching process.
Industry catch phrase I hope Ill never hear again: Youre sooo talented!
Marc Buhaj
Senior VP of
Programming,
Jetix Europe Ltd.
Years in the biz:
19.
Hometown:
Brisbane, Australia.
Favorite animated
show of 2007: Yin Yang Yo!
Recently acquired titles: Monster
Buster Club.
Things I look for in a show: Great
characters.
What I hate to see in a show: Lazy riffs
on current popular culture.
Favorite vacation spot: Vienna,
Georgia, USA.
Favorite restaurant on the Riviera: Le
Pizza.
The Movie/Book/TV Show that
changed my life: Porkys/The Magic
Faraway Tree/Wonder Woman.
Favorite rock band/performer:
Unklejam, Tool.
Shows I always TiVo: Sheer
Genius, The F Word,
Ultimate Fighting
What I love about
my job: Working
with a bunch of
great people
who are much
smarter than
me.
Industry
catch phrase
I hope Ill
never hear
again: Appointment
Viewing.
Donna Friedman Meir
President, National Geographic Kids Entertainment
Years in the biz: Ahhh ... 20!
Hometown: Montclair, NJ (The Far West Side of Manhattan!)
Favorite animated show of 2007: Mama Mirabelles Home
Movies & Iggy Arbuckleof course!
Things I look for in a show: Fresh, funny, distinct characters with a
clear voice, point of view; a breakout/Ive-never-seen-it-before look;
Ideas that tap into National Geographics mission to excite kids to
explore their world and care about the planet in smart, funny, surprising ways.
What I hate to see in a show: The predictable, the banal, the stuff Ive seen several times
before...
Favorite vacation spot: Ahhh...thats tough... Italy, if I must choose.
Favorite restaurant on the Riviera: Mantel.
The Movie/Book/TV Show that changed my life: Oh, The Places Youll Go by Dr. Seuss.
Favorite rock band/performer: David Broza.
Shows I always TiVo: The Ofce (U.S. version);
Gilmore Girls.
What I love about my job: The truly amazing,
talented, passionate, committed, smart, funny
people I get to work with... on all sides of the
business!
Industry catch phrase I hope Ill never hear
again: Anything can happen... and usually
does!
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Alice Cahn
VP, Social Responsibility, Cartoon Network
Years in the biz: Oy, 27!
Hometown: Maplewood, NJ .
Favorite animated show of 2007: Class of 3000.
Recently acquired titles: Banana Splits, Mr. Men.
Things I look for in a show: Kid-friendly characters.
What I hate to see in a show: Developmental inappropriateness.
Favorite vacation spot: Orient, LI.
Favorite restaurant on the Riviera: Le Pizza.
The Movie/Book/TV Show that changed my
life: Harriet the Spy.
Favorite rock band/performer: Rufus Wainwright.
Shows I always TiVo: Law and Order.
What I love about my job: Making kids happy.
Industry catch phrase I hope Ill never hear again: Kids
will have so much fun, they wont even know theyre
learning!
Nick Wilson
Director, Childrens Programs, Five TV
Years in the biz: 30!!!!!!
Hometown: Windlesham, Surrey.
Favorite animated show of 2007: The Beeps!
Recently acquired titles: Mr. Men (new), Bert and Ernie (new), Bottletop Bill (new
series).
Things I look for in a show: Story, story and more story.
What I hate to see in a show: For preschoolersvulgarity.
Favorite vacation spot: Sutherland, Scotland.
Favorite restaurant on the Riviera: Croissette Coffee Bar
east of Martinez!
The Movie/Book/TV Show that changed my life: The Art
of Coarse Angling.
Favorite rock band/performer: Blondie.
Shows I always TiVo: If I had TiVoSouthampton
FC matches.
What I love about my job: All the eccentric creative
people I meet.
Industry catch phrase I hope Ill never hear again: Key
demographic!
Adina Pitt
VP of Acquisitions,
Nickelodeon and MTVN
Kids & Family Group
Years in the biz: 15
Hometown: Puerto Rico.
Favorite animated show
of 2007: SpongeBob
SquarePants.
Recently acquired titles: Speed Racer, Three
Delivery, Yo Gabba Gabba, Domo Kun.
Things I look for in a show: Irreverence, humor,
action, fun, individuality.
What I hate to see in a show: Too much talk and
no physical humor/action; Shows that move at a
snails pace.
Favorite vacation spot: British Virgin Islands.
Favorite restaurant on the Riviera: Mantel.
The Movie/Book/TV Show that changed my life:
Movie: Star Wars; Book: The Giving Tree, TV show:
The Carol Burnett Show
Favorite rock band/performer: Alejandro Sanz
Shows I always TiVo: SpongeBob, Entourage,
Greys Anatomy
What I love about
my job: No two
days are the
same. I get to
meet different
people each day
and learn about
their projects. Every
decision has its risks
and its exciting to see
what resonates with
the audience. Theres
also huge learning in the
decisions that dont quite work. Having the remit
to think big and the freedom to fail is an incredibly
rewarding challenge.
Industry catch phrase I hope Ill never hear again:
This is the next SpongeBob; This is the next High
School Musical; Jules and Debbie love this!
Linda Simensky
Sr. Director of Kids Programming, PBS
Hometown: Union, NJ.
Favorite animated show of 2007: The Simpsons.
Recently acquired titles: Whats the Big Idea? (The Jim Henson Company), Martha
Speaks (WGBH) and an animated show with the Kratt Brothers.
Things I look for in a show: The holy development trinity of amazing characters,
compelling stories and brilliant and unique designs. And, of course, the seamless
integration of an interesting educational curriculum into the stories.
What I hate to see in a show: Terrible timing, shows that are over-designed, annoying voices.
Favorite vacation spot: Colorado: Its a vacation from humidity.
The Movie/Book/TV Show that changed my life: The movie Tommy. It was when I learned that not everything always makes sense.
Favorite rock band/performer: The Beatles.
Shows I always TiVo: The Simpsons, Ace of Cakes.
What I love about my job: My son and daughter think its cool. And I have more fun at work than anyone I know.
Industry catch phrase I hope Ill never hear again: The educational part is so hidden that kids wont even know that they are learning!
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Beth Gardiner
VP of Production and
Development, Playhouse Disney
Hometown: Baltimore, MD.
Favorite animated show of 2007:
My Friends Tigger & Pooh.
Recently acquired titles: Charlie
& Lola.
Things I look for in a show: Kid-relatable characters, a unique way of telling a story, an interesting visual style
and silliness.
What I hate to see in a show: Pandering and preciousness.
Favorite vacation spot: Big cities for food & culture, most recently Rome.
Favorite restaurant on the Riviera: Wherever Toper Taylor recommends.
The Movie/Book/TV Show that changed my life: Im in the middle of The Omnivores Dilemma by Michael
Pollan & it IS life-changing!
Favorite rock band/performer: Bob Dylan.
Shows I always TiVo: Friday Night Lights, 30 Rock, The Ofce, The Sopranos (sniff).
What I love about my job: The people I work with and talking and listening to kids.
Industry catch phrase I hope Ill never hear again: Think out of the box, when youve said that, youve
become the box.
Paul Robinson
Global Managing
Director, KidsCo
Years in the Biz: 27 years
in the biz.
Hometown: Camberley
Surrey, United Kingdom.
Favorite animated show
of 2007: Charlie & Lola
from Tiger Aspect.
Recently acquired titles: Inspector Gadget, Neds
Newt, Sabrina, Babar the Elephant, Tracy Beaker,
My Parents are Aliens.
Things I look for in a show: Originality of
characterizations and show design.
What I hate to see in a show: Excessive ghting and
violence or condescention towards children.
Favorite vacation spot: Caribbean.
Favorite restaurant on the Riviera: OnDine, because
there is nothing more audacious than dining on
the beach.
The Movie/Book/TV Show that changed my life:
Roger Scott, the DJ on Capital Radio in London,
U.K., whose passion for music got me into media.
Favorite rock band/
performer: Pharrell, Scissor
Sisters, Jake is a complete
star.
Shows I always
TiVo: Hustle, Doctor Who,
The Apprentice, Lost.
What I love about my
job: That its only TV, and
nobody died, but its a
brilliant business and I
am loving building a new
childrens TV channel with
my partners and my fantastic team.
Industry catch phrase I hope Ill never hear
again: Oh my god, its soooo good to see you.
Michael Goldsmith
Director of Original Content, Teletoon
Years in the biz: 7, but new to
Teletoon!
Hometown: Toronto, Canada.
Favorite animated show of
2007: At the moment Im
loving Total Drama Island but
it is so hard to have a favorite
when there are so many great shows.
Recently acquired titles: Shaggy and Scooby-Doo Get a Clue!, Chop Socky Chooks, Ricky Sprocket, Squirrel Boy,
Frisky Dingo, Metalocalypse.
Things I look for in a show: Story, characters, humor and irreverence.
What I hate to see in a show: Hate is such a negative word copycats.
Favorite vacation spot: Anywhere with my wife and kids preferably with mountains and a lake.
Favorite restaurant on the Riviera: Time for a confessionnever been there!
The Movie/Book/TV Show that changed my life: Short stories by Raymond Carver.
Favorite rock band/performer: Wilco and The Pogues.
Shows I always TiVo: No TIVO dont like to miss Entourage and Curb Your Enthusiasm.
What I love about my job: Working with fun and creative people every day who love what they do.
Industry catch phrase I hope Ill never hear again: Global Recession.
Cecilia Persson
VP of Programming, Acquisitions and Presentation,
EMEA, Turner Kids Channels
Years in the biz: More than 10.
Hometown: Stockholm, Sweden.
Favorite animated show of 2007: Storm Hawks.
Recently acquired titles: Brave from Kickstart,
World of Quest (Cookie Jar), Fraggle Rock (Hit
Entertainment), The Latest Buzz (Decode).
Things I look for in a show: Entertaining, kid relatable, quality animation.
What I hate to see in a show: Un-originality.
Favorite vacation spot: Tuscany, Italy.
Favorite restaurant on the Riviera: La Palme dOr, Martinez Hotel.
The Movie/Book/TV Show that changed my life: Buffy the Vampire Slayer.
Favorite rock band/performer: Pharrell.
Shows I always TiVo: Heroes,
Dexters Laboratory, My Name is
Earl, Greys Anatomy.
What I love about my job: The
programs and the people.
Industry catch phrase I hope Ill
never hear again: I still like them,
still use them, and probably way
too much.
Compiled by Claire Webb
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T
hose of us who grew up on PBS
staples such as Sesame Street and
The Electric Company in the 1970s
recognize how TV can help young
viewers develop their early reading
skills. This month, a new animated PBS
series sets out to introduce three- to
ve-year-old viewers to an exciting
new way to recognize words and to
associate them with their correspond-
ing images in the real world.
Partially funded by the U.S. Dept.
of Education as part of the Ready to
Learn literacy initiative, WordWorld
allows kids to see how letters are put
together to form words. CG animation
is used to bring simple words such as
Duck, Sheep, Frog, Pig and Ant (who
are also the shows ve central char-
acters) and everyday objects such as
lamp and truck to life.
Our goal was to teach kids about
reading and words by using humor and
simple storytelling techniques, says Don
Moody, who created the show with his
wife, Jacqueline. What makes the show
stand out is that when a word is formed
correctly it morphs into the character or
thing it represents, which makes learn-
ing to read a fun new experience.
Helping Moody realize his vision are
childrens TV veteran Tina Peel (exec vp
of production,
education and
research) and
Emmy-winning
director Olexa
Hewryk (Little
Einsteins, Little
Bill). Although
the team initial-
ly experiment-
ed with using
2D animation
and live action, they realized that CG
animation would allow the exibility
needed to esh out the concept. The
creators believe that CG makes the
letters look more appealing to young
viewers, and that it was a natural t for
the premise.
We decided to use Crest Anima-
tion Studios in India as they provided us
with a great sample test, says Moody.
We found that their timing and [Maya-
based] animation was really good,
and they embraced a lot of things that
we wanted to see in our show. Studio
352 in Luxembourg is
also animating up to
10 of the seasons 26
half-hour shows.
Moody, a creative
entrepreneur, former
ad agency man and
Soho painter, says
his career took a dif-
ferent path when
his wife became
pregnant with his rst
daughter (who is six
now). I wanted to
lead by example, he
notes. I was fascinat-
ed by TV and anima-
tion, and I decided it
was time to help other children learn,
instead of being a reckless artist!
Hewryk, who has built an impressive
career as animation director for top
preschool shows, says he likes work-
ing on projects that make him proud
of what he set out to do. Ive been
working in childrens TV for more than
10 years now, and I really believe that,
working on preschool shows, Im ben-
eting society. WordWorld is teaching
children about the building blocks of
the world around us. Both Don and I
share a commitment to using humor,
just like the old Warner Bros. shows, the
Tom and Jerry classics.
For both Hewryk and Moody, watch-
ing the shows impact on test audienc-
es has been an emotional experience.
We had a roomful of kids who live be-
low the poverty line in Brooklyn watch
the show and to see them scream out
for the characters and wanting the
characters to do well was amazing,
recalls Moody. Then when they got
the literacy lesson at the end of the
show, I almost cried and had to leave
the room!
When you tag along with the re-
search department and see how chil-
dren are responding to your work is the
most rewarding part of the process,
adds Hewryk. Often people who work
in animation forget about this stage of
the project. To see the impact makes
all the long hours of work worth it
Thats the biggest payoff. Q
The ABCs of Reading
WordWorld, a new PBS animated series, has crafted a
clever way of teaching preschoolers how to read.
by Ramin Zahed
WordWorld premiered on PBS Kids
on September 3.
Don Moody
Olexa Hewryk
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his fall, before the madness of the
MIPCOM Jr. and MIPCOM markets
takes Cannes by storm, 60 animat-
ed TV projects from 12 different Euro-
pean countries will be competing for
buyer and investor attention at the
18th edition of Cartoon Forum (Sept.
19-22). Organized by CARTOON (Euro-
pean Association of Animation Film),
this years event is held at the Catalo-
nian city of Girona and will showcase
some 400 hours of content with a price
tag of 216 million euros.
Among the countries participating at
this TV toon event, France has the high-
est number of projects (15) followed by
U.K. with 12, Spain with 11 and Germany
and the Nordic countries each have six
shows to present. Among the trends no-
ticed by the organizers this year: The 26-
part 10- to 13-minute package aimed
at kids, 6-12, is the dominant format,
while 2D animation is still the medium of
choice over complete CGI. The aver-
age cost per minute is projected to be
in the 9,000 to 10,000 euro range. More
then ever, producers are showing inter-
est in developing multiplatform projects
and many are creating High-Def car-
toons as well as planning distribution on
VOD, IPTV, ADSL, TV and mobile players.
Since the launch of the event, over 300
projects have obtained nancing (for a
grand total of one billion euros) and are
currently being produced or broadcast
in countries all over the world.
Frances SIP Animation is one of the
15 companies representing the coun-
try at the Forum. The toon shop is bring-
ing Astaquana: The Xtreme Waders
Legend Fish Tournament, a 26x22 series
produced in full HD Hybrid animation.
Based on an original concept by
Charles Barrez and Nadege Giardot,
the series will help bring urgent mes-
sages about the future of our planet to
young viewers.
We wanted to create a show in
which nature was treated like a full-
edged character, says Stephanie
Kirchmeyer, SIPs managing director.
Threatened by the terrifying and pow-
erful Nightmare Fish (The Omega) who
tries to shatter natures balance, na-
ture will be saved thanks to the brav-
ery, solidarity and humanity of our kid
heroes. The show offers action, come-
dy and thrills: We wish to go a step fur-
ther than other productions to deliver
an intriguing mix between the Harry
Potter and Indiana Jones series.
Kirchmeyer points out that although
the shows main topicshingis very
different from other animated projects
contentit offers an original and cre-
ative answer to young peoples inter-
est in shing and nature in general.
The biggest challenge in creating an
animated TV show for kids that will ed-
ucate and entertain them is establish-
ing and maintaining creative excel-
lence in an environment where it is
becoming more difcult to raise nanc-
ing, she notes.
Spains Screen 21 (BRB) will offer its
buzzworthy new project Angus & Cher-
yl for buyers and nancers. Currently in
production at the Catalonia studio,
Angus & Cheryl is a series of 104 one
and a half-minute episodes produced
in high-denition 3D. The dialogue-free
comedy offers a fun look at the daily
clashes in any couples relationship,
and explores universals truths through
the conicting personalities of Angus,
who is very simple and direct, and
Cheryl, who is complex and devious.
Barcelona-based Icon Animation
(Lola & Virginia) will also have a strong
presence during the pitching sessions.
According to the companys head of
marketing and sales Christophe Gold-
berger, the studio will launch a new se-
ries titled Lucky Fred at the Forum. The
(52x12) 2D-animated series centers on
an inventive 13-year-old and an amaz-
ing Reality Enhancement Drone (RED)
which crashes into his life and changes
his world forever. The series is a great
combination of comedy and the rela-
tionships that develop amongst the
shows characters, says Goldberger.
When asked about the importance
of Cartoon Forum to European pro-
ducers, Goldberger responds, The Fo-
rum has been a great venue for Icon
Animations projects. We successfully
launched both our shows Lola & Vir-
ginia and Sandra: The Fairy-Tale De-
tective at the event. Its a great plat-
form to secure nancing from Europe-
an investors just before going into MIP-
COM to complete the nancing and
investment structure. He adds, This
year the keyword is multiplatform
again. You need to have a great prop-
erty with built-in features which will fa-
cilitate its cross-media distribution,
Chasing Creativity in
Catalunya
European TV animation producers and nancers nd their
way to the Spanish town of Girona to face the hustle and
bustle of the annual Cartoon Forum event.
by Ramin Zahed
Its a great platform to secure nancing from European
investors just before going into MIPCOM to complete
the nancing and investment structure.
Christophe Goldberger, ICON Animations head of sales
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whether it be online, mobile phone or
publishing.
Also riding high on the promise of
new technologies is Italys Gruppo Al-
cuni, which is bringing a new 26x26 2D-
animated series to the Forum. Co-pro-
duced by RAI Fiction,
SLASH:// follows a group
of adventurous kids who
discover a magic stone
that allows them to ac-
tually travel through the
Internet. Positive values
like friendship, teamwork
and creativity are em-
phasized in the series,
says creator Sergio Man-
o. We intertwine these
values with themes such
as ecology, cherishing
past traditions and the
search for individuality in
our show.
Mano is quite open
about the many chal-
lenges facing animation
producers in Italy. The
major difculty is the lack
of a proper production
groundwork, he ex-
plains. By this, I mean a
network that brings
together producers,
broadcasters, distribu-
tors and anyone else in
the eld with a common
goal. Cohesion is the key
for dealing with a chang-
ing animation market.
Guillaume Hellouins
Paris-based outt Team-
TO will attend the Forum
for the second year in a
row. This years pitch is
centered on How to Drive Every-
body Crazy, a great-looking CG-
animated series about a mischie-
vous 10-year-old boy named Ange-
lo who offers tips on how to play
jokes on family members, teachers,
neighborsor as the title promises
everyone!
The series is based on a series of
illustrated books and developed in
collaboration with France 3, says
Hellouin. Created in the rst-person
style of sitcoms like Malcolm in the
Middle, the project centers on Angelo
and his friend Lolo as they share their
pranks with the young audience. Their
jokes are funny and unexpected, but
they are never mean. He also men-
tions that the new series will be avail-
able in both a 78x5.5 package and a
78x1.5 format to make it easier to offer
to TV/cable broadcasters and multi-
platform outlets alike.
Although we only had the space to
highlight some of the shows being pre-
sented at the event, we know from past
experience that there will be a lot of
creative sparks ying in the charming
town of Girona. As one veteran of the
toon business puts it, Sure, its a pain to
sit through all these pitches for three
whole days, but, hey, you have to kiss a
lot of frogs to nd that one prince
charming among these toads. Q
A complete list of Cartoon Forum
projects can be found at www.car-
toon-media.be/FORUM/6_Projects.
htm
Good As Gold
O
ne of the recently added side-
bars to the Cartoon Forum
event is the European Assoc. of Ani-
mation Films award for best short
lm. The prestigious Cartoon dOr
winner will be announced during a
ceremony on Sept. 21 in Gironas
Teatre Municipal. The ve nalists
were selected from 27 candidates
that received awards from Car-
toons European partner festivals.
This years jury was composed of
Hungarian director Aron Gauder
(The District!) Estonian director Jan-
no Poldma (Lotte from Gadgetville)
and Televisi de Catalunyas head
of childrens programs Xavier Rome-
ro. The 07 nominees are:
Life Line by Tomek Ducki (Hun-
gary)
Peter & the Wolf by Suzie Tem-
pleton (U.K.)
The Irresistible Smile by Ami Lind-
hom (Finland)
The Pearce Sisters by Luis Cook
(U.K.)
t.o.m. by Daniel Gray & Tom
Brown (U.K.)
TeamTos How to Drive Everybody Crazy
SIPs
Astaquana
Screen 21s Angus & Cheryl
Icon Animations
Lucky Fred
RAI/Gruppo Alcunis SLASH://
t.o.m.
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___
I
ts no secret that the boom in Asian anima-
tion and digital and multiplatform enterprises
continues to draw numerous industry profes-
sionals to the thriving region. This fall, media
professionals will have numerous opportunities
to share best practices, forge strong business
networks and foster international collaborations
and deals at the Asia Media Festival (Nov. 14-
Dec. 4) in Singapore.
The global animation community will have a
major presence at this years events, according
to AFM organizers. Held under the umbrella of
the Asia Media Festival, the Asia Animation
Conference is dedicated to the needs of ani-
mation creators, producers and distributors. This
is the platform for animation professionals to
meet with key distributors and buyers in Asia,
and to be updated on the latest trends and
developments in the industry. Among the many
industry movers and shakers which will be par-
ticipating this year are:
EM.Entertainment GmbH (Germany),
brings its latest slate (Master Raindrop, Dogstar
and VIPO) to the market.
Icon Animation (Spain), will offer three
of its top new productions (Lola & Virginia,
Go!Go!Pig and Rat Man).
Telescreen (Netherlands), with over 25 years
in the business, this European heavyweight show-
cases two outstanding new series (Frog & Friends
and Alien Clones from Outer
Space).
Studio 100 Media (Ger-
many), a new global services
and rights platform entity, will promote its new
preschool puppet series, Big and Small, and the
live action, CGI preschool series, Bumba the
Clown.
Of course, the reach of the Asia Media
Festival is far beyond the animation industry.
Over 200,000 participants from over 40 coun-
tries, will be treated to a spectacular showcase
cf lhe |cle:l, riche:l cnc fne:l mecic lc|enl,
content and services that the region has to
offer at the different trade and public events to
be held as part of AMF 2007.
This year, industry attendees can take part in
various essential workshops, conferences and
exhibitions held under partner events: Promax/
BDA Asia Conference and Awards; Asia Television
Forum; Asian Television Awards; Asia Film Market
& Conference; Asia Factual Forum;
Asian Festival of 1st Films; Asia Image
Apollo Awards and MediAction.
In addition, animation professionals
can join other media experts at the Me-
dia Financing Forum (MFF) for updates on the
mecic fncncing :cene in /:ic cnc ceve|cping
trends in alternative funding sources for media
projects at this Forum. This valuable event also
creates opportunities for budding producers,
directors and creative executives to meet up with
fncncier:, gcvernmenl cgencie: cnc ccmmi:-
sioning editors through one-on-one appointments
to pitch their ideas to potential investors.
Selling the Sizzle in Singapore
The Asia Media Festival is the regions most prestigious
trade event for the media industry.
Major global TV distribution and production companies such
as Porchlight Entertainment (above) and E! Networks at-
tended the AMF event in 2006.
Advertorial
Em.Entertainments Dogstar and Telescreens Frog and Friends (below) are
two of the many animated projects available for buyers at the upcoming
AMF confab in Singapore.
Telescreens
Frog and Friends
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ith participation from 49 countries,
the event has seen 25% growth
year on year, according to Ed Ng,
president of Reed Exhibitions Singapore-
Malaysia. Sales companies were up 25% to
250 and the number of Asian companies
were up 44% to 121 in 2006.
Finding the right co-production partner is
on the agenda of many of the companies
at the Forum. In 2006, for example, Discovery
Networks International, Koreas Educational
Broadcasting System, Taiwans Chungwa
Telecom and Sri Lankas Derena were on
the lookout for partners, especially in the
HDTV arenas. NBC Universal TV Distribution,
Sony Pictures TV International, Buena Vista
lnlernclicnc| IV /:ic Fccifc, C8S Fcrcmcunl
International TV and 20th Century Fox
Distribution were some of the major U.S.
entities at the market.
Many of the U.S. majors expressed a
renewed interest in small-screen offerings as
program licensing in Asia is on the increase.
This rise is driven by cable TV growth as well
as such digital platforms as IPTV, broadband
TV and video-on-demand/pay-per view.
Singapores Media Development Authority
played a major part in the 2006 edition of
the Forum. The organization announced a
:|cle cf cec|: fcr feclure f|m:, lhe creclicn cf
c cigilc| f|m func cnc c new cgreemenl lc
boost audio mixing in Singapore. Singapores
production and post house Mega Media
and Indonesias Omnicron Media Kreasi also
announced a memo of understanding for
a total of 10 High-Def digital features to be
produced in a two-year time frame under a
new Singapore-Indonesia Digital Film Fund.
In addition, Indian companies were also
a source of major news in 2006. For example,
Buena Vista International Television Asia
Fccifc cnncuncec c mu|liyecr prcgrcmming
cec| fcr |iLrcry ccnlenl wilh lncicn f|m
channel Filmy.
Overall, AMF 2006 ended on a high note
with $47.1 million in transactions recorded at
the anchor events of the festival, which was
c :ignifccnl increc:e frcm lhe $33 mi||icn
mark hit in 2005. Analysts point to this huge
jump as a major growth indicator especially
considering
that AMF's
fr:l culing
in 2002 prccucec c mcce:l $.3 mi||icn in
transactions.
Singapore Takes Center Stage
The success of AMF underscores
Singapore's unique position as a media hub
for the region. With its strategic location,
excellent infrastructure and burgeoning
talent, Singapore is seen as the ideal
gateway for media professionals to deliver
their products and services to the global
market. Singapores Media Development
Authority strives to help the region reach
its ambitious goalsand judging by the
prc|iferclicn cf high-lech culfl: cnc lcp-
quality animation and vfx-related studios
in the country, it has already set a high
standard for other territories to emulate.Q
There is no better place to experience the best the industry
has to offer than at AMF 2007a truly unique premier platform
designed to help media players around the world keep in touch and
seal international collaborations.
AMF 2007 promises all the glitz and glamour of the media
industry, along with unrivalled opportunities to get down to the
business of mediaquite simply, AMF 2007 is THE place for media
professionals to buy and sell content, pitch story ideas to nanciers
or just to be seen and heard.
The Media Development Authority of Singapore aims to develop the country into a vibrant
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Advertorial
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About Last Years Event
Another exciting event for animation professionals this year is the Super
Pitch. At this widely attended event, toon creators will have the opportunity to
bring their ideas and concepts to life. The SuperPitch offers media companies a
unique platform to pitch their capabilities and ideas to a panel of commissioning
editors and broadcasters. If you are interested in taking part of this unique event,
you can submit material on the website at www.upload.superpitch.com.
The deadline for material submissions is October 15, 2007.
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I
t has been 40 years since the network televi-
sion debut of the very rst Fantastic Four
weekly animated series, and that show is
nothing less than a milestone for a number of
reasons.
On September 9, 1967, at 9:30 a.m., ABC un-
veiled Fantastic Four based on the beloved
Marvel comic book and produced by Hanna-
Barbera Productions. This was a terric moment
in both comic book and cartoon history be-
cause it happened to be Marvels rst network
show, beginning one half-hour before the
companys Spider-Man cartoon, which also
debuted on September 9, 1967, (produced
by Grantray-Lawrence Animation) and be-
came a success.
My experience with the property began
very innocently in the fall of 1966, when my
father Stuart Fischer (who was an agent and
represented Hanna-Barbera) noticed that I
was reading a Fantastic Four comic book
and asked me a very simple question: Do
you think that comic book can be a TV car-
toon? Naturally, I said Yes! and proceed-
ed to tell him how exciting it was to read the
superteams adventures and get involved
with their battle with the evil forces of the
universe.
By this time, Hanna-Barbera had estab-
lished itself as an innovative force in television
cartoons by creating instant classics such as
The Flintstones, The Jetsons, Yogi Bear, Huckle-
berry Hound and QuickDraw McGraw. Marvel
had also proved itself a huge force in youth
entertainment by putting out best-selling com-
ic books and reaping the rewards in related
merchandising and consumer products.
After getting the answer that he wanted
from his son, Sy Fischer immediately contacted
his client, Joe Barbera, and told him of the exis-
tence of this comic book which very well might
have potential to be a Saturday morning car-
toon. After reading the comic himself, Barbera
agreed and told my father to pursue the prop-
erty. My dad then contacted Stan Lee and the
two got together and had a very nice meeting.
Hanna-Barbera acquired the rights from
Marvel to produce The Fantastic Four as a
Saturday morning cartoon and then got the
go-ahead from ABC for a development
deal. They worked closely with Lee and
Jack Kirby to develop the characters so
that they would make a smooth transition to
the small screen. ABC greenlit the show and
added it to its Saturday morning schedule
(at 9:30 a.m.) for the 1967-68 season.
The animated series was very faithful to
its origins and featured stories from the
comic books. The show lasted three sea-
sons on ABC and went on to have a longer
shelf life in TV syndication and on cable.
During the 1967-68 TV season, the three
networks Saturday morning schedules
were populated with original made-for-TV
superhero cartoons, such as Space Ghost
and Frankenstein, Jr., as well as comic-
book characters who made it to the TV
screen, including Spider-Man, Batman
and Aquaman.
Hanna-Barbera continued to be a domi-
nant force on Saturday morning in the
years ahead and created many other mile-
stones. The studio worked with Marvel again
in 1979 to create a show centered on The
Thing (without the other three members of
the F4 team), following the success of the
live-action version of The Incredible Hulk.
The Fantastic Four returned to the world of
Saturday morning animation in 1978 in a show
produced by DePatie-Freleng Enterprises,
which also delivered Spider Woman that same
year. In this version of the show, The Human
Torch was missing in action because the net-
work feared that young viewers would be en-
couraged to Flame on like the superhero. In-
stead they added a new character, a talking
robot called H.E.R.B.I.E. Unit, who worked well
with the other members and also appeared
afterwards, for a while, in the comic book.
The third Fantastic Four series was done for
the rst-run syndication market and was pro-
duced by Marvel itself, which by then had
formed its own animation studio. The new
show ran with Iron Man under the Marvel Ac-
tion Hour banner (1994-1996) and also in-
cluded an introduction by Lee himself.
The fourth and latest version surfaced in
2006 as Fantastic Four: Worlds Greatest
Heroes and was produced for the Cartoon
Network by Marvel and French toon studio
Moonscoop. Styled after the successful
2005 live-action feature, the 26-part series
rst aired on CNs Toonami block in Sep-
tember 2006 and returned to the network
lineup this past June. It combined 2D art and
CG animation to create a more modern
look for todays TV audience. Although Car-
toon Network didnt air the series in its en-
tirety, the rst DVD of the show was released
in March, and a second volume will be re-
leased this month. Each DVD features only
four episodes of the series.
Many fans of the show remember the rst
animated incarnation of the popular Lee/Kirby
heroes with great fondness. Its quite amazing
to see how many more people discover these
enduring characters year after year all around
the world. I salute the visionary men who cre-
ated such a terric show and also my dad, Sy
Fischer, who saw the potential in my favorite
comic book many years ago. Q
Heroes with Lasting
SuperPowers
Our guest columnist looks back at the origins of the rst
animated Fantastic Four show on the occasion of its 40th
anniversary. by Stuart Fischer
H.B.s 1967 version
Fantastic Four: Worlds
Greatest Heroes (2006)
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he record temperatures in Hungary over the past
few months have nally dropped, but Budapests
busy animation house Studio Baestarts is showing
no signs of cooling off. Andras Erkel, the studios sea-
soned managing director, tell us that there are plans
to continue expanding the outts ventures in three
different directions in the next few years.
We are setting our sights on growing in three
main areas, notes Erkel. We are planning on pro-
ducing one feature animated project per year.
Were entering animation in a big way by launching
a new 3D CGI studio together with Paris-based
company TeamTO, and were also excited about
entering the live-action eld.
At this years Cartoon Forum event, Baestarts will
be shopping its latest preschool show, Huhu, cre-
ated and directed by the studios creative head
Alexei Alexeev (Mr. Bean: The Animated Series).
Its a slapstick comedy about the adventures of a
group of owls who get lost in the Arctic, says Erkel.
The 52x2 package is conceived as a 2D digital
show. Weve designed the series specically so
that it can be exible for multiplatform usage.
Inspired by the classic Buster Keaton and Lau-
rel and Hardy comedies, the show zeroes in on
each of the different owl characters and their
various humorous eccentricities as they face vari-
ous challenges in the unfamiliar Arctic landscape.
The three-year-old company is also working on a
traditionally animated feature based on Mama
Moo, one of the most popular Swedish childrens
book by Jujja Wieslander and Sven Nordqvist (Pett-
son and Findus, Bjorn Bear). Svensk Film started to
talk to us about this project about two years ago,
and it was this February by when the nancing was
put together and its nally in production now,
notes Erkel. Telepool will be distributing the lm.
The new feature is exec produced by Johann
Mardel and Erkel and directed by Igor Veichtaguin
of Studio Baestarts, who also helmed Svensks and
Studio Baestarts 2006 effort, Lor-
ange, Mufn & Dartanjang.
Erkel points out Nordqvists hand-
drawn, lovingly illustrated style is
perfect for the classic 2D feature.
The movie tells the story of a lasting
friendship between a cow
and a crow, and follows
their many adventures to-
gether. We feel that this is
going to be one of the nal
traditionally animated,
hand-drawn features were going to be in-
volved with. Over 200 people will be working
at our studio on the lm.
Another feature project also in develop-
ment at Baestarts is based on a best-selling
Hungarian childrens book about a young boy and a
young girl who embark on various adventures in a
fantasy world ruled by the King of Splodge. Titled
Maszathegy (Hill of Splodge), the lm will be animat-
ed using 2D and 3D digital technology. Erkel will seek
co-producers for the project at next years Cartoon
Movie event in Potsdam, Germany.
A new venue for Erkel and company is the live-
action eld. A shining example of these new partner-
ships is a joint venture with Gyorgy Pal, one of Hun-
garys and Europes most promising young directors
whose 2006 movie Taxidermia won the Sundance/
NHK Filmmakers award. Hes considered one of the
most inuential and innovative lmmakers, says
Erkel. Were very proud to be working on his next
feature, which is a fantasy movie based on Hans
Christian Andersens fairy tale, The Wild Swans.
According to Erkel, the feature will be a 15 mil-
lion euro production, an epic adventure in the vein
of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. French animation
veteran Guillaume Hellouin and his TeamTO studio
will be contributing to the vfx work of the lm. Hell-
ouin is also in discussion with Erkel to set up a 3D CGI
animation studio for feature and TV animation in
Hungary in the near future. The two companies
have been working on the plans together (using
Maya software on HP stations) for the last year. On
the TV front, Svensk is continuing to develop the 3D
CG-animated series Beats with Baestarts. The music-
based 52-part preschool series featuring eccentric
characters generated much interest at last years
Cartoon Forum confab and is hoped to begin pro-
duction early next year at the new 3D studio.
An adult comedy series based on French book
property Ma Maison is also on the drawing board.
Designed and art-directed by Delphine Durand
and directed by Alexeev, the animated project is
said to be reminiscent of the classic Monty Py-
thons Flying Circus offerings.
Like many other animation studios around the
world, Baestarts is also active in gaming. Based
on a project created as a graduation presenta-
tion by Applied Art Academy student Otto Ritter,
Baestarts picked up a preschool multimedia
game called Hiding Place (Rejtekes). This proj-
ect received a lot of attention and were devel-
oping a complete CD-Rom game as well as a
multiplatform series for mobile, Internet and TV.
We have been very excited about the
quality of work weve seen from the Applied Art
Academy students, therefor we continue to of-
fer training and production opportunities for two
diploma students every year, adds Erkel. We
are also setting up a new program in 3D digital
animation in conjunction with Guillaume [Hell-
ouin] and the Academy next year. Its a promis-
ing new way to train the next generation of digi-
tal artists in the country. Q
Business Is
Humming in Hungary
Budapests Studio Baestarts makes plans for animated
and vfx-driven projects in three different arenas.
For more info, visit www.studiobaestarts.com
Ma Maison
Hiding Place
Huhu
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O
n paper, it seems like a no-brainer,
cant lose, bet-the-babys-milk-
money-on-it type of proposition.
Your device is already in the hands of some
195 million U.S. consumers, and youve got
a cool new service that delivers entertain-
ment, news, sports and more to those con-
sumers for as low as $10 per month. So why
to date, well into the second decade of the
cell phone revolution, have only 5 million
people taken the mobile industry up on the
offer?
To many industry observers, its a classic
chicken-and-egg paradox. If you dont
build it (properly) they wont come. And if
you do build it, they might ignore you any-
way.
For their part, mobile content creators
are having a hard time generating revenue
from advertisers. So any original, cell phone-
exclusive programming they produce is, for
now, a loss leader. Thats little incentive to
spend time and money on a platform that
might never reach its potential. In 2006, $421
million was spent on mobile phone advertis-
ing, a fraction of the $48 billion spent on
broadcast television, according to the Uni-
versal McCann media agency. Someone
needs to take a leap of faith.
Many [ad buyers] act like its 1999, says
Steve Ogden, whose animated short Flakes
recently won a Mobifest L.A. award. They
dont even understand YouTube, much less
understand media for phones. I think they
dismiss it as a gimmick or that a tiny screen
represents tiny opportunities. Thats tiny-
minded. Among other things, Ogden runs
an indie animation website, AnimWatch.
com, which is also having a hard time gain-
ing traction with online advertisers. Media
on phones is powerful, he says. People al-
ways have their phones with them, and
people who enjoy phone media are vora-
cious consumers. When people are bored,
what do you see them do? They whip out
the phones.
Help may be on the way. Ad models in
mobile are slowly beginning to emerge,
says Ross Cox, senior director of advanced
platforms at Cartoon Network New Media.
The technologies that deliver the ads are
still in the early stages. Things will change
once standards are adopted and can be
taken across multiple carriers. This will in-
crease the mobile audience footprint and
create a more appealing model for every-
body.
Flakes was not made with an eye on the
mobile market. Rather, it began as a three-
minute lm for two of Ogdens colleagues,
Mike Gibson and Carlson Bull (who were
starting up a new animation studio). When
the lm won the Mobifest award, part of the
Grand Prize was a mobile distribution agree-
ment, whose details are still being nailed
down at press time. By day, Ogdens a lead
artist at Firaxis Games. By night, he writes,
draws and animates in the comfort of his
home. Im mainly a one-man band. I cre-
ated it, wrote it, designed and built all the
geometry and textured everything and di-
rected it, he says. He even did the Foley
work. Steve Karp and Waymon Harrold
helped out with the animation and special
effects, while Herman Witkam composed
the music.
Meanwhile, there are some major con-
tent creators who are taking a lead despite
a less-than-certain future. Warner Bros. re-
cently created a six-episode series of shorts
based on the CW networks Smallville series.
And Sony Pictures Television International
has acquired Afterworld, 130 two to three-
minute original episodes for the mobile and
PC market. The series is the creation of
Emmy Award-nominated producer Stan
Rogow (Lizzie McGuire, All I Want for Christ-
mas) and writer Brent Friedman (Dark Skies,
Mortal Kombat 2). A multi-platform experi-
ence, games, maps, diaries, blogging, mes-
saging, community, personalization possi-
bilities and user participation will be part of
the shows roll-out.
Its not so much an after-the-fact acqui-
sition as a creative and business partnership
with the producers, whose backgrounds
are in traditional TV and feature lms as well
as console and online gaming and Internet
content creation, says Bill Sanders, vice
president of mobile networks programming
and digital product development at SPTI.
Dedicated web content will be housed on
Afterworld.tv, along with other material.
Meanwhile, over at Cartoon Network,
much of the cablers for-mobile activity re-
volves around repurposing existing content.
Waiting for the
Right Phone
Plan!
Animation industry insiders are wondering how
much longer they have to wait for the toon
revolution to take off on cell phones in the U.S.
by Chris Grove
We need much more reach, more frequency,
more content and more habit. For advertisers to
be interested beyond the trial learning stages,
there needs to be a large dependable audience
to make the buy worth their while.
Bill Sanders, vp of mobile networks programming and digital product
development at Sony Pictures TV Intl.
How Long, Great Pumpkin?
Europes Mobile Streams
recently signed a deal
with United Media to bring
Peanuts video content to
handheld devices.
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CNs Mobile channel features,
among other things, eight- to 11-
minute excerpt-episodes from on-
air programming and original
shorties created as rst-run content
unique to the mobile channel.
CNM has a lot in the works, but
no specics were available as of press
time. The promise of new platforms with
unique content offers an opportunity to
simultaneously reach both the kids demo-
graphics and their parents, says Cox. The
mobile environment is quite different than
TV. Parents actively seek content for their
kids to watch and subscribe to a video ser-
vice with programming for their children,
he says. Kids are also becoming incredi-
bly tech-savvy and actually in
many cases recommend a
phone, carrier or even a data
plan to their parents. So, ulti-
mately [were reaching] both.
We want the parent to be able
to nd us on their phones, and
we want their kids to enjoy the
experience and keep watching.
For its part, SPTI is also in the process of an
international roll-out of Animax Mobile, a
made-for-mobile version of the popular Ani-
max TV Networks seen on cable and satel-
lite. The service provides two hours of anime
content refreshed daily. Its comprised of
full-length episodes of four A-title Japanese
anime television series: Blood+, Last Exile, R.
O.D the TV and Gankutsuoh: The Count of
Monte Cristo. It also includes the animated
short series PiNMeN and Petey & Jaydee.
According to Sanders, the solution to the
cell phone entertainment conundrum is rel-
atively straightforward. We need more
reach, more frequency, more content and
more habit, he says. For advertisers to be
interested beyond the trial learning stages,
there needs to be a large, dependable au-
dience to make the buy worth their while.
As with our TV networks, we look at mobile
channels as a destination viewers will return
to time and again thanks to ample volume
and predictable scheduling.
All of which probably wont happen as
long as Verizon, AT&T, Sprint and others offer
download services mainly comprised of
clips from Comedy Central, ESPN and day-
old CNN headlines. Or, as in the case of Mo-
bile Streams in Europe, licensed re-purposed
cartoons. The company recently signed a
deal to distribute Peanuts video segments,
a mobile game and images to cell phone
subscribers in Germany, Switzerland and
Austria. It marks the rst time Charles M.
Schulzs beloved characters have ap-
peared in the mobile world.
None of this is going to happen the way
the big-bet placers said it would, says Rich-
ard Doherty of Envisioneering, a high-tech
consulting rm with ofces in Seaford, N.Y.
and Los Gatos, Calif. The more likely sce-
nario is that existing TV broadcasters will
soon roll out a digital service thatll let con-
sumers stream programming to ultra-light,
portable digital TVs much as passengers on
Jet Blues A319 airplanes watch satellite TV
on seat-back monitors today. Doherty esti-
mates that new, wireless, digital TVs will be
on the shelves of your neighborhood Best
Buy by the 2008 holiday season.
Local television broadcaster-delivered
mobile digital television offers a larger audi-
ence base and larger advertising revenues
than that of existing, diverse, multi-vendor
cell phone TV efforts, Doherty says. In this
scenario, cell phone companies, with their
much slower data rates and narrower
bandwidth, will offer services complemen-
tary to what the industry has dubbed Mo-
bile-Pedestrian-Handheld devices. This sce-
nario, if it plays out, may have an unintend-
ed social benet. People will no longer be
alleviating their anxiety by loudly narrating
their day into a cell phone in the airport
waiting area. Theyll be silently watching
Lost or the previous nights Jimmy Kimmel
Live! Q
Chris Grove is a Los Angeles-based journal-
ist and actor who specializes in new tech-
nologies, digital effects and animation. He
can be reached at cwjg@earthlink.net.
Steve Ogden
Cast of Characters:
(Clockwise from top
left) Warner Bros.
Smallville Legends:
The Oliver Queen
Chronicles, Animax
Mobiles Blood+
and PiNMeN, Steve
Ogdens Flakes,
Animax Mobiles
Petey and Jaydee
and Electric Farm
Entertainments
Afterworld are
some of the
recent newsworthy
animated content
for mobile
platforms.
Palm Pal: Cartoon Network New Media has
created a new mobile solution called CallToons
which binds together mobile functions such as
wallpapers, ringtones and text alerts, delivered
by CN characters such as Fosters Home for
Imaginary Friends popular Bloo.
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or a struggling visual effects house,
one good zombie pic can really bring
things back to life!
After Canadas Mr. X landed the lead vfx
work on Zack Snyders Dawn of the Dead
remake, then delivered some astounding
digital scope on time and on budget, the
lm went on to topple The Passion of the
Christ from its number one box-ofce posi-
tion and paved the way for Mr. X to be-
come the creative partner of the mid-bud-
get set.
It really gave us some street cred ... That
was the beginning of what Mr. X is today,
working on usually genre lms in the $20-$45
million range that need to look like much
bigger movies but can only spend 10-15
percent on fx, says founder and co-owner
Dennis Berardi, who admits the edgling
company struggled for three years, the
darkness before the Dawn. All the work we
did previously, except for Wrong Turn, no
one really cared. But Dawn became the
model [for our future work], where we tried
to be as upstream as possible with the pro-
duction designers and writers proposing
strong visual approaches and even advis-
ing on story points.
Not surprisingly, the remake shared many
of the same elements director Paul W.S. An-
derson was looking for when prepping the
rst sequel, Resident Evil: Apocalypse. Basi-
cally my reel was just the Dawn of the Dead
crowd shots, digital makeup work, eye re-
placements, gore enhancement, environ-
ment work, CG helicopters, much of which
Paul wanted to do in Res-
ident Evil: Apocalypse,
Berardi recalls. We did
250 of the sequels 400
shots, which was our ca-
pacity at the time. So
that relationship started
there.
Anderson wrote the
script for the latest installment, Resident Evil:
Extinction, but turned directing chores over
to Russell Mulcahy. The story again pits the
luscious Alice (Milla Jovovich) against the
evil Umbrella Corporation, now hidden deep
beneath an abandoned desert weather
station, where evil Dr. Isaacs endlessly gener-
ates Alice clones in the hope of creating an
anti-heroine to destroy the real one. Ander-
son helmed post-production to insure that
the lm ultimately said what he intended;
the 290 planned visual effects shots nearly
doubled to 512. Most involved zombie
hordes, killer crows and Alice clones.
The Alice doppelgangers are grown in
giant sphere-shaped tanks, teardrops of
water in which each clone is suspended.
The challenge was creating the right sur-
face dynamics and tensile properties. To do
so, Berardis crew studied water droplets,
lmed at 1,000 fps using Photosonics cam-
eras, then replicated the results digitally,
comping real Milla clones in the foreground
and all-CG versions further back. As each
clone is born, Isaacs puts them through
Alice in Zombie Land
How the crack team at Mr. X delivered digital zombies,
killer crows and Milla Jovovich clones for Resident Evil:
Extinction. by Ron Magid
Dennis Berardi
continued on page 50
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their paces and when they fail, throws them
into this pit, Berardi reveals. Theres one
big shot where we did a motion-control
pullback from the pit to show all the dead
clones with various fatal injuriesarms, legs
or heads sliced off.
So does that mean that many of the
victims are Alice? No wonder the Undead
have descended in droves. We literally
had an army of Undeadin our widest shot
we had 20,000 fully digital characters, Be-
rardi reveals. We had 80-100 extras on-set
on any given day, so we photo-surveyed
their wardrobe to create a texture library,
then modeled about 50 different Undead
variations, which gave us thousands of
combinations once we randomized sizes
and textures. 10 animators created an ani-
mation library of loop-able cycles, then we
ran the Massive logic engine to get the ac-
tion we needed. We did 30 shots that
showed the progression of the Undead
crowd, all rendered through RenderMan. By
the end, we had huge processing issues.
The solution: render the biggest shots in
tiles. Some shots needed over 200 tiles just
to be able to render them, plus each tile
had ve different layersambient passes,
highlight passes, shadow passesover 400
to 500 frames, Berardi adds. These shots
became real processing problems.
So how did Mr. X render shots with 20,000
CG zombies without buying the render
farm? Thank god [Pixars] RenderMan is
renting licenses now, Berardi says. We
had 250 CPUs rendering these shots be-
tween our render farm and our worksta-
tions. We rented 50-60 extra RenderMan li-
censes to get all that capacity.
In another eye-popping set piece, Alice
and her friends are attacked by grotesque
zombie crows that have been feeding on
infected esh and are looking for fresh
meat. The 100-shot sequence is Mr. Xs take
on Alfred Hitchcocks The Birds. The crows
are our showpiece in this lm, Berardi says.
Paul wanted them to look more threaten-
ing than the average bird, so we gave our
digital models Undead eyes and more an-
gular brows, resulting in extreme looking
skulls. All of the shots of the crowsexcept
for a couple closeups of a real bird on a
buswere digital. For the live bird, we
tracked the angular brow on as a digital
prosthetic, and replaced its eyes with Un-
dead eyes.
The widest shot featured a staggering
12,000 crows. We had 15 different crow
models: They varied in size, anatomy, feath-
er texture and coloration, Berardi says. The
crows closest to camera had feathers, the
crows further away had high-res textures,
and we tried to use these whenever possi-
ble. Wed been through an experience on
Skinwalkers involving a CG hawk with 3,000
feathers that was almost not renderable. For
the most part, we got away with the tex-
tured crowstheir oily, velvety specularity
and blackness really helped us. After shoot-
ing tons of reference footage to see how
they ew, took off, landed and attacked,
we worked closely with Paul dening hero
paths for our master crows. We wrote a tool
for RenderMan, which attached hundreds,
sometimes thousands, of crows to this mas-
ter path, then randomized them.
So whats next for Berardi and Mr. X?
Think a remake of Death Race 2000, up-
dated to Death Race! Its Gladiator with
carsBig action, he notes with satisfac-
tion. We cant wait. Q
Ron Magid is a Los Angeles-based jour-
nalist who specializes in visual effects and
cult cinema.
Sony Screen Gems releases Resi-
dent Evil: Extinction in theaters na-
tionwide on September 21.
We literally had an army of Undeadin our widest shot we
had 20,000 fully digital characters.We had 80-100 extras on-set
on any given day, so we photo-surveyed their wardrobe to
create a texture library, then modeled about 50 different Un-
dead variations, which gave us thousands of combinations
once we randomized sizes and textures.
Dennis Berardi, Mr. Xs founder and co-owner
Resident Evil
continued from page 48
Birds of a Feather:
Mr. X paid homage
to Alfred Hitchcocks
classic, The Birds,
with a 100-shot
sequence featuring
over 12,000 crows.
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T
he best commercials often capture
our attention by putting people
into impossible situations. For ex-
ample, Zack Snyder of 300 fame recent-
ly directed a Miller Lite spot in which
thousands of people slammed together
into the shape of a giant strut through a
live-action town. On the other hand, the
cartoon people in Lux soaps Neon
Girl shine because they behave as if
theyre in a real world, albeit one thats
entirely CG.
In the Miller Lite spot, we rst sense the
giants huge legs walking past a laun-
dromats windows. The camera moves
behind the giant from street level and
we can see its made of thousands
of people squirming, ailing, hold-
ing on and falling off. As the giant
sashays along, it sucks a man from
a beach chair into the crowd.
When the giant crowd reaches a
bar, a deep voice says Beer, and
its arm reaches into the building.
But, one person doesnt stick with
the crowd. He says, Miller Lite,
and the giant collapses into indi-
vidual people.
To create a giant from 1,200 peo-
ple, Method Studios used a combi-
nation of Maya, Massive and Air
software. We had used Massive
before, says CG technical supervi-
sor Gil Baron, but only to ll streets
and stadiums with crowds. We had
never done anything on this scale.
Working from a previsualization by
Halon of a giant walking down the
street, Method Studios arranged for two
motion-capture sessions at the House of
Moves; one for the giant, another for
characters that would compose the
monster. By applying motion data for
the giant to a Maya model, the crew
quickly fed animation into the previz to
time the crowd shots and angles. We
had 10 weeks to nish this crazy thing,
says Baron.
Lead 3D visual effects artist James Le-
Bloch then ran a cloth simulation in
Maya on the giant to add a rippling mo-
tion. We wanted to have a little play in
the surface so we could feel the dynam-
ics, says Baron. Then the tricks were in
guring out how to put people onto the
giant and, once there, to move them
with Massives dynamics.
To place the people, the crew scat-
tered points onto two layers of the gi-
ants geometry, 600 points representing
600 people on each layer. We basically
used the giant as a unique position tar-
get, says Baron, and wrote out the
data as APF motion data so Massive
could read it. Software developer Hai
Nguyen developed the bridging soft-
ware that exported the locators and
vectors from Maya into Massive.
So that they could apply the motion
data efciently to a variety of charac-
ters and to speed rendering, the team
created thousands of people from mod-
ules that all used the same topology.
Once in Massive, the characters be-
haved according to rules planted in their
brains by Phil Hartman, using captured
motion cycles and dynamics to wriggle.
The motion-capture cycle might tell
a character to squirm, lean forward and
look left, says Baron. So, thats what
the character had a tendency to want
to do. But, Massive might tell him he
cant lean forward because someone is
in front. So, the character keeps trying
to lean forward and if the person in front
moves out of the way, he does.
Massives dynamics, which caused
characters on the tips of the giants fast
moving ngers to move differently from
those on the lumbering legs, added re-
alistic details. The faster the motion, the
more the characters use dynamics,
says Baron. The less they move, the
more they blend back into motion cap-
ture. The Massive brains controlled the
blends.
Once the crew had run the Massive
simulations, they brought the two layers
of cooked simulations back into Maya,
laid A over B and rendered them in
one pass via MayaMan to the RIB-com-
pliant renderer Air, which produced the
correct shadows. Compositors then
added animated characters and live-
action elements in close-ups.
People dont get into CG to do
things theyve done before, says Baron.
If you dont ip yourself out doing this
stuff, youre not happy.
Cause & Ef f ects
The Outer Limits
Two new CG-animated ads put humans in impossible
and visually arrestingsituations.
by Barbara Robertson
Method used a combination of Maya,
Massive and Air software to create
the CG effects for Zack Synders
inventive Miller Lite spot.
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53
Neon Girl
All the action in the
sparkling spot crafted at
Framestore CFC for Luxs
Shine soap takes place
on a giant billboard. The
60-second commercial
created by agency Santo
for the Argentinean mar-
ket opens with a waitress
traced in neon on the left
edge of a billboard. Neon
tubes outline her legs and
arms in red, her dress is
blue and her hair is yel-
low.
The sign has three posi-
tions for her forearm;
when the neon turns on in
one position after the oth-
er, she appears to wave.
But, when the bulb in her elbow blows
out, she turns and walks home, one
arm lit and the other dark. As she trav-
els, the animation ows across the sign,
the neon lights turning on for each pose
and then off as she steps in a puddle,
loses the lights on one leg, and trips. At
home, she washes the bad day away
with Lux soap and regains her glow.
She steps out into the world again and
nds happiness in the form of a neon
cowboy. In the last scene, she and her
cowboy kick up their heels at the top of
the billboard, and the camera pulls
back to reveal the entire sign.
Framestore CFC created the anima-
tion using a combination of hand-
drawn sketches, Toon Boom, Houdini
and RenderMan software. Senior ani-
mator Dale Newton drew the sketches,
which the crew converted into vector
graphics in Toon Boom. But although
the animation happens on a single
plane, each tube is 3D.
We wanted it to feel as realistic as
we could, says senior technical direc-
tor Diarmid Harrison-Murray. The 2D
animation Dale rendered out of Toon
Boom was very cartoony and nice, but
by rendering it in 3D we could get light
bouncing off the wood behind. To ac-
complish that, Harrison-Murray moved
the vector graphics into Houdini.
There, he laid all the 2D animation
frames one on top of another: The bill-
board needed to include all the poses
even though sometimes the curves
would be dark. It was like registering
one bit of animation on top of anoth-
er, he says. If a curve was already
there, I didnt bother adding another
on top.
Next, Harrison-Murray converted the
animation curves into neon tubes by
extruding cylinders and adding sockets
at either end. We also set up Houdini
to put little clips along the curves de-
pending on the
length, he says.
Then I reapplied the
animation to tell
which tubes to turn
on. The curves spec-
ied the colors.
To help add real-
ism, Harrison-Murrays
team programmed
Houdini to have the
light travel down the
tube and sometimes
icker. Each tube
behaves differently.
Neon is a gas, says
Harrison-Murray. It
doesnt turn on
equally at either end.
It took time to set this
up, but once it was
working it was fairly automatic.
To add the strobing Tungsten lights,
the team attached spheres to points
on the neon tubes. We copied a bit of
geometry to the surface, Harrison-Mur-
ray says. Then, by animating color up
and down the curve [tube] with the
spheres, we could get fairground ef-
fects when we turned the lights on and
off in sequence.
Rendering could have been a prob-
lem because all the 3D objects are
lights. But, rather than have RenderMan
look up shaders to calculate an indirect
glow, the renderer looked at the sur-
face color attached to the geometry.
That was key, Harrison-Murray says.
We animated effects using surface
color. The animation is captured on the
surface of the object. So, if the glow
had happened in the shader, we
wouldnt have picked up the anima-
tion.
Procedural effects such as these
helped drive the decision to use Houdi-
ni and made the complex action fea-
sible. The spot was hand crafted at
rst, and then a big complicated auto-
matic machine procedurally animated
it at the other end, says Harrison-Mur-
ray. It was a really unusual job. Q
Barbara Robertson is an award-winning
journalist who specializes in CG anima-
tion and visual effects. If you have new
story ideas for her, you can email her at
edit@animationmagazine.net.
We had used Massive software before, but only to ll streets
and stadiums with crowds. We had never done anything on
this scale.
Gil Baron, Method Studios CG technical supervisor, on the shops new Miller Lite ad
Londons
Framestore CFC
animated effects
used RenderMan
for a technically
challenging
spot featuring
animated Neon
characters for the
Lux Shine soap
line.
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54
I
m not sure why so many suc-
cessful electronic music gurus
turn out to be nerdy white men
with names like Norman, Ed, Andy,
Tom or Richard Melville Hall (a.k.a.
Moby) or why the majority of them
seem to be from Manchester or
Leeds in the north of England. May-
be mixing block rockin beats keeps
your mind off the lousy weather and
bad Tandoori. At any rate, hiding
behind the anonymity of assumed
identities, they have collectively managed over
the past few years to mix/write some of the best
dance tracks around (Rockafella Skank, Star
Guitar, Bodyrock, etc.) And because none of
them are exactly Bono on stage, creative music
videos supporting the albums are a necessity.
Case in point: the newly minted video for the
Chemical Brothers catchy and hook-lled track
The Salmon Dance. Featuring vocals by ex-
Pharcyde rapper Fatlip, the new single is from
the Brothers latest album, We Are The Night. Di-
rected by the Brit-based directing team of Dom
and Nic (Dominic Hawley and Nick Goffey) and
produced at Framestore CFC, most of the video
takes place in a sh tank. Hitting just the right
note is crucial with a project like [this], says
Dom. Fortunately, we knew we could rely on
the guys at Framestore. Their 3D work is awlessly
realistic and always perfectly integrated into
our live-action material. [The work] never draws
attention to itself as an effect, but convinces
the eye and sells the shot every time.
Ben Cronin, a veteran of many Dom & Nic
projects, was the visual effects supervisor and
lead Inferno artist for the project. After some
initial discussions, Florent de La Taille, one of our
animators, came up with some preliminary sh
sketches, says Cronin. The previsualization
gave us a chance to block out some of the big
chorus sequences, though not as many as wed
hoped, time being against us. After 14 days of
shooting live-action plates and rigging, the spots
3D team was able to complete work in Maya on
some 320 hand-animated sh in just over six
weeks. One thing that really helped along the
way was a brilliant dynamic script developed by
[junior technical director] Henry van der Beek,
says lighting TD Simon French. Van der Beek ani-
mated the ns and other features of the sh. It
was a massive time-saver in the animation and
brought an extra level of realism to the renders.
As with all high-tech projects, its often low-tech
Day For Night-type realities that bog a produc-
tion down. In this case, two days of shooting
were lost to cloudy water in the sh tank and a
malfunctioning periscope camera.
Olive Oyl and Pink Panther Revisited
Theres enough pressure in the commercial
business as it is what with insecure clients, ad
agency producers who really want to direct
and directors who want to direct movies. Add to
that equation recreating a classic cartoon char-
acter (and having to answer to the rights hold-
ers) and youve got yourself in a pretty tight
spot. That doesnt seem to faze the principals of
Glendale, Calif.-based Renegade Animation. A
few years ago they did work on spots featuring
Bugs Bunny, now its with Olive Oyl. In this case,
Olive stars as a nervous cook searching in
vain for a way to spice up her Prego to-
mato sauce.
Renegade went to great lengths to en-
sure that their iteration of Olive conformed
to the original cartoon series both in the
way she looks and behaves (Renegades
model was the version of Olive featured in
Max Fleischer cartoons.) Our animators
are cartoon fanatics and treat iconic char-
acters with reverential care, says Darrell
Van Citters, who directed the animation
for the spot. They also do a lot of research to be
sure they get the nuances right. Compositing
the character into the live-action kitchen set
proved a challenge due to the contrast be-
tween the bright colors of the environment and
Olives darker-toned wardrobe. Renegade
solved the problem by blending animated light-
ing with the lighting from the live-action scene.
In New York City, meanwhile, animation
house FlickerLab is using another animation
icon, the Pink Panther, in a series of ads for the
Virginia Lottery. The most recent high-denition
30-second spot, Camouage, will begin
screening on TV August 13, and in theaters
throughout Virginia August 6. The classic Pink
Panther cartoons are still some of the best ani-
mated shorts on television, says FlickerLab
founder/creative director Harold Moss. Were
thrilled to nd that everyone at the agency was
as intent as we were on capturing the style and
sense of humor from the original.
The FlickerLab team used Adobe After Ef-
fects, Photoshop Illustrator and Flash to animate
the spots and Apple Final Cut Pro to edit and
mix. The famous Henry Mancini track under-
scores the spots and was licensed from MGM.
Incidentally, a new Pink Panther movie is sched-
uled for Feb. 13, 2009, with Steve Martin reprising
his role and joining forces with John Cleese,
Andy Garcia, Alfred Molina and Aishwarya Rai,
(a.k.a. Queen of Bollywood). Were sure the ani-
mated icon will also put in an appearance in
the sequel. Q
If you have any tips about new vfx and anima-
tion spots, you can email Chris at cwjg@earth-
link.net.
by Christopher Grove
D i g i t a l M a g i c
Framestore Puts Chemicals in Fish Tank
Framestore animated
the new Chemical
Brothers video.
FlickerLab used
Pink Panther in
new Virginia
Lottery spots.
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Eyeons Rotation and
Vision
I
ve been a Digital Fusion user for the
past decade and have seen the
evolution of the software to its current
form. (The Toronto-based company
unveiled the Fusion 5.2 at the recent
SIGGRAPH confab in San Diego
which boasts plug-in capabilities that
support the native Fusion API, the After
Effects API and the OFX API.) Now
Eyeon has two new products based
on the same mold as Fusionthey
are roto and paint-specic Rotation
and motion-graphics-related Vision.
Whereas Fusion encompasses com-
positing as a whole with all the bells
and whistles, Rotation and Vision fo-
cus on specic tasks.
Rotation is like the workhorse sibling
of Fusion. It does all the mundane tasks
that Fusion is capable of, but at a frac-
tion of the cost. Take a full luxury car
like a Bentley or Aston Martin: Its pow-
erful and has all of the amenities; thats
what Fusion would be. But you dont
want your eet of pizza delivery guys
driving $200,000 cars. So, you buy a
bunch of 1984 VW Rabbits, throw in the
Fusion engine, and leave out the stuff
you dont need. Itll get you where you
want to go and it will get you there
fast. Plus, you can buy a lot of them for
the price of the Aston Martin. Rotation
is the VW Rabbit. Although, it looks ex-
actly like the Aston Martin!
Rotation is designed to focus on ro-
toscoping, pulling matters, and paint
worklike wire removals, dust busting
and embedding your signature hidden
in the visual effects shot. The rotoscop-
ing features utilize both Bezier and
BSplines. They have controls for the fall-
off of the edge of the mattes in order
to control how soft or hard the edge
may be. This is extremely benecial for
objects whose edge may change in
quality over the same object. Motion
blur on the edges can also be man-
aged with shutter angle and weighting
to match the motion blur of the roto-
scoped item.
The keying tools are the ones found
in Fusion for channel, chroma, blue/
green screens, and difference. And, all
the controls are there from Rotations
big brother. Erosion, Dilation, Contrac-
tion mattes, spill suppression algorithms
and channel Boolean fuctions for com-
bining mattestheyre all there!
The paint tools are just as robust, with
tablet pressure sensitive vector-based
strokes that have un-
limited undos and the
standard functions of
cloning, smearing and
copy/paste. Every-
thing is animatable
and strokes can be at-
tached to trackers for
automation.
Most important, ev-
erything that is done
in rotation is portable
to Fusion so that the compositors can
nesse the elements into place. Rota-
tion supports all resolutions and color
depths, so there is nothing lost in the
translation.
Now, if Rotation is Fusions younger
brother, Vision is the little sister. Shes
not as big or strong and may not be
able to handle the image resolutions
that the older siblings can, but shes re-
ally creative. And she doesnt play the
same games that Fusion and Rotation
do. She is used to design on-air graph-
ics packages and motion design work
for broadcast.
Vision is node-based, so the family
resemblance is immediately recogniz-
able. Fusion users will feel at home.
Most of the tools from Fusion are avail-
able, like roto and
paint, keying, image
warping, and even
an integrated particle
system. However, Vi-
sion shines most in its
title design tools and
automation so that
you dont have to
recreate frequently
used designs. For in-
stance, in sporting
events for the score,
or player stats, the data that changes
can be easily fed into the design
stream, and then spit out using the sup-
port for multiple broadcast or HD I/O
cards like AJA, Blackmagic, Bluesh, or
Matrox.
All in all, Rotation and Vision are nice
little packages which deliver a lot of
punch. Their integration into Fusion al-
lows for all of their work to be done in
the less expensive packages and then
shufed over to the big brother for n-
ishing. This gives design and vfx houses
the ability to provide many more li-
censes to artists. So, it would be wise to
invest in the software that does the job
for less money, and hire more artists.
Everyone wins.
Website : www.eyeonline.com
Eyeon Rotation: $695
Eyeon Vision: $1,495 Q
Todd Sheridan Perry is a vfx director
and supervisor and co-owner of Ven-
ice, Calif.-based Max Ink Caf and
Max Ink Productions.
by Todd Sheridan Perry
Te c h Re v i e ws
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L
ondon is home to several successful
digital visual effects studiosDouble
Negative, Framestore and Cinesite
among them. So its surprising to learn that
the London Film Academys new digital vfx
curriculum represents something rare. To
my knowledge, there is only one other
course in the U.K. that covers the art of vi-
sual effects, says Alan Marques, the pro-
grams main instructor. Marques, whose vfx
supervisor credits include GoldenEye and
Lost in Space, observes, It is more common
in the U.K. for colleges and universities to fo-
cus on 3D computer graphics and digital
post-production rather than the art of visual
effects as a general subject. American col-
leges tend to have a much wider-ranging
coverage of the visual effects arts.
The London Film Academys intensive,
12-week dvfx program was designed by
Marques and course leader Dave Barnard
to be taught in seven modules: Previsualiza-
tion, High Dynamic Range Imaging (HDRI),
Match Moving & Set Extensions, Motion
Capture & Motion Synthesis, Digital Environ-
ments, VFX Cinematography and Compos-
iting. Alongside the classes conducted at
the school, there are specialized workshops
held at pro houses Artem Digital, Motion-
FX and Darkside Animation. Barnard be-
lieves, Students may gain some useful in-
sights through the industry companies
in London who are contributing to the
course.
One example of the programs profes-
sionally based sessions is a full motion-cap-
ture shoot that the students will conduct at
Artem Digital, and Marques explains,
Theyll use Vicon optical technology as
well as real-time facial animation capture.
This material will be usedalong with Natu-
ralMotions Endorphin and 3ds Maxfor
digital crowds and stunt work.
Learning how to create virtual environ-
ments using e-ons Vue 6 Innite software
will be another focus of the dvfx curriculum.
Not everyone can actually paint photo-
realistically, says Marques, who notes that
Vue software has been employed in high-
end vfx-driven lms like the Pirates of the
Caribbean trilogy. Teaching students how
to use a sophisticated 3D environment-
generating tool, he thinks, Allows the aver-
age artist to produce matte painting shots
without the need to paint artistically.
Barnard and Marques have selected a
diverse range of well-known 3D tools for
these courses, including animation pack-
ages like NewTeks Lightwave and Au-
todesks 3ds Max. But theyve also chosen
to teach students how to use the 3D mod-
eling app SketchUp from Google. Their
thinking is that edgling (and budget-con-
scious) lmmakers should be able to previ-
sualize their set construction ideas before
actually building anythingespecially
bluescreen or greenscreen sets.
Cost-effectiveness is a theme that runs
through the dvfx curriculum in several re-
spects. Marques is teaching match moving
London Calling
Digital Disciples
The London Film Academy launches a state-of-the-art
digital vfx program. by Ellen Wolff
Futurescape: This striking
CG-rendered image was
created by instructor
Alan Marques for his
Digital Environment
module course at the
London Film Academy.
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using Andersson Technologies SynthEyes
software, which he calls a replacement
for expensive motion-control shoots. Dur-
ing this course module, students track the
camerawork in various live-action plates,
learning three main methods: manual
tracking, semi-automatic and fully auto-
matic tracking.
In addition to working with existing plate
photography, students generate their own
effects shots using HDRI techniques. They
are taught to process their images using
Adobe Photoshop and HDRSofts Photo-
matix and produce HDRI maps to light a
CG element. They then composite that CG
element into location photography using
Adobe After Effects.
At the end of the 12 weeks, says Barnard,
Students will have effects shots to use on
their show reels, and will have their work as-
sessed by Alan and myself with a view to-
wards their future careers. Should students
have a moment to spare during such an
intensive program, Barnard adds, They will
also be able to get assistance with personal
projects that they work on outside the
course hours.
The London Film Academys dvfx classes
also can be taken as individual modules,
notes Barnard. We have had quite a lot of
interest from students in other LFA courses,
particularly for Previsualization, HDRI Light-
ing and VFX Cinematography. But not all
students can meet the pre-requisite of be-
ing a European Union citizen, which Bar-
nard explains is required because the EU
subsidizes the program. London and the
LFA are very international, he says.
A sneak preview of the dvfx program
was recently in day-long, condensed mas-
ter class sessions that Barnard and Marques
conducted at Londons Rushes Soho Shorts
Festival and the Edinburgh Film Festival.
These sessions attracted a range of inter-
ested parties, observes Marques. A num-
ber of people were there
purely to get an insight into
how to implement low-cost
technologies into their own
productions. But some stu-
dents who had already
signed up for the course
turned up to see just who
would be teaching them
and how good we were!
What they also saw was
that the people running the
London Film Academys digital vfx program
bring a sense of humor to the subject. The
nal slide shown by Marques in the master
class program was a shot of an actor wear-
ing a spacesuit. He was holding a cup for
donations, and carried a sign that read:
Replaced by CGI. Please Help! Q
For more info, visit www.londonlmacade-
my.com.
Ellen Wolff is a Los Angeles-based journalist who
specializes in vfx and higher learning. She can
be reached at edit@animationmagazine.net.
Wonder Globe: Light probe image created by Alan
Marques for the HDRI Imaging course.
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Event Date Place Website
Brand Licensing Show Oct. 2-3 London, U.K. www.brandlicensingexpo.com
Romics Intl Comics and Cartoon Festival Oct. 4-7 Rome, Italy www.romics.it
123rd AES Convention (New York) Oct. 5-8 New York, NY www.aes.org
Shocker Fest Oct. 6-7 Modesto, CA www.shockerfest.com
MIPCOM Jr. Oct. 6-7 Cannes, France www.mipcomjunior.com
MIPCOM Oct. 8-12 Cannes, France www.mipcom.com
Flanders Film Festival Oct. 9-20 Ghent, Belgium www.lmfestival.be
Rocky Mountain VidExpo Oct. 10-11 Denver, CO www.vidxpo.com
Woodstock Film Festival Oct. 10-14 Woodstock, NY http://woodstocklmfestival.com
Annual Austin Film Festival Oct. 11-18 Austin, TX www.austinlmfestival.com
Heartland Film Festival Oct. 18-26 Indianapolis, IN www.heartlandlmfest.org
Chicago Intl Childrens Film Festival Oct. 18-28 Chicago, IL www.cicff.org
CTIA Wireless I.T. & Entertainment Oct. 23-25 San Francisco, CA www.wirelessit.com
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Advertisers in Alphabetical Order
American Film Market 2007
www.americanlmmarket.com 29
Animation Toolworks
www.animationtoolworks.com 61
Asia Television Forum
www.asiatvforum.com 35
BRB
www.brb.es Inside Front Cover
California Institute of the Arts
admiss@calarts.edu 57
Cartoon Colour
www.cartooncolour.com 62
CartoonSupplies.com
www.cartoonsupplies.com 62
Center for Digital Imaging Arts at Boston
University
www.digitalimagingarts.com 55
Full Sail
www.fullsail.com 57
Iconix Entertainment Co., Ltd
wjkim@iconix.co.kr 13, 15
JourneyEd.com
www.journeyed.com 61
Lightfoot
www.lightfootltd.com 62
Media Development Authority
42, 23
MPSC
www.animationguild.com
Inside Back Cover
Mytoons
www.mytoons.com Back Cover
Nickelodeon
3
Ottawa International Animation Festival
www.animationfestival.ca 51
Savannah College of Art and Design
www.scad.edu 61
Sony Pictures
www.SonyPictures.com/tekkon 9
University of the Arts
www.uarts.edu 59
TeamTo
www.TeamTo.com 5
ToonBoom
www.toonboom.com 19
USC
http://anim.usc.edu 61
Van Arts
www.vanarts.com 55
Virtuality Conference 8
www.virtualityconference.it 49
Walt Disney Feature Animation
www.disneyanimation.com 11
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ur journeys take us to Nelvanas Toronto-based quarters this month where the
team behind the YTV animated series Ruby Gloom are polishing up the second
season of the hit toon about the happiest girl in the world.
Director Robin Budd channels Lord Voldemort every day at
9 a.m.
From left: Amy, Brad and Leanna agree that designing a
pretty show isnt always very pretty.
Life imitates art: Coordinator
Meaghans boyfriend loves it when
she dresses up like Ruby. Sleep-deprived animators Kelly, Campbell, Jean-
Sebastian and Shawn begin to lose track of
Rubys adventures in the land of the undead.
Ill cut whoever dares to defy my scientic
principles, says editor Annellie.
Animators Tom, John and Aiden
mourn the recent passing of TV
impresario Merv Grifn.
After taking their daily dosage of Prozac soda, the crew likes to
refer to themselves as The Happiest Crew in the World!
Brad brings his
unique vision to the
show.
Robin tries to share the bright side of the dark
side with YTV exec Bonita Siegel and creative
producer Merle-Anne Ridley.
Kevin tries to convince Adrian and Nick that a new
character called Little Rob Zombie would be the
perfect romantic foil for Ruby.
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