Animation Magazine June/July Issue #311

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DreamWorks’ Spirit Untamed Plus We the People, The Bad Bunch, Flee, Rugrats, HouseBroken, Best of Annecy, & Nelvana’s 50th Anniversary

Beautiful Monsters:

Pixar’s Luca Takes a Creative Leap

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The Beautiful Monsters of Pixar’s Luca Plus We the People, The Bad Bunch, Flee, Rugrats, HouseBroken, Best of Annecy, & Nelvana’s 50th Anniversary

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Hot to Trot: DreamWorks Unleashes Spirit Untamed

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FINALLY, an In-Person Animation Event!

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June | July 2021

Volume 35, Issue 6, Number 311 Frame-By-Frame 4

Stuff We Love

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June/July Animation Planner

Features 8 In Praise of Mediterranean Sea Serpents Enrico Casarosa recalls the magic of childhood and his Italian hometown in Pixar’s lovely summer movie Luca.

By Ramin Zahed

38 The New Rugrats Are Here!

The series’ showrunners tell us about the joys and trials of revisiting Chuckie, Tommy, Susie, Angelica and the rest of the gang in CG. 40 Pets With Issues Show-runners/co-creators Gabrielle Allan and Jennifer Crittenden take us behind the scenes of Fox’s hot new show HouseBroken.

42 A Dynamic Force for Positive Change Award-winning creator Chris Nee talks about Ridley Jones, We the People and Aida Twist, Scientist, three of her amazing shows for Netflix.

12 Equine Majesty Director Elaine Bogan and her team bring a lot of glorious visuals and artistic horsepower to the new DreamWorks feature Spirit Untamed.

By Karen Idelson

44 Desirable Mutations How the creators of Star Wars: The Bad Batch expanded the ever-popular franchise in a fascinating new direction.

By Tom McLean

16 George & Abe’s Excellent Adventure Matt Thomson and Dave Callaham tell us everything we need to know about their Founding Fathers movie, America: The Motion Picture.

By Michael Mallory

46 Sophisticated Snapshots The second season of Netflix’s adult animation anthology Love Death + Robots delivers eight futuristic, animated gems.

By Trevor Hogg

18 Unchained Memories Danish director Jonas Poher Rasmussen brings the turbulent life of an Afghan friend to animated life in the prize-winning feature, Flee.

By Ramin Zahed

Spotlight

50 Ready for the Spotlight U.K.-based GFM Animation prepares Blazing Samurai for global audiences

24 Return to the Mirrorlands The creative leaders at Wizart Animation share a few secrets about their eagerly anticipated fifth Snow Queen movie.

52 A Good Year to Watch Toons Just in time for the 2021 Emmy season, we chat with acclaimed TV critic Robert Lloyd about the current state of TV animation and other toonrelated topics.

26 Wonder Woman We chat with acclaimed animation auteur Joanna Quinn about her brilliant new short Affairs of the Art, as well as life and animation career.

28 Short-Form Magic This year’s edition of the Annecy Festival offers a rich collection of highly original and inspiring shorts from around the world. Here is a sampler: 34 Films in the Spotlight at Annecy A quick rundown of hot new titles debuting at the annual toonfest, returning in full (hybrid) swing this month.

Television/Streaming 36 Exploring New Horizons Venturing into new territories, Cyber Group Studios introduces a slate of hot new shows to the market.

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48 Northern Star Nelvana celebrates 50 years of producing memorable animation content

22 A Froggy Trip Cottonwood producers David Michel and Zoé Carrera talk about their fun new movie, Around the World in 80 Days.

Event Spotlight

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VFX 63 Tech Reviews Foundry’s Nuke 13 and HP’s ZBook Fury 15 G7 workstation.

By Todd Sheridan Perry

Opportunities 64 Autonomous Animator Your handy work-from-home survival guide.

By Martin Grebing

Cover A: Disney-Pixar’s Luca arrives on Disney+ on June 18

Cover B: DreamWorks Animation’s Spirit

Untamed opens in select theaters on June 4.

Day in the Life

Annecy Cover: Cyber Group Studios brings

65 This month, we visit Lisa Hanawalt’s nest as a new season of Tuca & Bertie flutters to Adult Swim.

Cannes Cover: Wizart introduces The Snow

its series Droners to the Annecy market.

Queen 5 to the globlal market.

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hen you’ve been covering the animation business for a while, certain times of the year immediately remind you of specific events: Before the pandemic, we always connected March to Cartoon Movie, April to MIPTV, May to the Cannes market, July to Comic-Con, August to SIGGRAPH, September to the Ottawa festival and Cartoon Forum, etc. But June always belonged to Annecy, and we’re glad the festival is back in a hybrid version (in person and online) with a rich selection of panels, shorts, features and works in progress presentations.

Make sure you read about many of the highlights of the beloved French event in this issue.

It wouldn’t be summer without the anticipated arrival of the big studio animated features and VFX-driven titles. This month, we have fun behind-the-scenes pieces about some of the season’s hottest movies, including Disney-Pixar’s Luca, DreamWorks’ Spirit Untamed, the Euro Sundance prize-winner Flee, as well as in-depth looks at new shows such as The Bad Batch (Disney+), Rugrats (Nickelodeon/Paramount+), We the People (Netflix), HouseBroken (Fox) and Love Death + Robots (Netflix). We also spotlight Canadian animation powerhouse Nelvana’s 50th anniversary and take a look at the latest offerings from French houses Cyber Group Studios and Cottonwood Media.

It’s a jam-packed issue, and we are so happy to be able to cover so many different projects and creative newsmakers. Just as we were closing this edition of the magazine, we learned that there are at least 10 new animated shows and movies premiering in the next couple of months. That means our industry is healthier than ever after a period marked by numerous challenges all over the world. Here’s to even better, more productive seasons ahead for all of you animation and VFX professionals and toon aficionados.

Ramin Zahed Editor in Chief ramin@animationmagazine.net

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t is with mixed emotions that I welcome with our June/July Issue the Cinefex subscribers to our Animation Magazine family. For many years, we’ve respected how the Shay family and Jody Duncan, the magazine’s Editor-in-Chief, celebrated the work of the talented VFX artists across our industry. We admired their ability to continue to produce each lovely, perfectly bound edition of the publication four times a year for four decades. Like many of you, I have been collecting and enjoying them since the 1980s.

I am happy to be able to supply the readers of this beloved publication with our own, almost 35-year-old industry magazine, and hope that we can give you some of the information you enjoyed so much in the pages of Cinefex. Much like Cinefex, Animation Magazine is an independently owned labor of love. We have continued to stick to our original vision of bringing the world of animation and VFX to our global readers through difficult years like this past one and understand the challenges and joys of this work. I do believe that we have come to that point in time when the worlds of animation and VFX have come to be one, and this marriage is in some ways reflective of that synergy. Through our in-depth coverage of the technologists and visual effects artists in feature articles and our monthly tech reviews by Todd Sheridan Perry, you may be surprised to find much of the same information you had been reading about in Cinefex. We hope with your support we will be able to build on and increase that coverage over the coming months.

Our talented Animation Magazine team hopes that you will tell us what it was that you loved so much about Cinefex and how we can best serve your interests. We hope that you will sign up for our daily, on-line newsletter (www.animationmagazine.net), where we are able to cover so much more of what is happening in the world of VFX each and every day.

All my very best, Jean Thoren Publisher jthoren@animationmagazine.net

ANIMATION MAGAZINE June|July 2021

Vol. 35, Issue 6, No. 311 Info@animationmagazine.net

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Stuff We Love

Raya and the Last Dragon Ushering in a new era of heroic Disney Princesses, the studio’s latest original fantasy-adventure is questing to disc with a new traveling companion: Zach Parrish’s short Us Again. From directors Don Hall and Carlos López Estrada and co-directors Paul Briggs and John Ripa, the movie brings the lush Southeast Asianinspired world of Kumandra to life as we follow Raya (Kelly Marie Tran) on her mission to find the last dragon (Awkwafina) in order to restore harmony to the land and repel the monstrous Druun. The new release also boasts deleted scenes, outtakes, Easter eggs and indepth special features. (Tuk Tuk not included.) [Disney, DVD $20 | BD $25 | 4K $30]

The Art of Eric Guillon: From the Making of Despicable Me to Minions, The Secret Life of Pets, and More Get inspired by the playful, visionary designs of the French animation artist who has helped bring Illumination’s smash-hit films to life with color, character and a certain je ne sais quois. A visual feast for fans of the films as well as fellow artists and admirers of fine draughtsmanship, the 384page hardcover offers striking insights into Guillon’s process, illuminating outtakes and brainstorms on the journey to the screen. Featuring in-depth interviews with the artist as well as a foreword from Illumination founder Chris Meledandri, the book is authored by France & U.S. film journalist Ben Croll. [Insight Editions, $60]

The Prince’s Voyage When the old monkey Prince Laurent runs aground on an unknown shore, he is found and taken in by young Tom and his parents, a couple of scientists who were banished from their community because they believe in the existence of other monkey civilizations.

Thus the beautifully crafted intrigue of Jean-François Laguionie’s (The Painting) latest animated feature begins to unfold in vintage-toned 2D/3D. Co-directed by Xavier Picard (Moomins on the Riviera), the Annecy, Stuttgart and Locarnoselected film is produced by France’s Blue Spirit and Luxembourg’s Melusine, and arrives on Blu-ray in North America complemented by a bonus directors’ interview and a study of the “Ice Flow” sequence. Another enchanting European indie to add to your collection! [Shout! Factory, BD $20] The Art of The Mitchells vs. The Machines Find out how the artists at Sony Pictures Animation prepared for the robocalypse in the official behind-the-scenes book, penned by Animag’s own Ramin Zahed with a foreword by Debbie Rianda — mother of writer-director Mike Rianda and the inspiration for Linda Mitchell. Explore this very different family road trip flick through concept art, sketches and early character designs as well as exclusive commentary from Rianda, co-director/writer Jeff Rowe and producers Phil Lord and Chris Miller. From the artsy sparkle of “Katie-vision” to the many bug-eyed faces of Monchi the pug, this Art-of is a 200+ page joyride from cover to cover. [Abrams, $40]

Moomin X Melaja Lamps The perfect combination of whimsy and style, celebrating Tove Jansson’s classic characters through the vision of the legendary Finnish design company. The all-white molded plastic pieces come in three styles — Moomintroll, Snorkmaiden (pictured) and Haittifatteners — size small (30cm/12”) or medium (50cm/20”).

They do have the European plug, but isn’t brightening your home a better job for your travel adapter than gathering dust in the drawer with your passport? [shop.moomin.com, €169-299 / ~$207-366 USD]

The Dragon Prince: Battlecharged The debut board game inspired by the hit Netflix original series, developed by Brotherwise Games in partnership with show creators Aaron Ehasz and Justin Richmond’s Wonderstorm. Set in the rich, diverse fantasy world of Xadia, the strategy game features detailed miniatures of eight heroes and villains, six battle maps and illustrated attack/ability cards to super-battlecharge the play. Pre-orders open in June, so don’t miss out! [brotherwisegames.com/thedragonprince, $40] ◆

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June/July Animation Planner

JUNE

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Don’t forget to shoujo up for the double-feature global debut of Toei’s Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon Eternal: The Movie on Netflix today.

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DreamWorks Animation’s Spirit: Untamed gallops into theaters (read more in this issue)!

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The week-long Croatian animation celebration Animafest Zagreb kicks off today. This year’s Lifetime Achievement honoree is Ralph Bakshi! [animafest.hr]

Hungarian animator Marcell Jankovics’ psychedelic 1981 masterpiece Son of the White Mare gets a remastered Blu-ray release today.

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Summer means that Eastern Europe’s animation festival circuit is really heating up! This month, catch in-person and online events offering fresh perspectives: Fest Anča [Bratislava, Slovakia | July 4-7 | festanca.sk], Oscar-qualifying Animator [Poznań, Poland | 9-15 | animator-festival.com], Insomnia [Kaluga, Russia | 15-19 | insomniafest.ru], Supertoon [Šibenik, Croatia | 19-23 | supertoonfestival.com] and Anibar [Peja, Kosovo | 23-30 | anibar.org].

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Mike and Sully meet new creature coworkers in Monsters at Work, the new Pixar series on Disney+

today.

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SPA’s Wish Dragon also gets a Netflix premiere this month. The Chinese co-pro directed by Chris Applehans voice stars Jimmy Wong and John Cho.

Lisa Hanawalt’s boss birds Tuca & Bertie flies to a new nest on Adult Swim for S2 today.

After last year’s pandemic shuffle, Annecy Festival & MIFA is planning a bigger and better hybrid edition for the fest (June 14-19) and market (June 15-18), with a special focus on African animation. [annecy.org]

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Take home all the blockbuster kaiju battling action of WB’s Godzilla vs. Kong, or follow the limelight dreams of Rock Dog 2: Rock Around the Park, on disc in an array of formats today.

Anime Expo Lite brings its two-day otaku fest online.

Registration fees ($5) benefit Hate Is a Virus commUNITY Action Fund this year, with programming available on VOD through July 16. [anime-expo.org]

It’s Rick and Morty Day as Adult Swim celebrates the S5 premiere with extra out of this world content across platforms and around the world.

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Enjoy festive frights in the DC Universe’s latest animated movie from WB in Batman: The Long Halloween, Part One, out today.

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The Bitsy’s back with more schemes to take over Central Park in S2 of the Loren Bouchard, Josh Gad & Nora Smith musical series for Apple TV+.

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Cinephiles will be immersed for two weeks in the prestigious Cannes Film Festival & Market. The 74th edition will emphasize 12 commitments to creating a more environmentally friendly event. [festival-cannes.com]

Marvel’s Black Widow bites back in a same day theatrical/Disney+ debut. Starring Scarlett Johansson, the standalone pic is directed by Cate Shortland (Lore).

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Are ya ready, kids? The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge on the Run makes its physical home video debut today!

WB is hoping for a slam dunk with Space Jam: A New Legacy, bringing the Looney Tunes back to screens in theaters and no HBO Max alongside LeBron James, Cedric Joe and Don Cheadle.

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Catch a Mediterranean wave with Luca, the new Pixar original premiering on Disney+ today! (Read more in this issue.) Plus, Sony’s hare-raising hybrid sequel Peter Rabbit 2: The Runaway — starring CG critters by Animal Logic — finally hops into U.S. theaters.

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Lisbon’s MONSTRA fest celebrates its 20th edition through Aug. 1. The program includes a special focus on Belgium. [monstrafestival.com]

Comic-Con@Home returns as an online event for three geektastic days. Those missing the San Diego vibe should mark their calendars for November, when the smaller, supplemental Comic-Con Special Edition will take place. [comic-con.org] The Drac Pack is back! The fourth installment of Sony Pictures Animation’s blockmonster franchise Hotel Transylvania: Transformia gets an early theatrical release today. The pic is written by Genndy Tartakovsky and directed by Jennifer Kluska & Derek Drymon.

On streaming, ‘80s kids and fans of Castlevania studio Powerhouse can catch the first five episodes of Masters of the Universe from Kevin Smith and Mattel TV on Netflix today.

For younger viewers and slapstick fans, the Xilam-produced Chip ‘N’ Dale: Park Life series debuts on Disney+.

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One more before we go: While a final date is TBD at print time, keep an eye on Netflix for the premiere of the new DreamWorks movie Trollhunters: Rise of the Titans, which pits all the heroes from the Tales of Arcadia series against the Arcane Order in their most perilous, magical adventure yet.

To get your company’s events and products listed in this monthly calendar, please e-mail edit@animationmagazine.net. www.animationmagazine.net 6 june|july 21

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Features

Enrico Casarosa recalls the magic of childhood and his Italian hometown in Pixar’s lovely summer movie Luca.

By Ramin Zahed n the surface, Pixar’s 24th feature Luca is a charming, colorful valentine to the sun-drenched Italian summers of director Enrico Casarosa’s boyhood. However, the beautifully mounted feature, penned by Jesse Andrews (Every Day, Me and Earl and the Dying Girl) and Mike Jones (Soul) and produced by Andrea Warren (Cars 2, Lava), manages to explore universal themes such as the lasting power of true friendships and the human need for belonging.

As Casarosa, who was born and raised in Genoa and studied animation at the School of Visual Arts in New York City during his 20s, explains, “This movie is about the friendships that change us … It’s a love letter to the summers of our youth — those formative years when you’re finding yourself.”

Luca’s imaginative storyline centers on the friendship between two young boys, Luca (Jacob Tremblay) and the older Alberto (Jack Dylan Grazer) who are actually sea creatures who take on human form when they venture out of the Mediterranean. Maya Rudolph and Jim Gaffigan provide the voices of Luca’s par-

ents, and newcomer Emma Berman voices Giulia, an unusual girl the boys meet in the Italian Riviera town near their home.

The director based the look of the film’s setting on his own hometown. “I had the luck to grow up in Genoa — a port city on the Italian

Riviera,” he says. “It’s a very specific coast because it’s really steep — the mountains rise up from the ocean. I always imagined them like little monsters coming out of the water. The Cinque Terre is really close to where I grew up.

These five little towns are lovely — stuck in time, really, because they’re so small. They’ve retained that old, seasoned look — so wonder-

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Features Monsters Among Us: Enrico Casarosa’s Luca was inspired by the idyllic summers of his youth in Genoa, Italy.

Jacob Tremblay, Jack Dylan Grazer and Emma Berman provide the voices of the three main kids in the movie.

ful and picturesque. I moved to the U.S. in my 20s, and as often happens, the more you’re away from your roots, the more you value those roots.”

In addition to Italian landscapes, the overall visuals are heavily influenced by the art of Hayao Miyazaki and the films of Japan’s Studio Ghibli, which made a big impression on the director when he was growing up.

“I grew up with Miyazaki’s early TV work,” recalls Casarosa. “Once I started to study animation and Ghibli movies, I realized why some cartoons are so amazing and impactful. That is honestly one of the reasons I am in the industry. Miyazaki is such a hero of mine. I live and breathe his work. I also love the studio’s attention to detail, which was perfect to bring to our Italian world.”

The director explains that the anime look was perfect for a young protagonist who is interested in seeing the world. “His eyes are big and he’s leaving his world for the first time,” he adds. “His sensibility makes you notice nature.

When he enters the human world, it makes you notice things about the human world that we take for granted. Of course, since our movie is set in Italy, it has a very specific flavor. So we pay close attention to the simple beauty of laundry drying under the rays of the sun. The fish-out-of-water experience lends itself beautifully as you see the world through the eyes of a young kid.”

The film’s production designer Daniela Strijleva, whose Pixar credits include Toy Story 3, Monsters University and Coco, was part of a small group who traveled to Italy to research the film’s details. She says she loved joining the director’s parents for dinner. “Not only did we get to enjoy the food and study Italy, we also get to bond as a team and think about the creative process together … We visited the places Enrico went as a child. We watched him climb a 30-foot rock and dive in — realizing after the shock of it that he’d been doing it since he was a child. That extra layer of experiencing his memories and nostalgia really underscores his love of the place. And of course meeting people from the region — fish-

ermen, locals — gave us so much to work with.”

The look of the film’s appealing sea monsters was based on illustrations of the classic creatures seen in old Renaissance maps as well as scientific drawings of fish from the region and Japanese dragons and serpents. “We looked at a lot of sea maps, as well as lots of Roman mosaics and iconography like sculptures and fountains to see how sea life was represented in art,” says Strijleva, who also lived in Italy for a few years when she was a young before moving to the U.S. with her family. “We also looked at fish, but didn’t want to really be realistic, because our movie is a fantasy.”

She adds, “Enrico would draw these sinuous, simple shapes of reflections in the water that looked like traditional wood blocks. With that in mind, we were challenged with simplifying the look of a 3D film, which was super fun to do — hitting a certain level of caricature that’s true to Enrico’s style. It’s very expressive and lyrical. In fact one of the things I love about the movie is the fact that our main characters Luca and Alberto look like Enrico’s early sketches, just as he had imagined them in the beginning. I think it’s such a big success to be able to retain that hand-drawn charm in a CG-animated film.”

One of the qualities that sets the movie apart from many other animated projects is its

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Features Simple Shapes: The film’s designers and animators looked at the simple mouth shapes in both Miyazaki’s movies and Aardman’s works to liberate themselves from the brutal realism of CG animation.

beautiful evocation of a specific location at a particular time in history. The classic Italian Vespas, the way locals dunk their focaccia bread in their coffee, and the town’s posters and signs for popular Italian movies of the ‘50s reflect Casarosa’s admirable pursuit of authenticity.

“I always felt there was something very lovely about the Italian Golden Age — the ’50s and ’60s,” he says. “The cinema and the music of that time is iconic and special. We Daniela Strijleva Andrea Warren have lots of Easter eggs that fans of Italian movies will be able to spot throughout the movie. There are homages to Marcello Mastroianni, Big Deal on Madonna Street, Divorce Italian Style, Roman Holiday. We used the signs as love letters to our favorite writers and filmmakers. You can see different movie posters in the town’s little cinema in the background. The casting for the Italian version of the movie is currently underway, and I’m curious to see who we can feature in the Italian language. It would be awesome to have some of those wonderful stars.”

The filmmakers also felt the period setting was a better time to explore the division between the humans who lived on land and the sea monsters who dwelled in the sea. “You can see that things are getting worse for Luca and his family because of progress,” says the director. “There is more progress, scuba diving, and also there is more fishing in the waters, so that leads to more sightings and fear of each other.”

As Casarosa looks back at the four-year journey of bringing Luca and his world to animated life, he says he hopes the movie will remind audiences of their own childhood adventures and best friends who taught them about the world. “My hope is that you will be inspired to call your old friend and have a fun one-hour conversation,” says Casarosa. “It will only take you five minutes to be right back where you were a long time ago. If you are a kid watching the movie, then I hope you go ahead and jump off that cliff into the sea. Just make sure the water is deep! I guess just like Luca, recognize the voices inside of you that are holding you back and find those friends that help you overcome those fears!” ◆ Pixar’s Luca premieres on Disney+ at no extra charge on June 18.

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ome of my love for 2D animation is in my DNA. And the other side is that I just love sketching and travelogging. I come from drawing comics and watercolors. Another inspiration was Sargent and his watercolor. We’ve talked about woodblock prints, and beautiful Miyazaki movies, but then there’s also Sargent who would do these beautiful watercolors in Venice. We looked at a lot of those. I just think there’s something wonderful about trying to bring these two things together.

“I remember someone asking me when I pitched La Luna, it was all watercolors, and it was, ‘But you want to do it in watercolor?’ And I was like, ‘Well, I mean, you know, we’re at Pixar and I think we should use our tools, but how do we bring some warmth and imperfection...’ I think the thing I don’t always love about computers, there’s a certain sheen and a certain perfection to it. Now it’s gone past that and it’s gone toward realism. But I come from loving sketches and I’m not one to love a perfectly painted picture that is realistic.”

Enrico Casarosa

— Enrico Casarosa

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Features

Equine Majesty

Director Elaine Bogan and her team bring a lot of glorious visuals and artistic horsepower to the new DreamWorks feature Spirit Untamed.

By Karen Idelson

T

hroughout the years, noble equine companions have been a popular staple of coming of age stories in literature, films and TV shows. One of the most memorable horse heroes of the past two decades made his debut in DreamWorks Animation’s Oscar-nominated feature, Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron back in 2002. A spin-off animated series Spirit Riding Free trotted out on Netflix in 2017. This summer, Spirit returns to the big screen in a new feature that follows a young girl’s journey into adulthood.

In an important milestone for DreamWorks, Spirit Untamed has three top female creatives in key roles: Karen Foster (producer), Elaine Bogan (director) and Aury Wellington (writer). The film is co-directed by studio veteran Ennio Torresan, Jr. The storyline still includes a wild horse, but this new outing features a young girl named Lucky Prescott who finds a connection to her late mother and her Mexican heritage through horseback riding in the new sleepy town she’s forced to move to. The voice cast includes Isabela Merced as Lucky, Jake Gyllenhaal as Lucky’s father, Julianne Moore as Aunt Cora and Walton Goggins as Hendricks.

The bulk of the film’s animation was created all

over the world with individual animators located in Vancouver, Northern California and at Jellyfish Pictures in London. Approximately 50 animators worked on the project at Jellyfish, and the production also used about 70 animators worldwide.

Re-imagining a Horse’s Tale

Foster says the film’s artistic team was keen on preserving and expanding many of the most dynamic parts of the story established in the series.

“Because we were reimagining the basic story for

the big screen, we wanted to do honor to the big screen,” says Foster, who was a co-producer on How to Train Your Dragon and also produced several Kung Fu Panda shorts and Scared Shrekless. “We have changed the story somewhat. We wanted to give it a kind of a new re-imagining.”

The producer points out that a horse has always represented a certain kind of power for young girls. “It’s like the first romance,” says Foster.

“There’s a wildness to it. There’s a freedom that as young women we don’t necessarily get all the

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Features Free to Roam: A young girl meets a beautiful mustang and two new friends when she moves to the sleepy town of Miradero in DreamWorks’ Spirit Untamed, directed by Elaine Bogan and Ennio Torresan, Jr.

time. I’m not a horseback rider, but I remember as a young girl I really wanted to go horseback riding because it looked so exciting. It’s adventure and freedom and power. It’s a thrilling adventure that’s wholesome, but it’s also boundary breaking.”

Bogan, whose directing credits include DreamWorks shows such as Tales of Arcadia and Dragons: Race to the Edge, says she loved the series and the previous film and was inspired to take the premise and the characters even further.

“We really wanted to just dive in even deeper and add to what was already a really great character and storyline from the series,” says Bogan. “The whole franchise itself has kind of a different type of evolution than most film franchises I’ve seen.

Our movie isn’t a sequel to either the first movie or the TV series. It’s really more its own standalone chapter that lives within the Spirit world.”

The director also explains that the Spirit horse featured in the movie isn’t the same one that was the focus of the original 2D animated movie. “Our horse is the one from the TV series, who has the white stripe down his face. It was always said to be kind of the same lineage, but for a new generation. We wanted this to be a new generation and to bring something new to the audience, who are both fans of the TV series, fans of the movie and newcomers. So we needed to reach all of these different parts of the audience and provide all of them with something new and something different, which is a challenge when you are basing your story on existing characters.”

A Latina Perspective

That reimagining meant exploring Lucky’s Mexican heritage, her history as the daughter

‘Because those environments started to get a little more 3D, a little more detailed and cinematic, we had to then adjust the designs and the look of the characters and the horses as well so that they felt like they could live in that space and be believable.’

— Director Elaine Bogan

of an adventurous mother who is no longer with her and a difficult relationship with her father. Bogan especially liked the history of the TV series in which real life problems faced by young children were explored and discussed. She says they wanted this kind of grounded storytelling to be part of the film.

Bogan says she has been riding horses since she was about nine years old. She took on the project having already forged a strong bond over

many years with her own horse, Ziggy Stardust, who lives close to the DreamWorks campus. While she knows her own horse from nose to tail, she realized that the film’s crew would also need to get to know horses the same way before they set off to create the animation.

“You know, horses are renowned for being one of the most difficult things to animate,” says Bogan. “It was a lot of research and we actually took some really amazing, amazing seminars

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Karen Foster

from Dr. Stuart Sumida, one of the industry’s most famous anatomy experts. He came into the studio and taught us a lot.

We owe a lot to him for teaching us about proper leg movements and gait and how horses walk, trot, canter — and showing us how it all works.”

Sean Sexton, Spirit Untamed’s head of character animation, who has been working on DreamWorks movies for almost two decades, adds, “The other thing that really helped us was that Elaine’s horse lives five minutes away from DreamWorks. So we actually had one outing before COVID where we just went to the stables and Dr. Sumida was there and we would just watch horses. And then Elaine and I went horseback riding. It was my first time ever on a horse and I thought it was so informative to feel a horse’s body and understand how his weight shifts as it moves.”

The Mane Attraction

Some of the stylistic choices that were made included creating characters with bigger eyes, rounder faces and — as in the 2D movie and Netflix series — giving Spirit eyebrows so that the horse could be more expressive. These adjustments were made so that the characters that would play well in a theatrical setting and connect with audiences. Both Sexton and Bogan agree that these alterations somehow made the characters more engaging and relatable.

she notes. “He and I are both nuts about going to every National Park, or traveling to Europe and photographing everything.”

Duncan wanted to find a look for the environments that felt like they could be anywhere. “It’s Mane to Tail Details: Director Elaine Bogan inspired the not necessarily specrew with visits to her own cifically this part of horse, Ziggy Stardust.

Europe or this part of America, so that it can reach people all over the Bogan says she loved the history of the characters and was thrilled with the back- world,” explains the director. “Once we started doground the crew was able to discover. “We ing that, we found a style for the environments also wanted to be sure that we were creating that we thought would hit the screen and be ata new look that would transport the story mospheric and rich enough to just bring people from the small screen to a big one” right along on the adventure. Because those envi“We already had some really great groundwork ronments started to get a little more 3D, a little done for us with the look and the design of the more detailed and cinematic, we had to then adcharacters in the TV series, but when a TV series is just the designs and the look of the characters and designed, it’s designed for a screen that’s about the horses as well so that they felt like they could the size of a laptop screen,” says Bogan. “People live in that space and be believable.” are going to be watching our story on a larger Bogan says she’s grateful that somehow the screen. But we knew we had a challenge, in a way, stars aligned so that everyone who joined her that we needed to stay within that sort of bound- team had at least one element in the story that ary, but we also needed to design something that they felt deeply passionate about. “I hope that as a was going to look great and invite the audience result, when people see the movie they feel that into the environment, and feel tactile and 3D the story and the characters are relatable and beenough on a giant 50-foot theater screen.” lievable. I hope all of our collective life experiencBogan and her team did a lot of research to es have been infused into the film for the audimake sure the film’s environments had the right ence to enjoy.” ◆ mix of realism and animation artistry. “I remember my production designer Paul Duncan and I Spirit Untamed storms out of the stable in U.S. first started taking out all our old travel photos,” theaters on June 4.

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George & Abe’s Excellent Adventure Matt Thomson and Dave Callaham tell us everything we need to know about their Founding Fathers movie, America: The Motion Picture.

By Michael Mallory

F

orget what you learned in school. Turn a deaf ear to the yearly telecast of 1776. Ignore even the political donnybrook taking place in both Congress and statehouses throughout the land over how America’s founding should be taught. The record has now been set straight by America: The Motion Picture, which arrives on Netflix just in time for this year’s Independence Day celebrations!

It’s a hilariously warped record to be sure, but that’s the point. And unlike a lot of today’s other history revisionists, the filmmakers revel in the fact that they’re joking.

“It’s about the founding of America as if the story was being told by an idiot,” says director and executive producer Matt Thompson. “It’s as if the dumbest person in the world said, ‘What if George Washington and Abraham Lincoln are best friends, and they go to Ford’s Theatre where Benedict Arnold turns into a werewolf and bites off Lincoln’s head, and that starts the American Revolution.’”

And that’s only the beginning. To avenge his best bud, Washington forms a revolutionary posse comprised of a dimwitted, beer-guzzling Sam Adams; Paul Revere, “the world’s greatest horse racist;” a female, Chinese American, scientific genius named Thomas Edison; the Apache leader Geronimo, who takes up

arms against the British and loses one of his own; and a hip African American blacksmith.

Together they battle a diabolical, steampunky British king and his lieutenant, the traitorous lycanthrope Benedict Arnold.

Facts, Schmacts!

It’s crazy, wild-ass American History 101.2 created by the filmmakers under the credo “No

Research Allowed” and promoted with the tagline “Facts, schmacts.” Even so, screenwriter Dave Callaham (Wonder Woman 1984), who originally tailored the script as a live-action comedy, says some people still missed the joke. “When I first sent it out amongst friends and colleagues in the entertainment industry, there were a few who came back with totally straight-faced notes like, ‘Hey, there are a cou-

‘It’s as if the dumbest person in the world said, “What if George Washington and Abraham Lincoln are best friends, and they go to Ford’s Theatre where Benedict Arnold turns into a werewolf and bites off Lincoln’s head, and that starts the American Revolution.”’

— Exec producer and director Matt Thompson

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Features ple historical inaccuracies in this thing,’” he states. Perhaps those benighted beta readers were reacting to Paul Bunyan’s combat with an ambulatory Big Ben tower, or the tavern called Vietnam that our heroes wish they’d gotten out of sooner … or maybe simply that the evil king facing the rebellion is named James, not George III. The project was greenlit while Callaham and producers Phil Lord and Chris Miller were in talks with Channing Tatum’s production company Free Association about an entirely different idea. “They asked for a writing sample and Lord and Miller gave them America: The Motion Picture,” Callaham explains. “Channing’s team said, ‘Why are we even talking about this other project? We should make this!’” Lord and Miller — Toon Town moguls who have their fingers in more pies than Marie Callender — subsequently introduced Callaham to Thompson, who is partnered with Adam Reed in the Atlanta-based toon house Floyd County Productions. Thompson loved the script and the decision to produce it in animation was finalized. The rest, as they say, is alternative history.

In addition to his exec producer status (along with Free Association partners Peter Kiernan and Reid Carolin), Tatum also voices the sincere, committed but sometimes dopey Washington who, along with the character of Martha Dandridge (Judy Greer), helps earn the film’s R-rating with a hot bedroom scene (spoiler alert: George Washington doesn’t get much sleep here). The voice cast also includes Simon Pegg (King James), Bobby Moynahan (Paul Revere), Jason Mantzoukas (Sam Adams), Raoul Max Trujillo (Geronimo), rapper/actor Killer Mike (Blacksmith) and Olivia Munn (Thomas Edison).

The decision to not only pull Thomas Edison out of his century but make him a Chinese woman might only seem counterintuitive if you have a hard time accepting that George Washington wore retractable chain saws on his wrists. It was, however, a personal matter to Callaham. “You might not get this from my name, but I’m Chinese American,” he says. “I fought, and was supported by my team, for there to be a Chinese American face on the screen as more than just a background character. Edison is one of the only characters that is pretty stand-up and correct in her behavior throughout the movie. I didn’t really want to associate any of the other characters in the movie with my identity.” (For the record, voice actress Olivia Munn is of Vietnamese heritage.) While on the subject of background characters, America: The Motion Picture boasts walk-ons by the likes of J.F.K.,

Dave Callaham

Historic Bros: Directed

by Matt Thompsons, America: The Motion Picture follows the adventures of a chainsaw-wielding George Washington and beer-loving bro Sam Adams to take down the Brits.

Teddy Roosevelt, Martin Luther King, Jr., Lucille Ball, Harriet Tubman — and even Channing Tatum from Magic Mike.

While most of the film has a graphic look that resembles cel animation, Toon Boom Harmony software was used by the artists. It was a shift for Floyd County, which had employed Adobe After Effects for previous seasons of Fox’s Archer. “We have changed to be a largely Harmony studio now,” says Thompson. “This is a mostly Harmony movie, and while we usually comp in After Effects, for the first time we comped in [Blackmagic] Fusion. That allowed us to do a little more of what I would call faked 3D to our comping.” Backgrounds were painted in Adobe Photoshop, and some of the characters were originally designed in Illustrator and then ported into Harmony. Thompson also credits Brian Fordney, the film’s tech director, with adding a few scripts to enhance the off-the-shelf software. Chris Appel served as the picture’s 3D animation director.

Even before the year-long animation process began, another year-and-a-half or so was spent storyboarding and developing the characters, to make sure there was a solid base on which to pile all the insanity. “We have so many crazy elements in this movie that it was important our story was still clean and had a through-line,” Thompson says. “We spent a lot of time making sure the story made sense and you really rooted for this ragtag bunch of characters who are going to fight this large army.”

All of the studio’s resources went into play for the climactic, all-stops-out battle between the revolutionaries and nearly-overwhelming forces of King James. “We did everything we could to make that battle big and amazing, and I think it really pays off,” Thompson says. “There is a ton of effects work in it. That scene was the last render of the movie and up until the last moment, we had to say, ‘Digital pencils down, we do not have any more time.’ It was by far the biggest challenge of the movie, and the biggest challenge I and my studio has ever made.”

Both Callaham and Thompson are quick to praise the participation of Netflix, which will release the America: The Motion Picture right before Independence Day. “My favorite kind of projects are those where I’m constantly looking over my shoulder and wondering whether someone’s going to pull the plug on what I’m doing,” Callaham says, adding: “Netflix never pulled the plug.”

“Netflix has been awesome to deal with,” echoes Thompson. “One of the great things about Netflix is worldwide release on the same day. I am looking forward to Americans and people all over the world sitting down on the Fourth of July and seeing this. I can’t wait for a person in Australia to go, ‘Well … that’s how America was formed!’ I look forward to confusing people all over the world.” ◆ America: The Motion Picture premieres on Netflix worldwide on June 30.

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Unchained Memories Danish director Jonas Poher Rasmussen brings the turbulent life of an Afghan friend to animated life in the prize-winning feature, Flee.

By Ramin Zahed

W

hen Danish filmmaker Jonas Poher Rasmussen was a teenager, he befriended a young Afghan refugee who had moved to his neighborhood. A couple of decades later, he finally got the chance to tell the story of his friend’s challenging life in the animated documentary Flee. The feature, which won the Grand Jury Prize: Documentary at Sundance earlier this year, has been praised for the way it uses the medium to tackle a difficult subject and cast a light on how early traumatic events can alter the way a victim recalls the past.

“I had asked my friend to make a live-action documentary about his experiences for many years, but he kept saying no,” recalls the Danish filmmaker during a recent Zoom interview.

“Finally, when I decided to tell his story as an animated documentary, he agreed to let me do it since animation offers a certain level of anonymity.” The film chronicles the harrowing life of “Amin”(a pseudonym), a gay Afghan refugee, who leaves his home to escape the mujahideen and the Taliban, only to be victimized by corrupt police in Russia before finding a new life in Denmark.

The upcoming Neon release made head-

lines for attracting Riz Ahmed and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau as exec producers and voice actors for the English-language version. Produced by Final Cut for Real, Sun Creature Studio, Vivement Lundi!, Mostfilm, Mer Film and several other companies, the 89-minute film was written by Rasmussen and Amin. The film’s art director was Jess Nicholls, animation director was Kenneth Ladekjær and animation producer was Charlotte de La Gournerie.

Drawn to Reality The director first sketched out the outline for the movie at Anidox, a creative workshop

that brings together documentary and animation professionals to help them work on projects together. Production on the film, which was made for around $4 million, began about three years ago. The 2D animation was produced using TVPaint. “The animation was mainly produced in Denmark, but we had some people working remotely in France and Georgia. Overall, we had about 40 people working on the animation,” recalls Rasmussen.

So, why did the live-action doc-maker decide to use animation to tell Amin’s story?

“This is a story about memory and trauma, and truths that are buried in the past,” ex-

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True to Life: Jonas Poher Rasmussen’s Flee, which was the winner of the grand jury documentary prize at Sundance, is also competing at Annecy this month.

‘We wanted to tell a human story and to emphasize that even in the darkest hours, you can find some light. If they recognize those genuine moments of joy in the darkness, then we have succeeded.’

—Writer and director Jonas Poher Rasmussen

plains the director. “These are things that are hard to do with live-action footage. Animation helps reveal deeper, more emotional layers.

We spent a lot of time doing research. Of course, one of our big sources of inspiration was Ari Folman’s Waltz with Bashir [2008], which is the crown jewel of the animation documentary world and did a beautiful job of blending animation with real-life stories.”

Rasmussen, who had never worked in animation before, says the making of Flee was a hugely eye-opening experience. “Compared to live action, animation goes so slowly, but that’s an asset as well,” he notes. “You can be very precise in animation. You have more time to really think things through and don’t have to rely on the daily film footage shot. You can get feedback from the group of people on the project who are working remotely and communicate with them just as if they are working right next to you.”

Another plus for the director was that he was not at the mercy of the live-action foot-

age he had to shoot each day. “In my previous work, you shoot a lot of footage and then build the film as you edit what you have,” he recalls. “In animation, if you don’t get the footage that you want or need, you can always draw it. You can decide how to build your scene, where the camera is placed. Animation gives you a lot of freedom, which I really appreciated, because in live-action you are simply at the mercy of the footage you bring back from the shoot. I also appreciated the feedback I got from my team, which was much bigger than what I’m used to in my previous projects — which was just usually just a photographer and an editor!”

Digging Up the Past Rasmussen worked closely with his Afghan friend to get to the heart of his life story. Overall, he did about 20 interviews to get all the material he needed for his film. “I interviewed him, beginning with his first memory from the time he first arrived in Denmark,” notes the di-

rector. “I transcribed all the interviews and organized the material and went over everything to make sure I had all the important details. We then went over the screen to make sure we weren’t missing anything that was crucial. We recorded all the interviews and animated them afterwards.”

Art director Jesse Nicholls, animation director Kenneth Ladekjær and producer Charlotte de La Gournerie worked closely with Rasmussen to create a world that looked and felt true to the story and its locations. “We wanted to be authentic both in terms of character designs and the backgrounds,” says the helmer.

“The goal was to try and make the characters feel alive while keeping authenticity in mind all throughout the movie.”

When asked about the movies that made a big impact on him, Rasmussen goes back to his childhood years. “When I was a kid, I lived with my family in Africa for a while, and we had a VHS tape of two films: Once Upon a Time in the West and The Karate Kid,” he remembers.

“That was my real exposure to cinema, because I watched those two movies so many times. More recently, I have admired some of the amazing South Korean movies such as Burning and The Handmaiden, as well as Jérémy Clapin’s animated film I Lost My Body, which came out about two years ago.”

Now that the film has been getting a lot of attention worldwide and is poised to be one of the most acclaimed animated projects of the year, Rasmussen hopes the movie will cast some positive light in a troubled world. “We wanted to tell a human story and to emphasize that even in the darkest hours, you can find some light,” he notes. “I think people are able to connect with that when they hear pop music that they recognize (from Roxette), or other pop culture references in the film. If they recognize those genuine moments of joy in the darkness, then we have succeeded.”

Rasmussen, who is currently working on adapting a trilogy by Danish graphic novelist Halfdan Pisket (Deserter, Cockroach, Dane), says he was quite moved by the positive reception of his movie when it was shown to an Afghan audience in Denmark. “I had thought I was making this film for audiences in the west, but they told me that this is the kind of story that Afghans need to see to understand that that it’s OK to be gay and come out,” he notes. “My childhood friend was happy to see it as well because he finally got the chance to tell his story.” ◆ Neon will release Flee in theaters later this year.

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A Froggy Trip Cottonwood producers David Michel and Zoé Carrera talk about their fun new movie, Around the World in 80 Days.

T

here have been many cinematic adaptations of French novelist Jules Verne’s Around the World in 80 Days, but this year we have a charming new version featuring a marmoset and a frog as the book’s globetrotting heroes Passepartout and Phileas.

The action-packed feature, which is produced by Paris-based Cottonwood Media and StudioCanal, is written by Gerry Swallow (Ice Age 2) and directed by Oscar nominee Samuel Tourneux (Even Pigeons Go to Heaven). The movie, which sparked a lot of interest at the Cannes market last year, will be opening in France this summer and will have a rollout in other Euro territories in the fall.

The film’s producers David Michel and Zoé Z. Carrera tell Animag that they were inspired by a Spanish-Japanese adaptation of the book (Around the World with Willy Fog) which they saw on French TV when they were growing up. “This was our first movie at Cottonwood, so we wanted to start with a wellknown property,” says Michel, whose many credits include Totally Spies, The Ollie & Moon Show, Squish and Meet Me in Paris. “We both loved this adventure, so we asked Jerry to write the story with animal characters. With my French accent, Willy Fog sounded like Willy Frog, so we all thought it would be funny to have Fog as our main character,” adds Carrera, who also worked on the movies The Lorax and Yellowbird.

Maximizing the Visuals Work on the movie began in 2016, and the animation production was split between Mac Guff Brussels in Belgium and Circus in France.

Overall, about 100 people worked on the feature, with the CG animation produced in Maya.

“We had a good budget for a European animated film, but we had to be very smart about our budget (estimated to be $19 million),” says

Michel. “We had about 50 backgrounds, and that meant we couldn’t build everything in 3D and had to take some shortcuts, but overall, we are very pleased with the visuals.”

The filmmakers also added their own special touches to the story. As Michel explains, “Jules Verne had an amazing sense of story, action and adventure, but the characters were a little bit flat. So we kept the main plot points and the narrative, but we redeveloped the characters.”

Carrera points out that the original novel didn’t have any real female characters, only paper-thin damsels in distress. “We wanted to have a real strong female character, so we revisited the original character of Princess Aouda and made her into a bold steampunk aviatrix who builds and flies planes. Of course, in our movie, she’s also a frog!”

Both Carrera and Michel are quite proud of Cottonwood’s first feature venture. “We’re really proud of the fact that we could put it together,” says Michel. “One of our most interesting parts of our jobs is to strive to do the

Zoé Z. Carrera

David Michel

maximum with a limited budget. The movie is screening at Annecy in June, and from a sales perspective, it has been a great success since StudioCanal has been able to sell it in many territories. It’s a great escapist adventure that can be a fun summer movie for the family. Essentially, it’s a buddy movie about a bookish frog who longs for adventure and a marmoset who’s really a con artist, and how they learn to get along as they travel the world.” ◆ For more info, visit cottonwood.tv/portfolio/ around-the-world-in-80-days.

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Return to the Mirrorlands The creative leaders at Wizart Animation share a few secrets about their eagerly anticipated fifth Snow Queen movie.

W

e hope Elsa from Frozen doesn’t get too jealous when she finds out that Russian animation powerhouse Wizart is working on its fifth Snow Queen movie this year. The hugely successful franchise, which was first brought to the

screen in December of 2012, has a built-in audience of fans around the world, so it’s not surprising that the team behind the first feature are bringing the young heroes Gerda, Kai and their friends back to theaters once again this year.

Producer Vladimir Nikolaev, whose credits also include the four previous Snow Queen features, Sheep and Wolves: Pig Deal and this year’s Secret Magic Control Agency, tells Animation Magazine that he and his team were already thinking about expanding the popular

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Features ‘The story is always based on the values that are clear and appealing to all people – like kindness, friendship, compassion and, of course, family.

Everyone needs some magic and entertaining content, especially now during a difficult period for many.’

— Director Andrey Korenkov

character’s universe as they were working on the fourth adventure, The Snow Queen: Mirrorlands.

“We couldn’t put all the interesting ways we’d like to continue the characters’ journeys into one film,” he points out. “But after the successful release of the fourth feature, we knew that it was time to proceed with our plans. In the beginning, we took a little bit more time to work on the script itself, since many of our team at the studio were involved in our Secret Magic Control Agency movie. However, that movie was completed and successfully launched on Netflix, they rejoined The Snow Queen project. It seems that the work on the SMCA has motivated our creative team a lot, given them some space for creativity. As a result, The Snow Queen 5 will reach a new production level.”

The Old Crew Is Back!

According to Nikoleav, the same team that worked on all the previous Snow Queen features are working on this new installment as well. “Our team’s professional skills have grown simultaneously with the quality of each released movie,” he notes. “So, there are about 150 people involved as always. Our film is being produced at our studio in Russia, but for simpler and urgent jobs, we use our freelancers from different corners of the world.”

The film’s director Andrey Korenkov points out that with each movie, the Wizart team puts more focus on the studio’s proprietary software to produce the animation. “When we began production on Snow Queen 5, we already had a series of proper software solutions, which cover our production needs almost entirely.”

Korenkov also gives us the scoop on the movie’s plot line: He says audiences will meet a new character, a difficult girl with magical powers named Ila, who lives in the

mysterious world of Mirrorlands. “You’ll get to know about her and where she comes from in this installment,” he notes. “Whether by mistake or because of her lack of knowledge, Ila causes huge trouble in Mirrorlands, which affects the human world as well. So she has to go to the outer world and ask Kai and Gerda for help. I promise that Snow Queen 5 will have a lot of magic, humor and adventures for everyone.” Korenkov says he believes Ila is quite a fascinating new character who allows filmgoers to see a new side of the heroes they know and love. “Now Gerda and her brother Kai act as her kind friends and wise mentors,” he explains. “By their own example and kind advice, they help the young magician girl overcome her childish whims, selfishness and fears.

Through a series of exciting adventures, they become a united team that can perform real wonders.”

Nikolaev says the biggest challenge for the filmmakers was not the technical aspects of the animation, but to create a fresh and unique story. Korenkov agrees. “Our goal was to make an interesting plot that would be connected to the previous chapters, but would also be mindful of the latest changes and trends,” the director says. “It’s not an easy thing to get all the franchise characters together and put them into a single appealing story that

A Holiday Treat The filmmakers tell us that they hope to release the new movie in time for the winter holidays this year. “We really don’t want to sacrifice the movie quality,” says Nikolaev. “It’s important for us to consider all the weak spots of our previous projects. That’s why we’ve put the winter holidays as the release deadline. We really hope everything will go smoothly.”

Both Nikolaev and Korenkov look back fondly at how fans responded to the four previous Snow Queen movies and are hoping for similar reactions this time as well. “When the first movie came out in 2012, many viewers began to ask for a sequel from the very beginning. Many fans of the franchise have grown up since then, but they haven’t lost their interest in the universe, and keep following the movies,” says Nikolaev.

“Fans bombard us with suggestions about the new movies, wonder about the details of the new installment’s plot and characters, actively discuss and explore the already released movies and even ask for more merchandise!” says Korenkov. “We’re really pleased to receive messages from all over the world.

I remember a funny response from a

‘Our team’s professional skills have grown simultaneously with the quality of each released movie.’

— Producer Vladimir Nikolaev

entertains modern audiences.”

When asked about the secret of the franchise’s global success, Korenkov responds, “When we make each new Snow Queen movie, we follow the same principles. The story is always based on the values that are clear and appealing to all people – like kindness, friendship, compassion and, of course, family. Everyone needs some magic and entertaining content, especially now during a difficult period for many.”

young girl who had just watched The Snow Queen 3: Fire and Ice and asked us when we were going to make the fourth movie. But we’d already released the fourth feature in her country! So, I guess since even the grownup viewers are still interested in the franchise and anticipate the new movie, it means we are doing our job right! We will do our best to make them happy this winter.” ◆ For more info, visit wizartanimation.com.

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Wonder Woman We chat with acclaimed animation auteur Joanna Quinn about her brilliant new short Affairs of the Art, as well as life and animation career.

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f you’ve been following the world of indie animation over the past few decades, chances are you have fallen in love with the work of Joanna Quinn. The British animator and director introduced her wonderful and relatable everywoman character Beryl in the 1987 short Girls Night Out, which took home three prizes at Annecy. Her 1996 short Famous Fred and 1998’s Wife of Bath were both nominated for Oscars, and her 2006 short Dreams and Desires: Family Ties was the winner of the grand prize at Zagreb’s Animafest. General audiences will also know her for her acclaimed hand-drawn animated ads for Charmin, Whiskas and United Airlines.

This year, her latest animated short Affairs of the Art, which was made with her partner and husband, writer Les Mills, catches up with the wonderful, eccentric and hilarious character Beryl.

Quinn was kind enough to chat with us since her NFB (National Film Board of Canada) produced short is also featured at Annecy this month:

ters that are multifaceted and unusual. We’ve made three films with Beryl as the main protagonist, so in Affairs of the Art we wanted to explore other characters. Enter her family: Ifor, Beryl’s husband and muse … mostly naked; her ambitious sister, Beverly, who’s fascinated by death — and the complete opposite of Beryl; geeky son Colin, obsessed with technical details like railway signalling systems and screw threads. Beryl actually has the least screen time in this film, but by showing her family we get a deeper understanding of her character and relationships.

What are the pluses and minuses of living and working with your writer/producer?

The pluses are we never have to go to work and can make plans lounging on the sofa with cups of tea, but the minuses are that we never stop talking about work. It drove our daughter out of the house at age 17, and she vowed never to have anything to do with animation! She became a vet.

What kind of budget did you have? Was it a lot more than your previous short?

The budget for Affairs was around £24,000 ($33,340) per minute, which was similar to our previous film, Dreams and Desires: Family Ties.

How did you like working in digital 2D? Affairs of the Art is actually animated on paper and colored in TVPaint. I originally animated for six months on my Cintiq, but I realized I wasn’t enjoying animating digitally and my animation became quite stiff. I loved exploring the TVP software and it’s great for coloring, but I found it hard to replicate the fluidity of animating on paper. I think it’s because I’m very intuitive when I animate and I get lost in the mark making and enjoy making mistakes, which might take me in different directions.

I’m also very physical when I animate and use my fingers to smudge and soften the pencil marks, which is just impossible on the Cintiq.

Anyway, I reluctantly shoved my Cintiq to one side and set up my dusty lightbox again and

Animation Magazine: It’s so good to catch up with Beryl and her family again in your new short! How long did it take you to make this latest chapter in her life?

Joanna Quinn: Well … Les [Mills] wrote the script way back in 2010, the storyboard was finished in 2015, and I began seriously animating in 2016, so the actual production took about six years. Waaaaay too long, and very glad to be on the other side now!

What do you love about Beryl and her family?

We love Beryl because she is a joy to animate and a great character to write for. It’s fun to subvert the audience’s expectations of an ordinary middle-aged woman. Les and I are great observers of people and love to create characwww.animationmagazine.net 26 june|july 21

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Events did a Google search for “world’s last supplies of animation paper!”

When did you first realize you wanted to work in animation?

It was in the first year of my graphic design course at Middlesex University. We were given a short animation project and the first thing I animated was a dog walking. I filmed it on a video line tester, then pressed play — I remember being utterly stunned that it actually worked. I watched it over and over, mesmerized by the fact it had come to life. It also made people chuckle, which was a revelation, too. That was when I decided that I wanted to animate and make films that would make people laugh.

Who are your animation idols?

I am such an animation nerd that I love and admire many animators. Somebody who has a special place in my heart, though, is the exceptionally talented Michaela Pavlâtovâ. We are the same age, and her first film, Etuda Z Alba, came out the same year as my first film, Girls Night Out (1987). Our various films were screened at the same festivals over many years, but I always arrived just after she had left, and vice versa. It was not until relatively recently that we finally met and I felt like I’d met my twin separated at birth. Her storytelling, design, color and humor are exceptional, and she will always be my idol.

My top choice for animation god would have to be, of course, Milt Kahl. I can sit for hours watching his animation on a loop, crying in awe. In fact, I used to visit the other animation god, Richard Williams, at his studio in Bristol, where he had many boxes of Milt Kahl’s photocopied animation. Together we would choose a scene, like Madame Medusa [in The Rescuers]

The Female Gaze: Oscar-nominated helmer Joanna Quinn’s latest project Affairs of the Art is one of the much-anticipated shorts at Annecy this year.

pulling off her false eyelashes, film it and go through it frame by frame, marvelling at Milt’s genius. I treasure those moments with Richard, who died not long after.

What are the animated or live-action movies or TV shows that have stayed with you the longest?

Short animated films that have stuck with me are Carnival by Susan Young, Two Sisters by Caroline Leaf, Your Face by Bill Plympton, Oh Willy...

by Emma De Swaef and Marc James Roels and, more recently, Naked by Kirill Khachaturov — all masterpieces.

What do you think about the state of animation today, especially the fact that there seem to be more opportunities for women today than, say, 20 years ago?

The animated shorts genre has always attracted women, so I don’t think it has changed that much, but I certainly feel there is a space now for films which are more diverse and radical.

The one positive thing I have noticed recently is the long overdue change in the representa-

tion of women on juries and panels at many film festivals (not all, of course). This absolutely makes a difference to the way women working in animation see themselves in the industry.

The more visible women and minorities are in positions of power, the more inclusive it feels. Things are changing (very) slowly, but we need to constantly remind the white men in power about unconscious bias and how to embrace change.

What’s the best advice anyone gave you about pursuing animation as a career?

Have a goal in mind and make it happen. Take risks and make big decisions as soon as you can, before you get burdened with the responsibilities of life. Ask for help and advice; most people in animation are encouraging and want to give a helping hand. Top tip: Always send a follow-up email if your first one doesn’t get an answer. It’s probably not rejection, just a busy person.

What is the funniest or most memorable reaction you ever received for your shorts?

I once took my grandmother to a screening of my film Girls Night Out. It was supporting a live-action feature, and my grandma sat diligently through the films, clutching her handbag on her knee. During the Q&A, she was waving at me from her seat, telling everyone around her that she was my grandma.

Anyway, on the way home I asked her what she thought of my film. She then proceeded to tell me how fantastic she thought the live-action film was, but hated the rude cartoon that was screened with it. I took full credit for the live-action film and changed the subject. ◆ Affairs of the Heart is part of Annecy’s Official Selection this year. You can find out more about Joanna Quinn at berylproductions.co.uk.

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Event: Annecy

Short-Form Magic This year’s edition of the Annecy Festival offers a rich collection of highly original and inspiring shorts from around the world. Here is a sampler: Darwin’s Notebook Directed by Georges Schwizgebel t’s always cause for celebration when we have a new animated short by Georges Schwizgebel. The Swiss animation master, who is best known for celebrated work such as Jeu, Romance and The Man with No Shadow, is back with a stunning work titled Darwin’s Notebook, which looks back at the atrocities committed by colonists to the people of Tierra del Fuego, the southernmost province of Argentina.

Schwizgebel was inspired to base his short on these incidents after visiting an exhibition on Charles Darwin at the Notre Dame University campus museum near Chicago. “There were several documents on this mishap that happened to three natives of Tierra del Fuego that Darwin recounts in his diary,” he says. “But it was only a few years later that I started this project and read other books on this topic that helped me better understand what had happened to the Alacaluf. The initial scenario was changed a lot and arrived at postproduction, and the COVID pandemic also delayed the finish. In fact it took me three years spread over five years to complete the short.”

Made for about $250,000, the short’s length expanded from its original planned seven minutes to nine minutes. “I’m still working the old fashioned way, so my tools are paint brushes, acrylic paint and cels. I am using an animation desk with a digital camera and the Dragonframe program instead of a 35mm camera, which is now stored in a cabinet,” the director tells us.

He says the toughest part of realizing his vision was the beginning.

“The big challenges are the first line tests, to come up with ideas for telling this story without using dialogue and how to move from one shot to another in an elegant way. Then the more the work progresses, the more ideas lead to others. I am most pleased with the music Judith Gruber-Stitzer composed for the film.”

Like many animators around the world, Schwizgebel had to deal with the restrictions of working during the pandemic. “It all happened the moment the images were finished for the short, but recording studios were closed. So in the meantime, I started another film at home without having to go to my studio.”

The director who has been nominated four times for his work at Annecy, leaves us with a few words of advice for aspiring short directors.

“First, be passionate about moving images. The tools have evolved a lot and allow you to make very ugly but also beautiful films. This is what I did not understand when digital animation was first introduced. At the time, I thought it was only useful for video games and the army!”

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No Leaders Please Directed by Joan Gratz elebrated Portland-based animation auteur Joan Gratz is best known for memorable shorts such as the Oscar-winning Mona Lisa Descending a Staircase (1992), the Annecy-nominated Kubla Khan (2010) and Candy Jam (1988). Of course, she has also worked on features such as The Prophet, Return to Oz and The Adventures of Mark Twain. This year, the brilliant artist returns to the festival circuit with the clay animated No Leaders Please, a homage to the works of Basquiat, Banksy, Keith Haring and Ai Weiwei.

“I was inspired by the poem by Charles Bukowski,” she tells us via email. “Though he was a cynic and ‘The Laureate of American Lowlife,’ this poem celebrates individualism, change and creativity.”

Gratz began animating her short on May 26 of 2020 and finished the visuals on July 29, 2020. “The film evolved from an interest in graffiti artists and their motivations,” she notes. “My animation tools consist of my finger, an easel and oil-based clay. I shoot digitally and then edit in After Effects. I do all the design, animation, editing and producing, and Judith Gruber-Stitzer did the music and effects.”

She says one of the advantages of being the producer, director and animator is that she can choose not to have a budget! “I know independent short films will not be profitable, so why consider a budget?” Gratz asks. “I was pleased to make a very short film based on such a powerful short poem read with such eloquence. The most difficult part of the film was to find the right music which did not compete with the words and images. I think No Leaders Please is such a positive film. It is the Just Do It of animated shorts!”

The distinguished director, who turned 80 this April, says she is a huge fan of the works of fellow indie artist Theodore Ushev (Blind Vaysha, The Physics of Sorrow). Gratz says she also admires animated features from Aardman Animations and Cartoon Saloon. “As an independent short film director in Portland, during an epidemic, I don’t have a take on the big picture,” she adds. “All I know is that Netflix is producing two features in Portland, which brings together animators, directors, producers and craftsmen from all over the world. If it wasn’t for COVID, I might be enjoying their company!”

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Event: Annecy How to Be at Home Directed by Andrea Dorfman short film about the global pandemic era’s social isolation is perhaps the perfect work of art for 2021. Andrea Dorfman collaborated closely with National Film Board of Canada producer Annette Clarke, poet-musician Tanya Davis and sound designer Sacha Ratcliffe to create the wonderful short How to Be at Home. As Dorfman tells us via email, “Early on in the pandemic, my friend and sometimes collaborator, the brilliant poet Tanya Davis, sent me her new poem about life in isolation, which is a tender, aching, relatable piece, the kind of poem that needed to get out, and I knew animation would give it wings to fly on.”

Made with an approximate 70,000 Canadian dollar-budget ($57,000 U.S.), the short uses pages of books to illustrate the many moods and ideas of Davis’s timely poem. “I wanted to work in acrylics, but supply and shipping were disrupted by the pandemic and I couldn’t get animation paper — but I had lots of books,” recalls Dorfman. “I love animated projects that use books (especially The Opposites Game by Lisa LaBracio) and I was curious. Also, the motif of a book — of reading, an activity we might turn to while isolated at home — lent itself well to the theme of the poem. The books, themselves, were another story. I wanted old books that had yellowing pages. I found several books in my boyfriend’s mother’s basement and the rest came from a friend who works at a second-hand bookstore. I used around 15 books in total.”

Production on the short began in early June of 2020, and it was completed in mid-August. Dorfman combined painting in books with stop-motion paper cut-out animation. She shot the books with a Canon 7D camera with a Nikon fixed lens at 12 frames per second, using the popular stop-motion software Dragonframe. The toughest part, according to the director, was dealing with the unusually hot summer weather in Nova Scotia last year. “I loved making this film, but I was animating in a tiny room with the window shut!” she remembers.

Naming the works of Amanda Forbis and Wendy Tilby, Lizzy Hobbs, Daisy Jacobs, Daniel Bruson, Alê Abreu and Signe Bauman as some of her favorites, Dorfman says she is always drawn to hand-made animation, where the audience can see and feel the presence of the animators. She also mentions that she loved the overwhelmingly positive response to her short. “The pandemic has been so hard for so many, and Tanya’s poem deeply resonates,” she notes. “The music, composed by Daniel Ledwell, is emotional and embracing, and the sound design by Sacha Ratcliffe pulls the viewer in to create a moving and immersive experience.”

In parting, she also leaves us with some great advice. “If you have an idea for a short animation, begin it!” she says. “Don’t get overwhelmed by how many options there are for materials, style or approach to use. Once you start, even if you don’t know exactly where you’re going, you’ll figure it out!”

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In Nature

By Marcel Barelli wiss artist Marcel Barelli has always been fascinated with nature. But for his latest animated venture, he decided to make a film that talks about homosexuality for a wide audience. “I read many articles that pointed out that homosexuality is very common among animals,” he says. “I thought it was an interesting idea and a little-known topic. In fact, there are very few books and documentaries on the subject, maybe about three or four books in English and one in French.”

The next step was to contact the French authority on the subject, ethologist and journalist Fleur Daugey. “She agreed to help me write the short film, as a French expert on the subject,” he notes. “The writing was very fast. I decided to turn the film into a children’s film, using simple language. It took me a year to make the five-minute short. I usually draw on paper, but for the first time, to work faster, I decided to animate the film with Toon Boom Harmony. I used my own daughter as the narrator for the French version! Altogether, it cost around 100,000 euros [about $121,2000].”

The director says his biggest challenge was keeping it short and simple, despite the complexity of its subject. “Talking about homosexuality without talking about sexuality and sex was a bit of a challenge,” he notes. “I am very happy with the result, because I feel we can tell everyone about the fact that homosexuality is present all over the world, and that it is something that is naturally present in nature.”

Barelli says his favorite animated film of all time is Frédéric Back’s Oscar-winning The Man Who Planted Trees. “I love films that make us think about the impact our way of life has,” he says. “And I try to do the same with my shorts. I hope that our short will make people smile, because it is also a funny film (I hope) but also makes them think a little bit!”

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Event: Annecy Under the Skin, the Bark Directed by Franck Dion rench artist Franck Dion has made splashes at Annecy in years past with his shorts Edmond Was a Donkey (2012) and The Head Vanishes (2016). This year he’s back with a new project that he says he made as a response to his previous work. “I think it was a failure since I spent a year and a half working to get a result that was not at all what I wanted to do,” he recalls. “It was extremely frustrating and sad. I blamed myself very much, and this had the effect of accelerating the process of a depression that had been hanging over me for a long time.”

Inspiration arrived a couple of years ago when Dion worked on a video mapping project with Gael Loison and discovered the music of the Dale Cooper Quartet & The Dictaphones. “I immediately recognized in their music a very inspiring emotion,” says the director. “At the same time, while I was writing my first feature, I had the idea for a short film which featured a character unloved by its author.”

The 2020 pandemic pushed Dion to focus on his short and to collaborate with Loison and his band. But his process was different from his previous ventures. “For this project, I turned this whole process upside down,” he notes. “I started by building the demiurge puppet without really knowing what its story would be. I changed his appearance dozens of times to finally realize that it was not his story that I wanted to tell but rather the story of his creation, the character of the hunter he draws.”

Dion used scanned ink drawings and worked both in 3D modeling and digital 2D to assemble the project. He adds, “Of course, there is the talent of the Dale Cooper Quartet who made the music for the film as well as Chloé Delaume and Didier Brunner, whose voices we hear on the answering machine. Then, there is the unwavering support of my wife, who is particularly precious to me.”

The director says he enjoyed improvising and exploring the pleasures of craftsmanship. “I loved going from traditional drawing to sculpture, from animation to compositing, with always the same joy. I find these different techniques so fascinating and complementary. I, who have known animation in Super 8, often tell myself that It’s a great opportunity to be able to take advantage of today’s digital tools with such ease.”

Of course, each creative journey has its own rewards. For Dion, the short allowed him to play with a radically different way of working. “I learned to let go of the usual contingencies: I think I needed to let off some steam! It was a very strong and happy experience which allowed me to continue working on my feature film with much more serenity!”

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Mom Directed by Kajika Aki hen Kajika Aki was 16, she battled anorexia because, as she tells us, her body no longer understood how to live.

“Then, at 18, I very quickly understood that drawing for me was about survival and introspection, I worked really hard for a long time,” she recalls. “If I wasn’t doing the job, at the end of the day I couldn’t eat nor sleep.”

The idea for her new animated short Mom came to her one night when she started thinking about images of running horses and dogs, so she drew them. After leaving her studies at Gobelins University in France in 2017, the artist made the short using TVPaint and After Effects, skipping the storyboard process completely. “I just drew shot after shot based on what was coming freely into my mind,” Aki recalls. “I need freedom to create and I can’t work for an audience. I work with ‘flashes’ of evidence and intuition; there is no limit to my honesty while I am creating because I’m not in control of it — it’s a pure, selfish act.”

Aki says she threw herself into the project and worked on it nonstop. “It took a long time then to find musicians and financial means,” she says. “My composers (Théophile Loaec and Arthur Dairaine) did an impressive job, I feel so lucky to have met them at the right time. I know how important the audio is in a movie.”

She finds it funny that it was only at the end of the process that she realized her short was about love. “It’s about the first form of love I received on Earth, so I called it Mom,” Aki explains. “The title always comes at the end, because I don’t know what I’m talking about until it’s done. Freedom and honesty are essential parts to my definition of love; and it begins with being true with myself.”

Looking back, she says the biggest challenge for her was respecting her own body during the production of the short. “I can work like a computer and forget to eat or move. After two months of work on Mom, I got out of my bed and fell down on the floor because my legs weren’t moving any more. I was alone in my flat and for five minutes I thought that I had lost my legs. Then, I had to exercise for 30 minutes each day … I’m not a good example of someone leading a healthy life! Working alone and creating is just like breathing or living, and everything seems logical when I’m alone: I struggle more when I’m on vacation!”

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Event: Annecy Conversations with a Whale Directed by Anna Bergmann ven horrible rejection letters from film festivals can act as unlikely sources of inspiration. Just ask Anna “Samo” Bergmann, who created a special folder to save all the rejection emails she received from animation festivals around the world. “I was spoiled by the previous festival success of my student days, and I was expecting things to be the same for my new film. Upset about my failure, I was trying to understand the reasons for the scale of my depression and to find new motivation to continue to work as an artist and filmmaker.”

Her new short Conversations with a Whale allowed her to reinvent her creative process. “I tried to keep the creation more intuitive, allowing things to grow on the go,” she explains. “I didn’t have any storyboard or animatic, only a rough idea, a feeling.

The ideas for the film were born on the animation table, while making animation. It was scary and annoying for me not to know exactly how the film would develop, but it also brought more excitement into each phase of the filmmaking.”

According to the helmer, Conversations with a Whale was created directly under the camera lens. “I was drawing with charcoal pencils and dry pastel on kraft paper, using cut-out animation and pixilation as well as objects I have built,” she notes. “I was mostly working on one layer, but sometimes I would have a second glass layer to add depth to the frame. I also made good use of Duplo blocks and white sticky putty to fix and hold objects in my animation. As for the software and equipment, I was using Dragonframe together with a Nikon D800 camera and did editing in Adobe After Effects and Premiere.”

Bergmann, who picks My Neighbor Totoro, Spirited Away, The Wolf House, When the Day Breaks and Tale of Tales as some of her favorites in the animation realm, says she feels lucky that she was able to solve the puzzle of her animated project. “I wasn’t sure until the end that I’d be able to find all the missing pieces,” she notes. “I feel lucky it all worked out! This film is my love letter to artists, art, its audience and in particular to animation. I hope that people who watch this film would feel this love and get the taste of magic happening that I have every time my characters start living their own life.”

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June Night Directed by Mike Maryniuk he many faces of silent film legend Buster Keaton and the natural world figure heavily in the latest short by artist Mike Maryniuk. The filmmaker says he wanted to explore pandemic dreaming in the project. “Dream logic is something that I really enjoy as a viewer and dreamer; it provides artistic elbow room and allows for a cinematic universe to blossom,” he explains. I also had been growing seedlings for the garden and imagined them yearning to go outside. I wanted to examine our relationship with nature, which can only be repaired by recalibrating, acknowledging the futility of certain pursuits, and dipping one toe from each foot simultaneously into the pools of the past and the future, while staring at the tangled pool noodle that is the present!”

The National Film Board of Canada project, which was produced with a 68,000 Canadian dollar-budget (about $55,400 U.S.) was completed last summer in a four-month period. “I used many X-Acto knives, lots of printer ink, card stock, miniatures, UV lamps, time-lapsed plants growing — all captured using Dragonframe and a few Sony cameras,” recalls Maryniuk. “My producer, Jon Montes (NFB), helped come up with some of the ideas and sourced archival images. The production department was a one-person army. We had a really great sound and music team (Andy Rudolph, Kelsey Braun, Sarah Jo Kirsch and Aaron Funk). Many people from the NFB worked their magic behind the scenes.”

The director says he was quite pleased with the level of artistic freedom he was granted on his passion project. “You experience creative synchronistic interventions from the world around you, too strange and exciting not to include in the creative process,” he maintains. “I guess the process of creating this film was actually the most pleasing part — that and paying tribute to Buster Keaton, the original independent filmmaker, was pretty special.” And the toughest part of the job? He replies, “I have to say it was probably cutting 16,000 individual Buster Keatons out of paper!”

When asked to tell us about some of his favorite animated work, he mentions Caroline Leaf’s Two Sisters, Virgil Widrich’s Fast Film, Ed Ackerman and Greg Zbitnew’s 5 Cents a Copy, as well as anything by David Daniels, Leslie Supnet, Helen Hill and Winston Hacking. He’s also wonderfully open-minded when it comes to advice about the art form. “Animation can be a lot of things,” he points out. “The latest technologies are fantastic, however working with your hands, antiquated technologies and an arts-and-craft mentality can become the antidote to sitting in front of a screen. This allows for editing, coloring and compositing to become the antidote to tedious handmade work. Ultimately finding some sort of balance is important when working.

You don’t need to be good, you just need to work hard, and be yourself.” ◆

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For more info about this year’s Annecy selection, visit www.annecy.org. ◆ www.animationmagazine.net 32 june|july 21

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Event: Annecy

Films in the Spotlight at Annecy We’re thrilled that the annual Annecy toonfest will be in full swing once again this month (June 14-19). In addition to all the amazing shorts, works-in-progress sessions and informative talks and panels, the event will showcase 19 animated movies (10 in the official competition and nine in the Contrechamps “reverse shot” sidebar). Here is a quick rundown of these hot new titles, accompanied by comments from the festival’s brilliant artistic director, Marcel Jean:

Official Competition The Ape Star. Dir: Linda Hambäck (Denmark, Norway, Sweden) “A film that follows the grand tradition of cinema for young audiences, from the north of Europe.”

Snotty Boy. Dir: Marcus Rosenmüller, Santiago Lopez Jover (Germany, Austria) “A pleasant surprise for this first animation feature produced in the Austrian vernacular; a funny movie that takes a biting look at reality.”

You Animal! The Nimfa Dimaano Story. Dir: Avid Liongoren (Philippines) “One of the selection’s special surprises. A fun and funny film tackling adult topics, with complex characters and a scathing depiction of social differences.”

Poupelle of Chimney Town. Dir: Yusuke Hirota (Japan). “An absolutely astonishing, profoundly original futuristic work coming to us from Studio 4°C.”

Jiang Ziya: The Legend of Deification. Dir: Wei Li, Teng Cheng (China). “A spectacular action and adventure work, another lush example of the artistic ambitions and high technical feats of Chinese animation.”

The Deer King. Dir: Masashi Ando, Masayuki Miyaji (Japan). “Production I.G studio’s most recent production, a film impatiently awaited by animation fans. This is a complex, expansive and ambitious work. Among others, Masashi Ando is known for having worked alongside Hayao Miyazaki and Satoshi Kon.” Flee. Dir: Jonas Poher Rasmussen (Denmark, France, Norway, Sweden). “A highly anticipated feature film coming to us after its incredible success early this year at Sundance.”

Lamya’s Poem. Dir: Alex Kronemer (Canada, U.S.) “A movie which belongs to the introductory

geopolitical sphere, quite present in animation cinema in recent years with such films as The Breadwinner. Lamya’s Poem is the first animation feature directed by Alex Kronemer, already the scriptwriter of Bilal: A New Breed of Heroes, selected out of competition at Annecy 2015.”

Josee, the Tiger and the Fish. Dir: Kotaro Tamura (Japan). “A juicy rom-com produced by Bones that holds pride of place at the festival’s opening session.”

My Sunny Maad. Dir: Michaela Pavlátová (Czech Republic, France) “My Sunny Maad from Michaela Pavlátová is the first feature film from a director who won the Cristal for short film in 2012. It is a touching story, full of nuance and subtlety about the experience of a Western woman living in Afghanistan. Definitely one of the most anticipated films of the year!”

Contrechamp (Reverse Shot) Mount Fuji Seen from a Moving Train. Dir: Pierre Hébert (Canada) “A living legend in film-stock engraving and animated explorations combining documentary and multi-disciplinary experimentations, Pierre Hébert has gifted us today with a major work inspired by pioneer Robert Breer.”

Archipelago. Dir: Félix Dufour-Laperrière (Canada) “This film signals the return of a filmmaker with a strong artistic touch, just two years after treating us to Ville Neuve, also competing in the Contrechamp section. What we have here is a visually sumptuous essay, reminiscent of the spirit of Chris Marker.”

Cryptozoo. Dir: Dash Shaw (U.S.A.) “Cryptozoo comes to us following rave reviews at Berlin and Sundance. This feature film spins its magic

between poetry, science-fiction and political philosophy. With it, Dash Shaw has shown himself to be a rightful heir to René Laloux.”

Chicken of the Mound. Dir: Xi Chen (Germany, China) “This movie will astound many! The director entices us into a world thronging with robots, a mix between David OReilly and The Matrix.”

Climbing. Dir: Hye-mi Kim (South Korea) “Climbing follows a female character obsessed with mountain climbing and performance, forced to face her own personal demons. Here is a film that flickers between intrigue, mystery and nightmare.”

Absolute Denial. Dir: Ryan Braund (U.K.) “A oneman work that once again describes how an artificial intelligence can overtake its creator.”

Bob Spit – We Do Not Like People. Dir: Cesar

Cabral (Brazil) “This film was to have been part of the Annecy 2020 selection. Unfortunately, this stop-motion documentary dedicated to the famous artist Angeli could not be completed on time due to the pandemic. We are so very happy to be able to present it to you this year.”

My Uncle José. Dir: Ducca Rios (Brazil) “A political and historical work made for young viewers. A beautiful example of the creativity that has courageously survived in Brazilian animation through these very tough times.”

City of Lost Things. Dir: Chih-Yen Yee (Taiwan) “This work entices us into a city awash with plastic bags and other discarded items. What we have here is an original piece, with a strong musical underpinning.” ◆

For up to date info, visit annecy.org.

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Event: Annecy My Sunny Maad

Lamya’s Poem

Josee, the Tiger and the Fish

The Deer King Cryptozoo

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Alex Player

50/50 Heroes

The McFire Family

Press Start!

Exploring New Horizons Venturing into new territories, Cyber Group Studios introduces a slate of hot new shows to the market.

F

or the past few years, Paris-based animation powerhouse Cyber Group Studios has used the Annecy market as an effective launching pad for some of its new shows in the pipeline. The complications from the COVID pandemic and its global restrictions have not kept the company’s CEO and co-founder Pierre Sissmann from moving full steam ahead with a strong collection of dynamic new IPs in various stages of development and production.

Sissmann is quite excited about the company’s brand-new 15,000 square feet studio located in Roubaix in Northern France, which houses an Unreal Engine-powered real-time rendering and motion capture

studio. The company which has been selected as an Epic MegaGrant recipient by Epic Games, which helps the studio explore new possibilities in the world of immersive entertainment.

The MegaGrant also helped launch a new show titled Giganto Club, an original scripted animated series that will expand on the success of the company’s children’s animated series Gigantosaurus, a blockbuster series that has already been greenlit for a second and third season by Disney and France Télévisions. The 52 x 11-minute series Giganto Club is animated using motion capture driven by Xsens technology and powered by Unreal Engine. Cyber Group Studios will also use the new technology in producing

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TV/Streaming

Pierre Sissmann

upcoming shows Monster in My Pocket, Alex Player and Digital Girl.

“This technology has really revolutionized the way we produce animation,” says Sissmann. “We work with live actors and Unreal technology. We still need animation directors and animators, but we lose the storyboard and layout stage. It’s a different process, which is not necessarily cheaper, but it gives us a much higher quality of animation at a faster pace. The quality is unbelievable and very close to feature animation. You can really get realistic emotions on the faces of the characters.”

Another advantage is how Unreal can speed up the dubbing process. As Sissmann explains, “Our engineers at the studio have added a new layer to the tool, where you can shoot the project in the first language of your choice, and then, you can have all the other languages generated automatically. The lips will automatically adjust to Italian, Spanish, Zulu — any language of your choice.”

Sissmann points out that Cyber Group Studios has always put a big emphasis on developing new technologies that help them improve the quality of the shows they make for family audiences. “You can say that we have always been a tech geek company,” he mentions. “When we were producing Zorro: The Chronicles, we decided to have 50 different horses incorporated in the show. We had full CG-animated grass created for our preschool show Zou more than 10 years ago. To make a great show, you need to have good scripts, great images and music, and we were always in search of improving all three elements.”

Sissmann says he’s also quite pleased with the team that he has put together at the studio. Earlier this year, former Disney and Universal executive Karen Miller joined the company as President and CEO of its U.S. office. Also on board is Merritt Farren as General Counsel and COO of the L.A. unit.

“Our goal is to attract the top talent in the industry and to provide enough work for them to stay with us,” says Sissmann. “We’re trying to build what you’d call a center of excellence, where we find the best people for cartoon comedy, give them enough work and keep them happy and retain this talent.

So, for example, we recently got Scott Kraft, who was the showrunner for PAW Patrol, to come work on our new show Press Start!, which is based on a bestselling Scholastic book. Right now, thanks to the growth of all the streaming platforms, there is a tailwind in our industry. So, we’re hoping to use this to expand our slate and continue to produce preschool, co-viewing and bridge shows, and even explore properties for teens and adults in the future. It’s all about fostering talent and creativity.” ◆

Taffy

Hot Toon Slate

Here’s a quick snapshot of what’s new at Cyber Group Studios:

The McFire Family

This fun 52 x 11’ preschool show centers on the adventures of young siblings Jax, Sparkle and Tom McFire, who join their mom and dad on daring rescue missions, using high-tech tools and cool vehicles. Sissmann says he came up with the idea for the show after his grandson asked him about Spider-Man and real life heroes like doctors, nurses and firemen. “It’s one of the most beautiful-looking shows we have ever done,” says Sissmann, who co-created the show with VP of development Ira Singerman. Jacqueline Moody (Gigantosaurus) is attached as writer.

50/50 Heroes This entertaining CG-animated children’s show (52 x 11’) centers on a Mo and Sam, half-brother and sister, who discover that their greatgreat-great-grandmother once had a fling with a superhero, and as a result, they have inherited some sort of superheroic half-power. This original graphic universe was created by members of STEAK Collective.

Press Start!

Sunny and Rue Zaki’s normal life becomes quite epic and exciting when the siblings enter the world of their favorite video game series Super Rabbit Boy. Based on Scholastic’s best-selling books by Thomas Flintham, this promising new 52 x 11’ preschool show is developed by Emmy-winning writer and showrunner Scott Kraft (PAW Patrol), who will also exec produce the series.

Alex Player Billed as the first series based on esports, this 26 x 22’ series follows the high-energy adventures of a young boy named Alex who discovers the ultra-competitive world of esports when he moves to a new school. With his team of underdog friends Mike, Camilla and Amy, he sets out to become a pro-gamer, learning lessons about courage, perseverance and team spirit along the way. ◆

For more info, visit cybergroupstudios.com.

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The New Rugrats Are Here!

The series’ showrunners tell us about the joys and trials of revisiting Chuckie, Tommy, Susie, Angelica and the rest of the gang in CG.

T

hat sound you’ve been hearing is the collective cheers of the children of the 1990s who are celebrating the return of Tommy, Chuckie, Susie, Angelica and the rest of the Rugrats clan to the small screen. The folks at Nickelodeon and Paramount+ unleashed the reboot of the hugely popular Rugrats series in late May in hopes of introducing the franchise to a new generation of fans.

The show, which originally debuted in the summer of 1991, was created by Arlene Klasky and Gábor Csupó (of the famous Klasky Csupo studio) and Paul Germain (Recess, Lloyd in Space). Thirty years later, the iconic babies and their families’ adventures are CG-animated and they have to deal with social media and all the trappings of life in the 2020s!

The 2021 show voice cast includes E.G. Daily (Tommy), Nancy Cartwright (Chuckie), Kath Soucie (Phil and Lil DeVille), Cheryl Chase (Angelica), Cree Summer (Susie), Tommy Dewey (Stu), Ashley Rae Spillers (Didi), Anna Chlumsky (Charlotte), Timothy Simons (Drew), Natalie Morales (Betty), Tony Hale (Chas), Michael McKean (Lou), Nicole Byer (Lucy) and Omar Benson Miller (Randy).

For Rugrats exec producers Eryk Casemiro and Kate Boutilier, who also worked on the original version three decades ago, the series has been a sweet homecoming. “Writing dialogue for characters that we wrote for some 25 odd years ago felt

like getting a hug from an old friend,” says Casemiro, who is also Nickelodeon’s senior VP of preschool programming. “To have the original voices who played the babies come back to play them again was incredibly heartwarming for us.”

“It was truly goose-bump inducing to see and hear Tommy Pickles again,” adds Boutilier, whose many credits also include The Wild Thornberrys, As Told by Ginger, The Mr. Men Show, Olivia and Poppy Cat. “We know the fan base is

super strong, and like them, we all have indelible memories of the show and these characters.

We hope they like the new series, too.”

Just Like Old Times Casemiro and Boutilier began working on the reboot in early 2019. “We actually met on the show back in the day and we’ve had a long career together,” reminisces Casemiro (Duckman, Rocket Power, As Told by Ginger, Rugrats: All Grown Up!, The

‘The translation to CG was quite tricky because one move to the left, and the show would be too cute.’

— Exec producer Eryk Casemiro

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TV/Streaming Wild Thornberrys). “When we started planning the show, we didn’t even know it was going to be a CG iteration. It was simply exciting for us to be able to have these characters to play with again.”

Casemiro points out that the show’s original creators were also on board to offer their input and suggestions. “Arlene and Gábor were the architects behind the series, and we had their input along the way. They gave us a little bit of oxygen, too, to take our own spin on the characters and to re-imagine them for a new era.”

The show’s beloved characters were updated to fit the needs and social framework of audiences in 2021. “Because the original is nearly 30 years old, some of the social satire that worked back then doesn’t feel right today,” explains Casemiro. “For example, in the old show Charlotte Pickles was portrayed as this female executive who was always on this bulky, brick-sized cellphone, and that needed adjusting. Grandpa Lou is now a veteran of Woodstock instead of World War II. We also revisited the relationships between the adults and made connections that weren’t clear in the original.”

Boutilier says the show creators knew that modern-day millennials who grew up with the show would be in their 30s. “We did the math of how old the new parents would be,” she notes. “We also changed what their friendships would be like.

Everything had to be plunked in today’s world.”

Keeping Up with the Times

There were a few course corrections, too. They made the Susie character slightly younger so that she could no longer talk to adults and spoil Angelica’s plots. That gave the writers more freedom with the plot developments and kept Susie part of the core group of babies.

“We had a lot of fun weaving in new technologies into the show as well,” says Boutilier. “We had to imagine how babies react to a smart speaker or respond to a tablet when their grandparents show up on a video call.”

There’s also more diversity in the cast of characters. The Betty character (Phil and Lil’s mother) is now a Latina and is part of the Carmichaels’ main group of friends. Charlotte’s exec assistant Jonathan is now a Latinx character who plays a much bigger role in the show. Grandpa Lou also has a wider, more diverse group of friends that he interacts with throughout the series.

The series’ transition from 2D to CG animation had its own share of trials and challenges. According to the exec producers, it wasn’t easy to translate the wacky, distinctive “ugly cute” character design and animation to the more rigid CG universe.

“The translation was quite tricky because one move to the left, and the show would be too cute,” notes Casemiro. “We didn’t want to just interpret the show in CG. We had to deliberately measure

Back to the ‘90s: The new CG-animated Rugrats brings back all of the iconic characters, including Tommy Pickles, Chuckie Finster, Angelica Pickles, Susie Carmichael and Phil and Lil DeVille, as well as some new players.

‘It’s a co-viewing show, so we hope that adults love the grown-up characters and kids love the core friendship of the babies. Older kids like how much the babies get away with.’

— Exec producer Kate Boutilier

the original designs and made sure we had the right version in CG. Arlene and Gábor went back to the archives and looked at the original character designs to get all the details — which included the asymmetry of the eye sockets — just right. “ The producers point out that they incorporated a very deliberate art direction so that everything, from the giant heads to the little pieces of food stuck in the carpet, feel perfect in this new CG Rugrats world. “Everything is still lumpy, but things are in CG,” adds Boutilier. “The color palette is still unusual, and the sets, the props, the colors of the sky, everything retains that special feeling — they’re fresh and updated in CG, but they feel familiar at the same time.”

Lighting also plays an important part in this new world. As Casemiro explains, “CG opened up a lot of possibilities in the lighting area. Our exec producer Casey Leonard (Breadwinners) and the directors helped create this new lighting schematic where the kids’ world is more shadowy because they’re closer to the ground, while the adults are lit differently because they’re higher up. This creates a special mood that is very different from other shows.”

Boutilier also explains that the lighting and CG animation also pushed the fantasy segments to a higher level. “You can really step inside the kids’ fantasies when they’re in the background, whether they’re inside a glowing cave of treasures or traveling in space,” she notes. “Between the lighting and the set designs, we think these set pieces are pretty vivid and spectacular.”

About 50 people worked on the first season (26 x half-hour) of the new show. “We have a small group of writers created for ideation in-house and used a pool of about 18 freelancers, some of which were original Rugrats writers, as well as some that

were fans of the original show,” says Casemiro. “We were able to use a diverse writing pool. The front end of the animation was produced at Nickelodeon in Burbank. A lot of the original asset designs were done in house, and Technicolor and Xentrix in India helped out with the rest of the animation production. It takes us about 18 months to produce an episode from start to finish.”

Now that they are ready to release their new baby into the streaming wild (the show premieres on Paramount+ and airs on Nickelodeon later), the two talented showrunners are hoping that fans will embrace the new take on their beloved characters. “I hope it does what the original did,” says Boutilier. “It’s a co-viewing show, so we hope that adults love the grown-up characters and kids love the core friendship of the babies. Older kids like how much the babies get away with and the funny way they speak. We hope the show crosses overboard and entertains different audiences.”

Casemiro adds, “When the show first came out, it was very novel to see the world through babies’ eyes. Every one of those characters was an archetype that audiences could relate to. Angelica was the big sister at home, Tommy was a hero, Chuckie was the scared one … This was one of the first shows about the original modern family, with everyone interacting and the kids being each other’s best friends.”

“The whole setup was that these characters were babies, but they were pondering life’s big questions, just like a kid who was watching the show might be wondering about the same things,” adds Boutilier.

“We hope to continue that tradition.” ◆ The Rugrats premiered on Paramount+ on May 27. The show will also air on Nickelodeon later this year.

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Pets With Issues Show-runners/co-creators Gabrielle Allan and Jennifer Crittenden take us behind the scenes of Fox’s hot new show HouseBroken.

I

f you enjoy Fox’s latest primetime animated series HouseBroken, you need to thank exec producer and co-creator Clea DuVall’s very hard-to-please pet cat. As she explained during a summer press event, “I have a cat who I have a very complicated relationship with, who just seems permanently dissatisfied, and I wanted more than anything to be able to go to a counselor together [and figure out how] I could finally make her happy. Then, I just started thinking that would just be such a great idea for a show, getting at what animals’ interior lives are really like.”

Fortunately, DuVall talked about her show idea with exec producers/co-creators Gabrielle Allan (Veep, Scrubs) and Jennifer Crittenden (Everybody Loves Raymond, Seinfeld, The Simpsons) after a table read when the three were working on HBO comedy Veep. “Jen and I are both pet lovers and pet owners, so we thought centering a show on animals in group therapy would be a great idea,” says Allan. “We also love therapy, and thought it would be a good way to tackle human issues in a fun and palatable way for everyone.”

A Poodle in Her Prime The result of their collaboration is a new animated series which centers on Honey (Lisa Kudrow), a standard poodle who runs group therapy sessions to help animals from her neighborhood

manage neuroses brought on by their owners and each other. The show’s super hip voice cast includes Nat Faxon as a sloppy St. Bernard, Will Forte as a sex-positive tortoise, Sharon Horgan as an aging Persian cat, Jason Mantzoukas as a

‘I am very happy that we were able to include silly fun and animal humor as well as the therapeutic and psychological aspects of the characters. We were able to walk that line and explore the issues that were projected on these animals.’

— Exec producer and co-creator Gabrielle Allan

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TV/Streaming Neurotic Animals: Created by Jennifer Crittenden, Clea DuVall and Gabrielle Allan, HouseBroken has expanded Fox's “Animation Domination” lineup to Monday nights.

nice spot between including silly fun and animal humor as well as the therapeutic and psychological aspects of the characters. We were able to walk that line and explore the issues that were projected on these animals. But, we also love a great fart joke. Hopefully, we found a great balance there. Plus, we think the show also has heart.”

The showrunners also praise the work of supervising director Mark Kirkland, a threetime Emmy-winning veteran of The Simpsons.

“Mark brought such a great aesthetic to the show,” says Crittenden. “Although the visuals are unique, they are a little familiar and they’re not shockingly weird. We love the way our show looks. The characters are instantly funny, and they owe a lot to the great animators, designers and directors.” The series’ directors are Amber Hollinger, Mike Morris, Jackson Turcotte, Jake Hollander and Eric Koenig.

Pets That Can Land Jokes

‘I hope audiences will relate to the animals as well as the pet owners. I mean we have both human and pet issues.’

— Exec producer and co-creator Jennifer Crittenden

street-smart cat, Sam Richardson as a co-dependent cat, Tony Hale as a sweater-wearing terrier with OCD, and DuVall as a know-it-all corgi.

“We had so many ideas for the show, so we had to trim it down for our pilot,” says Crittenden. “But we added the animals as we went along. We have a wild raccoon (Ken Simon) that comes in and joins in the group. There’s even a sinister parrot who hates Honey.”

The showrunners pitched the idea to Fox back in 2018, and they put together a team of 10 writers to work on the show in the February of 2020. “We all got to meet each other and work for a month at the studio, and then, after that, we all took it to Zoom because of COVID,” notes Crittenden. “Back then everything was so weird and scary in the outside world that our work was a safe place for all of us, where we could go and laugh and keep our jobs.”

It took them about 18 months to lock in the first episode. “We all learned to be very nimble due to the pandemic and it wasn’t always as smooth,” recalls Crittenden. “I worked on The Simpsons for two seasons, but that was mainly the writing. We didn’t deal with the post-production work. I learned a lot on this show. Joel [Kuwahara], our exec producer at Bento Box,

has guided and mentored us throughout the whole process, and we’ve learned a lot about all the details of putting together an animated show.” Saerom Animation in Seoul and Synergy Animation in Shanghai worked on the animation as well as Bento Box. Allan also points out that she and Crittenden were amazed at the caliber of talent they were able to attract for their show. “The people we got are so good at it, and they all seem to be really enjoying it too,” she notes. “You could never get all of them in a live-action show, it’s because this is an animated show and our schedule is very flexible for the actors.”

Crittenden says she is very proud of what her writing staff was able to do this first season. “One of the great things about working in animation is that you can keep rewriting and making the jokes better, add more twists to the storyline, and our writers were able to elevate the episode every time they did a rewrite. I was so happy to work with such great writers. We were also blessed with amazing directors who were hugely collaborative and each had their own special take on the show.”

Adds Allan, “Yes, I’m proud of them, too. I am also very happy that we were able to find a

Allan admits that the show’s tight schedule could be challenging at times. “When you work on a live-action show, if you don’t have the shot, you work with what you have. But in an animated show, you can always go back and do it over again. So, in a way, it becomes more challenging. The production never ends. For live action, you work six grueling months and then you get some time off, but on this show, we worked 18 straight months with no breaks. But, it gets easier and easier the more episodes you do. Also, animating animals and making sure they can land jokes with the right expressions is more difficult than animating people. I think we found it, but it took a little while.”

When asked about animation influences, Crittenden mentions The Simpsons and the classic Rankin/Bass Christmas specials, while Allan also points to the Saturday morning cartoons of her childhood such as Super Friends and ScoobyDoo cartoons as all-time favorites. “They used to be my babysitters when the rest of the family was asleep on Saturday mornings,” she recalls.

As they get ready to see how fans react to their neurotic pets, the talented duo have high hopes for the future. “I hope audiences will relate to the animals as well as pet owners. I mean we tackle topics like aging and intimacy issues. We have human issues and pet issues,” says Allan.

Crittenden adds, “I just hope people laugh at all the stuff we always think about our pets, and I hope they’ll connect with these characters.” ◆ HouseBroken premiered May 31, new episodes debut Mondays at 9 p.m. on Fox.

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Socially Responsible: Chris Nee’s new anthology series We the People uses music and animation to inform younger viewers about civic issues.

Segments are directed by the likes of Peter Ramsey, Trisha Gum, Tim Rauch, Jorge Gutierrez, Daron Nefcy and Everett Downing.

A Dynamic Force for Positive Change Award-winning creator Chris Nee talks about Ridley Jones, We the People and Aida Twist, Scientist, three of her amazing shows for Netflix.

W

e all knew that great things were going to happen when Doc McStuffins creator Chris Nee inked an overall deal with Netflix back in November 2018. This summer, we’ll get to see the first of many projects that the Emmy, Peabody and Humanitas Prizewinning kids’ entertainment icon has been developing, producing and overseeing at the streamer when Ridley Jones premieres in early July.

The show, which is produced in collaboration with 9 Story Media Group’s Brown Bag Films in Ireland, is an action-adventure preschool targeting series which centers a fearless six-year-old girl named Ridley Jones who is a protector of a natural science museum, along with her mom and grandmother. Of course, the animals and creatures on display come to life after the visitors leave the building!

“I have to say that I’m really proud of Ridley Jones, because I applied everything that I learned from doing Doc McStuffins and Vampirina through the years,” says the talented creative. “It’s a project that I made 100 percent for myself. This is the kind of show that I would have loved to watch as a young girl, as it has messages about female empowerment, the importance of community and how we live together and take care of each other

despite our differences. I can’t wait for audiences to meet Ridley, who is a smart, bold, adventureseeking girl who is also a great caretaker of the other characters.”

Interestingly enough, Ridley Jones was the last idea she pitched to Netflix. “This pitch was just sitting in the car, since I had a lot of ideas for things that I wanted to do after Vampirina,” admits Nee. “My mom worked at the Museum of Natural History as a docent and my son and I could go and visit her. She would give us a tour of the place when it was empty. We would all sit on the floor, and she would make the artwork feel real.”

Living in Harmony Nee says the unique setting also allowed her to address how we can bring different communities together, for example, one storyline looks at what would happen if the elephants wanted to have a dance party, which would be really hard on the ancient pottery exhibit. “Plotlines like that help us talk about how to bring together different communities that might have different needs, which is something we really need to do in our current political climate,” she explains.

The creative team wanted to portray the museum as a bright, colorful place, full of light and

excitement, so they used the Children’s Museum in Indianapolis as a source of inspiration. “We have five main characters which belong to different parts of the museum, and the designers and animators really nailed the look and feel of the backgrounds as well as Ridley and all her friends,” notes Nee. “The CG animation really captures the details of fur on the bison, the feathers on the birds, everything looks really fantastic in great detail.”

The acclaimed children’s show creator says she loves to surround herself with a group of trusted collaborators. Having worked with the Dublinbased Brown Bag team on her previous shows, Nee welcomed teaming up with them. “They do such amazing work, and we have a short-hand way of communicating about our projects now,” says Nee. “I am really happy to have Chris Dimond and Michael Kooman, who did the music for Vampirina, as well. I really have the best of the best people working with me on this show.”

Animation Super Stars and Civics Nee is also spearheading We the People, another fantastic project that is by far one of the most interesting and bold animated undertakings of the year. It’s a collection of 10 three-minute music videos that aims to educate younger viewers

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TV/Streaming Exhibiting Excellence: Chris Nee’s new show Ridley Jones follows a smart young girl who is the protector of the museum she calls home.

that kids are going to find it first, and then it can be used to teach civics at schools as part of the core curriculum. We’re especially pleased to have Amanda Gorman featured in one of the videos, because she is the perfect spokesperson for that generation we are trying to reach — kids who have watched us screw everything so much. We want to tell them it’s important to double down, re-engage in politics. This is your country!”

Scientific American

‘I care about the work, but I’m also thrilled that I can help grow and train the next generation of storytellers for kids. That I can find and empower voices that haven’t had the chance to be included.’

— Show creator Chris Nee

about civic lessons. Top-notch animation directors such as Peter Ramsey (Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse), Trisha Gum (The LEGO Batman Movie), Jorge Gutierrez (Maya and the Three, The Book of Life), Daron Nefcy (Star vs. the Forces of Evil) and Everett Downing, Jr. (Hair Love) tackle topics such as active citizenship, the Bill of Rights, immigration and the First Amendment. Nee also tapped amazing musical artists such as H.E.R., Adam Lambert, Cordae, Lin Manuel-Miranda, Brittany Howard, Brandi Carlile, Andra Day, Janelle Monáe and poet Amanda Gorman to create the soundtrack to these short animated gems.

“I was feeling that our country was in such a divided space and many people have developed this fear for politics,” says Nee. “I felt like we needed to introduce a common language, where we can all feel this bond as Americans. Civics is not partisan. In 2015, I felt like we needed something like Schoolhouse Rock, which was a work of genius.”

Nee says she started pitching the idea for this project back in 2016, but it was a hard sell. “Nobody was that interested in doing a show about civics,” she recalls. “They would say, ‘Yeah, but we really like that other show with the singing and dancing characters!’ I happened to be talking to Kenya Barris (black-ish) about this idea, and we met early on when I started at Netflix and decided to team up to make this happen!”

The third addition to the team was none other than former President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle. “Working with the Obamas was extraordinary,” says Nee. “Mr. Obama was so much more hands-on than I thought he would

be. We figured out what the 10 topics for the shorts were going to be. We then decided to age the target audience to be about 14 and 18 — the generation who is just beginning to understand the state of the world around them, and maybe is overwhelmed by it all. Our exciting challenge was, how do we tell this generation to get involved socially and politically?”

To make this project even more iconic, Nee aimed for 10 different animation directors and 10 different styles and pipelines. “We went for 50 percent men and women, with people of color and LGBTQ artists represented. This wasn’t going to be the ‘dead white men’s’ point of view.

This was ‘we the people.’ Eight of the 10 directors were established and renowned animation directors, and for the other two, we went with up and coming talent who were in the beginning of their journeys.”

The new helmers Victoria Vincent and Mabel Ye were quite surprised when Nee reached out to them to offer them this amazing opportunity to be part of the show. “When I called Mabel, who is a 20-year-old student, to tell her that we’re offering her the same job as Peter Ramsey, she was still living in her dorm room,” Nee recalls. “She asked me, ‘But what about my senior thesis project?’ and I assured her that since I was a professor at her school [CalArts], she didn’t need to worry about that!”

The show’s animation production was split between the artists at Titmouse and Buck studios. “It was one of the most challenging things that I had done, but it’s something that I’m the most proud of as well,” says Nee. “The hope is

Before we let Nee go back to her super busy schedule, we had to ask her to give us the details of her third new project of 2021: Aida Twist, Scientist. “I’m really excited about this show, which is based on the book series

by Andrea Beaty and David Roberts about an eight-year-old, smart, Black girl scientist who wants to discover the truth about everything. Her friends are a boy who wants to be an architect and a girl who is an engineer. It’s a celebration of both science and scientific thinking. We partnered with the Obama team and our showrunner/co-exec producer is Kerri Grant (Doc McStuffins). Exec producers are Mark Burton (Tallulah), Tonia Davis and Priya Swaminathan (Crip Camp, Becoming) and Beaty and Roberts. Brown Bag is doing the animation, which is gorgeous. They nailed the illustrations’ gorgeous sensibility and translated it to a stylized 3D space. That’s why it doesn’t look like any other show.”

Looking back at her insanely productive last couple of years, Nee is both grateful and optimistic about the power of children’s entertainment. “It wasn’t easy to leave Disney, but what Netflix did was tell me that they believed in me 100 percent. I care about the work, and I am also thrilled that I can help grow and train the next generation of storytellers for kids. That I can find and empower voices that haven’t had the chance to be included. That’s how we put together the all-Native American writing staff for Karissa Valencia’s upcoming new show Spirit Rangers. She is 100 percent the showrunner on that show, but I’m there to help and to advise her if she needs me.”

The brilliant woman behind Doc McStuffins, one of the most popular and trailblazing preschool shows of the past decade, says she’s grateful to be able to spotlight new visionary voices. “I know that the last few years have been difficult in so many ways. I’m just happy that I get to work every day to solve the problems and make those changes. That is a real privilege.” ◆ Ridley Jones and We the People premiere on Netflix in early July.

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TV/Streaming

Desirable Mutations How the creators of Star Wars: The Bad Batch expanded the ever-popular franchise in a fascinating new direction.

By Tom McLean

I

f you needed proof that the galaxy far, far away is a fully yielded universe capable of delivering a seemingly endless variety of exciting tales, then look no further than Star Wars: The Bad Batch, the new animated successor series to Star Wars: The Clone Wars now streaming on Disney+.

Created and executive produced by Star Wars animation guru Dave Filoni, Star Wars: The Bad Batch starts after the end of The Clone Wars series, during the events of the 2005’s Star Wars: Episode III — Revenge of the Sith. Emperor Palpatine has seized total control of the Republic and issued Order 66, prompting the vast clone army to turn against and execute their Jedi allies.

But the elite members of Clone Force 99, nicknamed “The Bad Batch,” are unaffected — the genetic modifications that gave Hunter, Wrecker, Tech, Crosshair and Echo heightened talents also make them immune to Order 66.

Their loyalties to the Republic intact, they’re forced to rebel against the Empire and go their own way as a group — one that now includes another altered clone, a sharp but shel-

tered girl from Kamino named Omega, voiced

by Michelle Ang.

Turbulent Days

That approach extended to the character designs, with the clone troopers in particular having their individuality diminished.

Executive producer and head writer Jennifer Corbett says the show reflects that evolution in all aspects of storytelling. “It’s the very early stages of the Empire,” she says. “There are some systems and some planets that are happy that the Empire ended the war and are just glad that there’s peace after so many years of fighting. And then there are some insurgents that are unhappy about Emperor Palpatine having all this power and having this clone army at his disposal. So there’s just kind of a lot of turmoil going on.”

While the show’s visuals are clearly inspired

by The Clone Wars, they also reflect the shift in premise to the Empire era of Star Wars, says Brad Rau, executive producer and supervising director. “You take a Republic tank, for example, that you think: ‘Oh, this is the good guys’ tank! Cool!’ And suddenly you give it this Imperial wash of color, it takes on a whole different aspect,” Rau says.

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TV/Streaming “We started to take out the color off of their pauldrons and off of their helmets that made them individual,” Rau says. They also refer to the troops less frequently with names, and increased the distortion in the filtered dialog from their helmet comms. “We’re trying to show that these are the bad guys. All of their equipment has been stripped of color — the lifeblood is drained out of it, and it’s now this insidious, Imperial, boring gray. When you see that, it’s really interesting.”

Music also helps this division, with composer Kevin Kiner tweaking the familiar cues and motifs with a different instrument or mixing it up in some other way. “It starts to seem a little bit more villainous,” says Rau. ”If we’re doing our job right, you won’t even think about it.”

The Wild Bunch First introduced in the final season of The Clone Wars, the Bad Batch members are a diverse bunch. Hunter’s talents include leadership and an ability to sense droids; Crosshair’s enhanced vision makes him an excellent sniper; Tech is the resident brain, with an affinity for handling technology; Wrecker has enhanced strength; and cyborg clone Echo has numerous abilities. Each member’s unique traits affect their looks, which makes it easier to differentiate the characters visually, Rau says. “It can be

a tricky thing,” he says. ”Wrecker’s a bigger guy than a regular clone, and Tech is slightly smaller, and they all look a little different because they are different than regular clones.”

It’s a task that was even trickier for actor Dee Bradley Baker, who voices all five members of the Batch. Rau says they thought it might be best to record all of one character’s lines at a time, but Baker preferred to play entire scenes, switching voices as he goes. “It’s really something to see,” says Rau. “He fully embodies those guys and that really helps keep them more distinct as well.”

The wild card in all this is Omega, a clone girl who appears to be 10 years old. ”In the early stages, we were talking about what could throw these elite soldiers off their game because they’ve already been established as competent warriors,” says Corbett. Raised in a solitary life on Kamino, home of the alien cloners behind the troops, Omega is a huge fan of the Bad Batch and thrilled to learn of her connection to them. “She doesn’t feel like so much of a misfit now that they’re around, which to [the Batch] is very strange, because they don’t know her. But they’re used to being misfits and oddballs, so it’s nice when they come together and they form this little family dynamic.”

Lucasfilm Animation continued its longstanding working relationship with Taipei-

‘I think what it really comes down to is you have these clones who were created and raised to be nothing but soldiers.

What does that say about them and their identity when you take that away from them?’

— Exec producer and head writer Jennifer Corbett

One-Man Band: Dee Bradley Baker stars as the squad of elite clone troopers with genetic mutations in Star Wars: The Bad Batch, which premiered on Disney+ last month.

based animation studio CGCG to update and refine The Clone Wars aesthetic for The Bad Batch. “We did take the opportunity to go into the design and put in more fidelity, to take that chiseled Clone Wars look and get a little bit more detail with the same style,” says Rau. “Even though the look is similar to what we’ve done on Clone Wars, we always say it’s kind of like a 2.0,” says executive producer Athena Portillo.

After seven seasons of The Clone Wars, Rau says he and Corbett worked on creating action sequences that feel fresh. “It works best when the stakes are clear, when things are set up in the right way and you feel concerned about what’s happening to the characters,” says Rau. “We talk about it every day, we pick things apart all the time. Even when a script is ’locked’ and we go into shooting it, it’s all very malleable still and we’re just trying to find what’s the best shot selection for this action or for this character beat.”

Corbett adds: “We’ve always been trying to make sure that they’re grounded because even though they have these enhancements, they’re not super soldiers, they’re not superheroes.”

An Epic Canvas The Bad Batch also offers the production the challenge of a broader canvas than what was featured on the previous series, Star Wars: Resistance.

“It’s thinking way ahead in terms of how we’re going to build those sets. How many characters we’re going to introduce, what species are they? If there is going to be a droid, is it humanoid? Is it bipedal? We have a lot more real estate to work with,” Portillo says.

One episode takes about a year to produce, from start to finish, with multiple episodes in production at the same time, Rau says. The partnership with CGCG has been especially important during the COVID-19 pandemic.

“They’re literally collaborative partners, and help figure out and solve problems all along the way,” says Rau. And it wouldn’t be Star Wars without a plan for where the series — currently set for 16 episodes in its debut season — will take its cast. “I think what it really comes down to is you have these clones who were created and raised to be nothing but soldiers. And what does that say about them and their identity when you take that away from them?” says Corbett. “It’s this team, with Omega, exploring the galaxy, asking these big questions of how are we going to survive the day-to-day, but also what’s their purpose in this new galaxy?” ◆ The first season of Star Wars: The Bad Batch is currently streaming on Disney+.

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TV/Streaming Technical Difficulties: The “Automated Customer Service” episode of Love, Death + Robots was directed by Meat Dept. and produced by Atoll Studio.

Sophisticated Snapshots The second season of Netflix’s adult animation anthology Love Death + Robots delivers eight futuristic, animated gems.

By Trevor Hogg

L

ast month, adult animation fans celebrated the arrival of Season 2 of Netflix’s muchheralded anthology series Love Death + Robots. Created by Tim Miller (Deadpool) and exec producer David Fincher (The Social Network, Mank), the sophomore season of the five-time Emmy-winning series also features the talents of supervising director Jennifer Yuh Nelson (Kung Fu Panda 2). This year’s eight shorts range from a comical depiction of robot assistants in an assisted living community in Automated Customer Service to a look at the ethical consequences of population control through systematic extermination in Pop Squad.

“Love Death + Robots is an anthology of animated short stories done by studios around the world,” notes Jerome Denjean (League of Gods), who returns as the production’s visual effects supervisor. “I have been working at Blur Studio for 19 years and have done a lot of game cinematics, commercials and visual effects; however, Love Death + Robots is unique in that it showcases the work of not only Blur Studio but also a lot of companies that used to be our competitors.”

He believes the anthology offers the perfect opportunity for younger studios to showcase something audiences would normally not see

from bigger animation houses working on family features. “We had around 13 studios from nine countries work on Season 1,” he notes. “This time we have returning companies, like Passion Pictures, Unit Image or Axis Studios; but we’ve made new friends by working with Atoll Studio in France. We also have our first stop-motion animation short, All Through the House, which was made by Blink Industries in London.”

Talented Trio In regards to the approaches and attitudes of Fincher, Miller and Yuh Nelson, Denjean praises the trio for their relentless passion for the art form and the stories they’ve selected to tell. “All three are extremely curious people who are also passionate about all forms of animation,” he offers. “The mandate for this show has always been to show people the different ways animation can be used to tell great stories for adults.

I hate the term adult animation because people tend to think there’s going to be mostly nudity, crass humor or graphic violence. We want to tell stories that appeal to adults in the same way Tim’s or David’s films resonate more with adults.

Animation truly gives you endless possibilities in that regard, and the goal has always been to show as many facets to it as we can.”

The new season showcases contributions from Miller, Yuh Nelson, Alex Beaty, Robert Valley, Simon Otto, Meat Dept, Elliot Dear and Leon Berelle, Dominique Boidin, Remi Kozyra and Maxime Luere. “I was involved early on during pre-production, before most companies or directors were chosen,” reveals Denjean. “Tim Miller chooses all of the stories, supervises the writing of every script, and there is a lot of them by now. Each season starts as this enormous puzzle where we stand in front of a wall of possible stories, and have to match them with directors, companies and animation styles. It’s a lot more difficult than you would think!”

According to the VFX supe, every animation studio was free to use their own pipeline.

“Each one of them is working on a full episode and nobody needs to share assets, so as long as they deliver beautiful frames in the end, I certainly don’t want to get in the way of how they rendered them. We take care of the final sound and final coloring, but otherwise I only want to discuss visuals, regardless of how all these companies got there.”

Long-Distance Collaborations Along with having to come up with stories and animation styles that were going to sur-

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TV/Streaming

Future Shock: Directed by Jennifer Yuh Nelson, “Pop Squad” is set in a dystopian world where breeding has become forbidden.

‘The mandate for this show has always been to show people the different ways animation can be used to tell great stories for adults.’

— Production VFX supervisor Jerome Denjean

prise viewers, an unexpected complication arose when the COVID-19 pandemic occurred in the middle of the production. “In hindsight, COVID made it more difficult but also brought all the companies together,” observes Denjean.

“We shared ways to collaborate and work from home with each other, and Love Death + Robots quickly became this amazing project that we all had to learn how to work differently for. We are all proud of the way we were able to get through this together and have something beautiful to show to the world right as it’s starting to open back up.”

Extensive concept art, storyboards and story reels were created for all of the episodes.

“Some are done in house by team Love Death + Robots before they get passed on to the company working on the short,” explains Denjean.

“Some are done directly by the companies, depending on their bandwidth and resources.

It is a big collaboration project and one that we spend as much as possible making sure the running times of all the pieces align with what the season needs, and there is enough variety in terms of world building. There is a

lot of sets and a lot of characters in a single season of Love Death + Robots, so we want to make sure that nothing starts to look the same, even if it’s by accident.”

Each story had specific creative and technical challenges that needed to be addressed.

“Automated Customer Service was done by Atoll Studio in Paris, and they were a young studio that started specifically for Love Death + Robots,” remarks Denjean. “Atoll Studio probably had the toughest time of all; the lockdown happened right as they were starting a new studio and developing a brand-new pipeline using Blender. But overall, Atoll Studio did a fantastic job and the final quality is as high as that of any of the bigger studios. For Life Hutch, the main difficulty by far was matching Michael B. Jordan’s likeness and keeping a high level of photorealism throughout the entire short. Ice was considerably more difficult than Zima Blue in Season 1. There is a lot more characters and way more action. Passion Pictures always makes it look so effortless.”

Motion-capture sessions were conducted for the photorealistic animated characters in

Snow in the Desert, Pop Squad and The Drowned Giant. “COVID was by far the biggest challenge we all had to face, and had the lockdown happened a couple weeks earlier we would have missed the opportunity to do the motioncapture shoots for a couple episodes, which would have delayed some teams by months,” states Denjean. “Tim Miller originally wanted The Drowned Giant to be a live-action short story with a CG giant, but by the time we were ready the entire planet was on lockdown. We couldn’t shoot it anywhere in the world, so we switched gears completely and decided to do it all CG instead. It still turned out beautifully.”

Denjean says choosing a favorite scene or shot from the season is not an easy matter. “People always ask me which episode is my favorite and it’s like choosing one of your kids,” reflects Denjean. “I truly love them all. On a more personal level, I’m looking forward to people seeing Jennifer Yuh Nelson’s short called Pop Squad. It’s a science fiction story that deals with a difficult subject, and I originally thought people might be turned off by it. But she created such a beautiful world and directed Pop Squad with such grace, that it really turned into something you’ve never seen done before in animation. I tear up every time I watch it.” ◆ Love Death + Robots Volume 2 is currently streaming on Netflix worldwide.

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Studio Spotlight

Modern Classics: In the past half a century, Nelvana has produced numerous award-winning series and specials, including (clockwise from top) Franklin, The Most Magnificent Thing, Ranger Rob and Max & Ruby.

Northern Star Nelvana celebrates 50 years of producing memorable animation content.

I

f you’re an animation fan, the image of a polar bear eying the North Star will immediately remind you of the famous logo of Canadian animation studio Nelvana, which is celebrating its 50th anniversary this July. Founded by Michael Hirsh, Patrick Loubert and Clive A. Smith, the studio is best known for a long string of animated TV series and features, many based on popular children’s books, which have entertained global audiences for five decades.

The list of quality animated hits from the studio is quite dazzling: Babar, Clifford the Big Red Dog, Rupert, Franklin, Rolie Polie Olie, Bob and Margaret, Donkey Kong Country, The Fairly OddParents, Cyberchase, Max & Ruby, Clone High, 6Teen, The Backyardigans, Beyblade, Mike the Knight, Bravest Warriors and Esme & Roy are just a few of the many outstanding titles Nelvana has produced through the years. And the studio, which is a subsidiary of Canada’s Corus Entertainment, is showing no signs of slowing down.

According to Nelvana president Pam Westman, who joined the com-

pany five years ago, the studio has been experiencing a highly productive period. “With a focus on improving our development slate, expanding our studio’s capabilities and maximizing the value of our vast catalogue, Nelvana has established an impressive portfolio of content bolstering our animation expertise and attracting some of the world’s Pam Westman best content production partners.”

She mentions the 2020 Emmy awarded to the studio’s in-house cloud-based VFX project management system Nelnet, the partnerships with Sesame Workshop on the show Esme & Roy, with Mattel on Thomas & Friends: All Engines Go!, with Nickelodeon on Ollie’s Pack and the upcoming ZJ Sparkleton and The Hamster Show, and hot titles such as The Dog & Pony Show, Agent Binky: Pets of the Universe and the recently announced Super Wish show.

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Studio Spotlight Exploring New Frontiers

“We are expanding into new formats of content including digital-first shorts, with shows such as Miss Persona and Toon Bops, making it a priority to be where kids are consuming content, and feature films,” Westman notes. “We also produced our first-ever short film, The Most Magnificent Thing, which won 27 awards. The short kick-started our program to produce more short films in the future and allowed our team to push our studio’s capabilities both technically and creatively, translating key learnings to our other 3D animations such as Agent Binky.”

Among the Toronto-based studio’s priorities in 2021 is continuing its production of live-action series such as The Hardy Boys, which premiered on Hulu in the U.S. last year and has performed very well for Canada’s YTV as well. The studio is also expanding into theatrical films – having recently announced a partnership with Duncan Studios. “Ken Duncan actually started his career at Nelvana, which helps make this the perfect partnership,” says Westman. “We already have two movies in the works, including This Was Our Pact, produced with Duncan Studio and Peter Dinklage’s Estuary Films, which is based on Ryan Andrews’ award-winning graphic novel. This magical family adventure will be adapted by Wolfwalkers writer Will Collins. The second film is Mother Nature, a richly layered sci-fi fantasy set in a futuristic society.”

The studio, which currently hires about 300 and 325 employees, is also tapping into its in-house talent to develop more new concepts and IPs: A recent example is Super Wish, a new show that was created by Nelvana’s Vanessa Esteves and Emmy winner Adrian Thatcher. The 2D-animated series was greenlit through redknot, Nelvana’s joint venture with Discovery.

Westman points out that the studio is focusing on fostering in-house talent as well as continuing its relationship with global children entertainment entities such as Sesame Workshop, Nickelodeon and Scholastic. “We have amazing talent at our studio and access to some of the world’s leading creators of kids’ content yet because of some past mer-

Out of This World

O

ne of Nelvana’s hot new titles is the CG-animated show Agent Binky: Pets of the Universe. Based on the books by Ashley Spires, the show centers on a space cat who is on a mission to protect his human family from interstellar threats with the aid of four pets in a secret agency. The second season of the production, which is produced by redknot (a Nelvana and Discovery joint venture) will be launching in the spring of next year. As older preschoolers can appreciate fantasy and pretend, the creative team behind Agent Binky had fun envisioning the world through their pets’ eyes, playing at what they’d perceive as threats if they were actually part of an organized protective agency. The show is also part of Nelvana’s venture into CG fur and hair, using Maya’s interactive Xgen for the characters’ fur and hair grooms.

chandising hits, there is a misconception that we are more commercially minded,” she points out. “However, we believe that great storytelling and merchandise success are not mutually exclusive, with dedicated teams championing both sides to find the right path forward.”

Another challenge is the constant need to attract and maintain top-tier talent in the world of animation. “With the animation industry consistently growing and changing, there is increased demand for high-caliber talent. We are always looking for unique stories and characters primarily, but not exclusively, in the preschool space. The perfect animated property for Nelvana is one that tells unique stories with multiple seasons distributed globally, challenges our animators in producing cutting-edge content, and drives a successful merchandise program. The ultimate goal is to produce an evergreen brand that is beloved throughout the world.”

Making an Impact

Westman, who came to Nelvana after many years as a senior VP at HIT Entertainment (former home of Barney, Angelina Ballerina and Thomas & Friends), says working in the kids’ content industry taught her the impact these shows can have on children across the globe. She recalls, “I knew immediately that even though I was focused on the business side, the content was what touched each child individually and those memories would remain with them for their entire lives. Not many other industries can give you that in your career!”

She says she loves the people who work at Nelvana because they are passionate about the children’s content industry. “They are creative and supportive of the art and of each other,” she says. “Their attitude brings joy to our everyday work life and you can see it on screen and feel it in the culture within the studio.”

“You have to love our evergreen brands Max & Ruby, Babar and Franklin,” Westman mentions. “They have stood the test of time and are loved by generations of kids. When you make shows that weave their way into the life of children and become loving memories, you have to celebrate that. I also have a special love for Agent Binky: Pets of the Universe as that series blends our Kids Can Press books with our studio talent and our Discovery partnership to produce a show that is gaining traction worldwide.”

Looking forward to the studio’s future, Westman says, “It’s a great time to be in animation. The industry is continuing to grow rapidly and we are currently in an animation boom. Animation, for the most part in the Western markets, is made for kids, but I think we’ll see this evolving more in the future with widening the demo into more mainstream adult-targeted content.”

She’s also pleased with the studio’s quick response to the challenges of the pandemic last year. “We transitioned Nelvana Enterprises and Nelvana Studio to a safe working-from-home environment, shipping over 280 workstations to artists and crew members across the Greater Toronto Area, while keeping all seven current animation productions on schedule,” she says. “Also, working closely with the team to ramp up development, we jumped on the opportunity to connect with creators, writers and showrunners who would otherwise have been busy on set and greenlit over five new productions in the fall of 2020 and spring of 2021.”

Finally, what does Westman hope the animation community will remember about Nelvana, which was incidentally named after a Canadian comic-book superheroine created by Adrian Dingle in the 1940s? “The studio is creator-driven,” she notes. “We are always looking to partner with creators to find, develop and produce ground-breaking content, no matter the format. We are also placing a huge emphasis on nurturing our in-house talent. We’ve had so many animation greats who have started their careers at Nelvana and we are looking to foster the next wave of renowned talent over the coming 50 years!” ◆ For more info, visit www.nelvana.com.

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Studio Spotlight

Ready for the Spotlight U.K.-based GFM Animation prepares Blazing Samurai for global audiences

B

ack in 2016, London-based GFM Animation was founded by Guy Collins to create a stand-alone dedicated animation business. “Our objective was to create a pipeline of quality family movies, with engaging stories and first-class filmmaking partners to delight theatrical audiences worldwide,” says Collins.

“We felt there was an opportunity to take our tried and tested financing and production structures used in live action and transfer them to independent animated films. And as you can see from our slate we have been pretty successful over a relatively short time.”

Since then, the studio has announced several high-profile animated features: Blazing Samurai, helmed by Rob Minkoff and Mark Koetsier with Cinesite and Aniventure; 10 Lives with L’Atelier Animation and directed by Chris Jenkins; A Greyhound of a Girl, based on the acclaimed Roddy Doyle book

on the fact that if we were to be successful in the animation space, we would need to build a team with experience in animation production.”

A Wonderful Mix

GFM’s head of production Sean Feeney says the company prides itself on its eclectic style and subject matter. He explains, “We are always mindful of asking ourselves the following questions: Is it a strong story that audiences will enjoy? Are we partnering with strong, creative filmmakers? Having an existing IP is always a positive, too. But ultimately we don’t want to pigeonhole ourselves.

We see GFM Animation as an almost virtual studio, free to work with different partners. It’s all about working collaboratively to bring that story to life. We also work across an extensive range of budgets depending on the IP, director, cast, script, 2D or 3D techniques, etc.”

The five-year-old company’s first feature, Blazing Samurai, is in the final stages of production and will be delivered this fall. “It’s not unfair to say this has been a labor of love,” says Collins. “We took a huge amount of financial risk to help the film in its early development stage and later to get it back on track. It has been a Blazing Samurai long process from which we have learnt a lot. Without Rob Minkoff’s unrelenting creative talent, commitment and all the experiand directed by Enzo D’Alò; Musketeers of the Tsar, from renowned directors Paul & Gaëtan Brizzi; ence he brings with him from directing films such and Humbugged! from Hardy Howl, the fantastic as The Lion King and Mr. Peabody & Sherman, the team behind the indie hit Hoodwinked. film would never had made it. Watching the film Collins says he and his team identified a grow- now as it nears the end of production, we feel a ing space in the market for high-end indepen- huge level of pride and are so pleased to be workdent animated movies. “At that time we had many ing alongside Cinesite, Aniventure, Huayi Brothers hurdles to overcome on the film Blazing Samurai, and Align, as well as Mark, Rob and respective crenot least the collapse of the animation studio we ative teams. This is a truly independent animated were working with in Toronto. We were focused feature with Hollywood-level quality and we can’t

wait for audiences to see it, too.”

In the coming years, the team at GFM Animation hopes to grow its feature film slate, increasing the number of films delivered each year to three or four, across a range of budgets and techniques.

“We are also actively looking at animated series,” says head of marketing Amanda Kerridge. “This is an area we started exploring back in 2019, but then lockdown happened and our attention was diverted elsewhere, but this is an area of growth we’re very much interested in.”

So, what would they like the animation community to know about GFM? “That we’re an approachable and friendly lot, and that we are very active,” says Collins. “We’re all about building relationships and collaboration; bringing our skills and the right people together to get each film made. It’s been a tough year for our industry, particularly the independent sector. But we remain

hugely positive that there is a market for great family content, particularly for theatrical audiences. We think there’s space for everyone. And how great is it that the independent animation industry is growing and thriving, across both the feature film space and series content.” ◆ For more info, visit GFManimation.com.

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Studio Spotlight

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A wards S potlight City of Ghosts

Kid Cosmic

Lazor Wulf

The Midnight Gospel

A Good Year to Watch Toons Just in time for the 2021 Emmy season, we chat with acclaimed TV critic Robert Lloyd about the current state of TV animation and other toon-related topics.

L

ooking back at the 2020 and early 2021, can you tell us which new animated shows managed to impress you and why?

Robert Lloyd: I have so much television to keep track of that I’m often late to the game when it comes to animation. But I loved The Midnight Gospel from Pen Ward and Duncan Trussell, and Elizabeth Ito’s City of Ghosts, which are highly personal and stunningly original, though both are built around interviews with real people. They’re really among the best things I’ve ever seen on television.

Craig McCracken’s Kid Cosmic is a delightful, desert-set serial adventure comedy about

a pack of accidental superheroes, including a toddler and a senior citizen, fending off alien invaders. The drawing, which might be described as sketchbook naturalism, is full of incidental detail — it reminds me of Studio Ghibli films like From Up on Poppy Hill or Whisper of the Heart — and the seasonal story arc lets the story and gags unroll at a slower pace and over longer stretches than the 11-minute stories McCracken has previously told. I also liked Central Park and Star Trek: Lower Decks, and need to spend some time with Birdgirl and The Great North.

This past year has been a specially rich period for shows featuring diverse characters and culture. Which ones stood out for you?

City of Ghosts is set amid minority cultures and subcultures in the real places of Los Angeles, including Boyle Heights, Leimert Park, Little Tokyo and Venice, and uses the voices, memories and observations of real residents, recast as ghosts and interviewed by a kid team of paranormal investigators. It’s about how the past informs the present, and possibly the future, with a luminous photo-based look and an attitude of joyful melancholy. It’s also maybe the best show ever about L.A. And though

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A wards S potlight it first appeared in 2019, the second season of Henry Bonsu’s Lazor Wulf arrived at the end of 2020; it’s a simultaneously busy and leisurely afrofuturist small town surrealist sitcom whose cast includes wolves, a horse, humans and God, with a clean, geometric look that embraces flatness. It comes in from someplace outside the usual cartoon lineages.

Which shows do you think need to be praised for taking chances and offering beautiful animation as well as memorable characters and writing?

Everything by Craig McKracken, who is very much in touch with his inner child. Shadi Petosky’s Danger & Eggs, with its themes of risk and inclusiveness; I like its delicate line as well. Home: Adventures with Tip & Oh had great knockabout energy and bold visuals. Anything from the Adventure Time diaspora – Rebecca Sugar’s Steven Universe, Ian Jones-Quartey’s O.K. KO! Let’s Be Heroes, Julia Pott’s Summer Camp Island – these series can be a little strange, and occasionally very deep, but I think the best cartoons for children aren’t necessarily “made for children.” (And the best cartoons that are actually aimed at children are the ones that also work for adults, which I suppose is another way of saying they’re made for the people who make them.) It’s good to see things that are challenging and mysterious, or smart and satirical, when you’re young — things that you understand imperfectly but that make you want to know more.

Being talked down to just keeps you down. Classic Looney Tunes, The Simpsons, Adventure Time — they make for a healthy diet.

Certain shows like The Simpsons, Bob’s Burgers, Rick and Morty and Robot Chicken seem to have cornered the market year after year. Why is that?

All awards are reductive by nature — they represent the intersection of what the voting body is likely to have seen and what’s likely to appeal to a wider range of tastes. People also tend to vote for things they’ve never actually seen but have heard of — and all voting bodies, includ-

ing the one we all belong to as citizens, can be a little lazy when it comes to doing their homework — so big name shows will dominate for years. This happens with the Emmys and live-action series as well. And there’s a kind of old and new media loop that pushes certain things forward into view and leaves others by the wayside. That’s not to say those shows aren’t good. Whatever you think of The Simpsons nowadays, really terrible shows rarely get trophies. It’s just math that more great work will be passed over than rewarded; that’s why I put no stock in awards. Any awards.

culture allusions (and putting animators to work); the originals are out there and are worth watching a thousand times over. We have the technology to make new movies with “Cary Grant,” but the Cary Grant movies we have are enough.

Still, it’s a matter of perspective: There are kids for whom Space Jam is their primary experience of Looney Tunes, just as Space Jam: A New Legacy, coming in July, will be for others; my feelings on the subject won’t make theirs any less worthwhile. Some people think The Phantom Menace is a good movie, and may the Force be with them.

How do you feel about reboots of older favorites like Animaniacs, Looney Tunes, Rugrats, DuckTales, Muppet Babies, etc.?

I’m not particularly a fan of reboots, though sometimes they produce interesting, or even historically important, results – Ralph Bakshi’s Mighty Mouse: The New Adventures kick-started the creator-division, historically allusive, slightly subversive cartoon renaissance of the 1990s.

Lauren Faust’s My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, made something special out of a franchise made to sell toys. And, of course, Space Ghost Coast to Coast is the greatest reboot of all time. (Honorable mention to Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law.) But there was some vision there, not just hauling some old characters back out of an inkwell you happen to own. I would rather see something completely new and surprising.

Where Disney’s recent Mickey Mouse shorts strike me as aesthetically and spiritually unrelated to the originals, the HBO Max Looney Tunes Cartoons is a very well made pastiche of classic Warner Bros., and much better than the 2011 Cartoon Network The Looney Tunes Show, which recast Bugs and Daffy as best friends and suburban roommates and changed their proportions. Peter Browngardt, who made the pleasingly hectic Uncle Grandpa, developed it, and his team has really internalized the nuts and bolts of the originals. At the same time, I don’t quite see the point, past the advantage of throwing in some modern tech and

Finally, what are some of your favorite animated characters of all time and why?

Jay Ward’s characters were a formative influence – Rocky and Bullwinkle (and Boris and Natasha), Peabody and Sherman, George of the Jungle (I still say “tee-NEE-tee” for TNT), Super Chicken, that whole crew. Even Captain Crunch – I watched those commercials as if they were 60-second shorts. Their mix of daring and cluelessness appealed to me; Ward and his writers were smart about what’s stupid, and I was aware early on that the strength of the writing and design made the limited animation beside the point. Bob Clampett’s Beany and Cecil had a different look but was hip in a similar way (lots of puns), and (as I would later learn) true to the letter and spirit of the ‘50s puppet show that inspired it. Bugs Bunny was a model for attitude; Daffy Duck for bad attitude. The Fleischer Popeye, for Jack Mercer’s improvised muttering. (I didn’t really cotton to the fact that it was a cartoon about sex and violence until much later.) I watched a lot of Felix the Cat as a kid, an oddly disturbing cartoon, and Gumby, even more so – though of course I identified with Pokey, who knew when to back out.

Homer Simpson is obviously a brilliantly original character – a Dumb Dad, but a unique conglomeration of unchecked appetites assembled in the service of satire. The Powerpuff Girls and Dexter – it was Craig McCracken and Genndy Tartakovsky who got me looking at cartoons seriously again. If I look at what’s on display on my bookshelf, it’s Adventure Time characters (Ice King is a singular creation); a stuffed Puppycat, from Natasha Allegri’s Bee and Puppycat; loved the Breehn Burnshelmed seasons of the Pen Ward-created scifi adventure Bravest Warriors – an ensemble rather than a character, I suppose. But if I had to choose one: Catbug, obviously. ◆

Catbug

Robert Lloyd

Robert Lloyd is the TV critic at the Los Angeles Times. Sometimes, usually after dark, he masquerades as a musician (credits available on request).

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Island of Animation Dreams A Spotlight on Animation Production in Tenerife

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enerife Film Commission director Ricardo Martínez Cedrés guides us through some of the latest developments and opportunities for animation productions in the scenic Canary Islands.

Can you tell us a little about the latest animation and VFX incentives offered to the productions in Tenerife?

Tenerife, the biggest of the Canary Islands, in Spain, offers a superb 50%-45% tax rebate for international productions taking place on our island. The requirements to obtain this tax rebate are simple and easy to meet. First of all, the total budget of the film or the series has to be more than 2 million euros. In the case of animation projects or postproduction, including VFX, foreign producers will have to spend a minimum of 200,000 euros on the island, always through a local animation studio.

Afterwards, the foreign producer will get 50% back of the first million that has been spent in Tenerife and 45% for the rest, in the case of investing more than 1.9 million euros, the first million will raise up to 54% of deduction.

In addition, there is no VAT for international productions that are serviced by Canarian production companies. We also offer a 5045% tax credit for Spanish productions or coproductions. So there are plenty of options to produce animation with studios from Tenerife.

What are some of the biggest benefits of producing animation in Tenerife?

It is a great combination, not only because

of the unbeatable 50-45% tax incentives for national and international productions. Thanks to the Canary Islands Special Tax Regime, new animation companies that settle down in Tenerife can pay only 4% of corporate income tax, instead of the average 25% in Europe. Therefore, local studios can present very competitive prices for their high quality work. And of course, Tenerife has a great worklife balance and top tier IT infrastructures, as the second highest performance computer in Spain is available to rent for rendering and great data connectivity.

What are some of the animation studios and productions that are based in the region right now?

Several studios abroad have opened new branches in the island, including studios from mainland Spain, increasing the number of companies from the industry already established in Tenerife. B-Water Animation Studios (part of TT Productions) has offices around the world; in Tenerife, with a crew of 120 people, they have just finished Pettson & Findus (S3 & 4) and are currently working on Treasure Trekkers (S2) and a TV movie — their director is the Oscar nominee Thierry Marchand. They are known because of the constant innovation in the pipeline, implementing real time to generate greater efficiency in the different productions.

Other studios include In Efecto Atlantis (Tara Duncan), La Casa Animada (Cleo), Mondo TV Producciones Canarias (MeteoHeroes, Grisú), Tomavision (Talent Explorers, Emmy & GooRoo) and 3 Doubles Producciones (Momonsters, 4 Day Before Christmas, Inspector Sun and the Curse of the Black Widow).

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What would you say few people realize about the animation scene in Tenerife?

Since 2016, our local animation industry has quadrupled in size. At the moment, there are around 350 people working in our eight animation studios and very top talent are keen on moving from big European cities to Tenerife because of its work-life balance. It is a fact that there is an ‘Animation Hub’ in Tenerife and also the Canary Islands has plenty of talented artists. We are only a two-hour flight from Madrid and four hours to main European cities, making Tenerife a destination with easy access for co-production. Tenerife also hosts the Quirino Awards.

Can you talk about the wonderful work-life balance in Tenerife and the quality of life in the region?

Tenerife is well known because of its excellent work-life balance. The island has one of the best climates in the world with its 23ºC average annual temperature. Add to this its impressive nature: 48% of the island is a natural protected area with beaches and great forests reachable in only 30 minutes’ drive from the main cities and offices. The cost of living is also lower than in Europe — the nice and fresh Spanish food is also enjoyable. Tenerife offers without a doubt the perfect balance between leisure and work, and animators, producers and other creatives really appreciate it. ◆ For more info, visit tenerifefilm.com/animation .

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A Northern Gem

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Inspired by Quebecois cultures, 10th Ave Productions Uncovers Felix and the Hidden Treasure.

n the early 2000s, screenwriter/director/producer Nancy Florence Savard founded 10th Ave Productions to create unique and inspiring animated projects for family audiences around the world. Having established herself in Saint-Augustin-De-Desmaures, near Quebec City, Canada, Savard developed, directed and co-produced the first Canadian stereoscopic CGI animated feature film. The charming 2013 film, The Legend of Sarila, was the result of 12 years of work, and was inspired by Inuit culture and traditions. It was the first 3D animated feature entirely produced and financed in Canada.

The award-winning movie was also the first in Canada to be directed by a woman.

Since then, 10th Ave Productions has been committed to developing a 100% Canadian animated feature and TV series industry, with public partners like Sodec, Telefilm Canada and the City of Quebec, and private partners like the Harold Greenberg Fund and the Québecor Fund. With their support, 10th Ave produced its follow-up films: Rooster Doodle-Doo (2014) and Mission Kathmandu: the Adventures of Nelly and Simon (2018). In addition to numerous festival selections and awards around the world, 10th Ave Productions was named the 2019 Film Producer of the Year by the Quebec Media Producers’ Association (AQPM).

In 2021, in the midst of the pandemic, 10th Ave Productions released its fourth 3D animated feature, Felix and the Treasure of Morgäa (Felix and the Hidden Treasure in the U.S. and U.K.). Despite audience limitations due to strict health measures, the film has shown good results since movie theaters reopened in Quebec. Over the months to come, Felix and the Treasure of Morgäa will be presented at various festivals and will be released theatrically in the USA, England, France, Spain, the Middle East and numerous other countries.

Felix and the Treasure of Morgäa is based on an original idea by director Nicola Lemay (Les Yeux Noirs, Nul poisson où aller, Noël Noël) who initially conceived it as a comic book. When Savard proposed bringing the story to the screen, Nicola joined forces with screenwriter Marc Robitaille (Un été sans point ni coup sûr, Le Club Vinland) to write the script. On this project, Savard decided to create her own animation unit: 10th Ave Animation. With help from five other Quebec stu-

dios, the production employed over 200 people and took more than 24 months to complete. Despite the pandemic, the team finished the film, working remotely.

A Remarkable Island

“Though the challenge was great, the team, led by director Nicola Lemay, art director Philippe Arseneau Bussières, and animation director Yann Tremblay, maintained its resolve to get a Quebec-made film onto the screen,”

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Nancy Florence Savard

says Savard. “The story unfolds in the unique setting of the Iles de la Madeleine, with their impressive rust-hued dunes and iconic lighthouses guiding sailors to safety. This setting is familiar to our art director Philippe, whose parents have lived there for years.”

Felix and the Treasure of Morgäa tells the story of 12-year-old Felix, whose father disappeared at sea two years ago. During his mother’s absence, Felix, convinced that his father is alive, sets out to find him, helped by Tom, a retired sailor; Rover, a cat who acts like a dog; and Squawk, Tom’s one-legged parrot. Together, after a difficult journey, the friends arrive at Darkshadow Island, ruled by the megalomaniacal Morgäa, who possesses a hidden treasure.

This animated adventure emphasizes the importance of family – the family we build with the ones we love, whom we strive to keep near us throughout our lives. The story also contains a touch of philosophy, teaching the importance of life’s every decade and reminding us that eternal youth is an illusion. The creative team at 10th Ave hopes these subjects will stimulate discussion at home after the film is over.

“As with all our previous projects, 10th Ave Productions is proud to be putting Quebec on the screen: its plants, its animals and countryside, so varied and exotic in their particular details,” Savard points out. “Blending techniques, 10th Ave delights in seeing its artists’ talents in the creation of designs, the elaboration of color schemes and the texture of productions. Though many stories have local settings, 10th Ave seeks out stories whose universal themes will attract international audiences with values that appeal to all.”

As its fifth film now goes into production, the company hopes to launch co-production projects in the near future. Today, 10th Ave is developing no fewer than six animated features in the adventure, fantasy and comedy categories. It also has animated TV series in the works, featuring characters from its films, as well as a collection of Holiday Tales that could be in preproduction by next winter. In short, 10th Ave has plenty of projects coming along, including a follow-up to Felix’s adventures. ◆ For more info, visit www.10ave.com and felixandthetreasureofmorgaa.com

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Spotlight on Spanish Talent

Alberto Vázquez’s feature Unicorn Wars is featured at Annecy this year.

Top Spanish animated projects and new industry initiatives steal the limelight at Annecy.

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s in years past, Spanish animation will have a strong presence at this year’s Annecy Festival and Market. We had the chance to talk to Tito Rodríguez, marketing director of Spain’s Institute of Cinematography and Audiovisual Arts (ICAA) to find out about the exciting details.

“First up, we’ll turn the spotlight on the use of disruptive technologies, presenting the three winning projects of the first Next Lab edition: Joaquín Martínez (Going Down), María Burgués and Enric Sant (Ibis) and Rubén Fernández (Protocolo Flambé) will be talking about their projects in an online presentation on June 16th and will travel to Annecy to have physical business to business meetings,” notes Rodríguez.

“We will also be highlighting women’s work in animation, extending the news about upcoming initiatives such as the Mia Anima mentoring program or the first Manifesto of Good Practices in Equality of the Spanish Animation Industry presented by DIBOOS [Spanish Federation of Animation Producers].

Spanish studios and companies will also be represented online, under the Animation from Spain pavilion powered by ICEX banner. Among the titles presented at Annecy are two new shorts— author and illustrator Pere Ginard’s Dad Is Gone and Shira Ukrainitz and Omar Razzak’s La Prima Cosa, which are playing in the Official Selection and Perspectives programs of the festival, as well as Alberto Vazques’s highly anticipated Unicorn Wars, which is one of the features in the Work In Progress showcase According to the film’s Iván Miñambres (UniKo), Unicorn Wars’ is a fantastic movie that centers on the ancestral war between the bears and the unicorns that inhabit the magic forest. “It’s actually the story of an internal war between two twin brothers for the love of their mother and the conflicts of their past,” he explains. “It is a step forward both narratively

and technically with respect to Psychonauts (Vázquez’s debut feature) with which we hope will reach a wider audience. The film is currently in full production between studios in Galicia (Abano Prodcións), Basque Country (UniKo) and France (Autour de Minuit and Schmuby). It is expected to be completed by mid-2022.”

Plans for a Brighter Future

Spain will also have a stellar VR presence.

As José Luis Farias, creator and Founder of Paramotion Films points out, “For the past ten

Going Down by Joaquín Martínez Ibis by María Burgués and Enric Sant

years, most of the companies have been using the same technology and keep on working with the same organizational structures in animation and vfx. However, there are new and inspiring projects that are generating ideas break the habit, thinking out of the box, such as NEXT LAB which is an initiative by Paramotion Films, that aims to change this trend in a disruptive way. Participants in the workshop spend six weeks learning new tools and producing at the same time to creator a teaser for an animated project. Mixing Quill and Unreal leads those projects to a new level in less time, achieving a more intimate relation between the artist and

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the final result, making technology an ally instead of an enemy in the creative process.”

Another exciting development is the special initiative titled Mia Anima, launched by MIA association (Spain’s Women in the Animation Industry), which brings together more than 100 animation professionals. This mentoring program involves six animation projects from Spain and Latin America (features, shorts and TV Series), through which participants will undergo four months of assessment by experts followed by an event including pitching sessions. (More info will be available this September on their website animacionesmia.com.)

Nathalie Martínez, member of the board in charge of Equality Policies at Diboos, adds, “2021 will bring exciting new initiatives in the area of women in animation promotion, with the first Manifesto of Good Practices in Equality of the Spanish Animation Industry being presented around June. Other initiatives are the call for women on their very first projects in development, ‘Diboos Opera Prima,’as well as Diboos Women’s Mixer, a bimonthly gathering for women producers and entrepreneurs.”

In the coming months, under New Spanish Animation, a new brand launched by ICAA at the past edition of Clermont-Ferrand festival, the Institute will continue to highlight the work of our studios, producers and talents, this month at Annecy/MIFA, as well as the Pixelatl festival in September and in Ventana Sur’s Animation! in December,” says Rodríguez. “We also try to actively participate in markets that take place in our country such as Quirino Awards, and we will be again present at WEIRD Market in October, the same month in which a beautiful project will see the light, that will represent a turnaround in the promotion of our cinema, involving an ‘animated’ key art. But I can’t reveal any more at the moment, because it’s Top Secret!” ◆ For more info, visit icaa.es

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TOC ADVERTORIAL Beardy Bodo

Riki Continues to Deliver the Global Hits

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or the past two decades, animation fans in production. The English-language Fixies have been following the fortunes of YouTube channel reached the milestone of 1 Russia’s Riki Group closely as the stu- billion views and 1 million subscribers.”

One of the Riki’s newest offerings is dio continued to build on the success of globBeardy Bodo, a highly entertaining show al franchises such as Kikoriki and The Fixies.

We recently caught up with Anna Mysskaya, that has a deeply effective educational comthe head of Riki’s international division to find ponent. “We developed this project as an out what’s cooking at the company this year. unusual educational show that combines “The Fixies and Kikoriki continue to sky- cognitive elements and silly humor. It also rocket,” she says. “While the 4th season of promotes open communication within a The Fixies is in production, we are also de- strict framework of education,” says Myssveloping a spinoff show and another feature. kaya. “The main character Bodo has unique Recently, the beloved characters were cho- qualities which helps kids understand that sen as mascots of the Russian Pavilion at it’s normal to be imperfect. We’ve had great the World Exhibition Expo 2020, and also in- response from viewers that proved to us that spired H&M to launch a joint sustainable col- we’re definitely on the right track.” lection and a special episode to promote environmental principles among children.

The Fixies have dramatically expanded PinCode their footprint in China recently and as of 2020 reached 13 billion views on Chinese platforms and became #1 among Russian IPs according to the ratings of Youku, Tencent and IQIYI.” Mysskaya says like many animation providers, the studio saw the demand for content increase during the pandemic. “In the past year the role of content has become more important than ever before,” she says. “This increased Family Movies and More competition among the quality IPs that are On the features front, Riki has plans for offered on the market challenges us. We two big releases in the 2021-2022 time were able to develop several new extraordi- frame. “Our CG-animated comedy Finnick nary projects. In addition, two new animated follows the adventures of a 13-year-old girl features and new seasons of Kikoriki, The Christine who befriends a Finn, a magical Fixies, Tina & Tony and BabyRiki are currently and mischievous spirit who lives in her new house,” notes Mysskaya. “Finnick has already received offers from distributors in the Baltic States, Latin America, France and Spain. We are also working on Teddy Boom, a breathtaking adventure about a self-assured thief named Max who steals a unique relic and hides it inside a teddy bear. By the end of this year, audiences will find out why it’s too late for games, when toys come to life!” www.animationmagazine.net 60

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Of course, Kikoriki shows no signs of slowing down. After 18 years, it’s still the most aired animated TV show in Russia. Russian distribution company Pioner Cinema brings special screenings of Kikoriki and Friends to cinemas throughout the country. This year, the program was also picked by Toonz Media Networks for India, Africa, Latin America, U.S. and Spain; as well as the CommonSense Network’s new app Sensical which will launch this quarter.

Mysskaya says she believes that Riki’s unique brands have a special appeal both for children and adults. “It’s all about the original humor, plots, and underlying ideas,” she notes. “This sets them apart from many other animation projects. We develop our projects from season to season and so they grow and change with the viewers.

The new season of Kikoriki which premiered last year in Russia is 2D animated and it has a huge nostalgic appeal.

Audiences who grew up with the show love to revisit the show, and they want it to look the same as they remembered when they were kids. We also targeted the adult audience when we launched a special TikTok channel and it turned out to be the right decision since it gained a million subscribers in less than five months and the number went up to almost 2 million in a very short time. We continue to get great response from fans worldwide, so I believe we’re on the right track!” ◆ For more info, visit en.riki.team The Fixies

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A Young Trailblazer India’s innovate studio 88 Pictures stays ahead of the competition.

hen Milind D. Shinde, founder and CEO of 88 Pictures, was working at the Oriental Dreamworks, China unit of DreamWorks Animation, he gained an interesting outsider’s perspective on how the Indian Animation industry was perceived. “I spent time in doing the so-called ‘need-gap’ analysis,” he recalls. “I always believed that some extraordinary talent existed in India. All I needed to do was to create an entity that could house such talent and challenge them by attracting of the best projects that were being done in the animation space around the world.”

About four and half years ago, Milind Shinde along with Siddhie Mhambre founded 88 Pictures, a state-of the-art CGI studio based in Mumbai, India, that focuses on creating beautiful CGI imagery across all formats from episodic TV to feature films. “Our studio specializes in 3D animation services from asset build to final color delivery in traditional CG pipe as well as new generation tech such as real time Engines,” says Shinde. “We have just completed a feature short using Unreal Engine. I always wanted to create a ‘value game’ rather than the ‘volume game.’ My mantra for the first five years of the company was stay nimble, stay agile and stay focused .We started small with 35 artists is 2016 at one location and now we are close to 350 to 400 staff working out of two locations, Mumbai and Bangalore.”

88 Pictures specializes in animation services from concept design to final picture.

Among the top-notch projects the studio has worked on Trollhunters, Wizards, Tales of Arcadia, Fast and Furious, Dragons Rescue Riders, Usagi Chronicles (in production). “We are also working on a very high-end Warner Bros. TV show and also contributed to features such as Scoob!, UglyDolls and Tom and Jerry to name a few. The feather in our cap is going to be Guillermo Del Toro-directed DreamWorks feature Tales of Arcadia: Rise of the Titans which will premiere on Netflix this summer.

An Eye on Future Technologies

Aby John, the studios’ COO and producer says he’s very proud of the studio’s leadership in technology. “Technology is at the core of what we do,” he notes. “‘Inspiration to Innovate’ is one of our core values of the studio. Our core pipeline is built with a proprietary technology and many software used are mostly open

Trollhunters: Rise of the Titans feature courtesy of DreamWorks Animation

Siddhie Mhambre, Co-Founder

source. Animation is mainly produced using Autodesk Maya for most of the projects. We also use Blender for previz and on some shows for modeling to color delivery. We are completing a very high- end animated short that’s entirely executed with Unreal engine. We have also produced an award-winning VR project in Unity. Our goal is to “up” the quality of work from project to project whether it is a new style of animation, real time previz, unique look and feel or cool shading techniques” According to John, the studio’s core workflow management is based on many in-house developed tools which are used in conjunction with the production management tool Shotgun.

Manish Kumar, Head of Animation and Founder member adds “We have custom rigging tools to support animators for achieving some of the stellar animation we recently did for Tom and Jerry and Scoob!’s marketing material. We are constantly wanting to reinvent ourselves by

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Milind D. Shinde, Founder and CEO

adopting newer technology stacks for facilitating production. Our talented leadership and a passionate crew is always ready to push the envelope across all disciplines.”

Co-founder Siddhie Mhambre chimes in, ”In the last four and half years, we had set clear goals for 2021 from the day one. We have achieved the business, creative and technology goals that we had projected for 2021. Our rich body of work speaks for itself for the accomplishment we have achieved over the last five years. We also want to tell compelling stories which are made in India, with our ‘Local for Global’ vision in mind. There are some interesting projects we are developing which will showcase Indian talent and stories to the world in a way that has never been seen before.”

Shinde believes that these are very interesting times for animation content. “Everyone is hungry for animated content,” he adds. “How do you stay relevant in the coming times is the key to success and longevity in this business.

Our core philosophy is to stay under the radar and let the work speak for itself. The service module will continue to push the envelope with some challenging projects in the pipeline.

We want to tell great stories which are local to global and share it across the world, so the focus will also continue to develop those unique IPs. We’d to appeal to anyone who is looking to push the boundaries of CGI and create some groundbreaking shows. So, now you know where to find us!” ◆ For more info about this fast-rising company, visit 88.pictures

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Tech Reviews B

Foundry’s Nuke 13

ack in March, Foundry came out with the latest and greatest version of its flagship: Nuke 13 brings some pretty fantastic 3D advances, a couple of powerful display enhancements, some kind of amazing machine learning stuff and, as always, more processing speed.

Taking a cue from its sibling Katana, Nuke is now supporting Hydra in its 3D viewer. This adds a closer representation of 3D elements to how they appear when rendered in the ScanlineRender. It’s great for positioning and visualizing the models

in 3D space, but it shines when you get into material and lighting adjustments. Viewing the look in the viewport in near real time speeds up production and feedback dramatically. This corresponds to the USD support that appeared in Nuke 12.2, which is more fully expanded in 13 with the addition of camera, light and axis support in USD files.

And all of the USD hooks are open so that studios can plug in their own USD workflows into Nuke.

There are some exceptions to the support, such as custom lights and cameras from other render engines, and currently there is only support for Windows and Linux. By Foundry’s own admission, there is a lot more they want to do with the Hydra viewer — but it’s a heck of a good start.

Nuke has inherited from Nuke Studio external monitor support for those using dedicated monitors. Users can have independent control of the color transforms and adjustments between the internal viewer and the external monitor. Resolution can also be different when working on a project with a higher resolution than the monitor can display, so the monitor will scale down the image.

A note to the Mac users who are sad because they can’t use the Hydra viewer yet: You can take advantage of your Apple XDR display and actually comp, and view, in high dynamic range.

For me, the most exciting additions have to do with machine learning for compositing tasks.

Nuke 13 has a node called CopyCat to use for footage that you need to modify — warp, paint, color correct or even generate garbage mattes. You june|july 21

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make those changes on numerous key frames throughout the sequence, but not all. Then you use these frames to allow CopyCat to compare and learn what the frames should look like. The more information you feed it, the better the results will be. Then, you can create an “Inference,” where others with similar shots can use what was learned to use on their shot. And if it’s not quite good enough, the new shot can be used to provide even more learning material, to solve not only that shot, but resolve the original shot better. Additionally, there are some AI presets that have been included in Nuke 13, including an upscale algorithm and one for removal. This stuff is computationally intense and processed on the GPU, so having an RTX card is a definite plus. And, as a cherry on top, Cryptomattes are now handled natively!

In short, there is a lot of great, amazing stuff in Nuke 13 worth checking out. I’m looking forward to using CopyCat on everything to see how far I can push it.

Website: foundry.com/products/nuke Price: Nuke Render: $592; Floating license: $5,248; NukeX: $9,768; Nuke Studio: $11,298.

Rentals are also available.

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VFX VFX

by Todd Sheridan Perry

double as a mic and speaker for Zoom calls.

The screen is a DreamColor UHD monitor, so with 100% DCI-P3, 600 nits and HDR capabilities, it’s up to spec for any color sensitive projects like photography, compositing, lighting, and color grading.

Out of the box, the Fury 15” is already spry, but it can be expanded to 128GB of RAM and 10TB of storage — which, quite frankly, is ludicrous speed.

Also, accessibility for expansion is all toolless.

Running 4K footage through Premiere Pro and Resolve runs at production-capable speeds, especially with RED footage debayering, accelerated with the RTX card. Arnold and V-Ray render on the GPU at workstation comparable speeds (because it’s all about the graphics card), so processing IPR renders on the fly to get immediate feedback is definitely a thing. The same is true with running real-time engines like Unreal.

I’m viewing these performance specs through the lens of someone who is frequently on set and having to create things on the fly so the directors and cinematographers can make informed decisions. With the combination of size, speed and display, the Fury G7 is optimal for my purposes, but I could see this being great for working from home,

HP ZBook Fury 15 G7

he last time I reviewed an HP ZBook, it was the G6 version with an RTX Quadro card in it, and it was a beast of a machine. This time out, I looked at the 15” ZBook G7 with a 16GB RTX 5000 — which may not sound like much of a difference, but the size, profile and weight makes a huge difference. The developers have managed to fit more power into a smaller space, which is kind of miraculous.

Part of the size reduction comes from decreasing the top and side bezels around the screen by half, reducing the size of the body without reducing the screen size. The aluminum and magnesium body is now reduced to under 5.5 lbs. Everything is kept pretty cool through a vapor chamber liquid that distributes heat from both the CPU and GPU, and venting out the sides keeps the bottom cool. New BIOS features detect and distribute power depending on what hardware is being used by which apps.

In this thin profile, they still manage to fit an SD card reader, an HDMI port, a MiniDisplay, and two USB-Cs — which can be expanded using a tethered Thunderbolt dock with 230W that can act to power your Fury as well as peripherals, and can

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or a dorm room, or in a coffee shop. Sitting down with a cup of coffee on an outside patio, a 15” laptop and a small Wacom tablet to edit the latest dailies sounds like a great morning. As a bonus, the plastic components come from recycled sources as well as reducing greenhouse gases in its processing, and protecting their peeps in a safe environment. So, you get a good product and you can be environmentally conscious at the same time.

Website: www.hp.com/us-en/shop Price: 15” customizable starting at $1,915 ◆ Todd Sheridan Perry is an award-winning VFX supervisor and digital artist whose credits include Black Panther, Avengers: Age of Ultron and The Christmas Chronicles. You can reach him at todd@ teaspoonvfx.com.

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Opportunities

Autonomous Animator

By Martin Grebing

Learn from Homer Simpson, who mastered the art of being productive at home years before the pandemic. (The Simpsons / 20th Television)

Your Handy Workfrom-Home Survival Guide

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here are more and more people working part time or permanently from home every day. For many, returning full time to the office may never happen again so it’s time to get settled into your home office for the long haul. Here are some tips, tricks, and necessities that every work-from-home animator may need: Extra mouse and keyboard. Always keep an extra mouse and keyboard handy. If you’ve ever had a mouse or keyboard break on you in the middle of a major project, the level of panic and feeling of utter helplessness that you experienced has probably never been matched before or since.

Long-Use Rated Office Chair. Not only do you need to find a chair that is comfortable for your height, but it needs to be a “Long Use” or “Extended Use” rated chair to help avoid achy necks, backs and arms after pulling long shifts.

Diffused Keylight. The main source of light in your studio should not be searing down on you and your desk, but rather a softer, diffused light that is bright enough to keep everything legible yet soft enough to be pleasant and free from glare.

Good Speakers with Subwoofer. Animators are often required to produce and deliver a final product, which means working with sound.

It’s a must to have a good quality sound system to adequately proof and experience the audio tracks.

Nice Set of Headphones. The only way to truly hear all the subtleties of a soundtrack is with a nice set of headphones.

Energy Drink. Green tea, coffee or Minotaur, you may need to have your preferred liquid boost available for those long days and nights.

Art Desk. If you’re stuck and can’t seem to get unstuck, try getting away from the computer and sitting down at an actual art desk to draw, sketch, doodle and write ideas out by

hand.

Whiteboard.

Keeping important notes, ideas and plans highly visible and easily editable is key for any independent animator. Invest in a large white board and nevermore lose notes scrawled on Postit pads. Take several clear photos of the board each time before erasing.

Wall Calendar. Being constantly aware of the current day, what’s planned in the upcoming week and future key milestone dates is essential. Buy a wall calendar and hang it right in front of you for easy reference.

Email/Digital Office Calendar. In addition to a wall calendar, utilizing a digital equivalent is a must. Having your email or scheduling software of choice filled with reminders is an excellent way to keep you on track and on top of multiple projects and tasks.

Create The Flow. Always operate in a systemized fashion with consistent naming conventions and identical project folder layouts so everything can be managed, tracked and archived easily. Every scrap of work you produce should be filed appropriately and effortless to locate. Make extensive use of shortcuts so production can flow smoothly and as uninhibited as possible. Populate your entire desktop with links to your most recent project, most used software, folders and files and promise to never navigate the long way again except to set up a shortcut link.

Back Up Your Work. Whether you have automatic backups performed or not, it’s more than

worth the time and money to buy external hard drives to perform manual backups every month. For extra safety, try redundancy: back up all of your files on one external hard drive and make a second backup on another external hard drive. This way, if one of them happens to fail, you have a backup to your backup.

Take A Breather. While working from home for extended periods of time, it’s easy to become sedentary. Be sure to stand up, stretch, walk briskly, do some jumping jacks or a quick exercise of your choice for one or two minutes while keeping your mind completely off work.

Set a reminder on your digital calendar to do this several times a day.

Take Lunch Seriously. Force yourself to take an hour lunch every day where you get away from your desk and preferably out of your house. This way you can spend some much needed time away from your home office and return refreshed, refocused and ready to conquer the rest of the day.

Martin Grebing is the president of Funnybone Animation Studios. He can be reached via funnyboneanimation.com.

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A D ay I n T he L ife We’ve been huge fans of Lisa Hanawalt’s, her comics and cartoons for many years, and we’re so thrilled that her fantastic show Tuca & Bertie is coming back for a new season on Adult Swim this month. We also love the photos this talented and funny lady sent us from a typical day in her fabulous life. Enjoy!

1 I spend most of my day working in my home office, and the IRS can’t prove otherwise!

2 For lunch, I ate a can of tuna with pasta until I got sick of it, then gave the rest to our dog, Annie.

4 I went up to the roof to get fresh air and do some writing (but I actually just looked at social media).

3 I reviewed some beaksync in a meeting with the rest of the wonderful Tuca & Bertie team.

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We had a sound mix meeting for a different episode. I go through lots of toothpicks, Altoids, ginger tea and seltzer every day, it’s horrible.

6 I escaped to the barn to visit my horse, Juniper. Hanging out with her has been great for my health and work/life balance. She was farting in this pic!

7 Back at home, my partner Adam and I found a random old movie to zone out to.

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8 I doodled while watching. It feels good to just draw for fun, for a change. www.animationmagazine.net 66

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I retire to my other “home office,” where I can watch more movies/TV from the bath.

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