Toon Boom News June 2006 by Toon Boom Animation

www.toonboom.com

NEW Toon Boom Storyboard Emmy-Award Technology June 2006

Image courtesy of Answer Studio

The whirlwind pace continues at Toon Boom with the team deployed all over the planet providing training, meeting customers, speaking at conferences and attending tradeshows. _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

MIPTV in Cannes was a huge success with Toonz Animation India, Maya Academy of Advanced Cinematics and Cosgrove Hall signing up to standardize on Toon Boom Harmony. The team then attended Cartoons on the Bay in Positano from April 5 to 9, sponsoring the Pitch me! Italia competition. Following this, the team ventured to the Association Québécoise des utilisateurs de l’ordinateur au primaire-secondaire (AQUOPS) in Quebec City from April 11 to 13, and to the National Association of Broadcasters tradeshow in Las Vegas from April 24 to 27. The Toon Boom team is also extensively involved in encouraging the introduction of Indian schools to Canadian ones to explore joint programs, transfer skills and develop the curriculum. _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

In India, Joan Vogelesang was a guest speaker at the Animation Symposium at Arena Animation Academy in both Kolkata and Mumbai and at the 24 fps Animation Awards. She addressed the State of the Animation Industry and the Role of India at the Animation Symposiums where attendance exceeded 630 people! During 24fps, she was awarded the Movers’n’Shakers Award in recognition of her valuable contribution, support and unique initiatives towards the expansion and promotion of the Indian animation and media industry worldwide. She also attended the Hangzhou Animation Event in China, during which Scott Dyer, Executive Vice President, Production and Development at Nelvana gave an excellent conference on The Origin of Animation Originality and the Exploitation of Property Chain. It was also a great opportunity to introduce Nelvana to the leading Chinese animation studios. Then, the team headed out to the Shenzhen Animation Event on May 19 and to the Animating with Toon Boom workshop in Stockholm on May 31. _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

MIFA 2006 will be a lively event this year as Toon Boom will participate in a general public presentation of Toon Boom Studio on June 6 at 6:30 pm at Annecy-le-Vieux Maison de la Jeunesse et de la Culture. The team will be showcasing Toon Boom’s software solutions at booth 2.03 at MIFA from June 7 to 10, while giving Animation Workshops at the Imperial Palace, Salon Ravel A, fifth floor, on June 7 and 8 from 9 am to 5 pm, in collaboration with Rhinoceros Formation. The detailed schedule will be available at Toon Boom’s booth or online at www.toon boom.com/company/news/events.php#mifa. _____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

After MIFA, the team is gearing up for the National Educational Computing Conference in San Diego from July 5 to 9; for Siggraph 2006 (Booth 1201) in Boston from August 1 to 3, 2006; and for the Ottawa International Animation Festival from September 20 to 24, 2006. Make sure to come by and see us!

Toon Boom Animation Inc. announced that it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Pegs’n Co., a privately held developer of 2D bitmap animation technology. With this strategic market consolidation, Toon Boom Animation will deliver greater animation solutions and reinforce its growth strategy in the media, and entertainment and educational arenas. “Toon Boom’s software solutions are recognized as the market leading technology in the animation industry and the integration of Pegs’ technology in Toon Boom’s portfolio will enable the company to continue delivering quality, efficiency and reliability to the animation community — for all animation styles, formats and users,” said Joan Vogelesang, President and Chief Executive Officer at Toon Boom. Pegs’n Co.‘s product line comprises all Pegs’ modules including scan, pixel painting, vector editor, exposure, FX and camera editing, sound processing and export to various output formats. Pegs will be integrated in Toon Boom’s current offerings and its user base will be supported by the Toon Boom Paris office. A press conference will be held at Booth 2.03 on Wednesday, June 7 at 11:30 am to present the new solutions and address all media inquiries.

toonboom news / june 2006

Toon Boom Storyboard is the leading storyboarding system for visual storytelling, perfectly suited to traditional and paperless methods. Truly completing the production pipeline, Storyboard helps you take an idea and translate it into a visual story that will become a complete program, whether animated or live-action.

Developed in conjunction with expert storyboard artists, Toon Boom Storyboard speeds up production planning and enables studios to reach new heights with increased production integration. Its advanced features make it the tool of choice to create an entirely digital storyboard. _________________________________________________________ Toon Boom Storyboard provides a: • Flexible layer-based panel display with motion camera capabilities • Complete set of drawing tools, including pressuresensitive brush tool when using a digital graphic tablet and pen • Customizable caption fields to insert fully searchable textual content, such as scene descriptions and comments • Advanced timeline to control timing and automatically generate an animatic with sound tracks and transitions between shots • Real-time animatic creation with dynamic camera moves • Extensive export capabilities, including printing, image sequences, and Harmony/Opus, EDL, SWF and QuickTime file formatting _________________________________________________________ Ideal for storyboard artists • Work faster with drawing layers and intuitive vector drawing tools • Create better animatics in less time • Accelerate the review and approval process

Essential for directors and producers • Enjoy complete pipeline integration • Review, update and reorder digital panels instantly • Leverage the reuse of assets by accessing storyboard drawings from other panels, its library of existing drawing and sounds, and the library of other storyboard projects _________________________________________________________ A must for visual storytellers • Draw, animate and edit in one powerful package • Develop multilayer panels with constant reference to script • Access advanced tools and ready-made templates to storyboard quickly • Preview story composition in real-time synced with sound tracks _________________________________________________________ The power of digital storyboarding Toon Boom Storyboard’s easy-to-use interface offers an elegant traditional panel window layout or an overview window layout that fits into your content creation process. The Storyboard interface is easily navigable using just a graphic tablet pen. Now available as an Early Access Program to all animation studios using Toon Boom Harmony and Opus. The commercial release meets the needs of all production types — whether 2D animation, 3D animation or live-action — and is scheduled for release at SIGGRAPH 2006. toonboom news / june 2006

SPONSORSHIP Toon Boom Animation is proud to support excellence in art, technology as well as in sports. In view of the upcoming Games of the XXIX Olympiad – Beijing 2008, Toon Boom has decided to sponsor Mark Heese, a multiple medal winner in beach volleyball. Mark has been one of Canada’s premier beach volleyball players for over a decade. With his partner, John Child, he has accomplished many firsts for Canadian beach volleyball. He brought home Canada’s first ever medal in volleyball at the inaugural beach volleyball Olympic event in Atlanta in 1996. He won Canada’s first FIVB International World Tour gold medal in Berlin 1996, and has won silver medals at two of the last three FIVB World Tour events hosted in Canada since 2000. As a beach volleyball pioneer in Canada, Mark has committed himself to being an ambassador for the sport whenever possible. He visits schools and camps on a regular basis spreading the values of the Olympic spirit and healthy living. He regularly receives media requests and makes it a priority to promote the sport, his team and his corporate partners. Check out Mark’s page at www.toonboom.com/markheese.

Get fit with Toon Boom Animation Workout Series Touching on all aspects of animation creation, the Toon Boom Animation Workout Series is a dedicated program of exercises designed to help users develop the techniques and skills necessary to get the most out of the Toon Boom product family. Each title of the Workout Series lays out the objectives, provides users with the tools and material necessary and guides them through each exercise, while allowing them plenty of freedom to experiment and add their own personal touch to the final result. Once they have completed the program they will be able to apply the skill set to their own projects. As a bonus, each animator involved in the series provides useful Animator’s Tips. The first Animating Workout title is split into two components. The first one

shows step by step how to use the drawing tools as well as animating, and the second shows how to add elements and create a movie. The Animating Workout sells at $24.99 US and is available at the Toon Boom online store. The next title is already in the works and will teach the fundamentals of cut-out style animation, showing step by step how to go from a rough sketch, to a fully painted character, ready for cut-out animation. The Workout Series is designed to work with Toon Boom Studio or Toon Boom Solo, users must have one of these two products installed on their computer. This is not designed to work with Toon Boom Studio Express. Check out all the eLearning tools Toon Boom offers online at www.toonboom.com/products/eLearning/.

Geneviève Chartrand

TOON BOOM STAR In each issue, we will introduce you to the people behind the technology and put a face to the voice you may have spoken to.

TRICKS & TIPS

Software instructor Marie-Ève Chartrand joined Toon Boom in 2005. She provides training on all Toon Boom products at customer studios as well as at the Montreal head office. Prior to joining the company, Marie-Ève worked for several animation studios, including Pascal Blais Productions and Manga Latina, as an animator, ink and painter and compositor. Her experience in animation production contributes greatly to her training assignments, giving her a unique perspective on customer needs and creative challenges. Marie-Ève travels extensively throughout the world but makes sure to spend quality time with her sweetheart, Eric Raglione, who, from time to time, jumps into a plane and shares the experience with her.

A transition is a way to gradually move from one scene to another. We usually use transitions to indicate a change of location or to give a rhythm to the action. Even though there are no actual transition tools in Toon Boom Studio, there are lots of easy ways to create transitions between your scenes. Users can simply use a drawing or an image on a peg or using either the Clipping effect or the Color Transform effect. Check out the complete article at www.toonboom.com/products/eLearning/articles/transitions0506.php.

toonboom news / april 2006

How to create transitions in Toon Boom Studio

Image courtesy of Answer Studio Image courtesy of Answer Studio

Cosgrove Hall, the prestigious Manchester based animation studio, has adopted Toon Boom Harmony. Dedicated to creating new and innovative work with the most advanced technology available in the market, Cosgrove Hall plans to maximize the pipeline integration Toon Boom Harmony offers while keeping all the production in the United Kingdom. “While Cosgrove Hall celebrates its 30th Anniversary, we plan to give the industry an idea of what is next for Europe’s largest animation studio. Adopting Toon Boom Harmony is a critical step in our strategy” shared Anthony Utley, Managing Director at Cosgrove Hall. Recently Cosgrove Hall has been more widely known for their prestigious work for hire, including most of the UK’s top rating children shows such as Little Robots, Fifi and the Flowertots and Postman Pat, however a recent major management restructure and fresh and targeted outlook to program development has ensured the studios are experiencing massively renewed international interest in co pros, development and production ideas. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Founded in 2004, the Answer Studio was created by leading and experienced Japanese animators who had produced several popular animated features. With the growing number of small independent studios in Japan, Answer Studio positions itself as a one-stop studio and is releasing its first original series, Flag, in co-production with Aniplex. Made using Opus, Flag is a documentary style animation featuring a young female photographer who covers a civil war in a small Asian nation. The story is narrated through the photos she takes. Opus’ features contributed greatly to establish the animation style and atmosphere of this project. “We put a lot of effort trying to find the best way to show photos, as we definitely wanted to avoid showing them just as held animation. The biggest challenge was to visualize the reality of ‘shade and light’ of battlefield photos. The director’s goal was to do something beyond existent Japanese animation style. After lots of trial and error, we found a way to blur the shadows of the character. As Opus enables us to naturally blur all the shadows as a mask, we could quite easily visualize realistic shadows. We can’t get this effect by using Japanese animation software. If we try, most of the work has to be done in post-production, which is time-consuming and costly. Also, as we seek realistic images, there are subtle color changes all over. The ability to play the color palettes and camera moves in real time really helps the team and directors working on this project,” shared Miki Kusama of Answer Studio.

Toonz Animation India, South Asia's leading animation studio, has become the largest Toon Boom Harmony installation in India. Preparing for the production of several in-house projects, Toonz is planning to explore Harmony’s wide array of capabilities to create traditional and cut-out animation in a fully integrated production pipeline. “To further our level of efficiency and bring our quality standards even higher, we decided to install Toon Boom Harmony throughout our studio” shared P. Jayakumar, Chief Executive Officer at Toonz Animation India. Toonz Animation India Pvt. Ltd., a major provider of animation to top US and European producers, is South Asia’s most admired animation studio. Founded in 1999, Toonz’s client list includes the biggest names in media and entertainment: Marvel, Hallmark, Paramount, and Cartoon Network. The Animation Magazine has heralded the company as one of the top ten multimedia studios in the world. The sprawling, 18,000 sq ft state-of-the-art studio is based in the electronic city of Technopark, Trivandrum. The facility is staffed with top creative professionals from across the world, including Philippines, Singapore, Canada, USA and India. toonboom news / june 2006

Image courtesy of SustainLane Animation Studio

and skills. Of course, our primary objective is to use everything we do to promote the Gospel and encourage the Christian lifestyle,” shared Pastor Minick. His emphasis has recently been on helping teenagers to find a place of ministry in the church. Many of the young people in his church have artistic and creative gifts and talents. “I believe that Solo can be used to develop the talent of our teenagers and fulfill the mission of our church by promoting the Gospel. It is my vision that we can produce programming for our children’s department as well as create short features as visual aids to our adult Bible lessons. Many thanks for this creative tool!” he added. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

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At the last NAB 2006, Johnny D. Minick discovered Solo during a demo at Toon Boom’s booth. “I knew then that it was exactly what I had been searching for. I am the senior pastor of River Of Life in Smyrna, Tennessee, and I find myself constantly searching for new ways to involve my congregation in exploring and developing their talents 6

toonboom news / june 2006

Image courtesy of Blue Tsunami Studios

SustainLane Animation Studio was created in January 2006 to catapult a new online media company into the future of art and entertainment information broadcasting. SustainLane connects families and urban communities from around the world to an influential online information source that is working to improve the health and lifestyles of every individual. Its development came about when SustainLane’s visionary CEO, James Daniel Elsen invited aspiring animation filmmaker, Byron Cloudwalker to their headquarters located in the heart of downtown San Francisco. The rest, as they say, is history. SustainLane’s creative team is currently developing an engaging fantasy series using ToonBoom’s state-of-the-art Solo software. And though the artists are required to align their work with company themes, they are free to develop their own stories in a work atmosphere that resembles a hybrid between a dotcom and miniature Pixar. “Needless to say, working at SustainLane is a blast from the past as well as a peek into the future, ”Byron stated. True to San Francisco’s admirable reputation as a melting pot, SustainLane’s diverse team of artists hails from places as far away as Russia and France. They are delighted to be part of the SustainLane family inside a building that has withstood the test of time, and a community that artists affectionately refer to as the “New Hollywood” of animation. You can view their current works at www.SustainLane.com.

Blue Tsunami Studios provides audio and video production services to independent musical artists with an emphasis on the electronic musician. “Toon Boom Solo is perfect for my production of Sub-level 03's music video project as it provides a complete, end-to-end production solution,” shared John Williams. Touch of Pink is the title song of Sub-level 03's latest release, the music group he is part of, and from its inception they discussed an animated video. Once they settled on a concept, they began to look for tools to produce the video. “We considered traditional methods like stop action or flip books as I was unaware of a computer software tool to completely produce a 2D animated project, be within our budget, and easy to learn and use — that is until I download the demo of Solo. Myself and Lennox are consummate do-it-yourself musicians/recording artists/video producers with a full arsenal of audio and video production tools. Toon Boom Solo is the perfect addition to our software toolkit and I'm sure Touch of Pink will not be the last animated video we produce,” added John.

Based in Rio de Janeiro, Carlos Eduardo Alves Ramírez is a born illustrator. In 2004, he opened his own studio, PICTUS arte interativa, where he and his team create content for digital media, including CD-ROMs and DVDs. ”I used to create all my digital animations using Macromedia Flash, and I liked it a lot. However, I felt I needed more flexibility while looking for an application that would follow the traditional methods of creating animation. Certain tasks were tedious and long to do traditionally, such as inking and painting, and creating inbetweens. I can now do them 80% faster in Toon Boom Studio. Another advantage that I enjoy is the ability to rotate the work area to better position my hand on the drawing. In Flash, this is impossible. The camera moves, which would require several tedious steps in Flash, can be done with just one attachment of a peg in Toon Boom Studio, enabling me to move the camera in any way that I want. ”Carlos and his team are currently brainstorming for the creation of three additional animations (probably an animated short, an animated feature and a 5-minute TV series).

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Rolf Eichenberger from ICO interactive communication (http://ico.ch) is part of a dynamic network which predominantly provides DVD and CD-ROM authoring as well as Flash, CSS and Typo3 for internet solutions. A few weeks ago, Burkard & Partner Werbeagentur AG, an advertising agency in Zurich, asked Rolf if he could do the animation of a cartoon-style ad made from drawings by their illustrator Matthias Lutz. Until then, he mainly used Flash for this kind of work but the incredible camera function, the lip-synch tool and the possibility to easily publish the final result to different formats such as internet, television and cinema made Toon Boom Studio his first choice. "Due to my longtime experience with Macromedia Director, Flash and similar software I got familiar with the workflow of Toon Boom Studio really fast. Congratulations to the Toon Boom team, keep your great work continuing," enthused Rolf. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Rob Campbell is a high school multimedia teacher and proprietor of Cartoon Thunder, a web site with cartoons aimed at the Harley riding crowd and their kids. On a couple of productions, GroundHog Day and Ripped Off, the Red Light Reindeer, using the lip-synch utility really sped up production and let him get the pieces out without much effort. ”Using the library lets me have long term consistency and control over the look of my characters, which inspires me to get the look right.” Since then, Rob has learned more about what he can do to make them better without much more time commitment—again, the library is key. ”I’m thrilled to have given it a try a few years ago. I expect more users to find how cool Toon Boom Studio is for animation and see the benefits to switching over.” toonboom news / june 2006

Image courtesy of Rob Campbell

Image courtesy of Presentek

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Presentek is in its 20th year, founded in 1987. Presentek provides professional communications services primarily to corporate clients in the areas of Product Marketing, Web Sites, Electronic Marketing Collateral, and Sales Tools & Product Demos. Presentek has a long history of using Flash animation to deliver compelling product information. In 2004, Presentek expanded its flash offering to include 2D character animation with the objective of offering its clients something different, lighter and more fun, but still designed to inform and entertain. This is when they added Toon Boom Studio to their toolkit which they put to use for the Ricoh Corp. Software Support site project. “After I established a workflow and gained some experience and familiarity with the program, animating became relatively quick and easy…and those are two words you’ll rarely ever hear an animator use to describe the process! The instant gratification of seeing my drawings move and watching my characters come to life – without the pain of drawing each frame traditionally – really made me a fan of Toon Boom Studio,” shared Laura Giorgi, animator at Presentek. Check their web site at www.presentekstudios.com

Image courtesy of Atlantic Video

Image courtesy of Carlos Eduardo Alves Ramírez

Atlantic Video is a full-service broadcast development and production management company headquartered in Washington, D.C. The post production division of Atlantic Video is responsible for the graphics and animation of the series Pendemonium for Discovery Education. Pendemonium is an educational series that teaches grammar to students through the adventures of four “pentastic” heroes battling an evil marker trying to take over the world. The project, currently in its second season, is developed entirely using Toon Boom Studio. “We selected Toon Boom Studio due to its essential mixture of animation functions not available in any other software package. The ability to lip-sync, work with a Z-axis, efficiently manage assets, and output to both web and broadcast formats make it an ideal animation software package,” said David Pascual, Director of Animation at Atlantic Video. Using Toon Boom Studio, we completed over four hours of animation for the series in the last year.

Motion Picture Services / Toon Studios

The New Horizon: A couple of years ago, State and Federal fire officials approached Daniel with a problem. They asked him if he knew what the number one cause of death in the U.S. was for children under the age of 12. “Oh, I did like everyone else and guessed car crashes, suffocation, and then I threw in what I knew would be the winning answer, poisoning. Boy was I wrong. The correct answer is house fires,” shared Daniel. They told him something drastic had to be done in order to educate young children as nothing new had been produced in the past ten years to address this problem. “So we as a company set out on a mission to volunteer our time to develop a series of cartoons, to not only address the needs of fire safety for children but to produce and distribute a series that would address issues such as child safety on the internet, childhood obesity, abduction, food allergies for children, and much more. I remembered this little program we had bought called Toon Boom Studio. We had played around with it a little. So it was time for us to roll up our shirt sleeves and get busy.” The Production Process Begins: “Time was our biggest enemy. I remember hearing the news on the radio on my way into work, a house fire claims the lives of two small children. For us, it literally became a race against the clock to finish this cartoon. Toon Boom Studio ended up being our little engine . . . that could!” Firefighter Frank started out as a simple children’s story, then was re-written as a screenplay, and finally turned into a manuscript for a children’s book. In the early stages of creation, they began storyboarding each scene. Fire officials were so impressed when 8

toonboom news / june 2006

Motion Picture Services / Toon Studios

“The thing I am most proud of is . . . with the help of the public we were able to discover a serious need, come up with solution, and execute it with Toon Boom Studio acting as our life preserver. We didn’t start out with the thought of producing a children’s cartoon, it just happened!” stated Daniel R. Johnson, President and Chief Executive Officer at Motion Picture Services / Toon Studios. For the past seventeen years, Motion Picture Services (MPS) has become well-known in the broadcast and cable industry for high quality production. The company started out producing film ads, and animated logo elements for theaters across the United States and Canada. MPS has done work for clients such as KIA Motors of America, U.S. Xpress, International Dairy Queen, The Weather Channel and many others. Toon Studios was formed in an effort to explore the possibility of incorporating 2D animation in projects for the company’s growing list of clients.

they would see little bits and pieces of a screen test, they leaned on Toon Studio a little to meet the deadline of National Fire Safety Week. The team found itself acting out the scenes, rather than storyboarding them. “No offense, but we didn’t want our cartoon to look like . . . a cartoon. We wanted it to look like a cross between a storybook and a cartoon. After all, our audience was pre-school to kindergarten.” They consulted with a lot of professionals as to the color palette and style to which young children would respond. To achieve the look and feel they were going for, Johnny Stockman, their head of animation, used colored pencils to color in the backgrounds. They were extremely mindful of adults having to watch the cartoon over and over with their children, so when they watched the dailies, they inserted gags into the video that adults would appreciate. “Before we started the cartoon, I knew only one firefighter. When production began I knew hundreds of them. These young men and women are incredibly giving and dedicated individuals.” The characters were developed, and voice talent was brought in to record the voice tracks for each character. Each character was hand drawn on paper (yes, paper), and the image was then either traced or scanned into the computer. The images were then imported into Toon Boom Studio and manipulated over the backgrounds. They produced a pencil test of each scene and then dissected it in meetings until they got the desired result. They would often test these scenes with children and note their reactions. “Toon Boom Studio was like a dream come true. If we needed to bring in an additional artist, they would have no problem learning how to use Toon Boom Studio quickly.” “Toon Boom Studio’s features allowed us to dress up the cartoon and make it more interesting by holding the attention of such a young audience. Let’s face it, fire safety

Motion Picture Services / Toon Studios

rules by themselves can appear boring; use of movement and gradients help to keep the viewer totally immersed in the story. We experienced a tremendous productivity gain by using Toon Boom Studio. The ease of use allowed artists to get up and running quickly, and being able to draw directly into the program allowed us to keep the hand drawn style we wanted so desperately to preserve. Prior to using Toon Boom Studio, we would have used an arsenal of programs such as Adobe Illustrator to Adobe After Effects. What previously took two to three days to produce with the other programs, takes only a day in Toon Boom Studio. This makes us much more productive

and eliminates the problem of keeping up with all the parts and pieces generated by the other programs. When you’ve got a real deadline to meet and have a program that outperforms your expectations, it’s considered a winner in our production house. Our staff give Toon Boom Studio 5 stars!” “We picked Baltimore, MD home to the Firehouse Expo as the site to debut the cartoon. When you’re standing behind a group of firefighters on an escalator, listening to them buzz about Firefighter Frank . . . you know you’ve got something!” Two years later, Daniel is proud to announce the release of the first thirty minute cartoon in the series, called Firefighter Frank. "That's not all. The cartoon is currently being used by fire departments across America as a teaching aid, and wait until you hear the heartwarming e-mails and letters that are coming into my office from educators who are using this wonderful cartoon in the classrooms.”

Elementary students + Toon Boom Studio = Success Barbara-Anne Krampfert is a teacher at St. Dunstan Elementary in Mississauga, Ontario. Six years ago, she began working with students during her lunch hours on developing animation skills as an extracurricular club. Students from grades 5 to 8 are picked for their drawing, computer and presentation skills. Students hone these skills in the Animation Club and go on to compete at the school, board and provincial levels. Three years ago, Skills Ontario mandated the use of new software – Toon Boom Studio. Her students had won Junior and Intermediate gold at the Dufferin-Peel Catholic District School Board (DPCDS Board) level and had to learn to use this new software in two weeks. “I purchased two copies of the software and it was very easy to install on our Mac computers. Students found it easy to use and could begin drawing and coloring without having to create frames for their animated items. The quick rendering time is a great Toon Boom Studio feature, especially for students who want quick results. Other features of the software which my students find effective and time efficient are the assigned keyboard shortcut commands which are adaptable to both Mac and PC. The tools are very easy to manipulate and the ability to grab an object and paste it into other scenes is fantastic. You can also save characters or objects to your library. My students have created a variety of short mini movies. This year, the Board challenge was to create a mini movie of the Passion of Christ,” shares BarbaraAnne. The students have had success ever since they began using Toon Boom Studio with the following wins: ***** 2004 DPCDSB Junior & Intermediate – Gold 2004 Skills Ontario Junior – Gold & Intermediate - Silver 2005 DPCDSB Junior & Intermediate– Gold 2005 Skills Ontario Junior – Silver 2006 DPCDSB Junior – Gold & Intermediate – Silver

“In keeping with the Ministry of Education’s goal to develop students’ media skills, Toon Boom Studio is a very quick hands-on tool applicable to any subject, in particular geography, science, health and religion. One student used the software to create an impressive health assignment on good eating and exercising habits, which was presented to the class. Another created a short piece for science.” “Presently, only a few secondary schools offer Character Animation in our school region as a subject or as an extracurricular activity. It is not until students reach the post secondary level that this opportunity is available again. With the Skills Ontario Competition, more schools

This drawing was done by a grade 5 student.

are becoming aware of and using Toon Boom Studio. My hope is that more school boards will begin to use Toon Boom Studio as a choice in their standard suite of software, allowing students to develop their creative skills that will foster future technology careers,” concluded BarbaraAnne. For more information regarding Ontario Skills Competitions and Workshops for both elementary and secondary schools check out www.skillsontario.com. toonboom news / june 2006

toonboom news / june 2006

RAD Productions

Based in Antigua, Guatemala, RAD Productions is a small independent animation studio providing projects tailored to any budget. RAD is a fresh young company with a sense of fun about their work. They can develop projects for any scale, from Web animation to television and film, in either Spanish or English. RAD was founded four years ago by Richard Dunmore and Xochitl Gazol, forming the perfect combination of Richard’s knowledge of systems and technology and Xoch’s artistic creativity. RAD was formed in a beautiful seven-room Colonial house with roof terrace gardens situated on luscious colorful grounds. It is an ideal haven in which to develop their ideas. Richard Dunmore is a New Zealander living in Guatemala. His background was in project management involving technical infrastructure in the telecom industry. Xochitl Gazol is from Nicaragua and studied graphic design in college. She began designing Web sites and is now RAD’s director and lead animator. They created animation for zero-budget independent short films in Guatemala. The team spent 2004 writing and producing a cartoon pilot for Latin American television. They are now involved in developing other animation and film projects. They started designing simple HTML Web sites for their clients —mostly foreign business owners. They were introduced to animation as they designed increasing complex Web sites using the technique. Guatemala is a developing country in Central America composed of an ethnically diverse population. Recently the civil war came to an end, bringing with it an environment of social dislocation and loss. The effect of this breakdown on the juvenile population is a lack of information about civil, judicial and state guarantees. Concerned by repeated abuses of Guatemalan children’s rights, loss of identity and social discrimination, RAD decided to create an animated series, focusing on viewers from 6 to 12 years old, where they can discuss children’s rights in an attractive and simple language. The project had to be easily understandable and show the different faces that constitute Guatemalan identity and community. The sacred book of the Mayans, the Popol Vuh tells the story of two young brothers who combat evil forces. RAD created a story based on the book, about indigenous twins, Luna and Hunapu, who fight against evil. The series is called El Viaje de Hunapu. Hunapu is separated from his parents and sister at a very young age. He travels around Guatemala searching for his sister, so together they can

reunite with their parents. On his trip, he meets other kids like himself with children’s rights issues. He then helps them understand their rights and even attain them with his magical powers. Considering the importance of this topic and the purpose it serves for the juvenile population, institutions like Save the Children Norway and Soros Foundation Guatemala decided to support the project. Save the Children Norway helps with the research component of the series development and Soros Foundation Guatemala provides a small economic contribution that helps to run the production. National channels have also expressed their interest in broadcasting the series as a part of their regular programming. RAD is still at an early stage of the project and the animation department has not yet started the full production. They are getting familiar with Toon Boom Studio to maximize the use of the software. At this point, they are completing designs of the characters and importing them directly into Toon Boom Studio for painting and rigging of the cutout. “From our short experience, we have eliminated Photoshop from our pipeline, and are scanning drawings directly into Toon Boom Studio for painting,” comments Alejo Crisostomo, General Director for El Viaje de Hunapu. “We love the Twain import that vectorizes all of my drawn lines combined with the smooth tool, this has given me great results and saved me lots of time. The color palette features are great too! It enables us to change the tint and alpha of entire palettes styles, from day to night with just a couple of clicks. Also the color management enables us to update all color changes just by changing the swatch. I am very pleased with the Flatten and Optimize commands also. The painting process has definitely speeded up by 200% and will probably start getting faster once we overcome our learning curve.” “On the animation side, I really like the automated lip sync. The directors asked if Spanish was going to be a problem and the testing has yielded excellent results. This is a huge potential savings in the animators’ time. On a previous project, we had a dedicated lip sync animator, on his best day, before being driven mad by the repetition, he could complete 20 seconds in a day. I have saved 100 days of work without having started. Already we are converted and plan to use Toon Boom’s family of software for all our animation projects,” concluded Alejo.

The Maya Academy of Advanced Cinematics (MAAC) joined hands with Toon Boom Animation in May 2006 to launch courses in 2D animation in four major cities in India (Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata and Bangalore) based on the curriculum designed by Toon Boom and the faculty trained specialists from Canada. "In the past few markets, I have seen tremendous interest in 2D/CGI work and, looking at the in-roads Toon Boom Animation has had in the major studios around the world, we feel that it is the right time for Maya Academy of Advanced Cinematics to introduce Toon Boom in its curriculum,” shared Rajesh Turakhia, Chief Executive Officer at MAAC. Maya Academy of Advanced Cinematics is the academic wing of Maya Entertainment Ltd.(MEL), a premier 3D Animation and Visual Effects house based in Mumbai, India and promoted by internationally renowned producer-director Mr. Ketan Mehta and acclaimed film actress Ms. Deepa Sahi. MAAC provides education in 3D animation, visual effects and post-production techniques duly supported by live projects, seminars by industry professionals and innovative workshops. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Located in the heart of Paris, France, and close to the largest animation studios, Rhinocéros Formation positions itself as a specialized training center of images in motion. Totally focusing on the creative professionals’ needs, this three-year old training center offers new training programs designed for cartoon animators in exclusive partnership with Toon Boom. Based on Harmony, this training which is the first of its kind in France, can be organized for individuals or groups, on a case by case basis, at Rhinocéros or on site, anywhere in France. The training fees can be 100% funded thanks to the special agreements made between Rhinocéros and the AFDAS (Caisse de Financement des Formations des Intermittents du Spectacle). This is a great opportunity to get trained on the most advanced digital animation technology at a very low cost. More information can be found at www.rhinoceros-formation.com. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

The RITS School of Animation in Brussels offers an extensive course in all aspects of professional animation, which takes four or five years to complete. Graphic design, storyboarding, 2D, 3D computer and puppet/plasticine animation are all taught by active professionals. The first two years initiate the students in all these fields, while they can specialize themselves from the third year on. During the fourth year (and sometimes fifth) they are offered the opportunity to create an animated short of their own. Harmony will be used to finalize 2D cartoon animation as well as for cut-out and multimedia techniques. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

ICARI adopted Toon Boom Solo for its one-year training program in cartoon animation. At first, students learn how to create animation traditionally then learn the digital techniques before starting their year-end project. “It is the best of two worlds, the transition to digital is very natural as the

Toon Boom Solo interface is very user-friendly to anyone familiar with the traditional methods,” stated Michel Murray, director at ICARI. “The students are excited when they realize what they can create thanks to the software,” he added. Founded in 1993, in the heart of Montreal, ICARI is a private school totally dedicated to providing professional training in animation and image high-tech. Accredited by the Quebec Ministry of Education, Leisure and Sport, ICARI provides specialized training that leads directly to the work marketplace. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

College of the Redwoods is a community college in Northern California, between the towns of Eureka and Fortuna. The Digital Media program has recently added new courses in 2D and 3D animation. “After a comprehensive software comparison, Toon Boom Studio was selected for its superior hand-drawn to vector conversion, along with the phonetic analysis for dialogue and mouth shape synchronization”, shared Clyde Johnson, Digital Media Professor. Students begin by using animation light boxes and pencil test equipment for traditional animation, learning fundamental skills in line control and movement. This is followed by learning a process for traditional to digital conversion. To compliment a solid sequence of animation courses, new courses in game programming, game art and of course, game animation will be a direction for many of the 2D and 3D animation students. Toon Boom Studio will be used in the Animation Principles and Cartoon Animation classes. Check the Digital Media website at http://isweb .redwoods.edu/dm to see examples of student work and find out more about the classes. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Ngee Ann Polytechnic, School of InfoComm Technology is Singapore’s premier institute for IT education. Established by the government in 1982 as the Centre for Computer Studies, it offers Diploma in Multimedia and Animation with specialization in 3D Animation, Interactive Media and Game Development. The Diploma is a threeyear program covering classical animation principles and techniques as foundation before progressing to a series of 3D animation modules. Toon Boom Studio and drawing tablet are introduced in the second year second animation module to enable students focus more on their creativity and for the purpose of enriching their learning experience in animation production. While doing a one-year long project in the third year, students will form into a project team, develop a concept, and work collaboratively in a simulated production pipeline. For students who are aspiring to be 2D animators, this workplace learning environment @ The MAC – The Multimedia & Animation Centre within the School, using Toon Boom as a productivity tool will give them a rich simulated working experience before they step into the real world. For more information, please visit our website at www.ict.np.edu.sg/mma (broadband access required). toonboom news / june 2006

Image courtesy of Chris Hinton

At Vancouver Film School, the Classical Animation students learn the entire animation process from developing a concept, to delivering a finished product. Just as in a studio, they learn to transform ideas into stories by working creatively with writers, directors, producers, actors, and sound designers. In addition to studying the cornerstones of animation, they work with the latest technologies such as Toon Boom Harmony. Students have production meetings during which the instructor sits as a technical consultant and makes recommendations right at the storyboard stage to make sure the production starts on the right foot. By the end of the year these technical and creative skills are applied to their original short films that they may be submitting to animation festivals. Toon Boom is proud to announce that five animated shorts made by Vancouver Film School students have been screened during the latest LEO AWARDS Film Festival and two were nominated in toonboom news / june 2006

the Student production category, namely: Strictly Cavy by Elisabeth Lenning and The Heart Collector by Michael Fallik. Congratulations! ____________________________________________________ At the latest ‘Pitch Me! Italia’ Competition during Cartoons on the Bay 2006, Francesco Filippi pitched his show Rusty Red to a world-class panel of judges, including Guido Manuli, a famous Animation Director, Michaela Haberlander from FilmFernsehFonds Bayern, Germany and Annita Romanelli from RAI fiction. The plot, which takes inspiration from the history of German Navy in World War I, is a about a grandfather who tells his grandson, Federico, about the legend of Captain Red. The captain was aware hero who saved hundreds of soldiers by opposing the evil admiral Kommel’s orders. Federico fears that with school starting, his favorite tale will soon be revealed as a lie; but he then discovers that not only is the story true, his grandfather hides a great secret. As a Toon Boom Studio prize winner, Francesco Filippi shared: “I am very grateful to Toon Boom for this award. We have really struggled with our current applications and it will be great to get an opportunity to work with a tool designed specifically for 2D animation.” Due to this boost of confidence, Francesco Filippi is taking his project to MIFA 2006 where he will be showing his completed pilot, hoping to gain a co-producer and raise the finance to go into production. Information about the project is available at www.studiomistral.com.

Image courtesy of Francesco Filippi

In March 2006, the Academy of Canadian Cinema & Television announced the winners of the 26th Annual Genie Awards, celebrating excellence in Canadian cinema. Congratulations to Chris Hinton who won the Best Animated Short Award with his seven-minute cNote project. He is a multi-awardwinning animator who has worked for the National Film Board, the CBC and several commercial animation studios. He is also heading the Animation Department at Concordia University in Montreal. cNote is an assembly of digitized elements arranged to contemporary classical musical. The music was created expressly for this short, as a creative counterweight for Hinton to work against and with. In this animated pas de deux, Hinton and Montreal-based composer Michael Oesterle leap back and forth between picture and sound; building, tearing down, and rebuilding until the film exists only as an integrated and unified “one.” Chris Hinton used Toon Boom Studio V3 as his primary animating tool. He also used Photoshop and Painter to alter the vector line and give it its very special look. ____________________________________________________