Leading U.K. media group Entertainment Rights Plc ("ER") has signed the distribution rights for Latin America for the new TRANSFORMERS ANIMATED series (26x22) plus a 70-minute special episode. The agreement builds on ER's announcement earlier this year for securing worldwide television distribution rights (excluding North America) and covers television distribution across both free and pay TV platforms.
The Stuttgart International Festival of Animated Film has extended its entry deadline to Dec. 31, 2007. Next year's event will take place May 1-6, 2008 in Stuttgart, Germany.
This week in AWN's Forums, a senior member wants to know if others have heard of Silverlight, a rival to Adobe's Flash. There's a post for well wishes to James Davis, who suffered a stroke earlier in the year. There's an Educator's post on the importance of life drawing. Others are giving their thoughts on ENCHANTED, while other members are talking about PERSEPOLIS. A student has questions about what to include in a portfolio. Others are continuing to add to the discussions on what is the best animated short and animated feature of all time.
ASIFA-Hollywood announced nominations today for the 35th Annual Annie Awards recognizing the year's best animation across film, television, commercials, videogames and short subjects.
With the feature animation industry booming in India, Lisa Goldman reports on the opportunities and challenges presented by an immense and diverse audience.
New Zealand-based Weta Prods. and U.K.-based Chapman Ent. are forming a partnership to develop a range of children's television properties. The first venture will be an animated comedy targeted at boys 6-9.
The development project will be jointly led by Martin Baynton and Richard Taylor of Weta and Chapmans Creative Director Keith Chapman. They are working on a selection of 2D and CG animated properties, which will be presented to broadcasters and the licensing community in the near future, with preproduction expected to commence in 2008.
Animated Dreams is a tiny, but a strongly viable part of the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival. Animated shorts were first screened in 1999 as preludes to the main features. It gave birth to the first and only animation festival in Estonia, the country of "a little big nation of animation."
Management firm The Gotham Group has signed a deal with Fox Broadcasting Co. to produce multiple pilots for prime-time animated television projects. Exploiting Gotham's prestigious client roster, the companies hope to produce the next generation of Fox animated hits to match the network's success with THE SIMPSONS and FAMILY GUY. The announcement closely follows Gotham's mega-deal with The Weinstein Co. to produce and distribute animated feature films.
Twelve features have been submitted for consideration in the Animated Feature Film category for the 80th Academy Awards, including such early favorites as RATATOUILLE, THE SIMPSONS MOVIE and PERSEPOLIS (which is also the French entry for Best Foreign Film). Under the rules, a maximum of three films can be nominated from this group.
The other nine submissions are: ALVIN AND THE CHIPMUNKS, AQUA TEEN HUNGER FORCE COLON MOVIE FILM FOR THEATERS, BEE MOVIE, BEOWULF, MEET THE ROBINSONS, SHREK THE THIRD, SURF'S UP, TEKKONKINKREET and TMNT.
Animated Exeter Festival 2008Exeter, U.K. Feb. 11-23, 2008Deadline: Nov. 5, 2007
Now in it's ninth year, Animated Exeter Festival is the longest dedicated animation festival in the U.K. With international shorts and features, regional competitions, exhibitions, masterclasses, interactive events and workshops. Includes Exeter Comic Expo. Competitive submissions from South West of England only, all formats, free to enter.
CALL FOR ENTRIES ANIMATED SHORTS for 2007 8th Annual San Diego Asian Film Festival Animation Showcase
20th Century Fox TV is in development on three new animated series, according to THE HOLLYWOOD REPORTER. The first is a retooled version of the 2003 live-action comedy THE PITTS, created by SIMPSONS vet Mike Scully. The second, RELATIVE INSANITY, will be exec produced by Jack Black. The third, MOTHBALLS, is from DRAWN TOGETHER creators Matt Silverstein and Dave Jeser.
Swedish-based development house Assorted Nuts Animation Studios and Canadian Subsequence Ent. has signed a co-development deal for two animated TV series titled MY PINK WORLD and SUPERZEROES.
MY PINK WORLD (52x11) is a relationship comedy aimed towards a 7-11 audience with a girl pull. The series features little blonde ten-year-old Tiffany, who on the weekend goes to stay with her dad Mike, a single car mechanic living a bachelor lifestyle in a dingy two-bedroom apartment.
Comedy Central has ordered a second season of the popular animated hit show LIL' BUSH, with the new season set to premiere in spring 2008 with ten new episodes.
"I'm thrilled the show has been picked up," said LIL' BUSH creator and exec producer Donick Cary. "I'm sorry it had to happen in the Minneapolis airport bathroom, but if that's the way Doug Herzog wants to run his company, it's cool with me."
LATV Networks has announced an expanded fall programming lineup featuring an additional 10 hours of original first-run content each week, including the first animated HOMIES show based on the worldwide figurine phenomenon created by Dave Gonzales.
LATV will air the exclusive premiere of THE HOMIES HIP-HOP SHOW, a comedic, stop-motion one-hour animated series, on Thursday, September 13. The show will then air on Tuesdays and Thursdays at 9:00 pm PT. Each show will consist of eight to 10 sketches interlaced with music videos.
Portfolio Ent. Has closed several sales on animated, children's and lifestyle programming, expanding the international reach of its catalog. Among the new deals, Jetix (Netherlands) has renewed CARL2 for the third season, while Ares Media.Net TV (Turkey) and KTV (South Africa) have both acquired the first three seasons (52x30) of the animated comedy series. In addition, RTM (Malaysia) has picked up the free TV broadcast rights for all 26 half-hour episodes of the animated children's adventure series TOAD PATROL.
In this month's column, Martin "Dr. Toon" Goodman ties up some summer loose ends concerning Transformers, Ratatouille, Nahoul the bee and the live-action Jonny Quest project.
The Chinese government announced today that it would use animated beat cops to patrol 13 of China's top Web portals in an effort to steer users away from illegal content, reports THE ASSOCIATED PRESS. Starting Sept. 1, 2007, the cartoon cops will walk, bike and drive across Web surfers' screens every half hour, warning them to stay clear of material "the Communist Party finds politically or morally threatening." By the end of the year, the animated warning will appear on all websites registered with Beijing servers.
THE TEN, a feature film directed by David Wain featuring Paul Rudd, Wionan Ryder, and Jessica Alba features a seven-minute animated segment called, THE LYING RHINO, animated by Augenblick Studios. Produced by Wain, Jonathan Stern and Paul Rudd, THE TEN is a THINKFilm release opening Aug. 3, 2007.
THE NEW FRONTIER, which began as a six-issue series in 2004 that follows Superman and other heroes of the DC Universe from the end of World War II through the Cold War, will be made into a direct-to-DVD animated film from Warner Home Video, reports THE NEW YORK TIMES. The saga has been published in one hardcover and two softcover collections and has inspired a line of action figures.
The annual NVIDIA Gelato User Group meeting returns to SIGGRAPH 2007, Aug. 8, in San Diego, where artists and animators from around the globe will convene to see next-generation rendering technology from NVIDIA, and premiere the new animated short film THE PLUSH LIFE, rendered entirely with Gelato rendering software.
The Gelato User Group meeting will take place from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. at the San Diego Marriott Hotel and Marina, Santa Rosa Room. For more details or to RSVP, please email gelatoinfo@nvidia.com(link sends e-mail).
PBS is bringing an animated version of Tom and Ray Magliozzi's CAR TALK radio show to TV. Based on the hit NPR radio show, the as-yet-untitled animated 10x30 sitcom is targeted for summer 2008. Fans will be invited to submit title suggestions for the television show.
The show will focus on the âoff-airâ escapades of Tom and Ray Magliozzi (known to their listeners as Click and Clack, the Tappet brothers) as they try to fix cars, fend off disgruntled customers and seek out ways to do less and less work.
A hard disk belonging to suspected U.K. terror plotter Kafeel Ahmed contains an animated video showing how a syringe can be used in a bomb, reports NDTV.COM. Police found the disk at his home in Bangalore.
The technology was to be used to trigger the bombs found in London, but they failed because the syringes malfunctioned, British investigators said.
Monster Distributes has just picked up the distribution rights to the new animated series, LIFEBOAT LUKE (52x5). The search and rescue adventure for kids 4-7 features Lifeboat Luke and his friends in the mad, magical seaside town of Donaghadoo. The stories use narration, effects and music and are easily re-versioned for different languages.
Animated Dreams at Tallinn Black Nights Film FestivalTallinn, EstoniaNov. 21-25, 2007Deadline: Aug. 15, 2007
Animated Dreams is a tiny, but a strongly viable part of the Tallinn Black Nights Film Festival. Animated shorts were first screened in 1999 as preludes to the main features. It gave birth to the first and only animation festival in Estonia, the country of "a little big nation of animation."
