The Super Bowl, American football's biggest game, kept people away from
U.S. theatres this past weekend, but STUART LITTLE, with primary visual
effects by Sony Pictures Imageworks, additional animation by CFX and Rhythm
& Hues, and miniatures by Thunderstone, stayed steady at 4th place in the
box office. Sony's great white hope (a white mouse that is) grossed US$4.78
million bringing its total to $123 million. THE GREEN MILE, with primary
Imax has inked a deal with Fox, DreamWorks and Sony Pictures to deliver to
audiences 3D versions of THE SIMPSONS, Princess Bala from ANTZ and several
original animated characters. The Imax feature will be entitled CYBERWORLD
and will hit U.S. theatres in October. Produced by Hugh Murray and Steve
Hoban, the 45-minute pic will feature 3D clips from ANTZ and THE SIMPSONS
interwoven with Phig, the tour guide of this futuristic animation museum.
Fox has leaked the scoop that a central Simpsons character will be killed
off on the February 13 episode of the decade old toon. Rumors have been
circling that the grim reaper will be swinging his scythe at Maude
Flanders, wife of Jesus freak neighbor Ned. In a bold move of honesty THE
SIMPSONS' executive producer Mike Scully fully admits the show is a
shameless attempt at grabbing sweeps ratings. "We're in our 11th season and
we're always looking for new ways to shake up the show a little and do
Michael Webster, who established Walt Disney's television animation
division in 1984, passed away at the age 60 following a long battle with
multiple sclerosis. On Saturday, January 29, 2000, Mr. Webster succumbed to
complications from pneumonia at his home in Port Townsend, Washington,
U.S.A. During his 42 year tenure, Webster created the Walt Disney
Television Animation division and served as its senior VP until his
retirement in 1992. He oversaw production of the Emmy-winning NEW
Nickelodeon has recently closed the San Mateo branch of its on-line unit
announced Nick On-line Pres. Fred Seibert. The office had been doing
research and development for "Project Nozzle" -- a re-launch of Nick.com as
a children's Web portal. To help strengthen the re-launch Viacom, owners of
Nick, bought San Mateo-based Web development house Nvolve, which turned
into the now de-funked San Mateo branch of Nick.com. This decision comes on
the heals of the suspension of "Project Nozzle's" main component My
ACCLAIM ENTERTAINMENT INC., a leading worldwide interactive entertainment
company, has appointed JAY ANDRONACO as manager of public relations and
BRADFORD W. LOUCKS as vice president of sales. Andronaco will oversee
public relations initiatives for Acclaim's recently announced Extreme
Championship Wrestling (ECW) license, including the launch of the first
video game title on February 17, 2000, ECW HARDCORE REVOLUTION. In
addition, Andronaco will manage media relation initiatives for select
Mill Film announced that LAURENT HUGUENIOT and DAVID LOMAX have been
promoted to joint heads of Mill Film 3D. The promotion takes place with
immediate effect and follows on the heals of the recent announcement that
Mill Film will unite operations with sister company Magic Camera. Lomax
joined Mill Film in February 1997 from Pixar Animation Studios where he was
senior technical director for modeling and shader development on the
animated feature film, A BUGS LIFE. Since joining Mill Film, Lomax has
Funkmation Studios, an animation house providing services for film,
television, CD-Rom and the Web, has floated into a new home in Brooklyn's
Navy Yard. The animation house will share the new space with New York
Studios' film and television sound stage. Funkmation's credits include:
SABRINA THE TEENAGE WITCH CD-Rom; storyboard and background design on
COURAGE THE COWARDLY DOG; Flash animation on Partner Re's screen savers;
and a 2D animation pilot with C&C Films entitled MAXIMUM BLACK. The new
Husband of the late Mary Kay Bergman, Dino Andrade, has put out a call to
SOUTH PARK and Mary Kay Bergman fans to write to the Academy of Motion
Picture Arts and Sciences in an effort to have Mrs. Bergman included in the
"In Memoriam" segment of the 2000 Oscar ceremony. Typically, the Academy
only honors higher profile talent who have passed away in the past year. As
reported [AF 11/23/99], Mrs. Bergman took her own life on November 11, 1999
Tom Snyder Productions' HOME MOVIES has found a new home at Cartoon
Network. The Atlanta-based toon channel has ordered 13 episodes for 2000.
The order also includes five episodes, which originally aired on UPN last
spring and eight new episodes, to be produced beginning in February. HOME
MOVIES is about Brendon Small, a restless, creative third-grader, who uses
his video camera to deal with his problems. The cast includes Brendon
Small, Melissa Bardin Galsky and H. Jon Benjamin. The show is very funny as
Cartoon Network's Cartoon Campaign 2000 is electing the next president from
a field of 50 cartoon candidates. Cartoon Network will provide the hopeful
candidates with free airtime from 7-9 p.m. each night between Sunday, March
5, and Thursday, March 9, 2000 when they will screen their own personal
cartoons for viewers. During each night's election coverage, viewers can
vote for their favorite characters via an 800-number that will appear on
The Emmy award-winning producer of THE LATE SHOW WITH DAVID LETTERMAN, JUDE
BRENNAN, has joined the ever-expanding roster at OXYGEN MEDIA. Brennan will
occupy the newly created bi-coastal position of senior vice president of
programming. Brennan will helm the television programming schedule for the
network. The new Oxygen channel will launch nationwide on February 2, 2000.
For the last 20 years, Brennan has served as vice president of creative
BERNARD STOLAR was named president of MATTEL INTERACTIVE, the division that
includes The Learning Company and other software and high-tech products.
Stolar joins Mattel from Sega where he helped engineer the launch of the
Sega Dreamcast video game console in the United States. At Mattel, he will
try to mend the ailing Learning Company division, whose unexpected $105
million loss in the third quarter shocked investors and diminished Mattel's
OLIVE JAR STUDIOS has opened their doors to a new executive in charge of
special venue and theme park productions, MARK RHODES. Rhodes will help the
company's new West Coast branch increase business in both long format
productions and theme park attraction work, as well as aid in the
commercial division. When at Universal, Rhodes supervised two separate
animation projects produced by Olive Jar for Universal Studios' new Islands
of Adventure theme park, which opened in Summer 1999. Rhodes' other
INFOGRAMES NORTH AMERICA, INC. announced that DEREK QUACKENBUSH and RON
RUDOLPH have joined the interactive company's senior management team.
Quackenbush takes on the role of CFO for Infogrames' North American
operations, while Rudolph will head human resources and administration as
the company's senior vice president of administration. For the past three
years, Quackenbush served as Sony's 989 Studios' director of finance and
administration. Prior to 989 Studios, he held various finance positions at
Tim Burton, creator of NIGHTMARE BEFORE CHRISTMAS, has inked a deal to
bring a series of animated shorts featuring his Stainboy character to
shockwave.com. Viewers will be able to download the charcoal-drawn
superhero's first five-minute short sometime in Spring 2000. Under the
terms of the deal, Burton will keep full artistic control over the
characters and properties. The William Morris Agency brokered the deal
which allows for the cross over to TV if the shorts become a hit on the
AMPAS announced on Wednesday, January 26, 2000, its short list of ten films
to be considered for the coveted Oscar nomination for best animated short
film. Three to five of these films will be selected as nominees and
announced at 5:30 am PST on February 15, 2000. The 10 animated short films
making the list this year are: Aardman Animations' Peter Peaks' HUMDRUM;
Character Builders' Oscar Moore has two short listed films with THE
INDESCRIBABLE NTH and THE PHOX, THE BOX AND THE LOX, which screened earlier
A new Switzerland-based company, CHROME Imaging, recently announced their
solution to the wonderful world of post-production Photonyx 1.5 is now
shipping. CHROME claims that the software, which is priced at a mere
US$675, was designed to address the high-end post-production market. The
program features RealTools, a painting palette which simulates real world
tools such as crayons, airbrush and charcoal. But moving on to compositing,
Photonyx features "Virtual Screens" technology which offers realtime zoom
RE:Vision Effects recently released ReelSmart Motion Blur, a plug-in for
After Effects 4.0, Commotion 2.0+ and Final Cut Pro. The plug-in is
designed to apply more natural looking motion blur to effects shots and
video sequences within After Effects. ReelSmart Motion Blur automatically
tracks every pixel in the shot which takes the handy-work out of the
process. Features include reduced strobing, fewer artifacts, and a tool
which lets one blur one image sequence using the motion of another
On Thursday, January 27, 2000, Disney announced their decision to change
the direction of their Go.com from an all purpose portal and search engine
like AOL.com, Lycos and Yahoo! to strictly an entertainment and leisure
destination. This announcement comes on the same day as The U.S. Court of
Appeals for the Ninth Circuit repealed the stay [AF 12/7/99] on a previous
injunction that bans the use of Go.com's green and yellow traffic light
logo. Disney was given the stay to allow them the chance to remove the logo
For the first time, Zagreb studio's library was offered for international
distribution at NATPE a year ago. The library offered all of Zagreb's
award-winning short films, including the works of such masters as Zlatko
Grgic ("Devil's Work") and Dusan Vukotic (his short "Ersatz" was the first
non-U.S. animated film to receive an Academy Award). Since then, Rembrandt
Films and Image Entertainment have released on video five hours of
animation from Zagreb Film. This is just another distribution deal, and
* Thursday, February 10, 2000. Westwood, California, U.S.A.
The Women In Animation Writers' Group will meet at Saban Entertainment at
7:30 pm. This month's topic is the animation premise and general animation
structure. The charge for the workshop is US$5. RSVP required. For more
information please contact Jean Ann Wright at: Tel.: (818) 360-8321 or
E-mail: jjwright@gte.net.
It's finally here!...The Winter 2000 Animation School Directory is your
complete, indispensable reference guide to over 440 animation related
schools and educational programs, from 37 countries...
California-based, Costa Mesa Coast College has a contract (tenure track),
full-time position to teach multimedia, 2-D and 3-D animation and
interactive concepts...
Bill's next feature, to be released in 2001, will be based on the graphic
novel "Mutant Aliens"...
