AWN Headline News

On September 14, Kid Rhino will release the soundtrack album for the upcoming feature length Scooby-Doo video, SCOOBY-DOO! AND THE WITCH'S GHOST, which is scheduled for release on October 5. In SCOOBY-DOO! AND THE WITCH'S GHOST, Scooby and Mystery Inc. travel to a small New England town to learn why it's being spooked by witches' ghosts. Scooby-Doo and the Mystery Machine will appear in the flesh at the Rhino Retrofest, August 13 to 15, at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium in Santa Monica, California, USA. Suggested retail price for the CD is US$13.98 and US$9.98 for the cassette.

The Welsh Animation Group, an association of Welsh animators created to develop an international animated film festival in Wales, has published the first issue of their newsletter, WAG NEWSLETTER. This new group centered in Cardiff has emerged for a number of reasons. Siriols Robin Lyons first discussed, The need for a lobbying pressure group and, just as importantly a forum for animators, as stated in the publications editorial written by Dave Berry.

The Walt Disney Co. has reported its earnings for the third quarter, andthe nine months ended June 30, 1999. Net income for the fiscal thirdquarter ended in June fell to $367 million from last year's $415 million.The figure includes a pretax loss of $87 million from the November purchaseof a 43% interest in Internet search engine Infoseek Corp. Net income forthe nine month period ended June 30, 1999 fell to $1.215 billion from lastyear's $1.554 billion. "While we are not satisfied with our current

Vancouver, Canada-based Mainframe Entertainment, Inc. has announced anoption agreement with Sirius Entertainment to develop a computer animatedtelevision and direct-to-video series based on comic book artist/writerJill Thompson's SCARY GODMOTHER comic books. SCARY GODMOTHER was firstpublished by Sirius Entertainment for Hallowe'en, 1997 as a hardcovergraphic novel. Since then Sirius has published a new graphic novel everyHallowe'en in addition to black and white one-shot comic books at other

Los Angeles-based CLASS-KEY CHEW-PO COMMERCIALS has signed VOLTAIRE as itsnewest director. Voltaire's style includes a combination of stop-motionanimation and live-action. He has done spots for British Nights, CrunchFitness, Cartoon Network, MTV, and The Sci-Fi Channel.

Read what Voltaire has to say about his unique techniques in "How'd They DoThat? - Stop-Motion Secrets Revealed" in the February 1998 issue ofAnimation World Magazine.

London-based PASSION PICTURES' CG animation director Chris Knott and postproduction house RUSHES' Paul Wratten have finished "Very Boggy," a :40spot for Nouvelle toilet tissue. In the spot a variety of toilets open andshut in time to the music of Handel's "Water Music." CG animator ChrisKnott reproduced the toilet seats which were first shot as live-actionreference. Mark Wilson completed all the builds, surfacing, lighting, andcompositing in Lightwave 5.6.

Newly released DreamWorks SKG's THE HAUNTING, with digital effects by ILM,finished first in the U.S. weekend boxoffice race, grossing an estimated$33 million. Also newly released, The Walt Disney Company's INSPECTORGADGET, with digital effects by DreamQuest, finished second, grossing anestimated $22 million. Warner's WILD WILD WEST, with digital effects byILM, finished seventh, grossing an estimated $5.4 million for a total of$104.2 million; Disney's TARZAN finished ninth, grossing $4.8 million for a

Mumbai, India-based GRAPHITI MULTIMEDIA has completed "The Case of theMissing Tooth" for Pepsodent, a 7-minute infomercial in which detectivesSqeezy, a tube of toothpaste, and Bristles, a toothbrush, work their waythrough a tooth maze, battle germs in a haunted house, peer into a foodcave, and are lectured by a dentist who explains to them the benefits ofgood oral hygiene. Traditional line drawings were used to create thecharacters, but environments were produced in 3D Studio Max. Cambridge

The British Academy of Film and Television Art's (BAFTA) InteractiveEntertainment Awards are open to entries from all parts of the world on allinteractive platforms. Categories include: Entertainment Website,Innovative Game, Moving Images, Sound, Interactivity, Design, ComputerProgramming, and more. Entry deadline is August 6, 1999. Awards will beannounced October 20, 1999. For more information contact BAFTA,195 Piccadilly, London, W1V 0LN, UK; Tel: + 44 171-7340022; Fax: + 44171-341792; e-mail: helenw@bafta.org; or visit www.bafta.org.

The International EMMA Awards are prestigious European-based interactivemedia awards. In 1999, there will again be an online announcement ofnominations and winners. In the months following the announcement, anotherseries of winners' celebration events will be organized to coincide with anumber of new media related events such as Invision in San Francisco andMilia in Cannes. Categories include: Business, Entertainment, GeneralInterest, Technology, Education, Games, Interactive, and Digital City.

This list of upcoming home entertainment releases includes some new titles,but most of them are new only to DVD. Disney has just re-released ROBINHOOD and ALICE IN WONDERLAND; their live-action RETURN TO OZ, whichincludes some stop-motion by Will Vinton Studios, will be released on DVDand VHS on August 10. Touchstone's WHO FRAMED ROGER RABBIT? will bereleased on DVD on September 28. Warner Bros. has just released 1999'sanimated THE KING AND I on both VHS and DVD; WALLACE AND GROMIT: THE

French company Infogrames Entertainment has released 'Bugs Bunny Lost inTime' for Sony PlayStation. In this video game Bugs encounters old nemeses,including Elmer Fudd, Yosemite Sam, Marvin the Martian, Witch Hazel, Rockyand Mugsy, Merlin the Wizard, the Bull, and Daffy Duck in settings rangingfrom the Stone Age and Pirate eras all the way forward to Dimension X.Suggested retail price is US$39.95.