AWN Headline News

Headline News

ILM hires ANDY HENDRICKSON promotes DAN MCNAMARA

INDUSTRIAL LIGHT & MAGIC has hired ANDY HENDRICKSON as director of systemsdevelopment, and promoted DAN MCNAMARA to director of film and editorialservices. Hendrickson returns to ILM after two years, following a stint asthe Director of Computer Systems at San Francisco-based Advanced PathologySystems. In his new role, Hendrickson will be working with the architectureof existing digital infrastructure systems at ILM, as well as shaping thefuture innovations in this area. In addition, he will be primarily

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Headline News

DONNA TEGGART joins ALIAS|WAVEFRONT

DONNA TEGGART has joined ALIAS|WAVEFRONT as manager of the global marketingteam. Her primary responsibilities will be to act as the companyspokesperson and to manage the industry and public perception ofAlias|Wavefront and its brands. Teggart was formerly in the publicitydepartment at Side-Effects Software.

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Visual Headline News

ITS announces Monitor Awards

ITS, a Vienna, Virginia-based trade association of the post-productionindustry, has announced the winners of the 1999 International MonitorAwards. "The Awards recognize artists who have successfully mastered thesynthesis of creativity and technology. It is the highest recognition foroutstanding production and post-production," says Ruth Roland, Chairman ofthe 20th Annual International Awards. This year's animation related winnerswere:

BEST ELECTRONIC VISUAL EFFECTS FOR FILM ORIGINATED TELEVISION SERIES

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Films Headline News

Nashville calls for entries

The 31st Annual Nashville Independent Film Festival 2000 takes place inNashville, Tennessee from June 7-11, 2000. The competition will include newtwo categories, Television Pilot/Episodic Television and Family andChildren's Films, in addition to the already existing features, animation,documentary, short films, and young filmmakers categories. The earlydeadline is December 17, 1999, and the final deadline is February 1, 2000.For more information call (615) 742-2500; or visitwww.nashvillefilmfestival.org.

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Disney Headline News

REMEMBERING WALT authors do Disneyland signing

Amy Boothe Green and her husband, Walt Disney Pictures publicist and vicepresident of studio communications, Howard Green, will appear in person tosign copies of their book, REMEMBERING WALT: FAVORITE MEMORIES OF WALTDISNEY, on Saturday, August 21 at The Disney Gallery in New Orleans Squareat Disneyland in Anaheim, California from 1:30-3 pm. For the book, theauthors interviewed more than 100 individuals about their experiences withWalt Disney, including Dick Van Dyke, Julie Andrews, animators Frank Thomas

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Headline News

Wallace & Gromit and Bugs Bunny return!

Warner Bros. Home Video is re-releasing the feature length THE LOONEY,LOONEY, LOONEY BUGS BUNNY MOVIE, a collection of Looney Tunes by FrizFreleng. It includes the following Bugs Bunny shorts: KNIGHTY KNIGHT BUGS,SAHARA HARE, ROMAN LEGION HARE, HIGH DIVING HARE, HARE TRIMMED, SHOW BIZBUGS, WILD AND WOOLY HARE, and THE UNMENTIONABLES, as well as CATTYCORNERED (Tweety & Sylvester), GOLDEN YEGGS (Daffy Duck), and THE THREELITTLE BOPS. (Note: Some films may not be complete.) Also from Warner Bros.

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Virtual Reality Headline News

CGSD demonstrates virtual reality driving simulator

CGSD unveils its DS-100 Virtual Reality Driving Simulator for the first time at this year's SIGGRAPH.

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Headline News

Women In Animation hosts the Klassy Gals from Klasky!

A lively evening of discussion with the women directors at Klasky-Csupoincluding Becky Bristow, Sylvia Keulan, Cathy Malkasian, Carol Millican,Bonita Versh, and special guest Jeff McGrath, creative producer for THEWILD THORNBERRYS. Location: Klasky Csupo, 6353 Sunset Blvd. RSVP: Tel.(310) 535-3838. The event takes place Wednesday, August 25, 6:30 pm inHollywood, California.

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Mipcom Headline News

Don't miss MIPCOM!

This October MIPCOM and MIPCOM Junior will once again bring together thetelevision producers, distributors, buyers, and programmers of the world inCannes, France. MIPCOM Junior takes place October 2-3, and MIPCOM takesplace October 4-8. MIPCOM will also include for the first time a three dayconference on the convergence of TV and Internet from October 4-6.Featuring special keynotes, strategic panels and case studies/workshops,MIPCOM will bring together players from the TV industry, new media networks

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Cinequest calls for entries

Cinequest San Jose Film Festival is accepting submissions of features andshort films (16mm & 35mm all genres) of artistic, social, or stylisticmerit. The festival is celebrating Maverick Films, Filmmakers andTechnologies. The festival takes place in San Jose, California fromFebruary 24 to March 5, 2000. The entry deadline is October 29, 1999. Formore information contact Cinequest 2000, P.O Box 720040, San Jose, CA95172-0040, USA; Tel: (408) 995-5033; Fax: (408) 995-5713; E-mail:cineqst@wenet.net; or visit www.cinequest.org.

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Animation Headline News

AnimAction presents Animation Workshop at the "Electronic Schoolhouse"

Clifford Cohen's AnimAction conducted a workshop in the Electronic Schoolhouse at SIGGRAPH this past Monday. Titled "Art Before Technology or Technology Before Art? That is the Question", instructors introduced attendees to the classical animation process, stressing the importance of the basics and illustrating how a solid foundation in the art of animation supports creation and teaching. Recently, AnimAction presented at Annecy '99 in association with UNICEF celebrating the completion of the animated features for Cartoons for Child's Rights.

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Film Headline News

Blue Sky plans aggressive slate of SIGGRAPH activities

Key Blue Sky staff are taking part in a number of events throughout the conference:

- "Bunny" the Oscar Award Winning short film from Blue SkyStudios will close each showing of this year's SIGGRAPH '99Electronic Theater at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles.The conference and exhibition is being held from August8-13th at the Los Angeles Convention Center.

- Chris Wedge will be speaking at the Wiltern Theatre in LosAngeles on Monday, August 9th at Noon as part of theSoftimage SIGGRAPH user group meeting.

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Headline News

Kaydara announces FiLMBOX matchmove

Kaydara Inc. has announced FiLMBOX matchmove, a new camera tracking system designed to automatically extract and track 3D camera information from pre-recorded video sequences. A part of the FiLMBOX v2.0 suite of products, FiLMBOX matchmove offers a host of new features - such as automatic track point selection, multiple-camera support, and real-time playback - which will greatly simplify the process of integrating 3D and video footage.

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Headline News

Sony Pictures Imageworks to highlight "Stuart Little" at SIGGRAPH

Sony Pictures Imageworks will be highlighting its major forthcoming project Stuart Little, a live action film whose star is a fully digital photo-realistic character. Imageworks isalso engaged in production on Hollow Man, Cast Away, What Lies Beneath and WhatPlanet Are You From, working with such directors as Rob Minkoff, Paul Verhoeven,Robert Zemeckis and Mike Nichols.Imageworks is home to some of the industry'stop talent, including visual effects supervisors Scott E. Anderson, Rob Legato,

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Headline News

BOXX introduces the first NT-based compositing/editing system for HD

BOXX, manufacturer of high-performance, high-bandwidth Windows NT-based systems for 3D, animation, film, and HD broadcast markets, has introduced the first NT-basedcompositing/editing system for HD as well as RenderBOXX, a completely scaleable NT rendering solution. The BOXX suite of solutions, which are designed to increase productivity and performance, include workstations and complete systems for 3D,rendering, film, and HDTV.

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Production Headline News

Kaydara launches FiLMBOX version 2.0

Kaydara Inc. has announced the launch of FiLMBOX version 2.0, its real-time production system. Incorporating an advanced suite of interactive character animation, motion capture and audio/video tools FiLMBOX v2.0 hosts a variety of new on-line production tools, such as camera tracking, real-time video input/output, and improved character mapping. FiLMBOX v2.0 provides live integration of 3D elements for game, film and TV production into a unified digital environment,

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Headline News

CGSD announces E-Town 3D building models for real-time applications

CGSD has debuted the E-Town Building Library, the first in a series of libraries of buildings and other structures ready to use in visual simulation, virtual reality, games, urban planning and visualization, flight simulation, and other interactive simulations. E-Town Building Library is a set of 100 three-dimensional computer models of residential, industrial, and public buildings, water towers, electrical transmission towers, and landscaping elements.

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Motion Headline News

Motion Analysis customers achieve "1,000 Captures a Week" for 3D animation

Animators in the TV, Film, and Video Game industries are achieving realistic 3D character animation economically and quickly using the suite of motion capture tools available from Motion Analysis Corporation of Santa Rosa, California. At SIGGRAPH 99, the company demonstrated the latest versions of its products.

"We have customers using our ExpertVision system to capture 1,000 moves aweek to produce a 22-minute TV show in only 10 days using just a dozenanimators. The economy and efficiency of producing digital entertainment

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Effects Headline News

PDI shares latest breakthroughs at SIGGRAPH 99

Computer graphics industry leader PDI (Pacific Data Images) will participate in a variety of presentations at SIGGRAPH 99. They include the following:

- PDI Co-founder and Chairman Carl Rosendahl is featured in the newACM SIGGRAPH produced feature-length documentary, THE STORY OF COMPUTER GRAPHICS. The documentary "chronicles the history of the industry, its impact on society, and the excitement of future possibilities."

- Electronic Theatre: For the fourth consecutive year, PDI is proud to

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Headline News

Nothing Real demonstrates its Shake line of compositing software

Nothing Real, a leading Los Angeles-based software provider ofhigh performance tools designed for the digital image creation market,is showcasing its flagship compositing software product Shake at this year's SIGGRAPH.

Shake is a next-generation compositing system that offers a broad rangeof 2D features for film, broadcast, interactive games and multimediaeffects applications. Shake offers dramatic speed and efficiencyadvances over traditional compositing packages, without the need forspecialized hardware.

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Headline News

Gnomon establishes advisory board

Gnomon School of Visual Effects has announced the members of their newly established Advisory Board. The panel of respected and experienced industry professionals have agreed to commit their time and expertise to guiding the future development of Gnomon's curriculum and program direction.

The Board will include:

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Software Headline News

Pixar releases Photorealistic Renderman 3.9 and Renderman Artist Tools 4.0

Point Richmond, California-based Pixar Animation Studios has announced thatit is releasing version 3.9 of PhotoRealistic RenderMan, its AcademyAward-winning visual effects software, and version 4.0 of the completeRenderMan Artist Tools suite. The new software version, scheduled forshipment in September, makes RenderMan easier and more powerful forcreative artists, and for the first time provides support for rendering onrender farms running the Windows NT operating system. Some other advanced

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Animation Headline News

Spend an evening with the professionals!

An Evening with the Professionals: TV Animation. Takes place at Walt DisneyTV Animation Studio, Frank Wells Building. The speakers will include CindyMarcus who (with her husband Flip Kobler) wrote POCAHONTAS II: JOURNEY TO ANEW WORLD and THE LION KING II: SIMBA'S PRIDE. Cost per monthly event is$10 for Women In Animation members, $20 for non-members. RSVP required toKellie-Bea Cooper at e-mail: kellie-bea@kellie-bea.com; or Tel:818-623-0020. The events takes place Thursday, August 19, 7-9 pm inBurbank, California.

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Animation Headline News

Don't miss the Computer Animation Group meeting

Women In Animation's Computer Animation Group meets at the Rhythm & HuesStudio. For more information contact Pauline T'so at Tel. (310) 448-7500.This month's meeting takes place Saturday, August 21, 7-9 pm in LosAngeles, California.

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Effects Headline News

Puffin Designs ships Commotion for Windows NT and Macintosh

Commotion, the award-winning visual effects application, is now available for Windows NT. Commotion version 2.1 marks Puffin Designs' first release for Macintosh and Windows NT. This highly anticipated release is a direct result of requests from thousands of NT-based effects artists who wanted to use Commotion on their platform of choice. Both versions are functionally and visually identical, enabling users to work in either environment without having to find work-arounds for interface or workflow differences.

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