AWN Headline News

In the wake of Sony's success with STUART LITTLE, Warner Bros. has

greenlighted a live-action/animated feature, CATS AND DOGS. Recently,

Warner has been looking to see if it could get a quick family-flick

finished for a Christmas 2000 release, however it looks like the studio

will take its time and shoot for a 2001 holiday release for CATS AND DOGS.

The story follows the neighborhood war between cats and dogs that occurs

right underneath human's feet without them even noticing. Reuters reported

The Walt Disney Company has announced its financial results for its

operations excluding its Internet business, GO.com. Disney pro forma

diluted earnings per share excluding GO.com were $0.25 for the quarter

ended December 31, 1999, a 9% increase over the prior year. Disney revenues

increased 5% to $6.8 billion and operating income increased 8% to $1.1

billion. Excluding the retained interest in GO.com, net income increased 7%

to $515 million. Broadcasting results for the quarter were driven up by

On January 24, 2000, Robert A. Iger was named president and chief operating

officer of The Walt Disney Co. as well as a member of its board of

directors. Previously, Iger served as chairman of the Disney-owned ABC

Group and president of Walt Disney International, Disney's overseas

business division. Michael Eisner, Walt Disney's chairman and CEO, also

announced the promotion of Chief Strategic Officer Peter E. Murphy and

Chief Financial Officer Thomas O. Staggs, to the positions of senior

Fantome, one of Europe's premier producers of 3D animation, was founded in

1985 by Georges Lacroix. Fantome has gained an international reputation,

and garnered more than 40 international prizes, including an Emmy. Its most

notable credits are: THE GEOMETRIC FABLES (50 x 3 minutes), the first

computer-generated animation series ever made, and INSEKTORS (26 x 13 min)

which has sold in more than 160 countries. In 1998 after being faced with

CYBERWORLD INTERNATIONAL CORPORATION, a new-media company, has announced

that PAUL LYPACZEWSKI has joined the company as senior vice president of

strategic business & product development. Lypaczewski will oversee the

strategic business and product development group within CYBERWORLD to

further develop the company's software technology. Lypaczewski will also

help build strategic industry relationships to help make CYBERWORLD the

dominant provider of interactive Internet-based multimedia. Lypaczewski

BOXX Technologies recently unveiled their RenderBOXX NT and Linux rendering

system, which relies on Intel Pentium III 800MHz processors to 'bolster'

rendering times. Currently shipping is the RenderBOXX 4000 series with

single or dual processors, and a price tag starting from US$2365. The focus

of the 4000 series is to streamline workflow for visual effects and video

game professionals, and because RenderBOXX is very easy to set, has a

completely open rendering system (it does not require special rendering

Three new Scandinavian markets surrendered their airwaves to Pokemania.

Worldwide sensation POKEMON was recently sold to TV4 in Sweden, TV2 in

Denmark and TV2 in Norway. The show will hit the new territories in January

and February 2000. Lacey Entertainment, the international distributors of

the series, also announced the sale of the Pikachu-vehicle to ATV in Turkey

and Noga Communications' Children's Channel in Israel. In Europe, POKEMON

began broadcasting in September 1999 on Germany's RTL2, The Netherlands'

Seneca College of Applied Arts and Technology in Canada has become the

first institution to bring ORAD video technology into the classroom.

Originally designed for the Israeli military's virtual reality training,

ORAD places real-time people into a virtual set. The ORAD system removes

the bluescreen behind a person and replaces it with a computer-generated

environment. Located at the Seneca York campus, students in the television

broadcasting, 3D arts and advertising programs will have the opportunity to

CLAIRE ROBINSON has been named senior vice president, intellectual property

law, for THE WALT DISNEY CO. Robinson will oversee Disney's intellectual

property group, which is responsible for intellectual property matters for

the company and its subsidiaries worldwide. Previously, Robinson held the

position of vice president in the same department. Before joining Disney in

1989, she was with the law firm of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher in Washington,

QUICKBAND NETWORKS, a leading distributor of short-form entertainment, has

signed KIM ADELMAN as editor of SHORT, a compilation of award-winning

live-action, animated, experimental and documentary short films distributed

exclusively on DVD. The company also promoted CRAIG WELLS to director of

acquisitions. Kim Adelman joins QuickBand Networks from fXM: Movies From

Fox. At the Fox-owned movie network, Adelman launched the short film

division, fXM Shorts. During her tenure at fXM, Adelman produced 19 films,

3D animator ANDREW SINAGRA has joined the computer graphics team at San

Francisco-based RADIUM. With specialties including modeling, particle

effects and volumetric effects, Sinagra will be involved in creating 3D

animation and visual effects for commercials and music videos. Sinagra

joins Radium from Midland Productions, a Berkeley, CA-based computer

animation house specializing in special venue films, feature films and

commercials. While at Midland, Sinagra created 3D animation for ROBOTS OF