Academy to Examine Editing for Animation

he Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ Perspectives on Editing seminar series turns its focus to animation for a one-night event set for Sept. 29.

Hosting the event will be Donn Cambern and Mark Goldblatt, both governors for the academy’s film editors branch. Other editors speaking will be Kent Beyda, whose credits include Alien Nation and Scooby-Doo; John Carnochan of Ice Age and The Simpsons Movie; Nancy Frazen, editor of Runaway Brain and Surf’s Up; Lois Freeman Fox, who worked on Fantasia 2000 and Osmosis Jones, and Kevin Nolting, who edited this summer’s Pixar-Disney film Up.

The session will include the screening of film clips and discussions between the guests and the audience.

The event will be held from 7-10 p.m. at the Linwood Dunn Theater, 1313 Vine St., in Hollywood.

Tickets cost $10 for the general public and $7.50 for academy members and students with a valid ID. More information on buying tickets can be found online at www.oscars.org.

Source: http://www.animationmagazine.net/

Stop Motion Bailed out Computer Animation?

Major Difference between Stop Motion & Computer Animation:-

1. Computer animation (or CGI animation) is the art of creating moving images with the use of computers. It is a subfield of computer graphics and animation.
2. Stop motion (also known as stop-action or frame-by-frame) is an animation technique to make a physically manipulated object appear to move on its own. The object is moved in small increments between individually photographed frames, creating the illusion of movement when the series of frames is played as a continuous sequence.
3. Using Computer animation the rendering can take a lot of time on an ordinary home computer.
4. Stop Motion will move frame step by step so it smooth process.
5. Traditional Computer Animation is very hands-on process; 2D animation is accomplished by hand-drawing hundreds upon thousands of individual frames only to transfer them to clear plastic cells, hand-paint them, and then film them in sequence over a painted background image. This requires a team of artists, cleanup artists, painters, directors, background artists, and film/camera crews, along with the storyboard artists.
6. Stop Motion Animations, the cost and effort involved in the processes, and the quality of the final output is very good comparing to traditional computer animation.
   

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Nasscom Lowers Forecast for Animation Industry

Mumbai, Aug. 26 The apex body of IT software and services, Nasscom, has lowered its 2012 forecast for the animation industry by 27.7 per cent and gaming industry by 16.3 per cent.

It now expects revenues from the animation industry to touch $830 million, against the earlier estimate of $1060 million, and revenues from the gaming industry to touch $1000 million against $1163 million.

This downward revision is largely on account of slackened demand due to the global economic downturn. “…the domestic box office for animation movies has not picked up as estimated, end-to-end skill sets not being developed in the animation services industry and proof of concept/IP creation not up to expectations,” Nasscom said in a press statement.

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Animation Has Potential in Vidarbha: Kulkarni

NAGPUR: Ashish Kulkarni is not new to the orange city. He was born and brought up here, and even held many posts in city-based and multi-national companies. However, on Sunday, he was here as the chief executive officer of Big Animation, and was conducting a seminar on animation as part of International Film Festival in Nagpur (IFFN).

Speaking on animation and development of the industry in Nagpur and Vidarbha, Kulkarni told TOI, "There is already a strong network of 500 to 700 dedicated multimedia and animation artists in the region with a huge participation from Amravati. The industry has just made itself known in Nagpur for three to four years now, and we need a critical mass of at least 3,000 such artists to set the ball rolling here."

He said that the industry would not take much time to take off in the city. "Nagpur is going through the 'grooming' process. I make sure that I visit here regularly. The moment we feel that the time is ripe to harvest Vidarbha for its talent, we will move in at the earliest. That was why when we decided to sponsor the short film contest of IFFN. I also suggested that we hold a seminar so that the people in Nagpur get to see the work we do behind the scenes, and learn to appreciate it," he said.

And what exactly is it that he expects people to learn about animation? "There are three aspects to making an animation film or becoming an animator. For one, the person has to have an artistic foundation wherein he or she must be able to have an innate sense of art. The second is the story-telling foundation where the person must have the ability to tell a story so as to engage the audience. The third is the film-making ability, which is to translate the story on film," Kulkarni added.

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Pixar directors win big in Venice

Directors of Pixar Animation Studios in the US have been awarded the Venice Film Festival's lifetime achievement award, making them the first team to bag the honour.

Pixar has made 10 films, four of which have won best animation Oscars [ Images ], with chief creative officer John Lasseter, 52, and other directors helming hits like Finding Nemo and Toy Story.

Star Wars [ Images ] creator George Lucas presented the Venice Golden Lion lifetime achievement award to Lasseter and his team.

Pixar began life as the computer graphics division of his company Lucasfilm, and it later became Pixar after Lucas sold it to Apple founder Steve Jobs for 10million dollars in 1986.

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Indian Animation Turns Spotlight on Local Stories

MUMBAI (Reuters Life!) - When the Cartoon Network channel launched in India more than a decade ago, it simply dubbed its shows in regional languages.

But it soon realized there was a market for local content and tapped Indian animation firms for shows such as "Krishna Balarama" on a Hindu god and "Tenali Raman," a popular folk hero who was a 16th century court jester.

Last year, parent Turner International, in a maiden effort, set up a multi-million dollar unit in India to develop and produce animated films and original live action TV series.

"The opportunity in developing local animation content is significant," said Samir Patil, chief executive of ACK Media, which was recently commissioned by Turner to produce two animated films and a TV series based on popular Indian folk tales and mythology from the Amar Chitra Katha comic books.

The animation industry in India, including entertainment, visual effects and gaming, is estimated at about $500 million and forecast to double by 2012, according to financial services firm Ernst & Young. The entertainment segment is likely to grow at 18 percent annually.

Animation in India, driven by lower costs and software expertise, was largely limited to low-end work such as title credits, special effects and brushing up of scenes created in Hollywood studios. Original work was rare or of poor quality.

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Australia’s SAE brings on animation courses through Access Atlantech

Chennai based Access Atlantech Technolgies India pvt. ltd. (AAT) in association with SAE college , is all set to roll out with Qantmâ s c ourses focused on Animation and Gaming.

Qantm College is Australia’s leading new media college which has its focus on animation, games design, games programming and multimedia, amongst others.

AAT provides training in media courses including digital film-making and animation, will introduce the courses with SAE college which is amongst worlds largest media schools with its presence in 21 countries having established a chain of 53 training centres.

The courses to be introduced are 18 months diploma and three years degree courses in (i) Animation and Sound for Games and (ii) Games design, programming and developing. The company has kickstarted the courses from 15th January 2008 at its four centres based out of Mumbai, Delhi, Bangalore and Chennai for which its has invested a lump sum of close to Rs. 5 crore.

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India's Animation Ind Seen At $1 bln By 2012-Report

MUMBAI, Aug 26 (Reuters) - India's animation industry is expected to hit $1 billion by 2012 and the gaming industry would touch $830 million then, aided by increased outsourcing and a growing domestic market, a report released on Wednesday said.

The Indian animation market, estimated at $494 million in 2008, is seen growing at a compounded annual growth rate of 22 percent till 2012, a report by National Association of Software and Service Companies (NASSCOM) and Ernst & Young said.

"The industry will witness a dip in growth rates for two years before becoming a billion dollar industry by 2012," Farokh Balsara, Partner & National Leader-Media & Entertainment Practice with Ernst & Young, said at a media briefing, referring to the animation industry.

The gaming industry was estimated at $167 million in 2008 and is seen growing at a compounded rate of 49 percent yearly to hit $830 million by 2012, the report added.

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