Fatkat Animation Studios fined for software piracy

Fatkat Animation Studios in Miramichi, N.B., has been fined $36,000 for software piracy.

The commercial animation and graphics studio was among five companies fined under the Canadian Copyright Act after an investigation by the Business Software Alliance.

The alliance conducts investigations into alleged under-licensing of software. That's a form of copyright infringement, which sees a single copy of software used to install a program on multiple computers without proper authorization.

Internal audits revealed Fatkat ran unlicensed copies of Microsoft and Autodesk programs.

Fatkat Animation's founder Gene Fowler said the infringement by his company was due to an oversight.

"Somebody that wasn’t very experienced was perhaps purchasing or installing the software, and they got themselves in the position where they weren’t licensed properly. It does happen," Fowler said Wednesday.

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FatKat attracts other animation company

A small animation company has been attracted to the Miramichi from Ontario by the prospect of freelance work with FatKat Animation Studios, its founders say.

Black Willow Digital, a two-person company made up of two graduates from the animation program at St. Clair College in Windsor, Ont, moved to Miramichi in September.

One of the animators, Tim Martin, said the company initially planned to set up in Windsor, but the economy in that city was moving in another direction. They then applied to FatKat to do in-house freelance work on the studio's show "Three Delivery," and moved to Miramichi soon after to be "closer to the source."

He said Black Willow's dealings with FatKat had been good so far.

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Bollywood to be a part of global animation phenomena

It does come as a surprise to hear Indian character names like Charlie Anna resonate through the iconic Walt Disney headquarters in Burbank, CaliforYash Raj Films-Walt Disney's
guffaw when what one would imagine is typical ‘Mumbaiiya’ lingo spoken with a heavy South Indian accent say, “Tension Not, I Yam the Boss.”

But then Bollywood is the name of the game in the hushed portals of big Hollywood studios since the last few years. Each holds a long-term view and every possible research report is being done. In a nutshell, all the mind-boggling figures and research point out that the only way to ensure an Indian eyeball is to get him to the movies, if not to a game of cricket.

But, mind you, Indian movies for Hollywood, through all these years, are still at the low end of the revenue pie, even with all the languages they are now dubbed in. This, paradoxically, is also the reason why they have headed to Indian shores - some with JVs, some with tie-ups - trying to see if they can tap the right local talent and nurture it to grow as a good, sustainable entertainment business in India.

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Animation training institutes fail to produce talent

PUNE: Ramesh Patil, a college dropout, was picked up by an animation studio two years ago and was trained for six months. He now works as part of its core character designing team. Alongside him sits Venkatesh Rao, who spent five years in a fine arts course before the studio hired him. Jaideep Singh, on the other hand, enrolled in a twenty-month, Rs 2 lakh course, and is still jobless, in spite of the animation training institute having promised him placement.

Ramesh, Venkatesh and Jaideep (names changed) represent the workforce in the animation industry. The contradiction is that new training institutes are opening almost every other week just as many studios have either closed down or have laid off artists over the past two years.

Four years ago, there were 640 animation studios across the country. This number is now down to around 300, with UTV Toons being the latest to do so. Sources claim that Reliance ADAG-owned Big Animation recently laid-off a sizeable number of its pre-production artists.

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