MAKE YOUR PRODUCTIONS FLY - Toon Boom Animation

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www.toonboom.com
MAKE YOUR PRODUCTIONS FLY
with Toon Boom’s Animation Software Solutions
April 2006

Image courtesy of Universal Pictures and Imagine Entertainment
Toon Boom’s leading animation
software solution Opus, has significantly
contributed to the feature film
production of Curious George.
Universal Pictures and Imagine Entertainment
ANIMATION SOFTWARE SOLUTIONS
THAT MAKE YOUR PRODUCTIONS FLY
Toon Boom roared into 2006 by attending Nasscom’s Animation India 2006 event in Mumbai on January 13, and
the National Association of Television Program Executives (NATPE) conference and exhibition in Las Vegas, from
January 24 to 28. Keeping up the pace we then went to the KidScreen Summit in New York, from February 8 to
10, and Tech Forum San Diego and the American Association of School Administrators Conference, running
concurrently from February 23 to 25. This was quickly followed by FRAMES in Mumbai, from March 22 to 24, and
the Tokyo International Anime Fair, on March 23 and 24.
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Keeping this pace on track the Toon Boom team will be attending MIPTV in Cannes, from April 3 to 7, Booth C1.05;
NAB in Las Vegas, from April 24 to 27, Booth C10512; and MIFA in Annecy, from June 7 to 9, Booth 2.03. Jump
on board! We’ll be delighted to meet you at one of the events! At the same time, the team conducted road shows
in Brazil, Singapore, Thailand, the Philippines, China, Korea and Taiwan.
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In Brazil, the Toon Boom team provided training seminars to 39 independent animators in São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro.
The seminars were extremely successful, with all of the participants becoming certified for Toon Boom Solo and
most of them purchasing the software. Organized with the assistance of the Brazilian Animators Association, the
courses were held at 2DLab in Rio de Janeiro and two technical colleges, ESPM also in Rio de Janeiro and SENAC
in São Paulo. Both of the colleges trained at least one of their teachers, who will transfer their knowledge to create
a Toon Boom environment amongst new graduates. Considering the Brazilian community’s enthusiastic response,
Toon Boom has played an active role in the Co-producing with Canada trade mission at the end of March and
organized additional workshops for 150 Brazilian producers.
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In Singapore, the team organized workshops and on-site meetings with the private and education sectors, in conjunction
with the Canadian Trade Commissioners Service and the Singapore Media Development Authority.
Toon Boom is extremely grateful for their endeavors and thanks them for making this trip such a success.
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Toon Boom is proud to spotlight the theatrical release of Curious George in February 2006. Toon
Boom’s leading animation software solution Opus, has significantly contributed to the feature film
production of this globally known character. Produced by Universal Pictures and Imagine
Entertainment, the feature offers an all-new adventure based upon the beloved tales of George,
the inquisitive little guy with an insatiable taste for action. “For more than 65 years, this little monkey
has captured the hearts and minds of so many people of all ages and we are very proud that
Toon Boom has been involved in the making of this fantastic 2D feature for the big screen,” shared
Joan Vogelesang, President and Chief Executive Officer at Toon Boom. Toon Boom recommends
that all animation lovers go see this movie!
2 toonboom news / april 2006

TECHNOLOGY NEWS
Toon Boom Studio
Now Supports Intel in Macs
On March 15, Toon Boom
Animation Inc. announced
the release of Toon Boom
Studio V3 for Apple’s
new generation of Macs,
featuring Intel processors.
Powered by the most
advanced Intel chip, the new Macs will run Toon Boom
Studio at peak performance. To help customers easily
identify that the software runs on both Intel and
PowerPC-based Mac computers a Universal logo will
be displayed on Toon Boom Studio packaging and
Web pages. “Toon Boom is totally committed to the
Mac community and has made a priority to port Toon
Boom Studio to Apple’s universal binaries. As the first
in a series of Toon Boom applications optimized for
the new CPU, Toon Boom Studio offers great performance
to create digital and cut-out animations for TV,
HDTV, video, the Web, PDAs and the iPod. We look
forward to seeing what professional animators, hobbyists
and schools will be creating with this latest
release,” shared Joan Vogelesang, President and Chief
Executive Officer at Toon Boom. The Toon Boom
Studio V3 Universal Binary release is ready to ship and
can be purchased at www.toonboom.com. All current
Toon Boom Studio V3 Mac customers are entitled to
download this latest version at no charge. The next
Toon Boom application available for Apple’s new Intel
processors will be Toon Boom Studio Express V3, ready
to ship on April 14, 2006.
Podcast Your Animation !
Now you can easily save your animation for podcasting using Toon Boom’s products. Podcasting is an emerging
technology that allows you to show media content on your iPod, including news, TV shows, and, of course, animations
powered by Toon Boom.
What better way to showcase your animated content anywhere
you go and reach an audience of millions. Use this
lightweight device to share your heavyweight Toon Boom
animations with your friends and family.
It’s easy: Learn how to create podcast-ready animation,
viewable on your iPod.
It’s fast: Learn how to podcast your animation on the
Internet, via a Web feed, using either RSS or Atom syndication
standard formats.
You’ll need:
➜ One of Toon Boom’s animation software solutions
➜ Apple iTunes 6.0.2.23 or higher
➜ An iPod for portable playback or Web server space for
podcasting
Here is how to export your Toon Boom project to make it
podcast-ready. This is the supported iPod video format as
described on Apple website:
H.264 video
File formats: M4V, MP4 and MOV
Video: Up to 768 Kbps, 320 x 240 pixels, 30 frames per second,
Baseline Profile up to Level 1.3
Audio: AAC-LC up to 160 Kbps, 48 KHz, stereo audio
MPEG-4 video
File formats: M4V, MP4 and MOV
Video: Up to 2.5 Mbps, 480 x 480 pixels, 30 frames per second,
Simple Profile
Audio: AAC-LC up to 160 Kbps, 48 KHz, stereo audio
You can use these settings directly in Toon Boom’s products
to export your animation. If you don’t know what the
above information means, don’t worry, iTunes will convert
it for you. Simply follow these instructions:
1. Export your animation from one of Toon Boom‘s products
as a QuickTime file. Using the H.264 is recommended but
not required. This codec is available in Toon Boom‘s
products after installing the free QuickTime Player 7.
2. Open iTunes (6.0.2.3 or higher).
3. Click the file menu and select Add a File to Library.
4. Browse to the location where you saved your animation
and select it to open it.
5. In iTunes, in the left panel select Videos (you should see
your animation in the right panel).
6. Right-click on your animation and select Convert
Selection for iPod. iTunes will duplicate your animation
video with the proper settings for podcasting.
You now have a M4V (MPEG-4 Video) file ready for podcasting.
Drag your converted animation to your iPod in
iTunes to transfer your animation
to your iPod. You will
use this new video file for
podcasting later in this article.
To play back your animation,
on your iPod, select
Video, then Films and the
name of your video. Enjoy!
toonboom news / april 2006 3

HARMONY NEWS
Image courtesy of 2DLab
Image courtesy of Enarmonia
2DLab is an animation studio in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. Over
the past three years, the studio has won the Liv Ullmann
Peace Award and First Prize in the Animated Television
Production category at the Chicago International Children’s
Film Festival as well as several other awards. 2DLab is currently
developing its first animated series, in co-production
with a Canadian producer. They have just certified all
their staff in Toon Boom Harmony. “We are currently stress
testing the product and are very excited with the results.
Our initial assessment is that Harmony is very wellsuited
to our specific style of animation and we
expect to have a 15-20% boost in productivity without
loosing the highly emotional style of animation
that has become our trademark,” shared Andre
Koogan Breitman, executive producer at 2DLab. “We are
always looking for new challenges and new co-production
partners. We work exclusively with 2D animation.” 2DLab
is part of the Delta Publishing Group, a group of four
publishing houses that over the last 75 years, has published
more than 4,000 titles that are currently in print, focusing
on college-level textbooks and reference works, including
the World Book and Larousse encyclopedias.
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Established in Turin in 1999, Enarmonia is one of the main
service companies in European animation. It plays an active
role in every stage of animation, realizing character and background
design, storyboarding, layout, digital and traditional
background, high quality traditional animation, 2D
and 3D digital animation, 2D/3D integration, compositing
and special effects. Enarmonia is the first European company
that has achieved the Quality Management System
Certification UNI EN ISO 9001:2000 in the animation field.
Enarmonia has worked with Lanterna Magica on Gino the
Chicken, and also on Neve e Gliz, a series developed for
the Turin Winter Olympics. Both of the 52 one-minute
episode series were produced using Toon Boom’s software.
Employing a permanent staff of internal artists the
studio is about to start a new digital production called
Uffa, che Pazienza using Toon Boom Harmony. This series
of 52 five-minute episodes will be a combination of cut-out
and traditional style to be co-produced with RAI/Motus
and a German partner. Enarmonia is also developing a digital
animation program at Instituto Europeano de Design
where Toon Boom Harmony will be part of the curriculum.
“We have decided to buy Harmony because we wanted
to develop the digital animation in our studio and we
think that Harmony is the software which corresponds
perfectly to the needs of our animators,” shared Federica
Maggio, Managing Director at Enarmonia.
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Have you ever seen a sweet and charming story with lovable
characters? What about a colorful and one-of-a-kind movie?
Have you ever worked on a production you would be
proud to show children all over the world, bringing fun
and joy to everyone? These are the reasons why Neomis
Animation is so proud to have been the only European
studio that contributed to the making of Curious George.
Neomis Animation thanks Universal Cartoon Studios for
this unforgettable experience and salutes the Toon Boom
Opus crew for their kind support. Neomis Animation has
been in action for two years, located right in the heart of
Paris, France. Their team of artists emerges from the Walt
Disney Feature Animation France crew, which contributed
to ten feature films, including The Hunchback of Notre
Dame, The Emperor’s New Groove and Tarzan. Neomis
Animation is a young studio, passionate about animation—
their talented and experienced crew speaks for itself!
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The best part of the AMC Theatres’ Soar cinema commercial
is that you believe it is a real trailer for an actual feature
film because it was done by feature directors Elliot M.
Bour and Saul Blinkoff who worked on such films as Disney’s
Lion King and Aladdin. The two are represented by New
York’s Curious Pictures. Having just completed a substantial
sequence of the Saul & Elliot-directed and Disneyproduced
Kronk’s New Groove. Saul & Elliot / Curious
Pictures approached Yowza Animation to produce the
animation through final composite. Yowza Animation was
established in Toronto, Canada in 1996 by Claude Chiasson
and specializes in high quality feature films, television
series and commercials. Roger Chiasson, renowned ani-
4 toonboom news / april 2006

Image courtesy of Curious Pictures and Yowza Animation
Image courtesy of Label-Anim
mation director and Claude where both involved heavily
in preproduction and final production of the spot. Yowza
traditionally animated Soar and used Opus for ink, paint
and composite. Sonya Carey was in charge of the digital
division using internal toolsets. Sonya was able to produce
a high quality final product, in a rather short period of
time complete with computer-generated special effects.
“The scan and ink-and-paint are so user-friendly that it
was easy to bring in support staff at the last minute and
have them trained fairly quickly. There were some camera
moves that were rather specific, so, with the use of the
scene graphs, it was really easy to control the camera and
the artwork to give the illusion of flight. Instead of having
to create specific motion by moving objects or the camera
frame by frame, Opus allows you to make fantastic
camera moves with only two or three key frames.
These are important features when you are short on time.”
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After 12 years as founder
and manager of Animage,
a subsidiary of the AB
Group, Thibaut Chatel decided
to open his own animation
studio, Label-Anim,
in 2003. Early 2005, Guillaume
Galliot, who was previously
in charge of the
audiovisual division at
Groupe Dargaud, joined
the team as executive
producer. Since then, the
studio has produced several
animated series and has started the production of
Kung-Foot, a new 26-episode 26-minute series for TF1,
using Toon Boom Opus. “Toon Boom Opus is a very wellknown
and established animation software. As we work
with Hosem Animation Studio in China, we wanted to be
fully compatible with them so the time was right to adopt
Opus. Also, we plan to take advantage of its wide array of
powerful features, among them the lip sync which we find
quite interesting,” shared Stéphane Gaultier.
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San Mao Joins the Army is a new media cartoon drama
produced by the Institute of China Traditional Opera
Academy, which was awarded the second prize at the fifth
National Children’s Drama exhibition. Professor Yu Shaofei
shared: “It utilizes the fictitious techniques of expression
that perfectly combines the animation and real people.
During the creation process of this drama, we decided to use
Toon Boom Harmony to create the animated portion of this
new media drama project
completely paperless.
Some sceneries
included 3D technology
as well, resulting in
a more powerful presence
and enhanced
story on stage thanks
to the visual reality
technique.”
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Since 2003, Firehorse Films has been producing bro’Town,
New Zealand’s first prime-time adult animation—an
unashamedly suburban, non-PC satire. Joined by the
Naked Samoans (Oscar Kightley, David Fane, Shimpal
Lelisi and Mario Gaoa) and by animation director Maka
Makatoa and designer Ant Sang, the show’s producer,
Elizabeth Mitchell, has experienced great success with the
series. The labor-intensive 2D animation style means that a
team of about 150 people, both at Firehorse and at their
satellite studio in India, are needed for each episode. Each
bro’Town show has between 16,000 and 24,000 drawings
and takes around six months to complete. bro’Town uses
Toon Boom Opus to make the show and this year has
increased its digital capacity. “Toon Boom was instrumental
in hooking Firehorse up with their Indian partners
DQ Studios. For Series 3, we are hoping to work with new
Australian studio TUI Studios, again with the help of Toon
Boom and its Australian dealer Adimex,” shared Elizabeth.
bro’Town is screening on Foxtel’s comedy channel in
Australia, on Air New Zealand’s Inflight service, on Fiji TV
and will soon air on Cartoon Network Latin America.
Image courtesy of Firehorse Films
Image courtesy of Institute of China Traditional Opera Academy
toonboom news / april 2006 5

SOLO NEWS
Image courtesy of Sophia Hilton Foundation
Image courtesy of HGN Productions
The Sophia Hilton Foundation of Canada is animating a
fifty-two episode story series, in collaboration with the
Shastri Indo-Canadian Institute. The entire project is being
executed using Toon Boom’s Solo software package. The
Ponnivela epic depicts the many challenges faced by a
16th century agricultural family from South India over a
period of three generations. It is hoped that the animated
version of this legend can be used to inspire South Indian
village artists and provide them with new techniques and
ideas for the communication of traditional story content. It
will also be used in schools and universities. The project
designers are striving to remain faithful to the folk art and
folk music of this particular cultural region. All one hundred
plus characters are being built and rigged using cut-out animation
techniques and Indian “folk art” stylistics. The lead
animator comments: “This is EXCELLENT software! I
have had extensive experience with Maya and switching
over to Solo’s 2D platform has been a delight. The
design and staging capabilities of Solo meet the expectations
of a 3D animator very well. I especially like the ability
to move the camera in so many ways, including ‘flying’
through the layers of a scene,” shared Ravichandran, Lead
Animator, Legend of Ponnivela Project.
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HGN Productions has been in the animation business for
sixteen years and started producing Disney series (Goof
Troop and Aladdin) in Brazil back in 1990. During that time,
they started their animation
training program
to increase and
speed up production
for the series.
They have trained a
lot of animators the
traditional way and
now they are adopting
Toon Boom Solo
Image courtesy of Angel Magic and Kanya Animation
in their classes so the students can learn the new trends and
technologies. The studio is also developing local TV series
and feature animation projects using Toon Boom software.
“Coming from a traditional animation background using
Oxberrys and cels not too long ago, it is just amazing what
Solo can do to increase production values and speed production
time,” shared Haroldo Guimaraes Neto, president
at HGN Productions.
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Angel Magic, a multimedia agency in Thailand, in partnership
with Kanya Animation, started its first international
animation project, called The Tiger Heart. This small 2D
studio began using Toon Boom Studio for TV commercials
and all other new public and private sector media projects.
As 3D animation production is getting more popular in
Thailand, Angel Magic is one of the four studios who still
produce traditional animation. “As a professional animation
studio with great experience, we decided to become an
animation tutor using Toon Boom products. We set up a small
class in our studio to educate young people to create their
own short animation projects. We find that Toon Boom’s
products are excellent for teaching the new generation
the best animation technology,” shared Vethit Thongchantr,
Managing Director at Angel Magic. The Tiger
Heart is an action fantasy story that blends
exotic Thai design with a world famous
sport: Thai Boxing. It is about four different
characters of four races (animal,
robotic, spiritual and human) fighting
for the heart of the tiger. “The project
shows the unlimited 2D animation
ability of Toon Boom Studio to
rotate the camera view around
the character as 3D does.”
Angel Magic has recently
added Toon Boom Solo
to its toolkit to benefit
from its more advanced
capabilities in
its upcoming
project.
6 toonboom news / april 2006

TOON BOOM STUDIO NEWS
Image courtesy of Matt Dell
On September 23, 2005, Brad Paisley launched his
headlining Brad Paisley Time Well Wasted tour, featuring
Sara Evans and special guest Sugarland, with sellout performances
in major cities across the United States,
including Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles. Brad has
been playing music since he was eight years old and got
into animation only later on. For his previous album,
Mud on the Tires, Brad played an instrumental piece
with the band, and his first cartoon running behind them
on the big screens was a big hit. In the current album,
Time Well Wasted, they have another four-minute fast
instrumental piece for which he developed a new cartoon.
He created a cartoon version of himself and uses
this character interactively with the crowd. “I love Toon
Boom Studio. I can honestly say that it is enhancing my
career in many ways. I travel a lot and with almost all my
traveling time on planes or by bus, I spend it animating,
creating new content for the show. To promote my next
single, I am planning to email radio programmers a personalized
animated message that will include a cartoon
version of themselves. I know them all personally so it
will be a more creative way to promote my new song
and have them play it on the radio,” shared Brad.
As featured in our November 2005 eNewsletter, the Youth
Digital Media and Arts CyberSchool announced its newest
course: Creating and Animating Video Game Characters
(VGD103). This course teaches how to create and animate
video game characters using Toon Boom Studio.
Characters are then imported into Clickteam’s Multimedia
Fusion video game design software. Since then, the online
course has been adopted by several schools and learning
centers throughout the United States. Filmed at the Julian
Charter School in San Diego, California, the CyberSchool
has produced a special video promoting girls and technology
as well as how video game design can be implemented
in core curriculum as early as the Grade 3 right up to high
school. This video also shows how to apply animation and
gaming to a school assignment, such as marine biology.
Check out the video posted at http://www.thelcg.com/yd
macs_video_game_design_in_education.wmv. This is edutainment
at its best!
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Rum Runners’ buxom adult cartoon star Brickhouse Betty
is one of the most popular characters on the Web. Her
ensemble cast has developed its own cult following which
includes Santa, the Easter Bunny, J.D. the Jungle Dude, the
infamous Grandpa Slappy and many other odd yet endearing
characters. Betty’s recent short Stormy Bangs Betty!,
which co-stars adult icon Stormy Daniels, was featured on
Wicked Pictures’ DVD Camp Cuddly Pines Powertool Massacre
which won the 2006 AVN Award for Best DVD Extras.
She can now be seen in Flash, on iPod, PSP, DVD and on
mobile phones. “The cartoons begin as traditional animation
drawings and are then imported into Toon Boom Studio and
prepared for animation. Rum Runners uses Toon Boom
exclusively for this conversion because of its incredible ability
to maintain the integrity of
the original illustration while
allowing tweaks that can
simulate the inking process.
In a small studio, that’s a lifesaver.
Without Toon Boom,
Betty and cast just wouldn’t
look the same,” shared Sven
from Rum Runners Studios.
Image courtesy of Rum Runners
Image courtesy of Rum Runners
toonboom news / april 2006 7

STUDIO CASE STUDY
Images courtesy of Ralph Bakshi
WITH 53 years of experience in the animation industry,
Ralph Bakshi has an impressive track record. This
famous animation director, animator, cartoonist and writer
worked on a remarkable number of features, TV series and
specials–all based on hand-drawn animation.
Ralph Bakshi was born in 1938. He grew up in Brooklyn,
New York, and went to the High School of Industrial Arts,
now called the High School of Art and Design. After graduation,
armed with a cartooning diploma, he went to work
at Terrytoons animation studio in New Rochelle, where he
started as a cel painter. He quickly became an animator,
working on major characters like Mighty Mouse, Heckle and
Jeckle, Deputy Dawg. Ralph became the director on these
shows at 25; he was appointed creative director of the studio
by CBS when he created and wrote The Mighty Heroes.
Ralph accepted the position of producer and director of
Paramount Cartoon Studios, which had been the old Max
Fleischer Studio, in 1967. There he did four theatricals:
Marvin Digs, Mini Squirts, Super Basher and Bop, and
The Fiendish Five. He hired Mort Drucker, Wally Wood,
Jack Davis, Joe Kubert, Jim Steranko, Gray Morrow and
Roy Krenkel. After founding his own studio, Steve
Krantz Productions asked him to take over direction
and production of Rocket Robin Hood, and
then, the Spider-Man series.
In the ‘70s, Ralph moved into animated features
with Fritz the Cat, which he wrote and
directed in 1971. He created, wrote, and directed
Heavy Traffic, released in 1973. In the same year,
he established Bakshi Productions, Inc. There he
enjoyed working with key names from the history of animation:
Jim Tyer, Virgil Ross, Irv Spence, John Sparey, Manny
Perez, Bob Carlson, Jonny Vita, and Ed Barge. He created,
wrote and directed Coonskin (Street Fight) with producer Al
Ruddy (The Godfather, The Longest Yard), released in 1975.
Wizards was created, written, directed and produced
by Ralph and released in 1977. He next directed the 1978
version of Lord of the Rings, using the rotoscoping technique.
At this point, he started painting seriously, preparing
for a show at the Ulrica Cantor Gallery in Los Angeles. Hey
Good Looking was also created, written and directed and
released by Ralph in 1980. American Pop was written,
directed and produced for release in 1981; then Fire and
Ice was created, directed, and co-produced in 1983 with
world-renowned fantasy illustrator Frank Frazetta. Two
years later, Ralph did a live-action and animated video for
the Rolling Stones called The Harlem Shuffle.
The next year, he began Mighty Mouse: The
New Adventures for the 1987 and 1988 TV
seasons with John Kricfalusi who went on to do
Ren and Stimpy. In the summer of 1987, Ralph
had another solo art show at the Philip Dash
Gallery in New York City, then his first liveaction
short, This Ain’t Be-bop, debuted on
PBS American Playhouse, which he wrote and
directed. It starred Harvey Keitel, and was a
look at the values of the Beat generation. Tattertown, a
Christmas Special, was done at the same time. The Butter
Battle Book special was done with Ted Geisel (Dr. Seuss) in
1989. Cool World, a mix of live-action and animation, featuring
Brad Pitt and Kim Basinger, was directed by Ralph
and released by Paramount in 1991. Ralph wrote and
directed, the live-action TV movie The Cool and The Crazy,
starring Alicia Silverstone and Jared Leto, which filmed in
Los Angeles in 1994 for Showtime. In 1997, he created the
animated science fiction detective HBO series, Spicy City.
In 1998, his fine art was showcased once again at the
Nardin Gallery in New York City. His next shows were at
Animazing Gallery in Soho in the spring of 2000 and 2001.
Ralph has created controversy with all of his films, and
continued to break new ground in his art form. He has
helped the public look at animation in a new way by creating
worlds that are familiar, yet strange and powerful. He
pioneered the design of animation with adult themes, by
using political commentary and satire. The Museum of
Modern Art in New York has added his films to their collection
and most recently his cult classics Fire and Ice and
Wizards were released on DVD. He wrote the screenplay and
began work on a new feature film, Last Days of Coney Island.
Ralph Bakshi and his son Eddie Bakshi are Toon Boom
Studio power users. “I have traditionally worked with handdrawn
animation but have shifted into assembling all of
the work on the computer using Toon Boom Studio. I work
on my projects with my son Eddie who has used both
Continuing on page 12
Images courtesy of Ralph Bakshi
8 toonboom news / april 2006

SOLO CASE STUDY
Patrick Bradley is a Media Producer at The Field Museum
of Natural History in Chicago. He is currently animating
twelve shorts for an exhibition on evolution set to open in
March 2006. Completing this project will mark the end of
a tremendous personal and professional journey. “I was forced
to find a balance between creating fun, entertaining cartoons
and the accurate educational tools that the curators required.
And the deadlines were extremely tight. My production
process changed dramatically from beginning to
end, culminating—thankfully—in the use of Toon Boom Solo.”
“When I accepted the Media Producer position, my
background in animation was limited. I focused on film and
printmaking at the Maryland Institute of Art, but I was
always drawn to the medium because I relished in the creative
control it allows. I had made a couple of my own animations
in Flash, but felt my style was pushing the program
to do something it wasn’t meant to.” But when the exhibition
team decided that animation was the best way to illustrate
key complex themes, he seized the opportunity. “I was
given free reign to make complex subject matter like fossilization,
the cause of ice ages, and natural selection fun.”
“The size and time constraints of this project made it
impossible concentrate on my animation style, but the more
I animated, the more I discovered and studied the styles I like.
For instance, I am still in awe of some of the classic Disney
films. Dumbo’s pink elephants, and Alice in Wonderland are
‘animated’ in every sense of the word. The absurdity of the
movement and exaggeration of form is fantastic. That is why
I love to see pencil tests. I feel that many of today’s films are
too clean and stiff; as if life has been sucked out of them.
One exception however is The Triplets of Belleville. The
drawing in that film blows me away because it has the look
of something unmistakably hand drawn, but clean enough
that the hand drawn nuances aren’t distracting.”
But initially, many of these stylistic concerns weren’t as
important as his production process, which was painstaking
and arduous. At the time, he was animating the only way he
knew how, to fully utilize his illustration talent. “The first shorts
were a combination of hand-drawn and paperless layers
that I created in Toon Boom Studio. Each layer of animation
was exported separately as a QuickTime file then brought
into After Effects to add depth and appeal with blurs, glows
and shadows. The finished scenes were then edited in Final
Cut Pro. Then when the animations were basically complete,
my brother Chris Bradley, who is an accomplished musician
Images courtesy of Patrick Bradley
and sound recording artist, was hired to create custom
soundtracks for each piece. It’s the greatest feeling to see your
drawing come to life with movement. The second greatest
thing is seeing your animations with a custom soundtrack
like the ones Chris makes. So I was happy with the quality of
the finished animations but the deadline was looming! And
the development team was six weeks behind schedule in
delivering scripts for the next projects. The Museum couldn’t
afford to outsource any of the remaining work, so I was forced
to streamline my process. Luckily, at this time, Toon Boom
came out with Solo. The final three animations were done in
Solo using a Wacom tablet monitor. I drew all of the characters
on the screen, directly into Solo which eliminated the
step of scanning hand-drawn sketches into Toon Boom Studio.”
“I instantly noticed a difference in the quality of the
rendered line art between Solo and Studio. In Solo, the
lines are softer and more natural looking. I credit the program
for opening my eyes to the creative possibilities
of 2D animation and would recommend it to any serious
animator looking to take their work to the next level.”
“I did all of the effects in Solo, eliminating endless exporting
for After Effects. This especially saves time in a project like
mine, where curators, developers and managers request
countless, minor modifications. Also, Solo creates separate
ink and painting, which saves time and allows for maximum
flexibility. Because I didn’t have an extra minute to spare, I
drew in the key frames for each scene, colored them, then
moved on to the next scene. When all of the scenes’ key
frames were complete, I drew in as many in-betweens as time
would allow. This is something you can’t do in a lot of programs,
including Toon Boom Studio, because intricate line
work is obscured by color on the auto light table. Solo
allowed me to create higher quality animation in about half
the time than I had originally scheduled.”
Now that all 12 animations are complete, Pat looks forward
to spending some of his spare time on his featurette:
The Mutation Agent. “It’s a 30 minute story that calls for
complex, visual effects and will give me an opportunity to
explore the emotions and motivations of my character
through movement. The shear magnitude of a project like
this would not be possible without Solo. With its capability
of creating textured lines, quickly clean up rough lines
and a number of other great features, it allows me to emulate
the hand drawn lines that I admire in the classics and
have come to expect in my own”. The first scenes from the
Mutation Agent as well as many works done for the Field
Museum can be viewed at www.patbradley.net.
toonboom news / april 2006 9

SCHOOLS ON BOARD
Back in 2004, Animaster and Algonquin College signed
an agreement that would allow Animaster to deliver
Algonquin’s new third year program in India at Animaster’s
numerous training facilities. Animaster has training centers
in Bangalore, Delhi, Chennai and Mumbai. Here is a quote
right from the Animaster web site: “A recent study conducted
by Andersen Consulting states that the Indian animation
industry currently pegged at $550 million is slated
to clock a growth rate of 30% annually in the next
three years. In that same timeframe, India would
receive more than $2 billion worth animation business,
according to the study. If you are a technology
savvy artist looking for an exciting working life then
this is good news. Meanwhile, Nasscom estimates
the current global animation market to be worth
around $45 bn and expects it to jump to between
$50 bn and $70 bn by next year. It also states that
India could use 300,000 professionals in content
development and animation by 2008, up from
27,000 three years ago. Poised for growth in India,
multimedia’s usage has expanded not only in the
field of animation but also in films, television, gaming,
music, internet, digital products and services.”
As Paul West, Co-coordinator, Animation Program,
at Algonquin, mentioned, “India is at the infancy
stage of their animation industry and at the edge of
the Indian animation boom. There is nothing but good
news ahead for the industry in India. Now it is up to the
training facilities to educate the new students with the
proper programs so that students are able to apply for
careers in animation and not just rush them through the
programs into short lived jobs. Which is why Animaster is
the first to get onboard with offering a Canadian credentials
to allow the students the best opportunities available.”
Neil Hunter, Co-coordinator of the Animation Program, and
Paul West were in India for two weeks to train the trainers
from the different centers and evaluate the students of the
Algonquin/Animaster three year ADA program. They delivered
both an overview and detailed lectures of their ideology
for teaching and their methodology that continues to
make Algonquin students graduate with industry ready
skills. “Since the seminar focus was on the future of animation
it was very easy for us to promote Toon Boom
technologies, which includes of course Harmony,”
added Paul West. This seminar was extremely successful
with over 600 people attending, including representatives
from leading animation studios and government.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Based in Auckland, New Zealand, the South Seas Film
and Television School offers industry-focused training in
animation, film, television and on-screen acting. The Diploma
in Animation Production is a two-year program covering
traditional, 2D and 3D training. Students on the 2006
Animation Production course will be completing work
experience on the popular and successful TV3 network animation
series bro’Town as part of their intensive industry
training program. The South Seas course curriculum is of
international standard and is accredited by the New
Zealand Qualifications Authority and registered by the NZ
Ministry of Education. Students from a wide range of countries
including Indonesia, China, India, Japan, Korea, Thailand,
England, USA, France, Germany, etc have graduated from
the New Zealand school. South Seas graduates have worked
in international films and television programs including King
Kong, Lord of the Rings, Last Samurai, Whale Rider,
Hercules, and Once Were Warriors. Established in 1992,
South Seas Film and Television School has grown into New
Zealand’s leading film, television and new media industry
training provider with over 650 graduates establishing
promising careers in the industry. Erica Lack, Tutor in
Animation Production speaks enthusiastically about Toon
Boom: “We use Toon Boom Studio V3 as a compositing
software for 2D animation as it is simple to understand
and operate with high quality results for both students,
tutor and the industry.”
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
ITE College Central in Singapore offers three creative
media courses in Digital Animation, Digital Media Design,
and Product Design. These programs equip the students
with the latest methods, processes and essential skills in animation
production and the courses have a strong emphasis on
drawing and design techniques integrated with creative
production using digital technology. Their ITE students
have been using Toon Boom Studio in their Storyboarding
and 2D Animation module. “Toon Boom Studio has really
empowered our students with an animation software
tool that is easy to learn so that we are able to
focus on developing the creative contents - the story
and character design,” shared Yeo Sock Tin, Director at
School of Info-Comm Technology (ITE College Central).
Image courtesy of South Seas Film and Television School
10 toonboom news / april 2006

Image courtesy of A. Fenwick
Image courtesy of TESDA
Image courtesy of M. Reeve
Staffordshire University in the United Kingdom is
installing Harmony at Easter where they will integrate this
into the current expansion in 2D practice across the curriculum.
“This move is largely due to major success with Toon
Boom Studio over the last two years,” shares Tony Smith,
Award Leader Animation. Examples of this are:
❃ ❃ ❃ ❃ ❃
Adam Fenwick’s I am a De-sexed Pussy Cat, which was
sponsored by British Council film Catalogue in 2005.
❃ ❃ ❃ ❃ ❃
Mark Reeve used Toon Boom Studio for his short Two
Shoes, which was a finalist in this year’s BBC New Talent
awards for New Animator.
❃ ❃ ❃ ❃ ❃
Gary Evans film Bobble and Scarf was published recently
in Digit magazine UK after receiving an award at The
Wolverhampton based FLIP Animation Festival.
❃ ❃ ❃ ❃ ❃
So now they look forward to integrating Harmony into their
curriculum and expanding on these successes at a higher
level of production output. Harmony will feature highly on
their new set of Awards starting in September 2006.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
The Philippines-based Technical Education Development
and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) is set to implement
its first software development and animation training
curricula at two new IT training centers this month. Codeveloped
by TESDA with the Philippine Software Industry
Assoc. (PSIA) and the Animation Council of the Philippines
Inc. (ACPI), the curricula will focus on basic to intermediate
learners as part of TESDA’s human resource capacity building
for the growing Philippine software development and
animation industries. The two new training centers were built
as part of a $5 million Korean International Cooperation
Agency (KOICA) program to help build Philippine human
resources. The first KOICA-funded training center is in
Quezon City, the second in Bulacan. “The Animation
Image courtesy of G. Evans
Council sits in the Governing Board of the training center
and animation is the flagship project on the facility. We
have to mention and even highlight the software like Toon
Boom Harmony for 2D animation and Maya for 3D animation
are among the software that will be used in the training
of incoming trainees. We target to start the training in
April 2006,” shares Marlyn Montano, President of the
Animation Council of the Philippines. TESDA will be offering
both modular and long-term courses in both 2D and 3D
animation. The courses in animation will be headed and
supervised by industry practitioners. The Animation
Council had formed a group of “industry experts” to teach
and train students in the training facility.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Southbank Institute, Brisbane Australia, has been a leading
education Institute in the field of Multimedia since
1996. Southbank Institute was one of the first education
faculties to start the Diploma of Multimedia in Queensland.
Since 1999, Southbank Institute has produced a number of
students who have had their skills recognized in the
National AIMIA Awards (Australian Interactive Multimedia
Industry Association). Again this year, Southbank students
have been short-listed for the national award which will be
held in early March. The latest developments in the department
include the start of Diploma courses in Games and
the latest program, the Diploma of Screen. The Diploma of
Screen has a strong focus on digital animation and video
production. Southbank is excited to add Toon Boom Studio
to the Diploma of Screen’s curriculum. It’s hoped that this
will strengthen the education experience for our students
and improve the quality of animation which is produced.
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
The University of San Carlos College of Architecture and
Fine Arts will be offering a short course on 2D Cartoon
Animation using Toon Boom Studio V3. The college offers
academic programs in B.S. Architecture, B.S. Landscape
Architecture, Bachelor of Fine Arts, majors in Interior Design,
Advertising, and Painting. It is one of the colleges of the
University of San Carlos, one of the major universities in the
Philippines, which has four campuses within Cebu City. The
College of Architecture and Fine Arts is housed in a brandnew
building, which sits on top of one of the hills overlooking
the Talamban Campus. The scenic view and the fresh
mountain air are very conducive to creative activity and study.
Toon Boom Studio will start the Department of Fine Arts’
development of a four-year bachelor course in animation
within the next couple of years. “The Toon Boom animation
program will be held at the Architecture Computer Center,
which has two 30-seat computer training laboratories and
an architectural service bureau, now fully-equipped to handle
training programs in animation and computer graphics.
Having Toon Boom Studio is a very positive addition to its
software arsenal,” shared Ionone Bangcas, Creative Director
for the college’s Video Post Production Facility.
toonboom news / april 2006 11

Continuation from page 8
Photoshop and some peripheral sound programs in conjunction
with Toon Boom Studio”.
“Eddie began some coloring and refining of artwork in
Photoshop then gradually moved over to doing this in
Toon Boom Studio. The crossover was relatively painless.
The programs worked well together.” Ralph explains how
his workflow is laid out for his projects. “I set up the picture
in a traditional manner then Eddie uses Toon Boom Studio
to do everything else. My animator Doug Compton also
uses Toon Boom Studio to assemble and send pencil tests
and animatics. Toon Boom Studio essentially becomes the
studio. We all appreciate Toon Boom Studio’s ability to
quickly preview the animation, the ease with which you
can add or delete elements, the ability to cut and paste
sections of the exposure sheet and the gradient color
tool. Also the ability to import wav files, to manipulate volume
in the sound editor and to use the function editor to
manipulate camera moves.
“Toon Boom Studio allows quality control on a level
I’ve never had through its instant visualization of all of
the areas that we need to see and assess. With that, our
productivity has increased tremendously. I would estimate
an 80% productivity gain! “I feel Toon Boom Studio
has freed all cartoonists to make any film they want to
make at an affordable price. This is more important in my
opinion than Walt Disney being born,” shared Ralph.
TOON BOOM STAR In each issue, we will introduce you to the people behind the technology and
put a face to the voice you may have spoken to.
François Lalonde has recently been promoted to Senior
Director of Sales, covering Western Europe, Latin America,
the Middle East and India. During his seven years at Toon
Boom, François has been involved in the successful business
development and implementation of Toon Boom’s software
products and services throughout
his territory, showing great
commitment during pre-sale
and post-sale services, and
ensuring the highest level of
customer satisfaction. François
has directly managed key
accounts in addition to developing
a network of value-added
resellers in key geographical
areas. His frequent customer
visits and thorough participation
at trade shows has made him
very knowledgeable of animation
production processes, proactive
in connecting Toon Boom customers to each other,
and proficient with the state of the global animation industry.
On the personal front, François and Catherine, his spouse,
are the proud parents of 3-year-old Rémi, and 8-month-old
twin brothers Thomas and Hugo. This young and happy family
is certainly very animated!
LATEST REVIEWS
Published on February 12, 2006
on Flashmagazine.com:
“Let’s face it—in terms of animation, Flash is rather
simplistic. What do you do when your animation
skills surpass the capabilities of Flash? Toon Boom
Animation may have the solution for you. “This is a
truly great piece of software that runs circles around
Flash when it comes to animation. It’s not really revolutionary
(compared to Flash) but the workflow in
Toon Boom Studio is much better suited for animators
and the Scene Planner and Lip Sync are great
timesavers. If you’re an animator looking for a better
tool, Toon Boom Studio is well worth checking
out. In terms of animation tools, this is by far the
best Flash replacement we’ve seen.”
....................................................................................
Maccompanion.com published another review on
February 7 by Robert Pritchett, giving a five-star rating
to Toon Boom Studio V3!
All reviews are available at
http://www.toonboom.com/com pany/news/reviews.php
Image courtesy of RonToon
CONGRATULATIONS
We would like to congratulate Ron Fleischer for getting
noticed in so many animation festivals, with his animated
short Lemmings. The production of Lemmings was
featured in the September 2005 issue of Toon Boom
News and was entirely done on Toon Boom Opus. After
winning the Chicago Award at the 41st Chicago
International Film Festival and being a finalist for Best
Animated Short at the Reno Film Festival, the popular
short just won for Best Animated Short at the Dam
Short Film Festival. It has also been invited to three
other festivals, the Omaha Film Festival at the end of
March, and the Sacramento Film Festival and the Red
Stick Animation Festival in April.
toonboom news / april 2006