Earlier in the day the speakers were quite likely to find themselves standing next to the Prince at the buffet lunch — another of the unique aspects of Imagina!

Other notable presentations included a panel on virtual characters with a witty presentation on artificial intelligence development by Imagina favorite Ken Perlin (NYU), which was followed by an extraordinary presentation on the huge avatar industry in Korea from professor Sookjin Kim of SeJong University in Seoul.

Apparently on-line clothing and accessories sales for personal avatars is a bigger industry among young adults in Korea than the actual clothing industry!

Post-production studios from France and the U.K. are always well represented at Imagina, and there was some great work on show from Framestore-CFC, Glassworks, La Maison, The Mill, Sparx, MacGuffLigne and The Moving Picture Co.

Chris Landreth presented a work-in-progress screening of Ryan and moved the audience to tears. © 1380098 Ontario Inc./National Film Board of Canada.

The Surprise
The closing day sessions are traditionally devoted to the major studios and feature film visual effects. Victor Navone (Pixar) analyzed animation techniques in Finding Nemo, Jamy Wheless (ILM) presented breakdowns of his work on The Hulk and Matt Aitken (Weta) revealed new technical breakthroughs on The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King.

All these sessions were engrossing, but, for me, the highlight of the entire four-day event was Chris Landreth’s work-in-progress presentation of his new short film Ryan.

Chris has been a regular and popular speaker at Imagina for many years now — but no one in the audience was prepared for the extraordinary impact of Ryan.

Chris’ earlier films, The End and Bingo, were very successful on the festival circuit, but with Ryan, he has achieved something that defies categorization.

Inspired by an encounter three years ago with renowned Canadian animator Ryan Larkin, the film takes the form of a series of interviews between Chris, Ryan and various individuals that played an important part in his life before his descent from success into addictions and alcoholism. This may sound an unpromising subject, but Chris’ unique realization of himself and Ryan as animated characters engaged in a conversation that draws us into Ryan’s world is filled with gentle humor, wonderful observation and, ultimately, an incredibly powerful emotional force that moved many in the audience, including me, to tears.

The filmmakers hope to premiere the completed 12-minute film at the Cannes Film Festival, and I fully expect it will have as great an impact as the sneak peek did at Imagina.

With only a couple of thousand delegates, Imagina is not a big event compared to SIGGRAPH, but the opportunity to see such a wide range of presentations, enjoy beautiful surroundings and, above all, be able to discuss their work with some of the most creative and talented people in the business is what draws us back year after year. This was a vintage Imagina for me and I’ll be back for more next year.

Shelley Page serves as European liaison for DreamWorks Feature Animation. Her feature credits include Who Framed Roger Rabbit, An American Tail 2, The Prince of Egypt, The Road to Eldorado, Antz and Shrek. DreamWorks is currently in production on Shrek 2 and Shark Tale.