Let's check in with a few of the participants from this past year's Cartoon Forum and see where Gotland's leads have taken them. Participants include: Honeycomb Animation, Artoon S.A., Fictitious Egg and Sav! The World Productions.

All in all it seems that indeed Cartoon Forum is an event that leads to real results.

Binka
A pre-school series of 26 x 5 minutes, produced by Honeycomb Animation

Honeycomb's Binka and the Last Christmas, just one of their current productions. ©Honeycomb Aimation.

Binka was presented to just under 100 TV buyers, distributors, producers and other animation professionals at this year's Cartoon Forum in Gotland. The project had the advantage of already having a sale to the BBC for UK terrestrial rights. It was received extremely well and had very complimentary things said about it, such as Binka being one of the few projects in the Forum that was successfully aimed at its target audience. As a direct result of the Forum, ZDF confirmed that they would pre-buy the series for Germany. BBC TV have now taken out an additional license for digital rights and BBC Worldwide have put up an advance for worldwide distribution. The series is now in production and the first 13 will air in April 2001 followed by the second 13 next autumn. BBC Worldwide will launch the series at the BBC Showcase in February 2001.

Sara & Simon Bor
Designers, Developers & Directors of Binka

Bahar
A series of 13 x 13 minute episodes, produced by Artoon, S.A.

The Cartoon Forum in Visby was a great opportunity for us to "test the waters." Bahar is a project addressed toward young adults, thus a project much more challenging than others, and difficult to fund as well! People liked the design very much and found the story quite intriguing. As soon as we finish development and send the complete dossier to all those who expressed an interest, we will know whether or not we will go ahead. (Even though we didn't have a huge crowd, there were people from Ellipse Animation, MTV Germany, EM TV Merchandising, among others, in attendance of our pitch.)

It was very interesting to find out that more "sophisticated" projects seem to find their own way now in the market. But time will tell!

Tina Pappas
Head of Public Relations and Communication, Artoon, S.A.

Johnny Casanova - The Unstoppable Sex Machine
A series of 26 x 24 minute episodes, produced by Elephant Productions and Fictitious Egg

Johnny Casanova - The Unstoppable Sex Machine is a series for television and the Internet with Webisodes being produced as part of the package, aimed at a teen/adult audience. After a very successful presentation at Cartoon Forum in Gotland, Sweden, co-producers Elephant Productions and Fictitious Egg, generated a great deal of interest from a number of potential investors, and as a direct result of the Forum are now about to clinch a deal with a major distributor. The series follows the adolescent adventures of 14-year-old Johnny Worms, who has changed his name to Casanova in an attempt to attract girls.

Also at the Forum, Elephant Productions presented the adult series Genius, based on the drawings of eccentric British cartoonist John Glashan, adapted by Martin Village and Roger Planer, with animation directed by Graham Ralph.