Swatch has announced the winner of the Swatchbeat 2 Flash Animation Competition on August 1. Hundreds of entries from around the world were submitted to a panel of Swiss judges and Internet audiences. The top prize was US$5000 dollars and a trip to the Locarno Film Festival in Switzerland from August 9 -13. Each participant had to create a Flash animation no greater than 30 seconds on the theme of "Waiting for the Movies." The winning entry was by Frank Gapinski of www.flashtoonz.com in Australia. The toon features a movie-goer's struggle to get a comfortable seat at the movies.

Anima Mundi 2001 took place from Friday, July 13 - Monday, July 23, 2001 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil then moved to São Paulo, Brazil from Wednesday, July 25 - Sunday, July 29, 2001. The major animation festival in South America, Anima Mundi included a wide range of open activities, including workshops, lectures and exhibitions. A panel of twenty-six animation industry professionals from around the world chose the 2001 festival winners: Best Film: "Father And Daughter" by Michael Dudok de Wit, Holland.

DECODE has sold 26 episodes of its newest series, THE BLOBHEADS, to Nickelodeon and France’s Canal J. The series is scheduled to premiere in 2002. For Nickelodeon, this deal marks the first program pre-sale across multiple territories in the U.K., Europe and Australia. Co-produced by DECODE and C.O.R.E. Digital Pictures, the series is aimed at 8-12 year olds and mixes live-action human characters with CGI aliens.

The World Animation Celebration will offer the only West Coast screening of "Mutant Aliens," Bill Plympton's new animated feature that premiered at the 2001 Sundance Film Festival. This sci-fi comedy about totally evil but cuddly aliens coming to Earth to get their revenge won the Feature Film Grand Prix at the 2001 Annecy Animation Festival. Bill Plympton, who did all the animation, will be present at the screening. He will also be signing copies of his graphic novel of "Mutant Aliens." The first 50 attendees will get special collectible viewers with raunchy stills from the film.

Brisbane, Australia's Blue Rocket Productions has started pre-production on their new 3D animated television series entitled HOOTA & SNOZ. The interstitial series of 26 episodes are being co-produced with RTV Family Entertainment and Pacific Film and Television Commission. The show follows the antics of two creatures that constantly bicker about everything. The characters speak in squeaks and grunts, which breaks down the culture barrier and has allowed the series to be sold into nearly 40 countries since its release at MIPCOM last October.

The May Acrobat issue of Animation World Magazine is now on-line! As we have recently changed to a weekly format with the magazine many of you have noticed that this has also changed our publishing schedule for the downloadable, monthly PDF version. Never fear! We are going to keep publishing the Acrobat version. Each 15th of the month we will publish the previous month's articles.

Mainframe Entertainment, Inc. has licensed its popular REBOOT animation series to Infogrames, Inc., for development on various interactive game platforms. The multi-year licensing agreement was negotiated by licensing and merchandising veteran Joy Tashjian, president of Joy Tashjian Marketing Group, the exclusive representative for Mainframe's properties, who is also contributing to Mainframe's expansion into the consumer products area through a recently formed strategic alliance.

Universal's SITTING DUCKS, a new CGI children's animated series, has been licensed in multiple international territories. ITV has secured rights to the show in the U.K., with other licenses going to France's TF1, Australia's ABC, Mexico's Televisa S.A., Portugal's TVI and Star TV in Greece. Cable rights to SITTING DUCKS have been acquired by Canada's YTV and by the Nickelodeon Channel in Australia. In the Netherlands, the show will be shown exclusively on the SBS group of channels.

Each week, Animation World Magazine offers new articles, special
features and theme-based coverage of the art, craft and industry of
animation. New this week:



- Special
Effects from Down Under: A Growing Proposition

While you might not realize it, you've probably already seen some of
Australia's top effects houses in action. Stephen Lynch explains.



- Nine

Ring of Fire completed three 30-second spots, "High Noon," "Day of the Dumpsters" and "Fashion Show,” for a Unisys campaign. Ring of Fire’s gear of tools included: Quantel Henry, Discreet Logic Inferno, Maya, Commotion and Adobe After Effects. "'Day of the Dumpsters' required a wide range of visual effects," remarked Ring of Fire senior post-production producer Casey Conroy. "One of our challenges was to create a CGI building that would sit in the middle of a lone desert landscape.