The Leo Award Winners Announced

Not only did THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE TWO TOWERS nab best movie at the 2003 MTV Movie Awards, held May 31, 2003 at Los Angeles' Shrine Auditorium, but Peter Jackson's second installment of the blockbuster Tolkien trilogy took three more prestigious awards, including best virtual performance by Gollum. TWO TOWERS also earned best action sequence for the Battle of Helms Deep, deepening WETA Digital's enormous stature among leading VFX studios, as well as best on-screen team (Elijah Wood, Sean Astin and Gollum.

THE SIMPSONS creator Matt Groening took home the Outstanding Cartoonist of the Year award at the 2003 Reuben Awards. The Reubens are presented by the National Cartoonists Society (NCS) in San Francisco over the Memorial Day Weekend, May 23-25, 2003. Glenn McCoy, who lead the nominees this year with three nods, took home awards in the Greeting Card and Magazine Gag Cartoon divisions. McCoy lost out in the Book division to BB Sams, who had also received a nod in the Advertising and Illustration division, which was subsequently awarded to Jim Hummel.

The 44th Annual Clio Awards were announced on May 21, 2003 in Miami, Florida. Anonymous Content and Digital Domain took home two Gold Awards for their Adidas "Mechanical Legs" spot. Clio is the world's largest and most famous advertising awards competition in the international advertising and business communities. This year's TV jury was chaired by Bob Scarpelli, U.S. cco for DDB.

The National Cartoonists Society (NCS) will be holding its Reuben Awards, Memorial Day Weekend, May 23-25, 2003, in San Francisco. This year Glenn McCoy leads the nominees with three nods in the Greeting Card, Magazine Gag Cartoon and Book divisions. The only other artists with more than one nomination were B.B. Sams (Advertising and Illustration, Book) and Jerry King (Greeting Card, Magazine Gag Cartoon). Several animation names appeared among the nominees, most notably Matt Groening for Cartoonist of the Year.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has selected 11 students from 9 colleges and universities around the country in the 30th Annual Student Academy Awards competition. The winning students, chosen from three regional competitions will be flown to Los Angeles to participate in a week of industry-related activities and social events that will culminate June 8, 2003 with the awards presentation ceremony at the Academy's Samuel Goldwyn Theater.

Animation Category
A WORK IN PROGRESS, Wes Ball, Florida State University, Tallahassee

ASIFA-East has announced the recipients of their 34th annual Animation Festival. Unlike other festivals, all entries are screened and are voted on by the members who attend the screenings. ASIFA-east is the Eastern U.S. chapter of ASIFA international, which was founded in 1960 by a group of animators to increase the visibility of animated films worldwide. Awards were handed out at 6:00 pm May 4, 2003 at the Tishman Auditorium, 66 West 12th Street in Manhattan, New York.

RUGRATS and DISNEY'S TEACHER'S PET were the big animation winners at the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences' 30th Annual Creative Arts Daytime Emmy Awards, presented during simultaneous ceremonies held at the Marriott Marquis Hotel in New York and the Sheraton Universal Hotel in Los Angeles, May 10, 2003. RUGRATS from Klasky Csupo won for Outstanding Children's Animated Program while DISNEY'S TEACHER'S PET from Disney TV Animation won for Outstanding Special Class Animated Program. Gregory Hines won the Emmy as the voice of Big Bill in LITTLE BILL.

ETERNAL GAZE by Sam Chen was chosen Best Animated Short by the Computer Animation Festival amongst 76 pieces selected for presentation at SIGGRAPH 2003, the 30th International Conference on Computer Graphics and Interactive Techniques, being held July 27-31, 2003 at the San Diego Convention Center in San Diego, California. Twenty-five of the selected entries will be shown in the Electronic Theater and 52 in the Animation Theaters. The Electronic Theater lineup includes 13 studio/production pieces, 13 non-U.S. entries and five student submissions from a total of 635 entries.

Winners for the 1st Annual International 3D Awards were announced at the evening ceremony May 9, 2003 at the Bella Center in Copenhagen, Denmark, running in conjunction with the 3D Festival 2003. The winners each picked up a Digital Hero trophy, hand sculpted by Dan Platt, at the ceremony The winners are:

Feature Film VFX

Gary Baseman and Peter Sluszka are the only recipients this year for Outstanding Individual Achievement in Animation in the 30th Annual Daytime Emmy Awards to be presented May 10, 2003 at the non-televised Creative Craft Daytime Emmy Awards ceremony held simultaneously in New York City and Los Angeles. This is a juried category voted upon by the Animation Peer group of the Academy, which determines how many, if any, are deserving of recognition.

Nominees for the 1st Annual International 3D Awards have been announced and Jason Schleifer, animation lead at Weta Digital (LORD OF THE RINGS), will host the Short Films category at the ceremony to be held in the evening, May 9, 2003 at the 3D Festival 2003 in Copenhagen, Denmark. Schleifer also chaired and oversaw the judging process for the Short Films category with an international panel of jury members from the 3D industry. The short film nominees are:
- SHOW & TELL, Kapow Pictures, Australia
- THE CHUBBCHUBBS, Sony Pictures Imageworks, USA

Animator David Russo won the $1,500 Golden Gate Award for best animated short for his film, PAN WITH US, in the 46th Annual San Francisco International Film Festival awarded April 30, 2003 at the Castro Theatre. The festival drew a record 94,500-plus attendants – up 5% from last year– to its 200 films from 46 countries. To check out all the results and winners go to www.sffs.org.

Vancouver-based Studio B Productions hit a triple treat of industry honors from the Writers Guild of Canada (WGC), the Leo Awards and the Alliance for Children and Television's (ACT) Awards for Excellence.

Studio B received an award from the WGC for its original series YVON OF THE YUKON on April 14, 2003. The second season episode, "The Trouble with Mammoths," written by Dennis Heaton, won a Top Ten Award from the WGC, which honors the 10 best Canadian screenplays in the country.

Winners of the 2003 Editors' Choice Awards, an extension of the annual NAB Awards for Innovation in Media (AIM) program, are Laird Telemedia's capdiv in the Content Creation category, Leitch Inc.'s CCS Navigator in the Content Management category and Triveni Digital's Skyscraper within the Content Delivery category. The winners were selected April 17, 2003 by a judging panel composed of editors from 18 industry trade publications.

THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE TWO TOWERS and SPIDER-MAN got five nominations apiece to lead the list of contenders for MTV's 2003 MOVIE AWARDS. The 12th edition of the awards will honor a new generation of performers in a new category: best virtual performance. Nominees include Yoda in STAR WARS: EPISODE II - ATTACK OF THE CLONES, Gollum in THE TWO TOWERS, Dobby in HARRY POTTER AND THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS, Kangaroo Jack in KANGAROO JACK and Scooby-Doo in SCOOBY-DOO.
THE TWO TOWERS is nominated for Best Movie along with SPIDER-MAN, 8 MILE, BARBERSHOP and THE RING.

Attendees at the NAB2003 exhibition in Las Vegas voted for the first NAB Awards for Innovation in Media (AIMs), given to 15 products for technological innovations that best address current and upcoming issues in the electronic media industry. The top five products within each category were handed out during NAB's Technology Luncheon on April 9, 2003. Key industry editors are reviewing these selections to select an overall winner in each category for 2003 "Editors' Choice" awards be announced on April 17, 2003.

The United States won half of the 10 main Pulcinella Award statuettes, including those for the Best Program and the Best Character of the Year, at the 2003 edition of Cartoons On The Bay in Positano, Italy, on April 12, 2003. KIM POSSIBLE, produced by Walt Disney Television Animation, has won the Pulcinella for the Best Program as well as for the Best TV Series for Children. HOME MOVIES, by Soup2Nuts won for Best Character as well as the award for the Best TV Series for Adolescents & Adults.