Winning Animators Announced For The TELETOON At Night Pilot Project

files/pictures/picture-35.jpgPress Release from TELETOON

(Toronto, ON, September 19, 2011) – TELETOON at Night fans have spoken! The votes are in and Vancouver, BC’s Sheryl Vedamani and Lemoyne, QC’s Philippe Ramsay Gaudreau have 10,000 reasons to gloat today as their animated films have been named the winners of the TELETOON at Night Pilot Project and TÉLÉTOON la Nuit Projet Pilote contests, respectively. As the winners, both Vedamani and Gaudreau have won $10,000 CDN and a trip for two to North America’s largest animation conference and festival, the Television Animation Conference and Ottawa International Animation Festival.

Vedamani, 20, is a Vancouver native and is a student at Vancouver Film School. Gaudreau, 26, grew up in Brossard, Quebec and currently works as a 2D artist at a video game company in Montreal.

The TELETOON at Night Pilot Project is a user-generated contest calling on aspiring and professional animators and animation enthusiasts in general to submit original, funny and unique animation or animation-related short films for a chance to win the grand prize. From February 6 to July 15, contestants submitted their videos to the English and French contests and their work was featured in online video galleries at www.teletoonatnight.com [1] and www.teletoonlanuit.com [2], respectively. On July 31, a TELETOON jury selected the 10 finalists (five English-language films and five French-language films), then turned to the public to vote for their favourites over the next four weeks.

Over the course of the voting period, more than 11,600 votes were cast for the 10 finalists to determine the two winning submissions.

Vedamani’s zombie-inspired Great Minds Taste Alike and Gaudreau’s superhero story, La Justicière Rose, will be featured along with the eight other finalists’ videos at a late-night screening during the Ottawa International Animation Festival on Saturday, September 23 at 11 p.m. at the Arts Court Theatre.

Great Minds Taste Alike by Sheryl Vedamani
Two friends discuss their preparedness for a variety of potential zombie attack scenarios.

La Justicière Rose by Philippe Ramsay Gaudreau
An unconventional superhero thwarts an attempted robbery without breaking a sweat – or a nail.

The original TELETOON Pilot Project launched in fall 2007, exclusively inviting Canadian producers to submit proposals to produce a pilot in either English or French to be broadcast on TELETOON. Ten projects were selected as finalists from more than 200 submissions, straddling a wide range of topics, animation styles and comedy sensibilities. The first TELETOON Pilot Project winner, Fugget About It, has been officially greenlit for production into a 13-part series in English and French.

TELETOON at Night is a special programming block on TELETOON for older teens and adult audiences who have an appetite for smart and culturally topical comedy shows. Available in both English and French, TELETOON Canada Inc. brings kids, youth and adults the best in animated and animation-related entertainment with four nationwide specialty television channels – TELETOON, TÉLÉTOON, TELETOON Retro and TÉLÉTOON Rétro – and select programming is also available through On Demand, Mobile TV, iTunes and TELETOON.com. Founded in 1997, TELETOON Canada Inc. is owned by Astral (50%) and Corus Entertainment (50%). For more information, please visit www.teletoon.com [3].