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Disney has announced plans to close The Secret Lab, the visual effects unit of its Feature Animation group. The Secret Lab was formed two years ago, emerging from Oscar-winning effects house Dream Quest Images, which was founded in 1979 and became a division of Disney in 1996. In a VARIETY report, Walt Disney Feature Animation president Thomas Schumacher stated that The Secret Lab is no longer actively seeking outside contracts. However, he also said, If the studio comes to me and says heres a movie that we have a special demand for, then fantastic.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences final deadline for entry forms looms large for the Animated Feature and Animated Short categories. This is the first year for the highly anticipated Animated Feature film category and as of Tuesday, October 30, 2001 the Academy had received five applications. It requires eight eligible films to activate a category, so if you have an animated feature film that is eligible, get in those applications! The deadline for completed applications for both animated feature and animated short films is November 1, 2001.

Renegade Animation has produced a new 30-second spot for Target and agency The Design Guys, Minneapolis to promote the store's Halloween items. Directed by Darrell Van Citters, He's Not a Freak, features an assortment of ghosts, ghouls, monsters and demons preparing for Halloween. A skeleton swallows a piece of candy (which drops straight through his rib cage) and a witch decorates her spooky mansion using the wrappings from a friendly mummy in place of crepe paper. The Design Guys based the commercial on characters created by Sarah Nelson of Werner Design Werks.

Rhino Home Video has acquired the home video rights to the entire collection of the GUMBY animated series. The deal encompasses 214 total episodes of THE GUMBY SHOW and THE ALL-NEW GUMBY created from 1956 to 1988 and marks the first time the full library will be available to the public. Rhino Home Video plans to release DVD boxed sets of the complete library as well as individual DVDs and VHS cassettes of the shorts. This marks the DVD debut of the early episodes and the home video premiere of the 1980s stop-motion animation cartoons. The GUMBY series will be a part of the Kid Rhino brand.

* A+A (Architecture And Animation). Barcelona, Spain. Thursday, June 20 - Saturday, June 22, 2002.

Entry Deadline: Thursday, January 31, 2002.

Santa Monica-based commercial and film production company Steam has added creative directors Rob Legato and Ron Ames and executive producer Marcy Frey to their roster. Academy Award-winning visual effects supervisor Rob Legato will be working with Steam as creative director. Rob continues to be represented by Sony Imageworks for feature film visual effects assignments. His credits as a visual effects supervisor include HARRY POTTER AND THE SORCERER'S STONE, CAST AWAY, WHAT LIES BENEATH and ARMAGEDDON.

TV-Loonland, in cooperation with German kids TV channel Super RTL and German production company GUM Studios, will start production of its first CGI project called DRAGONS ROCK in November 2001. Delivery of the 26 episodes of 24-minutes each are due at the beginning of summer 2002. Super RTL is co-financing the project and own the German rights and TV-Loonland holds all other worldwide rights to the series.

THE KELLYS, a Web animation series available exclusively on nascar.com, registered over 100,000 downloads of the episodes in the first 10 days of the show's September 26, 2001 launch. THE KELLYS series concept was created by SportsBlast, a company founded by voice actor Nancy Cartwright, who also provides voices for the series. In July, SportsBlast closed a deal with Turner Sports Interactive, a division of AOL Time Warner's Turner Broadcasting Systems, Inc. (TBS) for the show's production and distribution.

VidTranS 2002: Mastering Broadband Video Technologies: Sunday, March 03 - Wednesday, March 06, 2002, Lake Buena Vista, Florida USA. Entry Deadline: Thursday, February 28, 2002. VidTranS offers a specific focus on the interaction of new digital video and broadband telecommunications technologies and on how this interaction will affect service providers, equipment manufacturers and end users.

Comics World Expo 02: Tuesday, May 07 - Sunday, May 12, 2002, Innsbruck, Tyrol Austria. Entry Deadline: Friday, January 11, 2002. Insbruck - Austria from May 7 to 12, 2002, the first true worldwide Fair/Festival for Comics, BD, Manga, Cartoons, Animation Films, Video Games with Awards (inscription rights for Awards included in the stand rental fees). Everyone is welcome: Exhibitors and Visitors (we are expecting more than 200,000 professionals and individuals the 2 first days) coming from all over the world. For information and conditions, please visit our Web-site.

Ed Leonard, head of technology at DreamWorks Animation, has been promoted to a position where he will oversee technology for all DreamWorks animation facilities. His responsibilities now encompass both traditional and computer-animated film productions at DreamWorks Glendale facility, as well as the PDI/DreamWorks location in Northern California. Leonard will also play a key role in setting up a new CG production pipeline in Glendale. Due to launch in the next year, the new production arm will be a state-of-the-art computer animation studio.

Spanish-based animation company BRB Internacional secured a number of pre-sales for its two animation comedy series ZIP & ZAP and GLADIATOR ACADEMY. Portuguese broadcaster TVI will begin airing ZIP & ZAP in January 2003, as will Arab distributor Universal Productions. GLADIATOR ACADEMY was picked up by Mediatrade (Italy), NOGA (Israel), Turkish Media Corporation and MVS Latin America. Currently in production, the first 13 episodes are scheduled for delivery in July 2002.