Jun 24

Netflix to conduct a virtual discussion on ‘Black Creatives In Animation’

Posted in: Animation

 

Recently Netflix is coming up with an event titled ‘Black Creatives In Animation’ featuring seven professionals currently working in the animation sector as a part of their initiative to address the issues in the field of Animation.

The announcement was shared by Netflix creative executive recruiter Netflix Original Film Mike Jones

Netflix has been at the forefront of the catalytic changes in the OTT sphere of the entertainment space. Having championed and stood up for a variety of causes over the years, Netflix has been forthcoming in opening up gateways for nuanced discussion around the pressing issues that plague the global entertainment industry

Netflix also shared that the session will be moderated by Stevi Carter whereas the guests will include Frank Abney, Everett Downing, Kerri Grant, Brie Henderson, Jak Knight and Peter Ramsey.

With an aim to promote diversity and create a healthy community, this event will mark a discussion on the pressing issues that are deeply impacting the community.

The recent uproar caused by the killing of George Flyod has necessitated conversations around the prism through which the world views people of color and the affirmative action that is needed to make a more a fair and inclusive community.

Many organisations have come forward to stand in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement, launching various initiatives to promote inclusiveness, diversity and equity.

The event will be conducted on 26 June 2020

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Jun 24

Jio now offers Disney+Hotstar VIP subscription for Rs. 222 for selected customers

Posted in: Animation

Few weeks after Reliance Jio launched its prepaid data plan of Rs. 401 bundled with the free Disney+Hotstar VIP plan for new customers, the telco has come up with yet another plan for its existing customers who have already subscribed to Jio’s annual plans. 

The telco has launched a new plan of Rs. 222 Plan for its select bunch of subscribers, that too comes with a free annual VIP subscription of Disney+ Hotstar and other benefits.

The Rs. 222 plan comes with additional benefits of 15GB data with the validity of existing plan in hand and one year subscription to Disney+ Hotstar.

To avail the service, users need to download the Disney+Hotstar app after completing the specific recharge login using OTP from the eligible Jio number from MyJio App or Jio.com. Further details are available on the website and the app. 

Jio also offers other plans with a similar service like the Rs. 401 monthly or Rs. 2599 long-term plan. Data vouchers like the Rs. 1208, Rs. 1206, Rs. 1004, and Rs. 612 also come bundled with the OTT platform respectively.

Another telco, Airtel also offers a similar plan of Rs. 401 and above which gives a free access to the Disney+Hotstar VIP subscription. If users already have a subscription to Disney+Hotstar, they can opt for add-on plans being offered by the telco, starting at Rs. 612 till Rs. 1208. The add-on plans offer both voice calling and data benefits.

Disney+ Hotstar VIP subscription enables users to watch and enjoy exclusive shows from Star India and partner channels at 6 pm daily, ahead of their TV premiere, Hotstar Original programmes, live sports, live news, and Hindi-dubbed catalogue from Disney, HBO, Showtime, and other streaming partners. The plan separately comes at Rs. 399 on a yearly basis.

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Jun 24

Toon Club students add another feather to their cap with their animated feature winning at Blue VAFI

Posted in: Animation

A group of eleven creative students from Toon Club created an animated project titled, Out of the Frame funded by Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya to create a film for the launch of the new Children’s Museum. These students were winners of an art competition organised by the museum. Out of the Frame won accolades and the prestigious Blue VAFI award.

The students were asked to curate the exhibit for the new museum and pick three paintings to be part of the animation film. The story of the film revolves around these three paintings which are exhibited in the Museum. The characters from the three paintings come alive. One painting has a young boy who is about to mount a horse. You see him climbing out of the painting. The next painting has an ice-skater who notices the boy on the horse jumping off the table and decides to join him. She drops her pose and jumps out of the painting. The girl with a skipping rope in the third painting also jumps off the frame. They jump into a mini car displayed on a shelf and drive out of the museum. The sights they see in the real world make them feel terrible. A child begging on the streets, a child serving tea at a street tea stall, a children’s parks being replaced by buildings, and books replaced by gadgets. They decide to fix things and make the world a better place.

The feature deals with child rights. Talking about the importance of this information to kids, Toon Club founder and principal Tehzeeb Khurana mentioned, “Kids are sensitive and extremely aware of the issues impacting the world: child rights, child abuse, animal rights, health, environment etc. In order to develop ideas and concepts on these important issues, children brainstorm and delve deeper. This leads to further discussions, research and understanding. Children speaking about these issues makes these films far more impactful.”

Khurana is proud of the young student’s film travelling the world through the festival circuit. “Thanks to the wonderful creations of our students, Toon Club is getting a lot of recognition and respect internationally. We are proud that we are considered among the top studios teaching animation to kids in the World,” mentioned she.

The film is entirely created by students as there is no group leader. The team collaborates and works together without hierarchy. The children created the props, characters, backgrounds and animated every frame in this film. “all of them were directors and had to give their best performance to create this masterpiece,” Khurana added. With the films winning awards and accolades, the students are encouraged to continue making films.

Though the film received recognition after completion, the process was not easy. The group of kids who worked on Out of the Frame had never attempted animation and knew little about how it’s done. It took a couple of sessions just to introduce them to the art form and take them through the basics of animation and expose them to a few key animation principles to get them started. The next challenge was to train them in an animation technique they had never heard of: cutout animation. “We screened a few sample films and explained to them the stop motion process. It was a new world for them and this got them extremely charged and excited. They were all set to be directors after the first few sessions,” Khurana said.

“Kids are fascinated with the history of animation. One response I often get from students is ‘Ma’am, It’s like magic!.” she mentioned.

The VAFI and RAFI festival has two main sections: VAFI section for animated films ‘made by’ children or youth, and RAFI section for animated films ‘made for’ children and youth. The Blue VAFI is a section of VAFI which is awarded in collaboration with UNICEF in Croatia and Office of the Ombudsman For Children, for the film which promotes the children’s rights.

Toon Club has also won Blue VAFI (second prize) in 2013 for their film Children of the World. The film was later included in the educational kit that goes to every child studying in a Croatian School. “When Out of the Frame was officially selected at VAFI this year, I was hoping that we win the prestigious ‘BLUE VAFI’ again.. and we did!” Khurana proudly concluded.

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Jun 24

Five reasons why 2020 is the year of gaming

Posted in: Animation

We are halfway through the year 2020 and we have seen a lot of transformation, innovation in the gaming market. As we all know that businesses shape according to the current condition and gaming is no exception. Midway to Q1 15 March, the Government announced nationwide lockdown due to COVID-19 pandemic which has impacted businesses largely. When most of the businesses witnessing the descending curve, the gaming industry has witnessed an upsurge. By the end of Q2 businesses are aiming to normalise the workflow with partial lockdown and gaming aims to maintain the upsurge curve with new innovation and technology advancement.  Here are the reasons why we think 2020 is the year of gaming and what has kept the industry growing amidst COVID-19 pandemic:

Gaming platforms on rise: During the Covid19 period gaming platforms have seen an uptick. According to data from Arsenal.gg in collaboration with streaming tools platform StreamElements found that global viewership has increased by 10 per cent on Twitch and 15 per cent  on YouTube Gaming. They have pointed out that Facebook Gaming’s market share spiked quite a bit in year-on-year. While Facebook had around 3.1 per cent market share in December 2018, it grew to 8.5 per cent in December 2019.  The reason behind the growth of the gaming platforms is that people are getting chance to interact with people of common interest.  On the other side, Indian gaming platform like Paytm First Games which is a multiplayer gaming platform sees over five million app download during COVID-19 period and have also seen a 200 per cent increase in its user base betting March and April and More than half a million daily active gamers on the platform have spent anywhere between 30 to 45 minutes at the platform. WinZO a vernacular social gaming platform, has seen a 10X increase in the game play of age-old board games including Ludo and Carrom during the lockdown period. The concurrent users are increasing at 30 per cent-40 per cent day on day and the paid conversions have increased by 20per cent on the platform. Online searches for Mobile Premier League (MPL) saw a 406 per cent during lockdown. Nazara saw an increase of 20 per cent in time spent on its network platforms during the first couple of weeks of the lockdown and a five-time increase of in-app purchases during the period. Also Sports technology platform Rooter, which has engaged and retained audience through various sports content from quizes, debates, discussion, and so on, is now aiming to expand its platform for gaming and esports content.  Surely the growth gaming platforms have surely.

Real money gaming continues with upward surge: Due to house arrest boredom and urge of earning extra cash in lockdown has driven the players to play more real money gaming (RMG) in lockdown , and this has seen a surge in the sector . Spartan Poker, have seen greater traction during the lockdown with 100 per cent increase in acquiring new customers and overall  25 to 30 per cent growth, mostly from Tier 1 and tier 2 cities. Poker Dangal has witnessed growth in its user acquisition and time spent per session by the users skyrocketed. 9stacks witnessed 30per cent uptick in the number of concurrent users, and in total games played each day, referrals and new sign-ups have also increased by almost 100 per cent as compared to the pre-COVID period.  We are seeing explosive growth in Tier 2/3/4 markets. Thus the industry believes lockdown has helped many to build a very solid foundation for the future. Due to pandemic more and more people are seeking thrill and entertainment in the world of online gaming and casual gamers turn into serious ones. However, in the real money section where fantasy sports sees a dip  due to cancellation of sporting events other game of skill games like Rummy, Poker sees an uptick. Poker platform PokerSaint has recorded 15 per cent MoM growth in its user base amidst the lockdown period. Even the Rummy Circle has recorded a significant rise in the downloads on both — Play Store and iOS amidst the coronavirus lockdown. According to Paytm First Rummy has gained maximum traction with users and games played doubling every week, said the company, adding that every month it gives out rewards and gratification worth more than Rs 10 crore.

Surge in growth of gaming tournaments and esports:  Where all big sporting and gaming events were cancelled India has been bustling with gaming tournaments hosted by gaming platforms and the esports organisations. The tournaments are meant to engage more users and to retain them in the respective platforms. If we take example Paytm First Games and Riot Games team up to bring “Teamfight Tactics” tournament in India after it recorded over 11,000 gamers registration for esports tournament during the lockdown. Garena partners with Paytm First Games to host Free Fire esports tournament and then it launched free to play Ludo tournament Ludo lakhpati with over Rs. 1 Lakh prize money daily. Then  Paytm First Games brought Clash Royale Championship to India, offers a prize pool of Rs. 10 lakhs during lockdown. Also, gaming startup EWar unveils season one of EWar PUBG Mahayudh esports tournament, Microsoft is hosting new Halo tournament from 23 May to 18 July, Asus organised weekly Rog Phone users only Battle of Gods gaming tournament, Facebook Gaming introduced tournament feature as part of its social distancing campaign, ACT Fibernet introduced CS: GO online gaming tournament for their internet users, WinZO brought PUBG MOBILE online tournaments in 10 regional languages for Indian gamers and so on.

Apart from that esports organisations have hosted various charity tournaments to accumulate relief for COVID-19 fighters for example IGL organised Quarantine International Gaming Tournament to raise funds for COVID relief for example Global Esports hosted Overwatch charity tournament for Covid-19 relief raised more than Rs. 50,000, Sky Esports hosted a PUBG Mobile charity tournament for COVID-19, Fnatic teamed up with Loco and organised #GamingForGood, a charity event for the Indian esports community and so on.

Increase in new users and daily active users:  According to  Nelsen report gaming apps and platforms seem to be a clear winner as time spent on them has increased from 22 per cent  to 30cent even as the share of social networking remained flat during the period. Interestingly, the report states that there has been a greater increase (55per cent over ) in the times spent on gaming platforms by older females as compared to the average smartphone user (49per cent over) in the last six to seven weeks. As users are explored and experimented more and more gaming during lockdown the number of users base as well as the DAU rate have been increased. For example, LUDO King has recently crossed 50mn DAU with the daily installation of 20 to 25 mn during lockdown according to Gametion founder Vikash Jaiswal. Next Wave Multimedia co-founder and CEO Rajendran PR  said in their cricket game time spent have gone up average user session time has gone up by 25 per cent, the number of new users has increased with 30 per cent more. 75,000 new users joining the Paytm First Games platform every day according to company COO, Sudhanshu Gupta. Even games with Vs-Mode on the app has observed a 35 per cent spike considering people are playing with their friends online amid the lockdown according to WINZO spokesperson and more. The lockdown has made a huge impact in the mindset of people are consuming more gaming content than ever to overcome the boredom they are facing right now.

Investments in gaming startups during a pandemic : Ever since the Lockdown 1.0 was announced, several gaming platforms and apps witnessed a surge of players and saw a 21 per cent growth in user engagement. According to a report by Investment firm Maple Capital Advisors titled – “Gaming – India Story”, the Indian gaming industry is currently valued at $930 million and is expected to be valued at $ 3,750 million by 2024 with an annual growth of 41per cent. During Pandemic Pocket52 raised $1.75 million as series A funding from Gameskraft, Rooter, has raised a Pre-series A round of $1.7 mn. The key investors in this round include India’s leading financial services platform Paytm, leAD Sports- Adidas Family backed Fund, Rockstud Capital, and Founder Bank Capital- early stage arm of RB Investments. Anthill Ventures, Venture Catalysts, and a few more current angel investors also participated in the round, Indian esports platform Gamerji raises $400K funding from La Gajjar Group and more. Apart from that there have been various strategic partnership among esports and gaming brands with undisclosed amount or barter  which has helped the gaming startups to grow more. For example In10Media, Gameloft have signed strategic partnership with Zee5 for expansion of gaming businesses, MMD and Red Bull announce new partnership to bring enhanced console gaming experience and so on.

The Covid-19 period has not been easy for fantasy sports, where it was skyrocketing in 2019 and has seen a dip due to cancellation/ postponement of sporting events in 2020, also in terms of monetisation the Indian gaming industry has seen a depression but exceptions are there. Apart from that considering all other factors we can definitely say 2020  is the year of gaming in terms of new game creation, expansion, experimentation rate of new users, and retention.

 

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Jun 24

Pixar has started working on a 2022 untitled film: Aaron Hartline reveals on Instagram

Posted in: Animation

Pixar has reportedly started working on its untitled feature film slated for 2022, as revealed by Aaron Hartline (animation director for Toy Story 4) on Instagram last week.

Hartline took to his official account to share the news that Pixar Animation team has begun work for the untitled feature. He also added that everyone is working remotely on the film and will shift back to the studio when the situation and circumstances permit. 

 

View this post on Instagram

 

Today Animation officially started (from our homes) on @pixar ‘s 2022 film. #pixar #featurefilm #animation #quarantine #covid19

A post shared by Aaron Hartline (@aaron.hartline) on Jun 16, 2020 at 5:44pm PDT

Disney’s official theatrical release pipeline currently has two Pixar films set for 2022. One is scheduled to release on 13 March and the other on 17 June. It’s yet to be revealed which film the studio is currently working on. The details have been tightly kept under wraps.

Hartline, who has been associated with the company for 11 years now, has some of Pixar’s biggest hits to his credit, including Up, Toy Story 3, Cars 2, Brave, Inside Out, The Good Dinosaur, Cars 3, Toy Story 4, and the recent Onward. He is serving as the supervising animator for the yet to be titled 2022 film.

Rumors have it that a Cars 4 is in the works as per Reddit reports. But as per Pixar, both of the films going to release in 2022, are original films, and the details will be revealed soon.

Aaron Hartline

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Jun 24

Nike Air Max 97 – Evolution

Posted in: Animation
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Jun 23

Diversity and tokenism: How does it Influence the Game?

Posted in: Animation

Regardless of the medium, if you want to tell a good story, you need to introduce some colorful characters from different backgrounds and with different personalities. But, when the story is based on real life, it is hard to distinguish if you are using diversity or tokenism.

For the people not tokenised there won’t be a difference. They can both be familiar with the stereotype and accept it as it is or be completely unfamiliar with that group and thus the information you bring will be the first time they learn anything about that group of people.

But, for the members of that group, the fact you made a two-dimensional character will be obvious. It can be either boring or outright insulting, depending on the stereotypes you have chosen to use. You want to have a researched and plausible guess about how someone would act and feel, and not a casino-style bet about what they might be.

To make certain that you are using diverse characters, you must never start with the superficial features. Remember that every person is that person first with their gender, race, ethnicity, sexuality, and even beliefs coming second. Even two people who belong in all the same groups together may be polar opposites because of their core character.

The story comes first

The best stories are the ones that can be relatable regardless of who is reading them. In the grand scheme of things, all humans are quite similar and the human experience differs only slightly and superficially.

But, those few instances where we are different are usually the spice of life and the basis of every good story. While a tale of two brains in a jar falling in love with each other sounds like it is devoid of our ‘current understandings of love and sexuality’ is exactly the opposite, it is the truest form of the human experience of mutual affection. The fact that they are just brain is what makes them special, and what would make the story fun.

And those spices, where the slight differences make conflict, must be used carefully. You want to make a character where their human existence is emphasized by their many identities, not defined by them. They need to have their own story, detached from any group that they might belong to. They must be humans first.

Finally, even if they are not humans, you should never use that lack of humanity as a hand wave for lazy writing. You don’t want to be called ignorant in the future when aliens come and read your work.

Diverse people and diverse perspectives

For every author, the audience can tell which are the groups they like, dislike, fetishize, or know absolutely nothing about.

In modern popular media, one of the groups that are always allowed to be made fun of is geeks. Not dorks, but geeks as people particularly interested in a subject. These people usually know a lot about tech and are sometimes even the creator of some McGuffin. 

Instead of looking up a manual to see how actual devices work, authors will often jump straight to fictional science and talk about quantum this and that, even if that would be clearly against the rules of the universe you have made. And the character with big glasses and no social skills or friends will annoy everyone who is a part of that group and know about it.

Remember, Nikola Tesla is now often portrayed as a weird recluse and eccentric, even though there are notes about his meetings where many (many many) women described him as charming, charismatic, impeccably dressed, and very entertaining.

Write What You Know

Writing what you know doesn’t need to be only the things you have experienced. But, you must research what you are talking about.

For instance, there are several high-budget Hollywood movies that mention soccer and The United Kingdom playing some other national team. But, for anyone that has once opened a betting sportsbook, they will know that the UK doesn’t have a national soccer team but rather a different team for England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland.

This is an annoying mistake, but not an insulting one, even though there are a lot of people who rank being a soccer fan quite high in their list of identities. Now imagine doing the same for someone’s ethnicity, culture, or sexuality.

‘’Yeah, Jim, he is from Aurora, Denver. A true Texan, that one!’’ – Doesn’t sound right, right?

Don’t harass your audience

Finally, you should never, by any means, use your stories to harass or denigrate any identity of people. All you know, those people might be your audience, and you don’t want to pick fights with people you are trying to entertain.

This doesn’t mean never showing some person belonging to some group as a bad person. But, they should be a good or bad person because of their character and not their affiliation to some superficial identity.

Missing that mark will break your story and your game. But, if you make it at least honestly and dutifully, you will have something everyone will enjoy.

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Jun 23

Lin-Manuel Miranda hints new Disney Animation project

Posted in: Animation

Lin-Manuel Miranda appeared via video chat on an episode of Good Morning America (ABC) to discuss the filming and streaming launch of Hamilton on Disney+ and how he and his family are keeping busy during covid-19 lockdown.

Miranda revealed a new, musical animated feature project in the works with Disney. He wrote original songs for the studio’s 2016 hit Moana, including the Oscar-nominated, Grammy-winning tune How Far I’ll Go.

“The other thing I’m working on, I’m actually writing a new animated musical with Disney Animation,” Miranda said on the show. “I’m collaborating with the Zootopia guys and Jared Bush, who wrote Moana with me.” Bush also co-directed and co-wrote Zootopia, directed by Byrond Howard (Tangled, Bolt) and Rich Moore (Wreck-It Ralph, Ralph Breaks the Internet).

“The new project is set in Colombia, in Latin America, and that’s all I can say before Bob Iger just shows up in my apartment,” he added, referring to the Walt Disney executive chairman.

The new untitled project will add to Miranda’s slate, which also includes songwriting for Sony Pictures Animation’s Vivo, a CG musical comedy which follows a capuchin monkey with a thirst for adventure and a passage for music, who makes the treacherous journey from Havana to Miami to fulfill his destiny. Kirk DeMicco (The Croods) is directing the pic, which is slated for release 4 June 2021.

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Jun 23

Sky Cinema to launch new animation channel with ‘Angry Birds 2’, ‘Despicable Me’ and more

Posted in: Animation

Sky Cinema will be launching its very own animation channel next month and will be available to all customers at no extra charge from 23 July. It will be home to family-friendly favourites (and their sequels) such as The Angry Birds Movie 2, The Secret Life of Pets 2, Despicable Me and How to Train Your Dragon 3. There’s also plenty more animated releases to discover including Wonder Park, Spy Cat and Astro Kid.

The channel joins recently launched channels Sky Documentaries and Nature as well as Sky Disney which is home to your favourite animated and live-action classics. Sky Cinema has also put content labels on classic movies to flag any issues of outdated views which may cause offence to the viewer.

The labels have appeared on the likes of the original animated versions of Aladdin and Dumbo, as well as sci-fi sequel Aliens, Gone with the Wind and cult sci-fi Flash Gordon. They also appear on the movies’ listings on NowTV.

Reports have suggested that the station will replace the timeshift channel Sky Premiere+1, meaning that Sky Cinema will expand from 11 channels to 12 for the first time. Sky Cinema Animation will also launch on NowTV at no additional cost to existing Sky Cinema customers.

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Jun 23

Spartan poker to host India Online Poker Championship 2020 from 9 July

Posted in: Animation

Spartan Poker’s much awaited online poker tournament, India Online Poker Championship (IOPC) is all set to run from 9July to 26July, 2020 at official site Indiapokerchampionship

IOPC 2020 is creating history by bolstering its winning price of Rs25 Crores GuaranTeeD prize money (GTD). The best of the best who put his or her mind and skills into the 19-day long event, will be securing cash prize and a  IOPC Crown.


The second edition of IOPC 2020 will feature 113 tournaments with buy-ins starting from Rs 550 to Rs 1.05 Lakh.  These two weeks will be exciting and intense for all the poker enthusiasts with whooping winning prizes.
Commenting on the announcement,   The Spartan Poker co-founder and MD Amin Rozani said, “In these challenging times, we are constantly identifying opportunities to make online poker an efficient platform where a player uses his high intellect and instincts to be in the right spot at the right time. We are pleased to announce the itinerary of the second edition of our flagship tournament, India Online Poker Championship with highest GTD till now. With a mission to make IOPC the best online platform in the world, we are dedicated to bring a lot of excitement to the table and inspire poker players through higher GTDs and prestigious Crown. The overwhelming response from the players across the country has been our motivation to strive and make IOPC a better experience every season. I am confident that our initiative will help players to be their best and expand horizons in this mind sport.”

In addition, to delight high-stakes players, IOPC has incorporated action-packed Millionaires including Millionaire United Rs 1.5 Crore GTD, Millionaire Legends Rs1.5 Crore GTD and The Crown Main Event Rs 3 Crore GTD.

Player with high IQs, intelligence, and great playmaking will take home the crown and prize money. This is an opportunity for the smartest of the smartest players to put forth their best efforts to win the championship.

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