It’s more than two years away, but it looks like an unusual band of athletes will capture world attention at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Ga. First Olympians Productions of Toronto is well on its way to bringing some of the original Olympians of ancient Greece back to public attention through a series of computer-animated vignettes.

Superstars Return: The First Olympians is the brainchild of Athan Katsos. The idea was born during a 1988 trip to Greece where Katsos met his cousin, Greek filmmaker and documentarian Takis Christopoulos, for the first time. Christopoulos was interested in doing a documentary on the athletes of the ancient Olympic games. Katsos was surprised to learn that the stories and accomplishments of hundreds of the early Olympians had been recorded and retained in great detail. He came up with the idea of vignettes profiling these athletes, much like the Olympic profiles individual countries broadcast about their modern-day athletes.

In 1991, Katsos was laid off from the cbc after 26 years, and started working on a number of projects. It seemed always, though, to come back to the vignettes. The idea got him in the door of some big players – Coca-Cola, ibm, Turner Sports, CBS Sports, the International Olympic Committee, and the Atlanta Olympic Committee. (Katsos aimed the project for the 1996 Atlanta Summer games, the 100th anniversary of the modern Olympics.) Response was positive. Charles Fruit, director of global media for Coke, wrote that the soft-drink giant ‘would seriously consider negotiating for this project with major broadcasters.’

Major coup

A major coup came when isl in Switzerland, the top sports marketing agency in the world (one of its clients is the International Olympic Committee), got involved and agreed to market the vignettes. But Katsos needed a pilot.

After unsuccessfully scouring the broadcast and private sectors for funding, Katsos finally linked up with Barry Young of Toronto-based Cinecapital. Two weeks later, he had an investor. The individual, who wishes to remain anonymous, is a Canadian producer and sports personality.

From the beginning, Katsos knew that computer graphic animation was the way to go on this project. He had been meeting with animation houses around Toronto, and when the money came in, decided to go with TOPIX Computer Graphics and Animation.

First ‘free agent’

Under the direction of Harold Harris at topix, a team of computer artists is bringing to life Katsos’ and Martin Lager’s pilot script profiling Astylos of Croton – the sports world’s first ‘free agent.’ They will use a mix of live-action footage (Christopoulos will shoot footage of the modern-day ruins of Olympia), graphic art and computer animation.

To create the athletes, the team at topix is using a new software package from Wavefront called Kinemation, which arrived at the animation house just over a month ago. A skeletal animation software, Kinemation creates true 3D axes and allows for realistic bending at joints. They had previously been using Softimage.

For the particle animation and special effects, the team will use a Wavefront package called Dinamation.

topix will be assembing the project with Flint, another new software program that provides high-end digital on-line. In addition, ibm in Atlanta (ibm’s research and development headquarters) has lent the production some computers for the time-consuming rendering process. The pilot episode should be completed by mid-April.

Once the pilot is ready, isl can begin marketing the vignette series aggressively (although even without it, there’s been a lot of interest – the First Olympians: Superstars Return display at isl’s Mipcom 1993 booth generated a lot of traffic).

If all goes well, a series of 26 4- to 5-minute profiles will be used by broadcasters around the world to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the modern Olympics, and bring to light the long and fascinating history of the ancient games.