Having honed their skills on a variety of genres of projects from commercials to all manner of long-form service work, and having worked all over the geographical and stylistic map, Canadian animation companies are flourishing.

Many animation shops are now expanding in size and capacity, taking on new forms of work and high-profile jobs, with many stepping up to the production plate as independent producers. Herewith, a sampling of some of Canada’s new cartoon coconspirators.

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From its beginnings as a service animation shop working on visiting series projects, Toronto’s Canuck Creations subsequently took the evolutionary steps from commercial work, to big-budget feature service projects, to launching its own proprietary projects, recently beginning development on an adult-oriented primetime animated series.

Canuck was founded in 1993 by Alan Kennedy who had a 10-year background in animation as a producer for Kennedy Cartoons, working on Warner Bros.’ Tiny Toons and Disney’s Darkwing Duck.

The shop has been hopping for the past two years with service work on high-profile feature projects, including 10 minutes of animation for Warner’s Space Jam, and the recently released 20th Century Fox feature Anastasia and Warner’s Quest For Camelot, scheduled for release in summer 1998. All of which, says Kennedy, led to developing proprietary animation product.

Canuck has a trio of series projects in development. The first, Yip Yip Yahoo, is aimed at nine- to 12-year-olds. The show is based on a group of transforming animals attempting to assimilate into human society and Kennedy says it will have an Animaniacs-esque, fast-action, zippy look.

The shop is also developing a teen show called Pocketchange and recently undertook the development of Thorn in Your Side, aimed at a primetime audience.

Kennedy calls Thorn in Your Side cutting edge in terms of subject matter and says the content will be more stylistically simplistic and more dialogue driven than the kids’ show. With the idea for the series originating from a discussion among Canuck staff over coffee, the shop started work on the project immediately and according to Kennedy has devoted much of its development efforts to creating and drawing support for the show. Canuck is also developing a half-hour Christmas special.

Kennedy recently began shopping the adult show around to broadcasters and has shopped Yip Yip around the markets where he says the property has garnered interest from broadcasters.

Kennedy is currently seeking coproduction partners to finance the new shows, and had discussions at mipcom with German and French companies. To complete the financing picture, he is looking at private and corporate investment as well as leveraging government tax incentives.

For the kids’ show, the aim is to develop a domestic broadcast base and then branch out internationally.

The shop’s experience with executing high-end feature projects as well as delivering animation for multimedia titles including Disney Interactive’s Magic Kingdom and the recently released Myth from Bungie Software has provided Canuck with door-opening high-quality credentials, he says.

*Also in this report:

Post/SFX showcase:

Collideascope injects hip B2

Gajdecki: body parts R us B4

Big Bang graduates from Dog’s World to Lost World B4

Lost Boy’s extraterrestrial experience B6

Spin in the series race B7

Animation shops to watch:

Bardel gets Dreamworks nod B10

Dynomight’s Net direction B11

Sargent York kids’ 3-pack B12

Red Giant spawns series B14

Canadian prodcos plotting boffo toonflick projects B15

Animation House, Lightbox both hit 15 B16, B21

B.C. post shops winning more of the U.S. visual effects B18