With what it sees as general growth in Canadian animation production and an increasing slate of France/Canada coproductions as impetus, Paris-based animation house TouTenKartoon is planning to bring its array of animation production and image processing services to Canada.

TouTenKartoon is a two-year-old shop offering a full range of production services for the completion of animated series, as well as a research and development department which has created a proprietary software system to facilitate the process of producing a 2D animated series.

The Paris facility handles background scanning and touchup, line tests, compositing, special effects, 2D/3D integration, and management of technical issues in preproduction, employing about 70 pc workstations and about 50 production and seven r&d staff.

The Canadian office, located in Montreal and scheduled to be operational in September, will likely consist of a similar service lineup, including 2D and 3D compositing and effects, and possibly animation scanning and painting, for which the company is currently seeking a subcontractor.

TouTenKartoon president Jean-Louis Rizet says the impetus behind the Montreal move is mainly due to an increase in work between Canada and France and the need for uniform work to be done by both parties on a series.

‘We are proposing that the coproducers have the same tools and methods to get the same results,’ says Rizet. He also points to the robust schedules of Canadian companies like Cinar and Nelvana, the new crop of animation producers here and the opportunities afforded by close proximity to the u.s. as expansion inducements.

TouTenKartoon is part of the Ramses/ pev group, which provides image, sound post and effects, and dubbing services.

The long-range plan for the Canadian office is to incorporate post-production and sound further into its role in the animation process, using its expertise in sound and experience in creating animation files which are compatible with editing equipment.

The company currently works with Fast editing systems in the potentially time-saving process of direct reading of files into the editing box, and is now talking to Canadian technology companies like Matrox about facilitating a similar process here.

TouTenKartoon’s software, TTK V 2.0, was developed by the company utilizing the expertise of its animation, computer and production staff to create a software package which satisfied the exact technical and creative requirements of the shop, something the company says existing packages failed to do.

The nt-based software uses a standard control language and accommodates ink and paint, compositing, special effects and shooting.

The package allows realtime effects which work properly in 2D space and with camera moves (i.e. rain falling in front of and behind objects), as well as texture, interpolation and one-touch color changes. The package also has an integrated particle engine and allows transmission of line tests to clients via the Internet.

The TTK V 2.0 software, though not for sale, is installed in various production companies around the world, including AstralTech in Montreal.

TouTenKartoon is not a stranger to Canadian production, having worked on Bob Morane, a coproduction of Montreal’s Cactus Animation and France’s Ellipse Animation. It is currently working on Princess Sissi, produced by Saban with Montreal partner Cine-Groupe.

The shop has also worked on series like Space Goofs and Dragon Flyz from France’s Gaumont Multimedia as well as Gaumont series in progress The Magician and Oggy and the Cockroaches.

Rizet says the Montreal division will likely employ about 40 people in its first year, most of whom will be Canadians.