When Toronto’s The Animation House closed in April, founder Bob Fortier swore he’d have another animation studio up and running within six months, and he has done it at AXYZ Edit.

Fortier joined AXYZ as a creative consultant and set up Monkey Business, a 2D animation division at the Toronto editing house. ‘I’m back in business, so to speak,’ says Fortier. ‘AXYZ is just a great place to be. All of the technical and creative support is here; it’s worked out great.’

Fortier has already completed a Kellogg spot and has two more projects for Kraft Foods currently in production, a Post Sugar Crisp spot and an Alphabits spot through Ogilvy & Mather.

‘I was quite surprised that when we opened the doors work started coming in as quickly as it did,’ he says. The Kellogg job was initially intended to be a 15-second spot, but the client was so pleased it ended up being a :30.

Fortier’s initiative brings increased animation capacity to AXYZ, which already has a 3D animation department. According to Fortier, the 3D facilities are a great help in his 2D work because ‘everything that we do now is a kind of hybrid mix of all the different techniques.’

Even though he is staying in the traditional animation world, new technologies are playing an important role. Fortier says he’s been able to contact a wider talent base via the Internet and is in the process of developing a virtual studio for the new animation department with executive producer Susie Rucska.

Fortier left Animation House just before its final year and continued in a freelance capacity, leaving him with a non-competition clause he says took him out of the loop for about year. Now, after hitting the ground running with the Kellogg spot, Fortier and Rucska are in the process of putting together a new reel and pounding the pavement. ‘We had work in right away,’ says Fortier, ‘so that kind of distracts you from the other stuff.’