At the fore-Front of Craig’s nets

For the on-air brand of Craig Media’s Toronto 1, local shop Front fused city shots and 3D animation, filming a large mirror around town to reinforce the notion that the station reflects ‘today’s Toronto.’ The shop did openers for the net’s Toronto Tonight, Toronto Today, Last Call, Toronto Life and The Toronto Show.

For Craig’s western diginet Stampede, Front has devised a look it describes as ‘sexy cowboy cool.’ It designed ‘Amplified’, Stampede’s music block, and ‘Bulletproof Movie’, its film block. Still out west, the shop created a new image for A-Channel, positioning it as ‘TV that gets you connected!’

Other design projects include openers for 10 CPAC shows, Rogers Television’s In Toronto and Shop Toronto, and OMNI’s Fundamental Freedoms. Front has also done new IDs for CTV News in Vancouver and Winnipeg.

A new direction sees the shop launching Front TV, its own show about the design world, which a U.S. broadcaster is in the process of signing.

-www.front.tv

Loopmedia refocuses

Toronto’s Loopmedia has refocused, redesigning its logo, website and facility, and adding an edit suite. Creative director Craig Kirkham recently became a company partner and Aaron White has joined as art director.

The shop is at work on network IDs for ‘Home of Bravo!’, promoting upcoming movies on the specialty. Meanwhile, Loop is devising a couple of new characters to add to its branding work on MZoo, a family program block on The Movie Network. To create a look that would appeal to kids, teens and adults alike, Loop created seven ageless 3D characters.

Loop has also been charged with lending a new look to the 2004 Juno Awards, to air on CTV, after having worked on the 2003 design. This year’s style is inspired by 1960s and ’70s rock posters and ‘hippie chic.’

Loop has proven equally adept at attracting U.S. clients, exemplified by the ID package it has in the works for DIY – Do It Yourself Network. The shop is also doing a package for the net’s new Embellish This! series.

-www.loopmedia.com

Cuppa Coffee runneth over

Cuppa Coffee has expanded its Toronto broadcast design facilities and hired on two new staffers, designer Nacho Peon and senior producer Lisa Hemeon.

Projects in recent months, focusing on U.S. clients, include rebranding for The N, Noggin’s nighttime network for tweens, with design that has a kaleidoscopic style and surreal elements. Promos for Lifetime, meanwhile, drop live-action figures in animated landscapes, and promos for MTV manipulate images of some of the net’s most popular characters.

Rounding out the list of promo clients is Spike TV, Cartoon Network, PBS and Discovery Wings Channel. Cuppa also produced a promotional campaign for Playhouse Disney and created station IDs for Discovery Kids.

-www.cuppacoffee.com

Head Gear puts its mind toward net packages

Head Gear Animation, run by creative partners Steve Angel and Julian Grey, reports a busy past year. The Toronto studio completed network packages for Astral Media’s MFest, MFun! and MEscape and a commercial spot for ESPN. It also created Halloween packaging for Cartoon Network for the second consecutive year.

Rolling into the new year, Head Gear is hard at work on a series of spots and announces that it has won a competitive bid to design and produce a full brand extension for a U.S. broadcaster, with details to follow in the spring.

-www.headgearanimation.com

Chocolate and Valentines at Trace

A relative newcomer to the scene, Trace Pictures reports a variety of gigs over the past six months. The Toronto shop, headed by Justin Stephenson, former senior creative director at Cuppa Coffee, is gorging on chocolate, doing design for the U.S. Food Network’s forthcoming series The Secret Life of… It has also been working hard on a primetime campaign for Biography Channel Canada flagship shows Famous Faces, History Majors, Bio on Demand and Connections.

For the Sundance Channel’s ‘Film starts here’ promo, Trace filmed projectors in tiny winter forests. The shop also produced a couple of promos for Cartoon Network, rotoscoping superheroes for ‘November Premieres’ and making Valentine’s cards for ‘Don’t be my valentine’.

-www.tracepictures.com

Tango’s 2D demand

Tango Media says that after a year of 3D work in HD, it is now getting more 2D animation assignments.

Toronto’s Tango used Flash-style animation and appropriately zany creative on the opener for CBC’s daily tween show The X. Meanwhile, the openers for the series T’as faim? and Faites le 2, produced by Mediatique for TFO, called for a fusion of photography and animation. Also for Mediatique, Tango is producing an opener and elements for the series B.B. la Fouine. The traditional animation is originated on paper, then inked, colorized and composited digitally.

The shop has done some 3D as well, including IDs and a promo package for TVO’s rebrand, and the opener for Global Television’s Ottawa Inside Out.

-www.tangomediagroup.com

Spin joins the fight on Kenny vs. Spenny

Capturing the wacky humor of the Breakthrough Films and Television/Blueprint Entertainment reality youth series Kenny vs. Spenny, airing on CBC, Toronto’s Spin created a comic-book-style opener. Spin designer Luis Torres worked with Nahid Islam, Breakthrough post-production supervisor, creating a stylized collage of images inspired by ‘old Mexican wrestling posters and newspaper prints,’ as Torries explains.

Spin recently opened a Vancouver facility, headed by Gemini- and Emmy-nominated artist Doug Campbell, to add to its Toronto and Atlanta locations. The Toronto shop has recently upgraded its three post suites with new HD-capable Inferno systems.

Other recent Spin projects include an in-flight broadcast redesign for Air Canada and promos for The Movie Network.

-www.spinpro.com

Changes going on Upstairs

Changes are afoot at The Studio Upstairs, a division of Toronto’s Creative Post. While former executive producer Michael Churchill has left the company, designer/animator Jeff Woodrow and commercial creative director John Watson have joined. The shop has also opened a new Quantel Editbox suite.

The studio is keeping busy with design projects for the likes of Discovery, creating an ID titled ‘Motorcycle’ and the HD production ‘Bullet Time’, which airs in the spring. Upstairs also created openings for W Network’s Tell It Like It Is and Get Growing, and is at work on design projects for CTV and Toronto 1.

-www.thestudioupstairs.com

Triangle’s trio of projects

Triangle, based in Toronto, recently put its two motion design suites to work on an opener for the series Made to Order, airing on Food Network Canada. Shop creative director and senior designer Glenn Parsons spearheaded the project, aiming to give the opener an elegant style with iconic visuals and a non-narrative approach.

Parsons also created visual elements for the sponsor ID and opener for the Kids’ CBC program block. The style lends an appropriate sense of fun to the teasers and bumpers.

Finally, triangle came up with a title design for the forthcoming Canuck music doc series Four Strong Winds for Hallway Group Productions and ‘casters CMT and W Network.

-www.trianglestudios.com

Soho counts down ugly

Toronto’s Soho was recently hired on by local prodco Ellis Entertainment to create an on-air package for U.S. ‘caster Animal Planet’s Beastly Countdown. The five-part series ranks the ‘scariest, laziest and ugliest animals on earth’ from one to 10.

Animal Planet was looking for a dark, edgy feel, which Soho imbued in the series’ logo design, opener, bumpers, intros and supporting graphics. For Soho, Doug Morris is credited as executive director and Tony Cleave as creative director.

The shop has also been busy on a handful of high-profile commercial spots for the likes of Campbell’s, Fisherman’s Friend and Fruitopia.

-www.26soho.com

Teletoon’s animation GuruGuru Animation Studio’s collaboration with Teletoon has been ongoing for more than a year and a half now. The Toronto studio has designed and animated 25 station IDs for the tooncaster, featuring a variety of original and bizarre characters and incorporating the Teletoon logo into the story and design.