Alliance Atlantis Communications jettisoned the last of its post-production outfits on June 30, dismissing the six full-time staff at Calibre Digital Pictures in Toronto and selling its assets to its one-time competitor DKP Effects for an undisclosed sum. The move also shuts out some 30 independent contractors and concludes AAC’s plans to drop its three post-production houses.

AAC still owns the Calibre name and the rights to its titles such as the toon series Ace Lightning, but ‘has no intention of continuing the operation of the business,’ according to spokesperson Deborah Wilson.

The deal follows AAC’s sale of Casablanca to Magnetic North in June and the March sale of Salter Street Digital to a group headed by Rob Power. AAC had been expected to sell or close its post houses for sometime, but appeared to speed efforts when it announced plans late last year to all but entirely drop its production efforts.

‘Its future was always uncertain,’ says Kym Robertson, VP of corporate and public affairs at AAC. ‘As we exited the production business the post-production wasn’t core to us.’

DKP may rehire some Calibre people. The company has inherited a contract to work on 13 episodes of Shoebox Zoo for Blueprint Entertainment, and has offered to bring back five or six animators to finish the job, says John Morch, DKP’s VP of business development. Shoebox is Calibre’s only unfinished project. Morch says there is a chance others may be hired as DKP is expanding and plans to add 150 staff in the next six months to work on a CG feature film.

‘We’re working with Calibre and its customers on any outstanding deliverables,’ says Morch. ‘There are some very talented artists there and we hope to phase them into our production plans over time, but the immediate team is the Shoebox people.’

DKP was, itself, purchased in March by U.S. toonmaker IDT, which also owns Mainframe Entertainment in Vancouver.

Morch says talks to buy the shop began months ago, first through a third-party liquidator and then directly with Calibre management and AAC.

-www.dkp.com

-www.allianceatlantis.com