When Ken Steel launched his 3D animation and post shop Electric Crayon eight months ago in Vancouver, he had no idea the response from the industry would be so immediate. With a current staff of 10, including the recent arrival of communication and marketing manager Kathleen Gallagher, the shop is thriving with steady work from the commercial, television and games worlds.

Steel began his career in 1992 with Vancouver animation heavyweight Mainframe Entertainment. It was there that he first met Gallagher, learned his craft and developed the skills that have made Electric Crayon such a fast horse out of the gate.

‘I was employee number eight,’ says Steel of his days at Mainframe. He was one of the original animators on Mainframe’s hit cg series ReBoot, starting with the show in its preproduction phase. ‘I did a lot of modeling, basically gearing up for the first three episodes. By the second episode, I was a full-fledged animator.’

After doing some work on Beast Wars, Steel decided to leave Mainframe to explore the relatively untested realms of interactive entertainment.

‘I really think in the future there is going to be a lot more room for interactive movies and applying this kind of art to a more interactive market,’ says Steel.

He joined Radical Entertainment, a company mostly known for its video-game animation. Under the title of global animation director, Steel worked on a line of espn sports games and created the front-end film for ‘Jackie Chan’s Stuntmaster’ video game.

When it came time to go out on his own, Steel decided to create an environment he would want to work in if he were his own employee.

‘I wanted to make a place where if I personally walked through the door I would want to work here,’ says Steel. ‘One of the reasons I began doing this in the first place is because I really wanted to create a working environment that was easy-going, open-minded and creative.’

In its short time on the Canadian animation map, Electric Crayon has essentially put together three projects. The first is more than 12 minutes of full computer-generated animation, with effects, for the new SR Studios game ‘Goblins For Honor and Glory.’ The project took approximately four months to complete.

The second project handed to Steel and Electric Crayon was a pair of television spots for Payroll Loans, which will begin airing this month. According to Steel, he was originally approached by Payroll Loans to do some audio work.

‘We basically sold them on the idea of taking it into a 3D sort of a realm,’ says Steel. ‘Through talking to them, we found that they wanted to change their corporate image, so we came up with some ideas and pitched it by them. They were very impressed with what we put forward and we came up with this zany commercial idea.’

The result is a pair of commercials featuring the continuing battles of Cashflow Joe and his arch nemesis Money Troubles. The two cg 3D animated characters battle in each spot, with Cashflow Joe coming out ahead. This commercial project is actually making a bit of Canadian television history, says Steel.

‘What is interesting about this project is that it is going to air on the tv listings channels,’ he says. ‘It is sort of breaking ground. The tv listing channel is all infomercial style – stills with text over top – because the crtc doesn’t allow you to have full-motion video. We got around that and we are going to be the first fully animated cartoon-style commercial that is going to air on it.’

The spots will air on listings channels across Canada. This is very exciting for Steel and the folks at Electric Crayon, because their Payroll Loans ads will be seen twice an hour in every major market in Canada. There is room for further installments of Cashflow vs. Money Trouble as well, an ongoing rivalry which Steel compares to Mad Magazine’s popular and time-tested ‘Spy vs. Spy’ comic strip. If all goes well and the reaction to the spots is favorable, he has been told the ads will air on network television in the near future.

Steel reports Electric Crayon is about to embark on its third production – an animated series demo to be known as Darwin 218, set in a post-apocalyptic earth where animals have developed human traits.

Steel also plans to share Electric Crayon’s good fortune with those who have taken a chance working with the infant company as it grows.

‘We are trying to create incentives for our staff to basically propel our longevity,’ he says. ‘My idea is to try and give part of this company back to the people who are trying to build it over the next year or two years and hopefully onwards, so the people who help us start this company will be able to benefit down the line. We want to try and create a name of quality in the industry. We’ve been very lucky to have attracted people who are like- minded.’

He hopes Electric Crayon will grow in terms of staff by a full 100% by the end of the year. With the number of projects the shop is ‘hovering around,’ it will undoubtedly have to become larger. Meanwhile, Steel says he has been pleased with how the industry has embraced his new production house.

‘It has been surprising,’ says Steel. ‘I was hoping to see that type of response after another year or something. The response from the industry has just been great.’ *