– Spin does TIFF

Toronto’s Spin Productions has an array of new projects hitting the big and small screens, reflecting a recent initiative to establish a stronger presence in the design and film title markets.

Spin recently created an opening look for director Jerry Ciccoritti’s design-rich ‘Fellini meets Breakfast at Tiffany’s’ feature project Boy Meets Girl, which debuts at the Toronto International Film Festival this month.

Earlier this spring, Spin fortified its design and cg talent including the addition of design veteran Dale Smith as creative director. One of Smith’s first visitors at Spin was Ciccoritti, who approached the artist to design titles for his feature, which takes a look at love and poetry in an Italian neighborhood.

Smith and Ciccoritti got together over some rough sketches and overall design ideas and gelled on how to tackle the design job.

The film is a mix of fantasy and reality, drawing stylistic cues from the romantic comedies of the 1960s like Roman Holiday and Martin and Lewis’ Artists and Models. The look was captured with cinematography, production design and wardrobe, and Smith designed the titles to reflect that.

Smith used the often outrageous color palette of the film – including blending in elements from the classic basement staple of every Italian home, red velvet patterned wallpaper, which figures into the plot of the film.

Much of the project was done in Photoshop and up-resed for film. Smith worked with Spin producer Connie Dercho and Arto-Pelli producer Stavros Stavrides.

Spin was also responsible for creating the opening look for recently released feature Strike (aka Hairy Bird) from Alliance Communications and Redeemable Features.

The feature was shot and posted in Toronto, and when writer/director Sarah Kernochan had an unsatisfactory round of pitches in New York for the film titles assignment, she brought that part of the project to Toronto and Spin.

It was at Spin that Kernochan found the perfect rendition of the ‘hairy bird,’ a cute yet recognizable reference to a specific part of the male anatomy that she considered integral to the opening of the film.

The ‘bird,’ rendered by Spin animator Joe Sherman, and the background graphics and design by Steven Lewis captivated Kernochan, and although distributor Miramax changed the title of the film to the more accessible Strike, the bird remained part of the opening sequence.

Spin has also created some new station ids for Global, which are hitting the airwaves mid-month.

– TOPIX does Marbles

Toronto’s TOPIX/Mad Dog contributed the playful yet polished round of animation and special effects for the first annual Golden Marble Awards, Sept. 10 in New York.

topix/md designed and produced an overall package and a series of five-second category ids for the show, which recognizes the oft-overlooked area of children’s advertising.

The shop used the image of the marble itself – the visual foundation of the award – to form the basis of the animated pieces, which are a mixture of 3D animation effects and typography.

The goal was to create a look that plays off the whimsy inherent in the proceedings while addressing the requirement for a slick, sophisticated presentation.

topix/md lit and shot a number of still and spinning marbles, which were turned into texture maps, and other live-action sequences were integrated with the 3D animated elements.

The topix/md team created a number of generic sequences which incorporated different payoffs corresponding to show categories; for example, in a sequence in which a handful of marbles bounce into a seamless background, a comparatively huge basketball is dropped into frame to introduce ‘Best Sporting Goods Commercial.’

topix/md credits go to director of animation William Cameron, animator Janna McFadden, Flint/Flame artist Marco Polsinelli, Flame artist Frank Russo, and producers Chris Wallace and Lisa Weinrib. The show was onlined by editor Scott Blackett and executive producer Mike Cooper of Toronto’s Generator Digital Video Productions. Sound was handled by Mike Rosnick at Rosnick MacKinnon.

The show is being handled out of BrunicoEvents by exec producer Mark Smyka.

– Immersed at the Ex

Toronto’s Immersion Studios launched a new interactive cinema project at the cne this year called Monsters of the Deep, which involves an audience of 100 in a watery group-controlled adventure.

Monsters of the Deep is a 12-minute cinema story that utilizes the Immersion Reality technology developed by the company using wide-screen digital imaging and Dolby Digital surround sound.

Individual touch-sensitive monitors allow audience members to direct the action, with scores tallied to reflect each participant’s role in affecting the course of action in the story.

The company says the ride will become part of a library of group interaction properties and that it has received support in the form of an equity investment from Kitchener, Ont.-based Electrohome’s Advanced Visualization Group.

– Media 100 ships NT

Marlboro, Massachusetts-based Media 100 has announced it will begin shipping its first nt-based products – the Media 100 qx and qxc.

The new products are designed for broadcast, corporate and institutional and professional video editing applications.

Media 100 qx and qxc include Adobe’s Premiere 5.0 video editing system and also support QuickTime 3 to provide cross-platform compatibility. The two systems also support an array of third-party software and hardware including 3D Studio Max and Macromedia Director.

The Media 100 qx is priced at us$1,995 (ca$3,000) and qxc is us$3,995 (ca$6,000).

Media 100 has also announced it has certified the Intergraph Computer Systems’ TDZ 2000 ViZual workstation for use with the Media 100’s newly launched qx and qxc nt-based digital video systems. The TDZ 2000 workstation works with two dual Pentium ii processors designed to handle the high bandwidth necessary for the graphics applications of the video and broadcast applications.