The 2007 Flashforward Film Festival winners were announced last Wednesday night, and a couple familiar faces took home rubber arrows. Bernard Derriman’s Arj & Poopy episode Congo Windfall took home the top prize in the Cartoon category, while Laith Bahrani snagged the trophy in the Art category for his Flash-animated music video Creep. The final award given that night was the audience choice, which went to Adam Phillips, for his innovative 30 Shorts in 30 Days project. Phillips is no stranger to Flashforward rubber arrows, having won in 2003, 2005 and twice in 2006. Below are some clips from the event:

Thanks to Lynda, Toby and Christoph for the invite. I had a blast. And congrats to all the nominees.All three of these artists above have been interviewed here at CHF:

Bernard Derriman
Adam Phillips
Laith Bahrani

Bernard Derriman, an ex-Disney feature animator, has released another animated music video for the Big Green Rabbit project. Directed by Derriman, The Green Anaconda Song video was animated by Andrew Collins, Lily Dell and Ian Harrowell, all of whom worked on Jungle Book 2 where they likely got their first snake-animation experience. The short was animated in Toon Boom Solo.

Derriman was interviewed here at CHF back in 2005.

Another animated music video by Bernard Derriman from the Big Green Rabbit series. This one is titled The Dinosaur’s Song, and wasn’t animated with Flash, as his past work was, but in Toon Boom Solo.

Back in February, CHF posted an animated music video brought to life by Bernard Derriman, the artist behind Arj & Poopy. The video was created for Big Green Rabbit, “a children’s multimedia lifestyle brand dedicated to reducing childhood obesity and connecting children and nature.”

Enjoy The Iguana Song, which was animated in Toon Boom Solo.

Bernard Derriman has been a busy man, what with winning his big trophy at the Channel Frederator Awards and wrapping up the latest episode of Arj and Poopy. He’s also been hard at work on The Rhino Song, the first installment in a series of animations for a new children’s show called Big Green Rabbit. Derriman has been animating in Flash for years now, but has switched to Toon Boom Solo for this project.

Arj and Poopy are back! In this 10th episode, Congo Windfall, Arj finds himself in receipt of an incredible offer from a mysterious source. We also get to meet the latest edition to the Arj and Poopy cast - Bouncy the Dog. Bouncy is a neighbor in Arj’s building, and his voice might just sound familiar. Bouncy is played by Johnny Brennan, one half of The Jerky Boys, who has also worked his way into the cast of Family Guy.

But hold onto your hats - there’s a musical surprise in Congo Windfall that contains some of the most likable animation I’ve seen in a long time. Bernard Derriman, the animator and co-creator of the series, displays the animation skills that landed him a gig at Disneytoon Studios Australia many years back.

Derriman has been logging the production on the Arj and Poopy blog, where you’ll find his write-ups on storyboarding, backgrounds and the voice records. For more on Derriman and his illustrious career, head over to the 2-part CHF interview.

Last night at Cinespace in Hollywood, Fred Seibert held the first annual Channel Frederator Awards party. Seibert, the founder of Frederator and former President of Hanna-Barbera studios, attracted a mammoth crowd who enjoyed a continual cartoon screening, video interviews throughout the night and an A-list assembly from the kids animation world.

But the real stars of the night were the winners of the Channel Frederator Awards. Several of the award winning films were produced in Flash, including Jessica Borutski’s musical short I Like Pandas, which won Best Flash Film, and War Photographer by Joel Trussell which took home two awards - Best Music Video and The Producers’ Award. Jossie Malis’ Bendito Machine won for Best Design, Bernard Derriman’s immensely-viral Everyone Else Has Had More Sex Than Me took home Funniest Film, and Ed Skudder’s Flash-animated short The New Guy walked away with the Joe Robot Award, for best use of a robot.

I also saw heaps of great people, including Melissa Wolfe, who not only works for Frederator but also created one of this year’s Random Cartoons (Sparkles and Gloom), Bill Bennett (who co-created Chalkzone), Kris Boban from Liquid Generation, the guys from Six Point Harness Studio and Animax Entertainment and Michael Uman and Luis Blanco from Interspectacular, the NYC shop who was written up here last December for the Discovery Channel work.

Great party, Frederator. I don’t think you have a choice on this one - you’re doing that again next year!