If you hadn’t already noticed, Disney’s Jetix network has relaunched as Disney XD. New series have been added to the slate including a couple digital 2D projects – Kid vs. Kat (created by Rob Boutilier) and Jimmy Two Shoes (created by Edward Kay and Sean Scott). Kid vs. Kat is produced in Flash, while Jimmy Two Shoes is brought to life using Toon Boom Harmony. Jimmy Two Shoes is being produced by Breakthrough Animation and TELETOON, with help from Mercury Filmworks. Here’s title sequence:
Kid vs. Kat is from Studio B Productions and YTV Canada. Here’s the title sequence, which we showed here before:
A new Flash-animated TV series is ready to claw its way into your house. Kid vs Kat is a new comedy series aimed at children ages 6-11 “about the exaggerated conflict between a demonically malevolent cat and the beleaguered ten-year-old boy to whom it has taken a demented dislike.” The show, which is produced by Studio B Productions along with with YTV Canada and Jetix Europe, is rolling out around the world – including Canada (YTV), Europe (Jetix), South East Asia (Nick) and Australia (ABC). Rob Boutilier created the show. Here’s the title sequence:
The show, which features 3 Kung-Fu teens who deliver fresh food and fists of fury, features a traditionally animated look, which isn’t the common approach for TV series produced in Flash.
Here’s short clip from an episode:
These clips below are selected action and effect shots from the production, animated by folks like Jon Lambe, Melanie Albert, Matt Taylor, Jeff Davis and Neven Nesic, and overseen by Robert Keith Anderson, one of the animation supervisors.
Click on the thumbnails below so see some background layouts from the series production:
Lastly, let’s hear from some of the artists and production staff who worked out of the Miramichi-based studio:
It’s a rare occurrence to be able to animate in a traditional style in Canada in a Flash environment, and I find that it forces me to apply all the art and animation techniques I’ve learned over the years.
-Tavis Silbernagel – Director, Three Delivery, Fatkat
Anything worth doing in life is hard and this show is no exception. Long days, cold nights, the hard but worthwhile fights. At the end of the day it all comes together with final picture and sound and you pick yourself up off of the dirty floor and shake off the discarded candy wrappers that you used as a blanket and say, “yes, that’s the show we wanted to make.”
-Robbie Anderson – VP of Production, Fatkat
Three Delivery has been one of the best opportunities I’ve had in the animation business to do something truly different. The characters are believable and easy to sympathize with and the artwork doesn’t follow the usual rules of geometric shapes and bright colors.
-Alan Foreman, Art Director, Three Delivery, Animation Collective
Three Delivery is proof that you can traditionally animate an entire long format series in flash, and that you can do it here in North America with studios like AC and Fatkat.
-Gene Fowler, President, Fatkat
I’m logging this post under ‘Not Sure If It’s Flash, But Posting It Anyway.’ A few weeks back, I wrote about the Maple Shorts website, and I’m sure glad I went back again to sniff around. I just watched ‘Yam Roll,’ an amazing short created by Jon Izen and Jono Howard for March Entertainment. It’s surely produced with some sort of vector animation software, and I know Jon Izen once animated on ‘Mucha Lucha,’ so it’s a good bet that this project was animated in Flash. ‘The Very Good Adventures of Yam Roll in Happy Kingdom’ (the full title) is one of the most unique shorts I’ve seen in a while, and I’m hoping March Entertainment agrees and finances a season or two.
First Nicktoons broadcasts a dozen Flash-animated shorts during the Nicktoons Film Festival, then YTV airs a mostly-Flash-animated film festival called Funpak. Now the Canadian audience is getting treated to CBC’s Maple Shorts animation festival, a Flash showcase for Canadian artists. The project premiered back in April, and is currently airing in half-hour blocks at 4:30pm on Wednesdays. A total of 40 shorts will air during the festival, but you, the lucky internet viewer, will be able to watch them all on the Maple Shorts website.
March Entertainment, the Toronto-based company behind the Flash-animated ‘Chilly Beach’ series, produced the festival, screening the submissions, editing if necessary and assembling the animated blocks.
I spotted a few familiar names in the contest, in particular Steve Whitehouse, whose ‘Mr. Man’ played during the 3rd week. I also spotted plenty of work by Paul Gill, who founded Zodiac Media, the Canadian company that once produced the Maple Shorts festival. Paul died two years ago, at the age of 28, but his legacy lives on through his shows, which are peppered throughout the festival – ‘Victor vs. Victor,’‘Suburban Samurai,’‘Max Soul’ and ‘Formula for Disaster.’
Best of luck to all in the competition, and for those in Canada, don’t forget to tune in Wednesdays at 4:30pm on CBC.
It Anyway.’ A few weeks back, I 
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