The Slipper Cycle premieres in Stuttgart

Triggerfish partner Anthony Silverston's The Slipper Cycle has been selected to screen in the prestigious Stuttgart Animation Festival. It will show in a supporting programme focusing on animations from South Africa on May 8th. The stop-motion piece was Anthony's first film. Completed late 2003, it won Best Independent Animation at the Independent's Film Festival in Florida and has already shown in numerous animation festivals worldwide. Pin It

Judging BANFF

Triggerfish producer Stuart Forrest has been selected to judge the Animation Program in The Banff World Television Awards which takes place June 13-16 2010. The 2009 competition attracted more than 800 entries from 30 countres around the world. The specific category includes programs made for television, either as part of a series or as a one-off television special. Pin It

Triggerfish Studio in 3D!

As you can see from these photos, the last 2 weeks we've been learning a lot from L.A.- based Digital Stereography expert and 3D Cinema author Bernard Mendiburu.

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Press Release: Job creation in SA animation industry

Triggerfish, along with other prominent home-grown animation studios, is playing an integral role in what has become known as the Animation Industry Development Initiative (AIDI).

The Cape Film Commission (CFC), together with Animation SA launched the first phase of AIDI last year by recruiting fresh, young talent within the Mitchell’s Plain and Khayelitsha communities to undergo animation-related training. The CFC and Animation SA, with the support of the Services Seta, are committed to creating a strong and competitive home-grown animation industry. The overall aim of the AIDI is to create 10 000 jobs within the animation industry by 2020.

All five interns that were placed at Triggerfish for a 6-month period, are now employed full-time to work on the studio’s first animated feature film, Zambezia.

“We’ve been very impressed with how quickly the interns were brought up to speed and both the studio as well as the interns have benefitted enormously”, says Mike Buckland, senior producer at Triggerfish. “The initiative is a great opportunity for talented, young animators to work with the some of the best people in the industry”, he adds.

Four of the interns are graduates of the Animation School in Cape Town (Langa Ntombela, Ivan van den Heever, Sean Wilkins and Jovan Janari) while Thabe Ntebe studied animation for 2 years at Boston Media House in Johannesburg.

"I think the programme at Triggerfish is extremely useful because it offers specialised training which is essential to skills growth and finding your niche”, says Thabe Ntebe.

Triggerfish is synonymous with industry development in South Africa and co-founded the first national animation body, Animation SA, which now has over 1800 members across southern Africa. Pin It

And the winner of this year's (T)oscar is.........

The (T)oscars have become a bit of a Triggerfish tradition and this year's ceremony at the studio was a great opportunity to acknowledge the time, creative energy and hard work that everyone has put into making our first feature, Zambezia! Some of the awards included:

Kane - The 'Fantastic Mr Fix' Award


Karen - 'Mother of All Hens' Award (for taking all her chicklets under her wing and showing them the ropes).


Lindsay - 'Silent Movie' Award (for wanting to cut copious amounts of dialogue).


Mike - 'Stop, You can’t do that!' Award (for his less is more approach: “You can’t have so many characters, landscapes, camera moves....”)


Thabe - 'Pumpkin Patch' Award (for creating pumpkins you would sing for – “oh, oh, oh…”)


Edelgard - The 'Blackberry' Award (for keeping our director Wayne in touch and organized).

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Big up to Clockwork Zoo!

Well done to Clockwork Zoo for winning the Imbongi Award for Excellence in Animation. Pin It

Meet....the layout artist, Keenan Manshon

“I am ambitious and determined to make a contribution to animation, especially when it comes to changing people’s perceptions that animation is something only for kids.”


For as long as he can remember, Keenan has been inspired by animation. His love for animation began as a child watching Disney movies and then when Pixar came along... well then he just knew that a career in 3D animation was for him! Keenan is currently working on the feature film, Zambezia, and is responsible for setting up the final camera shots using storyboards as well as placing characters within the scene and adding rough animation to get a sense of timing. Keenan first joined Triggerfish as an intern after studying at The Animation School and then spent a few months freelancing before starting to work as a layout artist on Zambezia. If he had to choose one animation character he most identifies with, it would be Remy from Ratatouille because he was also determined and ambitious. Pin It

It's a wrap...

well, when it comes to recording voices, anyway. Here are some pictures from our recording sessions held at Tonic Studios in Cape Town and at the SABC studio in Gauteng.



The full cast of Zambezia: Adam Behr (Land of the Lost, Sushi Pack), Freshly Ground’s Zolani Mahola, Lali Dangazele (Rhythm City, When We Were Black), David Dennis (Disgrace, 10,000 B.C., Red Dust, Soul City, Charlie Jade), Lee Duru (Zola 7, In My Country, Home Affairs, Mama Jack), Richard E. Grant (Withnail and I, Corpse Bride), Keeno Lee-Hector (Fame, Montana, Khulululeka Siyavota ), Khanya Mkangisa (Yo-TV presenter, Mthunzini.com), Nik Rabinowitz (SA comedian of the Year 2008), Leeanda Reddy (Isidingo, Mr Bones 2), Brent Palmer (Charlie Jade, The Silent Fall, The Flood, Mercenary for Justice) Tema Sebopedi (Angel’s Song, Parliament) and Royston Stoffels (Stokvel, Interrogation Room, Erfsonder), and director Wayne Thornley. Pin It

Imbongi Award nomination for Triggerfish

Triggerfish has just been nominated for an award for Excellence in Animation! Please support us and vote for us here:
http://www.imbongiawards.co.za/



The Imbongi Awards are the prestigious Film Production Awards for the City of Cape Town and the Western Cape. This year sees the second annual Imbongi Awards and with 10 award categories and the Chairman’s Award, the 2010 Awards promises to showcase the very best production talent and facilities in Cape Town and the Western Cape.

The Winners will be announced at an Awards Ceremony to be held on Saturday 6 March 2010 at the Cape Town International Convention Centre (CTICC). Pin It

Is it a bird...? Is it a plane...?

.........actually, it's Brent Palmer pretending to be a bird.

Keep your eye on the blog for more photos from the recording studio! Pin It

SA's got talent

Actor David Dennis in the recording studio with director, Wayne Thornley.

This month we have been recording voices for our upcoming feature, Zambezia. The cast is made up of some of South Africa's finest actors, musicians and entertainers, and it has been inspiring to finally hear the characters come to life!

Starring alongside Richard E. Grant is Freshly Ground’s Zolani Mahola, award-winning comedian Nik Rabinowitz, Lali Dangazele (Rhythm City, When We Were Black), David Dennis (Disgrace, 10,000 B.C., Red Dust, Soul City, Charlie Jade), Lee Duru (Zola 7, In My Country, Home Affairs, Mama Jack), Keeno Lee-Hector (Fame, Montana, Khulululeka Siyavota), Khanya Mkangisa (Yo-TV presenter, Mthunzini.com,Leeanda Reddy (Isidingo, Mr Bones 2), Brent Palmer (Charlie Jade, The Silent Fall, The Flood, Mercenary for Justice) Tema Sebopedi (Angel’s Song, Parliament) and Royston Stoffels (Stokvel, Interrogation Room, Erfsonder). Pin It

CLIMATE SURVEY by Cathy Bradley

How’s the weather at Triggerfish? And we don’t mean literally...With the production of Zambezia well under way and because we consider our team to be the greatest asset we have, our HR Manager, Cathy Bradley decided it was time to check ’the state of the animation’ by conducting an in-house survey.

26 members of the Triggerfish team participated anonymously in the survey and were given the opportunity to make suggestions or give feedback on a range of issues including: training, working conditions, job expectations, job security, performance, recognition, communication, team-work and leadership confidence. The overall impression was highly favourable with the team feeling secure and happy at the studio. Confidence in leadership and team spirit, in particular, scored highly with the most of the participants saying that their input was being valued and that communication within the studio had improved.

This is what one of the crew had to say: “Apart from being involved in all the processes/stages of making this animation feature, I find myself very intrigued and inspired by the skills of everyone on the team. The constant enthusiasm about Zambezia motivates me all the time to become better at what I do. One can never gather enough knowledge and every day is a wonderful challenge. I can see that Triggerfish has great vision and I am completely inspired by everything that happens here. The project, the management, the team, the enthusiasm, the social efforts, the being-part-of-something-really-amazing causes me to wake up with a smile in the morning and get ready to tackle the day with eagerness and joy! Zambezia is easily the greatest project I’ve ever worked on and I’m hoping there will be more opportunities in the future.” Pin It