Clockwork Zoo

Last updated

Clockwork Zoo
Type Private
Industry Animation
Live action
Founded2005 (2005)
Defunct2011
Headquarters Cape Town, South Africa
Products Television shows

Clockwork Zoo, (formerly Octagon CSI), based in Cape Town, South Africa, was South Africa's largest animation studio from 2005 until its closure in 2011. [1] [2]

Contents

After creating the local action-adventure teen show Urbo: The Adventures of Pax Afrika, the company produced the animation for several international television series, including the fifth season of Caillou co-produced with Loogaroo Animation Studio, and the Cookie Jar Group, [3] Mr. Baby for Xilam, and the Playhouse Disney series Florrie's Dragons, co-produced by Wish Films. [4]

History

2005-2008: early career

Clockwork Zoo is Africa's largest animation studio and home to several of South Africa's most prolific storytellers and content creators. Starting in 2005 with URBO: The Adventures of Pax Afrika, the young animation division quickly grew to 30 people, producing 104 half-hour episodes. After a move from local to more international work and a change from Flash to Toon Boom as preferred medium, the studio worked on Mr Bebe (Xilam, France), Happy Valley (Dinamo, Wales) and storyboards for Wibbly Pig (Wish Films, UK).

2008-2011: later career

In 2010, Clockwork Zoo co-produced 26 half-hour episodes for the 5th season of Caillou with Cookie Jar Entertainment (Canada), and Loogaroo Animation Studio (Canada) significantly raising the bar on previous seasons. The Caillou franchise has sold in every continent and made $40 million in sales so far.

In 2010, the company co-produced Florrie's Dragons with Wish Films (UK) for initial broadcast on the Disney Channel UK. The 52 x 10 min series about a princess and her 6 pet dragons has gained a great deal of attention, and Playhouse Disney were "thrilled" with the result. Clockwork Zoo provided development, design, script, storyboard, build, background, animatics, layout, animation and HD video post on Florries Dragons.

The company closed in 2011 and many of the employees formed Sea Monster Entertainment.

Awards

The company won the prestigious 2010 Cape Film Commission Imbongi trophies in both Training & Development and Animation.

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">DIC Entertainment</span> Film and television production company

DIC Entertainment Corporation, branded as the Incredible World of DIC, was an international film and television production company that was mostly associated as an animation studio. As a now former division of The Walt Disney Company, DIC produced live-action feature films and licensed countless anime series.

<i>Caillou</i> Canadian preschool animated television series

Caillou is a Canadian educational children's television series which aired on Teletoon - with the first episode airing on the former channel on September 15, 1997 - until the fourth season. After that, it moved to Treehouse TV for season five. The series finale aired on October 3, 2010. It also aired on PBS and the PBS Kids Channel.

Zachary Thomas Moncrief is an American artist, producer, director, and writer in the animation industry. He's currently a co-executive producer on Netflix's pre-school series Ghee Happy. His titles have included supervising producer, writer, supervising director, storyboard artist, designer, and songwriter. In 2009, an episode from Phineas and Ferb, which he directed entitled "The Monster of Phineas-n-Ferbenstein", received a Primetime Emmy Award nomination in the category for Outstanding Special Class Short-format Animated Programs.

<i>The Doodlebops</i> Canadian television series and band

The Doodlebops is a Canadian live action musical-comedy children's television series produced by Cookie Jar Entertainment for CBC Television in Canada, although the series aired in the United States on Disney Channel's Playhouse Disney from April 11, 2005 to November 17, 2007. The series combines music, choreography, humour, and skits to teach social lessons. It included scenes from a concert in front of preschool audiences being participated actively.

<i>Johnny Test</i> Animated television series

Johnny Test is an animated television series created by Scott Fellows, originally produced in the United States by Warner Bros. Animation and later produced in Canada by Cookie Jar Entertainment. It premiered on Kids' WB on September 17, 2005, which continued to air the series through its second and third seasons. The rest of the series aired on Cartoon Network starting on January 7, 2008, in the United States and internationally. In Canada, the show premiered on Teletoon on September 3, 2006.

URBO: The Adventures of Pax Afrika is a South African science fiction animated television series created by the animation department of Octagon CSI, which later became Clockwork Zoo. It started airing in October 2006, and ran until November 2009. It chronicles the adventures of a gang of teenagers who live in a futuristic Cape Town, renamed iKapa City, the last known city on the planet, as they fight the evil industrialist overlord Maximilian Malice.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Xilam</span> French animation studio

Xilam is a French production company which specializes in making animated television series and feature films. Marc du Pontavice and his wife Alix founded it in 1999 as a replacement for the animation division of Gaumont Multimédia. Gaumont continued to have a deal with Xilam until 2003. Gaumont Multimédia was a video game publisher until closing in 2004.

Tooncan was an animation studio based in Montreal, Quebec founded by Paul Cadieux. The company has worked on TF1's The Bellflower Bunnies and Sylvain Chomet's The Triplets of Belleville.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lauren Beukes</span> South African writer

Lauren Beukes is a South African novelist, short story writer, journalist and television scriptwriter.

Events in 2001 in animation.

Events in 2008 in animation.

Events in 1969 in animation.

Events in 1963 in animation.

Events in 1974 in animation.

Events in 1951 in animation.

Florrie's Dragons is a children's animated television series that was produced by Wish Films and Clockwork Zoo and animated by Studio 100 Animation. The series is based on a children's book named Dear Dragon. The series was created by An Vrombaut, the creator known from 64 Zoo Lane, which the series is related to. The series mainly aired on Disney Junior in the United Kingdom.

References

  1. ↑ "Don't feed the animators". Lauren Beukes. Design Indaba Magazine. 1 February 2008. Retrieved 25 October 2010.
  2. ↑ "26 episode Canadian-South African animation co-production gets the go-ahead". Filmmaker South Africa. Balancing Act. 19 March 2009. Retrieved 25 October 2010.
  3. ↑ "Clockwork Zoo begins key animation on Caillou". AnimationSA. 25 August 2009. Archived from the original on 22 January 2010. Retrieved 25 August 2009.
  4. ↑ "Clockwork Zoo begins key animation on Florrie's Dragons". Screen Africa. 10 March 2010. Archived from the original on 16 July 2011. Retrieved 10 March 2010.


This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.