Quick on the draw

By Joyce Kam

Tuesday, October 20, 2009


Like many animation fans, John Chan Yu-fung was taken with Hayao Miyazaki's Castle in the Sky when it first appeared in 1986. He kept thinking to himself: "Wouldn't it be great to create an animated world of my own?"

He did. And one of his works swept the animation category at the 11th Hong Kong Independent Short Film and Video Awards in 2005.

Another, a 12-minute collaboration with Postgal Workshop on the social problems faced by the elderly, scooped the top prize at the DigiCon6 Awards 2008 Hong Kong Regional Competition and the grand prize at the finals in Japan in March.

"Technology has made animation easier to create and distribute. There's growing demand from advertising, music and film industries, especially from China. Hong Kong has lots of youths who are creative but they do need a chance to show off their work," said Chan.

Eddy Hui Shun, chairman of the Hong Kong Maya User Group, a nonprofit organization that promotes and cultivates professionalism in digital content creation, concurs.

That's why he has organized Panorama - Asia Pacific Animation Challenge and Animation Camp 2009 with Hong Kong Cyberport IncuTrain Centre. Sponsored by Autodesk, winners go home with products from the world leader in design software, cash prizes and trophies. The competition is open to works by students aged over 18 and fresh graduates from Hong Kong, the mainland, Australia, India, Malaysia, the Philippines and Singapore until November 1. Finalists from each country
and region are invited to the Animation Challenge Bootcamp while their work will be aired on Animax network.

In the four-day bootcamp, finalists get rare direction from well-known studios such as Lucasfilm Animation Singapore, which helped create the Star Wars: The Clone Wars TV series as well as some of the visual effects for Transformers, and Imagi Studio from Hong Kong, developers of Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Astro Boy.

"We deliberately excluded Japan and Korea because their animation productions are mature," said Hui. "We're hoping students can get a big picture of how their counterparts are doing in other emerging countries."

Hui, who is also deputy program leader of multimedia design at City University, believes Hong Kong's edge lies in a dynamic student community that is constantly stimulated to break new ground by the local film industry.

"We need to focus on our strengths to stay ahead of the pack because countries like Singapore are catching up really fast with their government providing strong support," he added.

Besides City University, the only others offering multimedia studies that include a strong animation component are Polytechnic University and the Hong Kong Institute of Vocational Education.

Hui said around 60 to 70 percent of his students can get a job in the industry.

"The animation market has huge potential. For instance, local movie McDull Kung Fu Kindergarten, launched a few months ago, was a great success in Hong Kong and the mainland. We hope to serve as a seedbed to foster interest in digital arts among the next generation," he said.