The Trivandrum-based $1.5 million turnover animation company, Toonz Animation India plans to cash in on the popularity of Indian folklore like the Panchatantra by producing cartoon films and comic strips under its classic series. The company recently launched its Pakka Toonz comic strip with cricket game as its central theme.

"India is a treasure trove for mythological stories. And we would like to tap this potential," says Mr. Bill Dennis, president and chief executive officer. Priced at Rs.50, the 56-page comic book will be printed on art paper. "I don't think the cover price is stiff. Our pricing is based on the market acceptance and our cost of production," says Mr.
Dennis.

Indian mythological stories like Mahabharata and Ramayana are rich in moral messages can be tapped to produce episodic computer/video games with slight modifications to suit the international audience. The video gaming industry is huge and many big names including Microsoft are entering this segment. Given this situation, even our software companies like Wipro, Infosys can get into this segment and rake in good cash, says an industry source.

Be that as it may Toonz Animation, part of the Canada-based $3 billion Chandaria group, Animation is largely involved in 2D animation works and also handles 3D animation works. Collaborating with two US based outfits the company is planning to produce a full-fledged animation film based on Taj Mahal at an outlay of $15 million. According to Mr. Dennis the finer aspects of the film production has to be worked out.

Currently with 65 animators (total staff 350 with plans to add 150 more this year) and investing around $ 2.5 million at its Trivandrum development centre Toonz Animation is executing 2D projects for Italian, UK, US based production outfits using Cambridge Animo and US Animation Toon Boon software systems.

According to Mr. Dennis, the company also executes 3D animation with the Studio Max System. "We do 3D works for ad films," he adds. Currently Toonz Animation's capacity is to make 23 minutes of animation per week and it intends to hike it up to 35 minutes soon.

With an order book position of $3.5 million that would take care of two more years of operations, Toonz Animation is going aggressively into the market. Billing its clients on job basis and not hourly rates, the company is pegging its rates at 20 per cent to 35 per cent discount to other major studios in countries like Taiwan, Korea and Phillipines.

Toonz Animation has contracted with Hongkong based Cartoon Network to produce 20, fifteen-second animation sequences as part of Get Tooned, marketing initiative of the cartoon channel. The animation company has also inked a production contract with
Rainbow Animation, Italy to produce entertaining animation films.

In India, the company has tied up with few production houses like Magic Box, Mumbai, Cosmic Communications and Seaview Suport Systems for production and distribution of animation films here.