Gaming in cybercafes will be on the rise for sometime, especially given the rather low broadband speeds we have in Malaysia...I was with some journalist in Bali for an IT event, the one from Singapore said that he is getting 10Mbps (there are faster services in Singapore as well) and the one from Hong Kong had a 15Mbps connection. He Hong Kong journalist also said that PCCW also provides fiber-to-the-home, up to 100Mbps...Me? I was to ashamed to say. Of course, I already knew that we're really behind after covering some international broadband forums before...
Here's a link to a rather obscure story on cybercafes and why they're not afraid about hotspots and braodband to the home: http://autaspace.blogspot.com/2008/04/cybercafes-not-worried-about-hotspots.html
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Free movies on-line!
Here's a link to an article about some great public domain movies you can watch on-line:
http://autaspace.blogspot.com/2008/04/free-movies-on-line.html
Autaspace! is another blog of mine...
http://autaspace.blogspot.com/2008/04/free-movies-on-line.html
Autaspace! is another blog of mine...
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
A past article related to local gaming industry
This version is slightly more detailed and longer than the hard-copy published version. Sorry I lost the pictures. They were mainly Team Fortress 2 pictures.
Local gaming development IP to rise
By Hazimin Sulaiman
CODEMASTERS has a presence in Malaysia, working along with local company Vision New Media. Electronics Arts is setting up shop with our southern neighbours, Singapore. These are world computer game heavyweights which would be a boon for the local creative content development industry to have on our shores. There are of course local game developers in Malaysia such as Pheonix and GameBrains. But it seems that in most cases, the games development industry in Malaysia still lacks its own Intellectual Property; most projects handled by these companies are outsourced jobs, with the IP belonging to respective foreign entities.
The interactive-entertainment industry itself is very enticing especially in 2007 video game software sales reached a staggering USD$9.5 billion. Compare that to the top-ten Hollywood blockbusters which generated USD$2.6 billion last year. Unless the local gaming industry gets a boost, it is likely that the local games development industry will remain at a service provider level for a long time.
Not owning unique IP can in the long run spell disaster if somehow a games developer decides to shift to other places which offer lower wages and other incentives. There is hope. As established foreign games entities realiase Malaysia's potential to produce quality work. We have some resources in terms of multimedia and animation talents but it takes more expertise to make a computer or video game. A game requires more people than a movie production. In that respect, relying on an established gaming engine is a good way to jump start the local games industry.
Datuk Hj. Abdul Hamid Mustapha, executive chairman of Online e-Club Management Sdn Bhd which owns NOESIS Interactive Sdn Bhd believes that one of the best ways to break into the lucerative games industry is by creating mods. The clear message is that one should not underestimate the power of game mods.Mods or game modifications is a key reason why games like Counter Strike (running on the Half Life engine) refuse to die.
In 1996, alterations to id Software's Doom resulted in modified versions. These mods extended the life of the game way beyond the point where its excitement would have died down. Since one must have the original game to play mods, sales went beyond the shelf life of normal computer games.Using this template Half-Life has made Valve Software's revenue stream steadily increase. Valve mainly attributes its success to three mods: Day of Defeat, Team Fortress and Counter Strike. In the first year Half-Life sold two million units. In its third year after its launch, it sold 3.8 million units. Over all, the Half Life franchise sold over 11 million units.
NOESIS Interactive intends to offer gaming development courses through franchisee university and colleges. Courses are scheduled to start by June, 2008. Leveraging on its partners Valve Software and NOESIS Interactive USA, NOESIS Interactive believes that we have an ecosystem in place to welcome a whole new generation of game developers from training, community development right through to digital distribution of games for commercialisation opportunities. In simple terms it means that budding game developers can take up the course from participating university and colleges and receive a certification in respective programmes such as 3D content creation with Softimage XSI, character design and integration with Half-Life 2, custom props and animation for source powered games, advanced character animation for gamers with Softimage XSI and advanced source level design bundle source level design essentials.
These certification means that the holder can be instantly put to work on games which specifically use the Half-Life engine. Besides Softimage, other 3D animation tools such as Autodesk Maya and 3ds Max-based courses are also offered. The project based training is open to all students, teaching professionals or those who want to upgrade their skills."NOESIS Interactive is a project conceived, produced and managed by Online e-Club Management Sdn Bhd to address the inadequancies of the Asian Electronic Game Industry. Currently there is only a handful of local games titles that have been released in this region," says Abdul Hamid. This he thinks is largely due to the lack of resources and more crucially the lack of access to any game engines. As for the pool of skilled designers, artists and coders it is believed by NOESIS Interactive that it is small and scattered, with most young talents are yet to be discovered.
NOESIS is also set to leverage on its connections in Brunei, Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Vietnam; since e-Club Management is the regional official distributor for Valve Software. With that, locally produced IP coming out from this has a good chance of being distributed as mods to these countries. The IP rights will also remain with Malaysians. Malaysia can use this opportunity to market its own unique culture as its own IP as well. Placement of facts or cultural objects can picque one's curiosity and influence them to find out more. This has a similar effect to placing products in movies.
Silat, the Malaysian form of martial arts for example, has been eyed by a Dutch-based company DGames Sdb Bhd. According to its advisor Azlan Ghanie, himself a respected martial artist and chief editor of the local martial arts magazine, Seni Beladiri, DGames representatives are keen to create an online computer game where players from all over the world can band together to fight the forces of darkness. "I hope that silat form of fighting will be depicted in the online game to introduce Malaysian silat to world," Azlan says.
DGames is synonamous with the child prodigy Paul du Long, who created his first online game when he was only 11 years old. His father Glenn du Long intends to have his son mentor local talents, as he has done for thousands of children in Europe. "We are scheduling the launch of the proposed game sometime in May or June in Kuala Lumpur," says Azlan.
DGames is keen to have Malaysia as a hub for developing online games. Malaysia it seems has hidden gems which can attract established names from the gaming development industry. But to build up the industry, it takes more than a bunch of companies. The pool of skilled and talent for example, needs to be polished enough to gain the confidence from these would be employers from overseas. We need to learn what we can from tried and tested formulas first, just like the Japanese animators, before branching out on our own.
Local gaming development IP to rise
By Hazimin Sulaiman
CODEMASTERS has a presence in Malaysia, working along with local company Vision New Media. Electronics Arts is setting up shop with our southern neighbours, Singapore. These are world computer game heavyweights which would be a boon for the local creative content development industry to have on our shores. There are of course local game developers in Malaysia such as Pheonix and GameBrains. But it seems that in most cases, the games development industry in Malaysia still lacks its own Intellectual Property; most projects handled by these companies are outsourced jobs, with the IP belonging to respective foreign entities.
The interactive-entertainment industry itself is very enticing especially in 2007 video game software sales reached a staggering USD$9.5 billion. Compare that to the top-ten Hollywood blockbusters which generated USD$2.6 billion last year. Unless the local gaming industry gets a boost, it is likely that the local games development industry will remain at a service provider level for a long time.
Not owning unique IP can in the long run spell disaster if somehow a games developer decides to shift to other places which offer lower wages and other incentives. There is hope. As established foreign games entities realiase Malaysia's potential to produce quality work. We have some resources in terms of multimedia and animation talents but it takes more expertise to make a computer or video game. A game requires more people than a movie production. In that respect, relying on an established gaming engine is a good way to jump start the local games industry.
Datuk Hj. Abdul Hamid Mustapha, executive chairman of Online e-Club Management Sdn Bhd which owns NOESIS Interactive Sdn Bhd believes that one of the best ways to break into the lucerative games industry is by creating mods. The clear message is that one should not underestimate the power of game mods.Mods or game modifications is a key reason why games like Counter Strike (running on the Half Life engine) refuse to die.
In 1996, alterations to id Software's Doom resulted in modified versions. These mods extended the life of the game way beyond the point where its excitement would have died down. Since one must have the original game to play mods, sales went beyond the shelf life of normal computer games.Using this template Half-Life has made Valve Software's revenue stream steadily increase. Valve mainly attributes its success to three mods: Day of Defeat, Team Fortress and Counter Strike. In the first year Half-Life sold two million units. In its third year after its launch, it sold 3.8 million units. Over all, the Half Life franchise sold over 11 million units.
NOESIS Interactive intends to offer gaming development courses through franchisee university and colleges. Courses are scheduled to start by June, 2008. Leveraging on its partners Valve Software and NOESIS Interactive USA, NOESIS Interactive believes that we have an ecosystem in place to welcome a whole new generation of game developers from training, community development right through to digital distribution of games for commercialisation opportunities. In simple terms it means that budding game developers can take up the course from participating university and colleges and receive a certification in respective programmes such as 3D content creation with Softimage XSI, character design and integration with Half-Life 2, custom props and animation for source powered games, advanced character animation for gamers with Softimage XSI and advanced source level design bundle source level design essentials.
These certification means that the holder can be instantly put to work on games which specifically use the Half-Life engine. Besides Softimage, other 3D animation tools such as Autodesk Maya and 3ds Max-based courses are also offered. The project based training is open to all students, teaching professionals or those who want to upgrade their skills."NOESIS Interactive is a project conceived, produced and managed by Online e-Club Management Sdn Bhd to address the inadequancies of the Asian Electronic Game Industry. Currently there is only a handful of local games titles that have been released in this region," says Abdul Hamid. This he thinks is largely due to the lack of resources and more crucially the lack of access to any game engines. As for the pool of skilled designers, artists and coders it is believed by NOESIS Interactive that it is small and scattered, with most young talents are yet to be discovered.
NOESIS is also set to leverage on its connections in Brunei, Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Vietnam; since e-Club Management is the regional official distributor for Valve Software. With that, locally produced IP coming out from this has a good chance of being distributed as mods to these countries. The IP rights will also remain with Malaysians. Malaysia can use this opportunity to market its own unique culture as its own IP as well. Placement of facts or cultural objects can picque one's curiosity and influence them to find out more. This has a similar effect to placing products in movies.
Silat, the Malaysian form of martial arts for example, has been eyed by a Dutch-based company DGames Sdb Bhd. According to its advisor Azlan Ghanie, himself a respected martial artist and chief editor of the local martial arts magazine, Seni Beladiri, DGames representatives are keen to create an online computer game where players from all over the world can band together to fight the forces of darkness. "I hope that silat form of fighting will be depicted in the online game to introduce Malaysian silat to world," Azlan says.
DGames is synonamous with the child prodigy Paul du Long, who created his first online game when he was only 11 years old. His father Glenn du Long intends to have his son mentor local talents, as he has done for thousands of children in Europe. "We are scheduling the launch of the proposed game sometime in May or June in Kuala Lumpur," says Azlan.
DGames is keen to have Malaysia as a hub for developing online games. Malaysia it seems has hidden gems which can attract established names from the gaming development industry. But to build up the industry, it takes more than a bunch of companies. The pool of skilled and talent for example, needs to be polished enough to gain the confidence from these would be employers from overseas. We need to learn what we can from tried and tested formulas first, just like the Japanese animators, before branching out on our own.
Jin On-line?
Play with Jin on-line
By Hazimin Sulaiman
JIN, in Malay means geanie, which in turn originates from the Arabic equivalent 'Jann.' As of now, iG-Interactive Sdn Bhd, a top online game publisher and one of the pioneers of Malay language online game publisher in Malaysia and Singapore, has in partnership with game developer, TQ Digital Entertainment (China), launched JIN Online (http://www.jin.com.my/) for public open beta. It seems to be yet another “PayU2Play” massive multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) by iGI. In JIN, you are immersed and trasported into a fantasy-based MMORPG virtual world of JIN. Gamers can choose one of the 2 heroic game characters, the Warrior or the Mage. 
JIN Online gamers will enjoy months of fun and exciting game-play commanding their heroes and pets to adventure the vast land of Atlantis and challenging monsters and real players with the power of sword and magic. What's more is that you can have pets which actually evolve into genies! As gamaplay progresses you can summon up to 3 genies concurrently, to help protect you from harm via convergence and attack tactics. The pet system provides a lot of genies to summon from. Some have super strength, some magic and some can self-destruct in sacrifice while others will possess enemies' spirit to impair them.To help working adults to get into the game, JIN Online introduces a perfectly designed `Offline Training' system, a first in MMORPGs. As the name depicts, Offline Training allows you to train and level-up your heroes and genies even when your computer is switched off. The emphasis for Jin is team-work of tightly knitted common online game components which includes an excellent legion and competition system; effective trade system; player mentoring; rewarding and other various systems guarantee JIN Online to be highly interactive and full of fun.
In conjunction with the launch, IGI will be running JIN Online Illustration and Comic Competition as well with the prizes of RM1,500, RM1,000 and RM500 for the Grand, Second and Third winner of each category and 5 consolation prizes each. More details will be available on our website as well. JIN Online CD starter packs are available at your local cyber-café, game-shop, news-stand early March, 2008 nationwide.
Monday, April 21, 2008
What do people think about the local scenario?
Local digital effects and animation in local TV and movies
By Hazimin Sulaiman
THIS year marks a new beginning for the digital special effects and animation industry in Malaysia, with a slew of projects finally supposed to come to fruition; including the much awaited first fully featured Geng: The Adventure Begins by Les Copaque in May, 2008. Or might it also be an uneventful year? For example the much awaited Toy Story III has been put on hold until 2010, much to the disappointment of many 3D animation fans.
We conducted a street poll exercise to ask the general public of how the digital special effects and animation seem to be doing this year, especially in local movies, TV programs and animation. The overall response of over 90 per cent, is that things are improving on the whole. Here are some comments from the people who had their responses recorded:
Xybase, systems engineer and big-time anime and animation fan, Maulviridha Abu Bakar, has noticed a marked improvement. He has working experience with companies which create 3D animation and digital special effects before and notices great improvement in the local animation scene. "There's much improvement compared to previous times. For example, we have come far since the early Usop Sontorian animation days; which by today's standars is very outdated. I've also noticed that montages and in between scenes for TV programs such as Puteri, now look much better," Maulviridha observes.
Child development expert, Mec Cheah, who is busy with nurturing and teaching pre-schoolers has hardly anytime to watch television nowdays but notes some improvements. "I hardly watch any TV nowdays and we don't depend on such medium for teaching. But I personally have noticed more digital special effects in local programs. Recently I saw some effects for a local ghost story on television, which is better compared to a few years ago," she says.
Perodua engineer, Dzulhilman Sulaiman, who is also an avid animation and movie buff says that the overall impression that he has seen in local programming and movies is that local special digital effects are improving. However, there are tendencies that he says the content creators should avoid. "If the CGI is used to further enhance the story to make it believable, then its fine, but excessive usage can actually make things look very fake- especially when something does something which it isn't supposed to," Dzulhilman says.
Public relations executive, Livan Bai also observes that there has been a marked improvement in local programs and movies in terms of using digital special effects. "There's been a lot of improvement in the use of digital special effects in local TV, movies and 3D animation. One example is the work by Les Copaque which has been aided by MIMOS' grid-computing technology. It's a growing market, but we're still at an infant stage. With more technologies coming in we can have a wider industry. Now it is still quite niche," says Livan.
UiTM law student, Noraisyah Bahrim observes that animation such as Les Copaque's Upin & Ipin shown last Ramadhan on Channel 9, appeals to a lot of children and definitely shows off the potential of local animation. "It definitely means that we will be seeing the same if not better quality of animation this year when the full featured 3D animation by Les Copaque comes out."
By Hazimin Sulaiman
THIS year marks a new beginning for the digital special effects and animation industry in Malaysia, with a slew of projects finally supposed to come to fruition; including the much awaited first fully featured Geng: The Adventure Begins by Les Copaque in May, 2008. Or might it also be an uneventful year? For example the much awaited Toy Story III has been put on hold until 2010, much to the disappointment of many 3D animation fans.
We conducted a street poll exercise to ask the general public of how the digital special effects and animation seem to be doing this year, especially in local movies, TV programs and animation. The overall response of over 90 per cent, is that things are improving on the whole. Here are some comments from the people who had their responses recorded:
Xybase, systems engineer and big-time anime and animation fan, Maulviridha Abu Bakar, has noticed a marked improvement. He has working experience with companies which create 3D animation and digital special effects before and notices great improvement in the local animation scene. "There's much improvement compared to previous times. For example, we have come far since the early Usop Sontorian animation days; which by today's standars is very outdated. I've also noticed that montages and in between scenes for TV programs such as Puteri, now look much better," Maulviridha observes.
Child development expert, Mec Cheah, who is busy with nurturing and teaching pre-schoolers has hardly anytime to watch television nowdays but notes some improvements. "I hardly watch any TV nowdays and we don't depend on such medium for teaching. But I personally have noticed more digital special effects in local programs. Recently I saw some effects for a local ghost story on television, which is better compared to a few years ago," she says.
Perodua engineer, Dzulhilman Sulaiman, who is also an avid animation and movie buff says that the overall impression that he has seen in local programming and movies is that local special digital effects are improving. However, there are tendencies that he says the content creators should avoid. "If the CGI is used to further enhance the story to make it believable, then its fine, but excessive usage can actually make things look very fake- especially when something does something which it isn't supposed to," Dzulhilman says.
Public relations executive, Livan Bai also observes that there has been a marked improvement in local programs and movies in terms of using digital special effects. "There's been a lot of improvement in the use of digital special effects in local TV, movies and 3D animation. One example is the work by Les Copaque which has been aided by MIMOS' grid-computing technology. It's a growing market, but we're still at an infant stage. With more technologies coming in we can have a wider industry. Now it is still quite niche," says Livan.
UiTM law student, Noraisyah Bahrim observes that animation such as Les Copaque's Upin & Ipin shown last Ramadhan on Channel 9, appeals to a lot of children and definitely shows off the potential of local animation. "It definitely means that we will be seeing the same if not better quality of animation this year when the full featured 3D animation by Les Copaque comes out."
Local Malaysian animation industry update
This story was submitted a while ago to my editor as a possible cover story, but was never used:
What's to look out for the animation industry in 2008?
By Hazimin Sulaiman
WHAT does 2008 hold for the animation industry? Well for starters, in May we will hopefully get to see much anticipated release of Malaysia's first full-length three-dimensional (3-D) animation movie Geng: The Adventure Begins sometime in May (international release: 2009). But what about the industry as a whole? We ask players in the industry.Executive director and producer of local animation outfit Saymohm Sdn Bhd, Fuad Samad believes that animation industry seems to be on a roll this year. Thanks to support from various agencies such as from states, MOSTE, KEKWA, MDeC and FINAS. "Everyone seems to be in the new media industry.
Even state governments are looking into animation and into providing human capital. They are looking into providing career opportunities for the youth," says Fuad. Something which Fuad hopes will change however, is the perspective of braodcasters towards local animation.
Broadcasters tend to have different views towards animation compared to drama or other local productions, hence the difference in the rates paid out as per program syndication. For example a syndicated local animation episode, with no sponsor, gets paid a flat rate of RM1,000. This applies to completed productions and not those still in the pipeline. To date however, the only local broadcaster which funds for entire local animation projects is still RTM.
Rocket Fish Studios based in Technology Park Malaysia, is hard at work creating content for the world. Staffed with local animators thanks to their innovative training scheme, Rocket Fish has trained a total of seven batches of more than 100 graduates. The free training entails graduates to be employable in other Flash-based animation studios. According to its general manager, Alice Dizon Manuel, more than 30 per cent of graduates have decided to stay on. The trained talent is important in the roadmap as Manuel reveals that " a lot of studios successfully develop ideas to sell out from Malaysia. For Rocket Fish, more outsourced projects have come up." Currently Rocket Fish is working on producing full pilot episodes of pre-school series Ketchup & Mustard and Backyard Buddies, to be shown at the MIPTV festival in April. Among the other stuff that Rocket Fish has churned out include the Warren Buffet's Millionarires' Club DVD and Skunk Fu for Cartoon Network Asia to be out this year.
Chairman and public relations chair of the ACM-Siggraph Kuala Lumpur Professional Chapter, Christopher Gomez says that development in the film industry, in general, is on the way up, but things are unacceptably slow. "The world around us is highly competitive. Unfortunately a small country like Malaysia, we absolutely cannot afford to go slow because this equals to dropping out of the game. The rules of the game are the same, but we're playing against players who are a lot faster, far more agile and have more stamina to withstand economic cycles," observes Gomez.This is unfortunate given the potential: "I've been watching the growth of, and changes in, the animation and computer graphics industry here in Asia, very closely the past decade. I can safely say, the kind of animation and CG works you see coming out of Asia today, are all quite amazing," Gomez notes.Gomez believes that We still do not have a clear IP framework.
"Even if the government claims they do, people in industry have not been well informed about this. Though the MDeC in general has arranged IP talks/seminars, I've yet to hear about similar talks by the other relevant ministries in film and TV-content production," Gomez says.Gomez feels disheartened that when he speaks to some senior executives in government about how slow things are in Malaysia, their quick answer seems to be that "we don't have the funds like out neighbors Singapore". "So it makes me wonder, if we don't have the funds, then why do we have agencies who preach about their interest in helping to build the industry," adds Gomez.
Industry building Gomez believes requires a lot of funds. And if you do not have the funds, maybe its not a good idea to blow your trumpet. He notes that it is embarrassing to think that we had a media initiative (through the MSC) easily 10 years ahead of our counterparts; and yet today we are lagging behind Singapore and even Thailand. As for Siggraph's 2008 initiative, Gomez says that for the first time in history, SIGGRAPH will be bringing it's conference to Asia. SIGGRAPH Asia will be held in Singapore, from Dec 10-13, 2008. "Some of the exciting things people should flock to see at SIGGRAPH Asia 2008, are the Computer Animation Festival, Emerging Technologies, the industry exhibition and the Jobs Fair," says Gomez.
Nicholas Shariff Collins, senior manager, Multimedia Development Corporation admits that a lot of talents a re coming out from local universities and colleges. "We want to help them move up. We are looking into pre seed programs with funds up to RM50,000 to help them start out," says Collins. The MDeC initiative he says will link to professionals to hear from experts so that they get to share in on the relevant background experiences and knowledge for the market. The future, Collins feels is going to be a good one: "look at the Asian region. There's exponential growth of the middle class and thus growing demand for content. All we have to do is to tap in the global market from the very start," Collins adds.One way to do this is to have more buy-in programs. A program started by MDeC last year to match collaborators from overseas with local industry players.
To encourage local growth, MDeC and MRCB have also opened up an incubation centre in Plaza Sentral KL.Besides these efforts, Collins feels that the industry needs to realiase that other delivery platforms are also available. Although there's growth in cable and satellitel broadcasting, they should also look into broadband and telecommunication opportunites. They should start to think out of the box as their products might work surprisingly well on other platforms. For example in Hong Kong he cites that there is a great demand for content. Up till now people were not sure what type of content to provide in Hong Kong; but it was discovered that the food channel is extremely popular.Although everything points out that demand is growing, revenue however might not grow exponentially as competition increases and budgets continue to be tight.
On the plus side, Collins belives that in a lot of saturated markets such as foreign European and American markets, companies are looking towards Asia- which is not just one market, but a lot of territories to cover including China, South East Asia and other emerging Asian countries. With all this in mind, 2008 could be the big year that the local animation industry has been holding out for.
What's to look out for the animation industry in 2008?
By Hazimin Sulaiman
WHAT does 2008 hold for the animation industry? Well for starters, in May we will hopefully get to see much anticipated release of Malaysia's first full-length three-dimensional (3-D) animation movie Geng: The Adventure Begins sometime in May (international release: 2009). But what about the industry as a whole? We ask players in the industry.Executive director and producer of local animation outfit Saymohm Sdn Bhd, Fuad Samad believes that animation industry seems to be on a roll this year. Thanks to support from various agencies such as from states, MOSTE, KEKWA, MDeC and FINAS. "Everyone seems to be in the new media industry.
Even state governments are looking into animation and into providing human capital. They are looking into providing career opportunities for the youth," says Fuad. Something which Fuad hopes will change however, is the perspective of braodcasters towards local animation.
Broadcasters tend to have different views towards animation compared to drama or other local productions, hence the difference in the rates paid out as per program syndication. For example a syndicated local animation episode, with no sponsor, gets paid a flat rate of RM1,000. This applies to completed productions and not those still in the pipeline. To date however, the only local broadcaster which funds for entire local animation projects is still RTM.
Rocket Fish Studios based in Technology Park Malaysia, is hard at work creating content for the world. Staffed with local animators thanks to their innovative training scheme, Rocket Fish has trained a total of seven batches of more than 100 graduates. The free training entails graduates to be employable in other Flash-based animation studios. According to its general manager, Alice Dizon Manuel, more than 30 per cent of graduates have decided to stay on. The trained talent is important in the roadmap as Manuel reveals that " a lot of studios successfully develop ideas to sell out from Malaysia. For Rocket Fish, more outsourced projects have come up." Currently Rocket Fish is working on producing full pilot episodes of pre-school series Ketchup & Mustard and Backyard Buddies, to be shown at the MIPTV festival in April. Among the other stuff that Rocket Fish has churned out include the Warren Buffet's Millionarires' Club DVD and Skunk Fu for Cartoon Network Asia to be out this year.
Chairman and public relations chair of the ACM-Siggraph Kuala Lumpur Professional Chapter, Christopher Gomez says that development in the film industry, in general, is on the way up, but things are unacceptably slow. "The world around us is highly competitive. Unfortunately a small country like Malaysia, we absolutely cannot afford to go slow because this equals to dropping out of the game. The rules of the game are the same, but we're playing against players who are a lot faster, far more agile and have more stamina to withstand economic cycles," observes Gomez.This is unfortunate given the potential: "I've been watching the growth of, and changes in, the animation and computer graphics industry here in Asia, very closely the past decade. I can safely say, the kind of animation and CG works you see coming out of Asia today, are all quite amazing," Gomez notes.Gomez believes that We still do not have a clear IP framework.
"Even if the government claims they do, people in industry have not been well informed about this. Though the MDeC in general has arranged IP talks/seminars, I've yet to hear about similar talks by the other relevant ministries in film and TV-content production," Gomez says.Gomez feels disheartened that when he speaks to some senior executives in government about how slow things are in Malaysia, their quick answer seems to be that "we don't have the funds like out neighbors Singapore". "So it makes me wonder, if we don't have the funds, then why do we have agencies who preach about their interest in helping to build the industry," adds Gomez.
Industry building Gomez believes requires a lot of funds. And if you do not have the funds, maybe its not a good idea to blow your trumpet. He notes that it is embarrassing to think that we had a media initiative (through the MSC) easily 10 years ahead of our counterparts; and yet today we are lagging behind Singapore and even Thailand. As for Siggraph's 2008 initiative, Gomez says that for the first time in history, SIGGRAPH will be bringing it's conference to Asia. SIGGRAPH Asia will be held in Singapore, from Dec 10-13, 2008. "Some of the exciting things people should flock to see at SIGGRAPH Asia 2008, are the Computer Animation Festival, Emerging Technologies, the industry exhibition and the Jobs Fair," says Gomez.
Nicholas Shariff Collins, senior manager, Multimedia Development Corporation admits that a lot of talents a re coming out from local universities and colleges. "We want to help them move up. We are looking into pre seed programs with funds up to RM50,000 to help them start out," says Collins. The MDeC initiative he says will link to professionals to hear from experts so that they get to share in on the relevant background experiences and knowledge for the market. The future, Collins feels is going to be a good one: "look at the Asian region. There's exponential growth of the middle class and thus growing demand for content. All we have to do is to tap in the global market from the very start," Collins adds.One way to do this is to have more buy-in programs. A program started by MDeC last year to match collaborators from overseas with local industry players.
To encourage local growth, MDeC and MRCB have also opened up an incubation centre in Plaza Sentral KL.Besides these efforts, Collins feels that the industry needs to realiase that other delivery platforms are also available. Although there's growth in cable and satellitel broadcasting, they should also look into broadband and telecommunication opportunites. They should start to think out of the box as their products might work surprisingly well on other platforms. For example in Hong Kong he cites that there is a great demand for content. Up till now people were not sure what type of content to provide in Hong Kong; but it was discovered that the food channel is extremely popular.Although everything points out that demand is growing, revenue however might not grow exponentially as competition increases and budgets continue to be tight.
On the plus side, Collins belives that in a lot of saturated markets such as foreign European and American markets, companies are looking towards Asia- which is not just one market, but a lot of territories to cover including China, South East Asia and other emerging Asian countries. With all this in mind, 2008 could be the big year that the local animation industry has been holding out for.
Sunday, April 13, 2008
Zanimated!
Hey all.
After some past attempt of blogging~ specifically photo blogging from a mobile phone years back, I've finally taken up the suggestion to finally to go on Blogger: "You know, your gmail account is tied to Blogger don't you? You should try it out, it's therapeutic ," said a colleague of mine in the news room (of a local Malaysian daily newspaper)...Or at least something to that effect.
So one of the objectives of Zanimated is to keep keep tabs on the Malaysian animation industry...Very least my unpublished articles can get to see some daylight...Z
After some past attempt of blogging~ specifically photo blogging from a mobile phone years back, I've finally taken up the suggestion to finally to go on Blogger: "You know, your gmail account is tied to Blogger don't you? You should try it out, it's therapeutic ," said a colleague of mine in the news room (of a local Malaysian daily newspaper)...Or at least something to that effect.
So one of the objectives of Zanimated is to keep keep tabs on the Malaysian animation industry...Very least my unpublished articles can get to see some daylight...Z
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)