© Ulf Büschleb

© Ulf Büschleb

20th Anniversary and New Event Location in 2016

Participants in next year’s animago AWARD & CONFERENCE can already look forward to a very special edition of the awards show and international conference for 3D animation & still, visual effects and visualisation. After seven successful years in Babelsberg, the animago AWARD & CONFERENCE is now moving to Munich, where it will take place at the Gasteig Cultural Centre there on 27 and 28 October 2016. Next year will also mark the 20th anniversary of the animago AWARD. The Bavarian State Ministry for Economic Affairs and Media, Energy and Technology and the Munich City Department for Culture will be supporting the event with a total of €200,000.

Bavaria’s Minister for Media, Ilse Aigner: “The animago AWARD & CONFERENCE is a major international heavyweight in the VFX industry, and we are delighted to be hosting the event starting in 2016. The move is further proof that Bavaria continues to be an attractive location in the field of digital media. We’re looking forward to cooperating with the animago AWARD & CONFERENCE over the long term to generate even more international visibility for our city.

Dr. Hans-Georg Küppers, Head of Munich’s Department of Culture: “Munich will be setting yet another cultural and creative economic milestone by hosting the animago AWARD & CONFERENCE in 2016. Our city is already an outstanding location for the cultural and creative industries, and in particular for media art and its technical implementation, so we’re delighted to have been able to attract the animago – a leading industry event that explores and honours artistic innovation in the field of animation and visual effects – to our shores. The animago AWARD will also serve to strengthen the visibility of our local digital artists. I’m looking forward to experiencing this exciting industry gathering at the interface of media art, creative industries and technical realisation”.

Karin Lang, Managing Director of the Munich-based special-interest publisher DETAIL Business Information GmbH: “We are especially grateful for the financial support provided by the Bavarian State Ministry for Economic Affairs and Media, Energy and Technology as well as from the City of Munich’s Department of Culture. These funds will enable us to bring the animago AWARD & CONFERENCE to Munich, the city that is also home to our publisher. At this point, however, I would like to send our sincere thanks to the Brandenburg Ministry of Economics and Energy and to the Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg for their excellent cooperation over the past seven years. The fact that the animago will take place at the same time as the Munich Media Days will no doubt be welcomed by all media enthusiasts and we’re looking forward to welcoming even more participants at Munich’s Gasteig Centre, which is a highly attractive event location”.

From 2009 to 2015, the animago AWARD & CONFERENCE took place at the Babelsberg Media City in Potsdam. During that time, the event was funded by the Medienboard Berlin-Brandenburg and the State of Brandenburg, who helped it grow into a prominent international conference that consistently attracted roughly 1,000 participants as well as leading experts and keynote speakers drawn from the animation and VFX industry every year. Among those attending regularly were prominent global studios such as Pixar Animation Studios (USA), Industrial Light & Magic – ILM (USA), Weta Digital (New Zealand), Framestore (U.K.), The Mill (U.K.), Illumination Mac Guff (France), Mikros Image (France), Trixter (Germany), Pixomondo (Germany), rise|fx (Germany) and many more. In the past several years, the animago AWARD received more than 1,000 submissions annually from digital artists from all over the world. The award show took place initially at the fx.Center and after that in the Metropolis Hall at Filmpark Babelsberg and was attended by roughly 600 invited guests.

About the animago AWARD & CONFERENCE:

The animago AWARD & CONFERENCE is an awards show, expert conference and leading trade exhibition all in one. The event focuses on three key areas: 3D Animation & Still, Visual Effects and Visualisation. For the past 20 years, the animago AWARD has acknowledged and honoured the year’s best productions with a special emphasis on technical skill and creativity. In the time period since the award was launched, an independent jury of experts drawn from the fields of film, development and post-production have evaluated more than 20,000 works sent in by digital artists originating in over 80 different nations.

The animago CONFERENCE offers a programme of keynote addresses, lectures and workshops that serve to connect the creative community with an audience of international experts and film and media enthusiasts. In 2016, the animago AWARD will be celebrating its 20th anniversary with all events taking place on 27/28 October 2016 – this year, for the first time, at the Gasteig Centre in Munich. All events will be supported by the Bavarian State Ministry for Economics and Media, Energy and Technology and by the Cultural Department of the City of Munich.

animago is organised by the special-interest German-language magazine known as DIGITAL PRODUCTION, www.digitalproduction.com. DIGITAL PRODUCTION is published by DETAIL Business Information GmbH, www.atec-bi.de.