Guillaume Hellouin: Celebs Rumors

Ben Croll While France’s overall animation sector employed 7,790 staffers last year, local grandees hope to see those figures swell to 15,000 by 2030, and have thus made doubling the workforce the third key pillar of the wider Great Image Factory initiative. With nearly all the major animation studios and VFX houses developing outreach programs, partnering with existing schools, or offering mentorships, one studio is going to set up a brand new institution. Well, almost brand new. In 2018, TeamTO launched ECAS (Ecole Cartoucherie Animation Solidaire), a Valence-based, no-tuition animation school meant to give underprivileged youths 3D training and to offer them a leg-up into the industry. Running four years, and boasting a 98% success rate, the program would open for a nine-month term and then go dark again, with subsequent sessions sometimes in doubt.

Anna Marie de la Fuente In a bid to further expand job opportunities in the animation industry, France’s first free animation school ÉCAS (Ecole Cartoucherie Animation Solidaire) has partnered with French animation producer Frog Box and post-production service provider Titrafilm to create a new course that will train professional actors in the art of dubbing animation projects.News was announced Thursday at the MIFA market at this week’s Annecy International Animation Film Festival where the issues of inclusion, diversity and labor shortages in the sector were discussed in some forums at the festival, particularly at the Women in Animation summit.Founded in 2018 by TeamTO in response to the under-representation and lack of diversity in the animation sector, ÉCAS has trained a new generation of underprivileged talent in 3D character animation and storyboarding (in partnership with Canada’s House of Cool) for the past four years. Said Guillaume Hellouin, president of ÉCAS and TeamTO: “Over the past few years, there has been a general awareness and desire among producers, major platforms and traditional broadcasters to integrate a greater representation of society.

John Hopewell Chief International CorrespondentCanada’s leader in animated pre-production is teaming up with one of France’s premier animation studios in a bid to address the chronic shortage of storyboard artists on the market.House of Cool (“Ferdinand,” “Trollhunters”) is lending its expertise to France’s Ecole Cartoucherie Animation Solider (ECAS), a free-of-charge non-profit CG animation school established by TeamTO (“Mighty Mike”, “Angelo Rules”) in 2018, to expand its scope to storyboarding.The brainchild of TeamTO founder and president Guillaume Hellouin, ECAS has trained some 95 students over the past three years. Nine out of ten have gone on to work in the animation industry.