Blue Sky Studios

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Blue Sky Studios, Inc.
Subsidiary
Industry Computer animation
Motion pictures
Founded February 1987; 37 years ago (1987-02)
Founders Chris Wedge
Carl Ludwig
Eugene Troubetzkoy
Alison Brown
David Brown
Michael Ferraro
Headquarters Greenwich, Connecticut, U.S.
Key people
 Carlos Saldanha
Chris Wedge
Brian Keane (COO)[1]
Steve Martino
Products Animated films
Number of employees
 500[2] (2017)
Parent 20th Century Fox
Website www.blueskystudios.com

Blue Sky Studios is an American computer animation film studio based in Greenwich, Connecticut that has been owned by 20th Century Fox since 1997. The studio was founded in 1987 by Chris Wedge, Michael Ferraro, Carl Ludwig, Alison Brown, David Brown, and Eugene Troubetzkoy after the company they worked in, MAGI, one of the visual effects studios behind Tron (1982), shut down. Using its in-house rendering software, the studio had worked on visual effects for commercials and films before completely dedicating itself to animated film production in 2002 starting with the release of Ice Age.

Ice Age and Rio are the studio's most successful franchises, while The Peanuts Movie is its most critically acclaimed film. As of 2013, Scrat, a character from the Ice Age films, is the studio's mascot.

History

1980–89: Formation and early computer animation

In the late 1970s, Chris Wedge, then an undergraduate at Purchase College studying film, was employed by Mathematical Applications Group, Inc. (MAGI). MAGI was an early computer technology company which produced SynthaVision, a software application that could replicate the laws of physics to measure nuclear radiation rays for U.S. government contracts.[3]:12–13 At MAGI, Wedge met Eugene Troubetzkoy, who held a Ph.D in theoretical physics and was one of the first computer animators. Using his background in character animation, Wedge helped MAGI produce animation for television commercials, which eventually led to an offer from Walt Disney Productions to produce animation for the film Tron (1982). After Tron, MAGI hired Carl Ludwig, an electrical engineer,[3]:13 and Mike Ferraro transferred to the film division from the Cad Cam division of MAGI. As MAGI's success began to decline, the company employed David Brown from CBS/Fox Video to be a marketing executive and Alison Brown to be a managing producer.[3]:12–13 After MAGI was sold to Vidmax (Canada), the six individuals—Wedge, Troubetzkoy, Ferraro, Ludwig, David Brown, and Alison Brown—founded Blue Sky Studios in February 1987 to continue the software design and produce computer animation.[3]:13[4]

At Blue Sky, Ferraro and Ludwig expanded on CGI Studio, the studio programming language they started at MAGI and began using it for animation production.[3]:12–13 At the time, scanline renderers were prevalent in the computer graphics industry, and they required computer animators and digital artists to add lighting effects in manually;[3]:13 Troubetzkoy and Ludwig adapted MAGI's ray tracing,[5] algorithms which simulate the physical properties of light in order to produce lighting effects automatically.[3]:13–14 To accomplish this, Ludwig examined how light passes through water, ice, and crystal, and programmed those properties into the software.[3]:13 Following the stock market crash of 1987, Blue Sky Studios did not find their first client until about two years later: a company "that wanted their logo animated so it would be seen flying over the ocean in front of a sunset."[3]:13–14 In order to receive the commission, Blue Sky spent two days rendering a single frame and submitted it to the prospective client. However, once the client accepted their offer, Blue Sky found that they could not produce the entire animation in time without help from a local graphics studio, which provided them with extra computer processors.[3]:14

1989–2002: Television commercials, visual effects, and Bunny

Throughout the late 1980s and 1990s, Blue Sky Studios concentrated on the production of television commercials and visual effects for film. The studio began by animating commercials that depicted the mechanisms of time-release capsules for pharmaceutical corporations. The studio also produced a Chock Full O' Nuts commercial with a talking coffee bean and developed the first computer-animated M&M's.[3]:14 Using CGI Studio, the studio produced over 200 other commercials for clients such as Chrysler, General Foods, Texaco, and the United States Marines.[6] Blue Sky Studios also produced the computer animation for the "Mathman" video game segments of PBS's Square One Television.[3]:14

In the mid-1990s, MTV hired Blue Sky Studios to animate their network IDs, which led to additional collaboration between the two companies on the film Joe's Apartment (1996), for which Blue Sky animated the insect characters. Other clients included Bell Atlantic, Rayovac, Gillette and Braun.[3]:14 The Braun commercial was awarded a CLIO Award for Advertising.[3]:14 Recalling the award, Carl Ludwig stated that the judges had initially mistaken the commercial as a live action submission as a result of the photorealism of the computer-animated razor.[5][7] In August 1997, 20th Century Fox's Los Angeles-based visual effects company, VIFX, acquired majority interest in Blue Sky Studios to form a new visual effects and animation company, temporarily renamed "Blue Sky/VIFX".[8] Following the studio's expansion, Blue Sky produced character animation for the films Alien Resurrection (1997), A Simple Wish (1997), Mousehunt (1997), Star Trek: Insurrection (1998) and Fight Club (1999).[3]:15

Meanwhile, starting in 1990, Chris Wedge had been working on a short film named Bunny, intended to demonstrate CGI Studio. The film revolves around a rabbit widow who is irritated by a moth. The moth subsequently leads the rabbit into "a heavenly glow, reuniting her with her husband."[3]:15 At the time, Wedge had been the thesis advisor for Carlos Saldanha while Saldanha was a graduate student at the School of Visual Arts; Wedge shared storyboard panels for Bunny with Saldanha during this time. After Saldanha's graduation, Blue Sky Studios hired him as an animator, and he later directed a few commercials. It was not until 1996 when Nina Rappaport, a producer at Blue Sky Studios, assigned Wedge to complete the Bunny project, which required CGI Studio to render fur, glass, and metal from multiple light sources, such as a swinging light bulb and an "ethereal cloudscape". In the initial stages of the Bunny project, Carl Ludwig modified CGI Studio to simulate radiosity, which tracks light rays as they reflect off of multiple surfaces. Blue Sky Studios released Bunny in 1998, and it received the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film. Bunny's success gave Blue Sky Studios the opportunity to produce feature-length films.[3]:15

2002–present: Feature films

File:Blue Sky Studios logo.svg
Blue Sky Studios' logo from 2005 to 2013

In March 1999, Fox decided to sell VIFX to another visual effects house, Rhythm & Hues Studios, while Blue Sky Studios would remain under Fox.[9] According to Chris Wedge, Fox considered selling Blue Sky as well by 2000 due to financial difficulties in the visual effects industry in general. Instead, Wedge, film producer Lori Forte, and animation executive Chris Meledandri presented Fox with a script for a comedy feature film titled Ice Age.[10] Studio management pressured staff to sell their remaining shares and options to Fox on the promise of continued employment on feature length films. The studio moved to White Plains NY and started production on Ice Age. As the film wrapped, Fox feared that it might bomb at the box office. They terminated half of the production staff and tried unsuccessfully to find a buyer for the film and the studio.[citation needed] Instead, Ice Age was released by 20th Century Fox on March 15, 2002, and was a critical and commercial success, receiving a nomination for an Academy Award for Best Animated Feature at the 75th Academy Awards in 2003.[11] The film established Blue Sky as the third studio, after Pixar and DreamWorks Animation, to launch a successful CGI franchise.[10]

In January 2009, the studio moved from White Plains, New York to Greenwich, Connecticut, taking advantage of the state's 30 percent tax credit and having more space to grow.[12][2] The studio stated in April 2017 that it intends to stay in Connecticut until 2025.[13]

In 2013, Chris Wedge took a leave of absence to direct Paramount Animation's live-action/computer-animated film Monster Trucks.[14] He has since returned to Blue Sky Studios and is working on multiple projects for the company.[15]

If it is approved, Blue Sky Studios would be affected by the proposed acquisition of 21st Century Fox by Disney, proposed in December 2017.[16]

Filmography

Feature films

Released films

# Title Release date Budget Gross RT MC
1 Ice Age March 15, 2002 $59 million $383 million 77% 60
2 Robots March 11, 2005 $75 million $260 million 64% 64
3 Ice Age: The Meltdown March 31, 2006 $80 million $660 million 57% 58
4 Dr. Seuss' Horton Hears a Who! March 14, 2008 $85 million $297 million 79% 71
5 Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs July 1, 2009 $90 million $886 million 46% 50
6 Rio April 15, 2011 $484 million 72% 63
7 Ice Age: Continental Drift July 13, 2012 $95 million $877 million 38% 49
8 Epic May 24, 2013 $93 million $268 million 64% 52
9 Rio 2 April 11, 2014 $103 million $500 million 46% 49
10 The Peanuts Movie November 6, 2015 $99 million $246 million 87% 67
11 Ice Age: Collision Course July 22, 2016 $105 million $408 million 16% 34
12 Ferdinand December 15, 2017 $111 million $296 million 71% 58

Upcoming films

# Title Release date Ref(s)
13 Spies in Disguise September 13, 2019 [17][18][19][20]
14 Nimona February 14, 2020 [21][22][23]
15 Foster March 5, 2021 [24][25]

Films in development

Title Ref(s)
Mutts [26][27][28][29]
Frogkisser! [30][31]
Escape from Hat [32]

Television specials

# Title Release date
1 Ice Age: A Mammoth Christmas November 24, 2011
2 Ice Age: The Great Egg-Scapade March 20, 2016

Short films

# Title Release date
1 Bunny 1998
2 Gone Nutty November 26, 2002
3 Aunt Fanny's Tour of Booty September 27, 2005
4 No Time for Nuts November 21, 2006
5 Surviving Sid December 9, 2008
6 Scrat's Continental Crack-Up[33] December 25, 2010
7 Scrat's Continental Crack-Up: Part 2[33] December 16, 2011
8 Umbrellacorn[34][35] July 26, 2013
9 Cosmic Scrat-tastrophe[36] November 6, 2015
10 Scrat: Spaced Out[37][38] October 11, 2016

Contributions

Accolades

Academy Awards

Year Film Category Winner/Nominee(s) Result
1998 Bunny Best Animated Short Film Chris Wedge Won
2002 Ice Age Best Animated Feature Nominated
2003 Gone Nutty Best Animated Short Film Carlos Saldanha
2006 No Time for Nuts Chris Renaud and Mike Thurmeier
2011 Rio Best Original Song "Real in Rio"
2017 Ferdinand Best Animated Feature Carlos Saldanha and Lori Forte

Annie Awards

Year Film Category Winner/Nominee(s) Result
2002 Ice Age Best Animated Feature Lori Forte Nominated
Best Character Animation Mike Thurmeier
Best Character Design in an Animated Feature Peter DeSève
Best Directing in an Animated Feature Chris Wedge and Carlos Saldanha
Best Music in an Animated Feature Production David Newman
Best Production Design in an Animated Feature Brian McEntee
Best Writing in an Animated Feature Michael Berg, Michael J. Wilson and Peter Ackerman
2005 Robots Best Character Design in an Animated Feature William Joyce
Best Production Design in an Animated Feature William Joyce and Steve Martino
2006 Ice Age: The Meltdown Best Animated Effects Alen Lai
Best Character Design in an Animated Feature Peter DeSève
Best Directing in an Animated Feature Production Carlos Saldanha
Best Music in an Animated Feature Production John Powell
Best Storyboarding in an Animated Feature William H. Frake III
2008 Horton Hears a Who! Best Animated Effects Alen Lai
Best Character Design in an Animated Feature Sang Jun Lee
Best Character Animation in an Animated Feature Jeff Gabor
Best Music in an Animated Feature Production John Powell
Best Writing in an Animated Feature Production Cinco Paul and Ken Daurio
2009 Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs Best Music in an Animated Feature Production John Powell
Best Voice Acting in a Feature Production John Leguizamo
2012 Rio Best Animated Feature Bruce Anderson and John C. Donkin
Best Character Animation in an Animated Feature Jeff Gabor Won
Patrik Puhala Nominated
Best Character Design in a Animated Feature Sergios Pablos
Best Directing in an Animated Feature Carlos Saldanha
Best Music in an Animated Feature Production Mikael Mutti, Siedah Garrett, Carlinhos Brown, Sérgio Mendes and John Powell
Best Production Design in an Animated Feature Thomas Cardone, Kyle MacNaughton and Peter Chan
Best Voice Acting in an Animated Feature Production Jemaine Clement
2012 Ice Age: Continental Drift Best Animated Effects Andrew Schneider
Music in an Animated Feature Production John Powell, Adam Schlesinger and Ester Dean
Best Production Design in an Animated Feature Nash Dunnigan, Arden Chan, Jon Townley and Kyle Macnaughton
2013 Epic Animated Effects in an Animated Production Alen Lai, David Quirus, Diego Garzon Sanchez, and Ilan Gabai
Character Animation in an Animated Feature Production Thom Roberts
Best Directing in an Animated Feature Chris Wedge
Best Music in an Animated Feature Danny Elfman
Production Design in an Animated Feature Production Michael Knapp, Greg Couch, and William Joyce
2014 Rio 2 Outstanding Achievement, Character Design in an Animated Feature Production Sang Jun Lee, Jason Sadler, and José Manuel Fernández Oli
Best Storyboarding in an Animated Feature John Hurst
Rodrigo Perez-Castro
Best Voice Acting in an Animated Feature Production Andy García
2015 The Peanuts Movie Best Animated Feature Craig Schulz, Bryan Schulz, Cornelius Uliano, Paul Feig and Michael J. Travers
Outstanding Achievement in Character Animation in a Feature Production BJ Crawford
Outstanding Achievement in Directing in an Animated Feature Production Steve Martino
Outstanding Achievement in Voice Acting in an Animated Feature Production Alex Garfin
Hadley Belle Miller
2017 Ferdinand Best Design in an Animated Feature Production Thomas Cardone, Arden Chan, Andrew Hickson, Mike Lee and Jason Sadler
Editorial in an Animated Feature Production Harry Hitner and Tim Nordquist

Golden Globe Awards

Year Film Category Winner/Nominee(s) Result
2015 The Peanuts Movie Best Animated Feature Film Steve Martino Nominated
2017 Ferdinand Carlos Saldana
Best Original Song (Home) Nick Jonas, Justin Tranter, and Nick Monson

Kids' Choice Awards

Year Film Category Winner/Nominee(s) Result
2002 Ice Age Favorite Movie Nominated
Favorite Voice from an Animated Movie Ray Romano Nominated
Denis Leary Nominated
2005 Robots Favorite Animated Movie Nominated
Favorite Voice from an Animated Movie Robin Williams Nominated
2006 Ice Age: The Meltdown Favorite Animated Movie Nominated
Favorite Voice from an Animated Movie Queen Latifah Won
2008 Horton Hears a Who! Favorite Voice from an Animated Movie Jim Carrey Nominated
2009 Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs Favorite Animated Movie Nominated
Favorite Voice from an Animated Movie Ray Romano Nominated
2011 Rio Favorite Animated Movie Nominated
2012 Ice Age: Continental Drift Favorite Animated Movie Nominated
2014 Rio 2 Favorite Animated Movie Nominated
2015 The Peanuts Movie Favorite Animated Movie Nominated
2017 Ferdinand Favorite Animated Movie Nominated

See also

References

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  15. ↑ http://www.comingsoon.net/movies/features/803167-cs-interview-director-chris-wedge-talks-monster-trucks
  16. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
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  33. ↑ 33.0 33.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
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  39. ↑ 39.0 39.1 39.2 39.3 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
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Further reading

  • Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.

External links

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