... Hollywood is banking on DreamWorks Animation's "How to Train Your Dragon 2," the sequel to the 2010 original that brought in $218 million domestically. Paramount Pictures' "Transformers: Age of Extinction" and 20th Century Fox's "Dawn of the Planet of the Apes" are also on tap for the summer. ...
All the high-budget movies listed above rely heavily on animation. Obviously not all of that animation is done in California, or even the U.S. of A., but let's acknowledge the tune being played here. Blockbusters, whether animated or live-action, need crews of animators to get to market. The studios in which they work might be in New Zealand or Australia or France or Canada or India, but animation workers are indispensable to the process, wherever they are.
This week, the California Assembly will be voting on Assembly Bill 8139, which puts the Golden State in serious competition with other New York, Georgia and Louisian, also Britain and Canada, for entertainment tax subsidies. For the first time, California has language in the bill for visual effects and the animation that propels VFX.
This hasn't happened before.
Up until now, California's entertainment tax subsidies have focused on cable t.v. shows and lower budget features, but the boys and girls in Sacramento have come to recognize that visual effects jobs and high-end movies/television have been scampering out of the state. This legislation (and who knows if it reaches the governor's desk and the governor freaking signs it?) is designed to stanch the bleeding.
My starry-eyed prediction: if this bill passes and gets signed, you will see a goodly amount of visual effects return to California.
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