Weta Workshop branches out to children's television

1.00pm

Wellington's Weta Workshop is branching out. The acclaimed Miramar special effects company is developing technology to be used on several children's television programmes. It is hoped the first will be completed by 2005.

Weta boss Richard Taylor said the company would look to diversify now that The Lord of the Rings was complete.

"We are pitching six shows into North America and England. Our first show is just getting off the ground now."

Weta plans to use technology that it pioneered for The Lord of the Rings to make animated characters more realistic and less expensive to produce.

Weta business adviser Andrew Smith said the New Zealand television scene was ripe for expansion.

"The entry barriers to television are a lot lower than with large budget feature films, which are inherently risky."

He said Weta had chosen the venture because, "Richard Taylor is passionate about children's television, the costs per episode are low and it could be very commercially successful."

Weta masterminded the technology behind Gollum, the deformed hobbit-like creature that plays a crucial role in the last two films of the Rings trilogy. Gollum was the first completely digital character to play a major part in a film.

Now the same technology will be transferred to television, where Weta hopes to develop an automated, real-time system of capturing movement. Characters have traditionally been modelled on a computer before being animated manually.

Weta received a $100,000 grant to develop the idea from government research and development funding agency Technology New Zealand.

Mr Smith said Weta saw its future in the development of its own intellectual property, distinct from Peter Jackson's films. Mr Taylor said the company was always looking for new projects.

"We realised many years ago that diversification would keep us in business because the film industry the world over is fragile."

Weta has been involved in several recent film projects including Russell Crowe's latest film, Master and Commander; The Last Samurai, starring Tom Cruise, filmed in New Zealand this year; and Neon Genesis Evangelion, based on a Japanese cartoon series.

- NZPA


* Return Of The King opens in New Zealand on Dec. 18.

Herald Feature: Lord of the Rings