Sunday - April 1, 2001
- DreamWorked to Produce Hieroglyphic Animated Feature!
- Dizney Unveils New Mascot
- Warner Sisters Denies Marketing Animated Film
- Monsters, LTD Receives Changes and a PG Rating!
- News Link of the Day - Dizney Acquires Aardwoman!
- Boogy Woogy Link of the Day - Ghost Busters: A dFX Production!

DreamWorked to Produce Hieroglyphic Animated Feature!
(by digitalmediafx.com) DreamWorked SKG announced today (April 1, 2001) that it is has assembled its team of hieroglyphic animators from The Prince Altered Egypt in order to produce a new cutting edge feature animated film called Jeffrey, Jeff and the Hieroglyphics Bunch. The full length animated feature will run nearly two hours and will feature DreamWorked executive Jeffrey Kaughtabird, in animated form.

Kaughtabird stars in the movie as Jeff, a boy who yearns to be a saxophone player like former President Clinton. Because Jeff spends too much time getting even with people he doesn't like, and not practicing, his dream looks like it will escape him until a family trip to Egypt uncovers a secret hidden from mankind for over 3,000 years -- live hieroglyphic characters!

After getting lost deep in a pyramid, Jeff finds that the batteries in his flashlight are dead, leaving him in the dark. He pulls out his Palm Pilot (official sponsor of the film) and turns it on for light. He holds the Palm Pilot, complete with 16mb RAM, close to the wall to try and see the images when a bolt suddenly zaps forth, from his state of the art Palm Pilot XIV, hitting the pyramid wall and bringing an ancient hieroglyphic band to life. The hieroglyphic characters, thinking Jeff is a god, pledge their loyalty to him and grant him one wish. Jeff wishes that they all be part of a new boy band called "Jeffrey, Jeff and the Hieroglyphics Bunch."

With that wish, Jeff is transported into the hieroglyphic world where the characters come to life and "Jeffrey, Jeff and the Hieroglyphics Bunch" become the most sought after entertainers in the hieroglyphic kingdom.

Jeff lives a great life in the hieroglyphic world until an evil villain, wearing mouse ears, seeks to destroy the pyramids of Egypt in order to build a theme park called "Dizney's Egyptian Adventure". The plan may succeed unless Jeff's drive for revenge can save the day and save all of his hieroglyphic friends.

"This is a magical entertaining PG-13 film for the whole family," says Kaughtabird. "It has a very valuable lesson to always stand up against the powers of evil. If a bully hits you, then you kick him. If a bully steals your sandwich then you steal his bike."

Digital Media FX has been able to obtain some top secret drawings from this new film which are displayed throughout this article.

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Ant Crossing:

Dizney Unveils New Mascot!
(by digitalmediafx.com) Dizney today unveiled a new animated character that will replace Mickey Moose as its official mascot. The unveiling of the character is said to coincide with the firing of 50,000 more employees.

And the mascot is... Eisney!

"Eisney! is actually suppose to be a human cartoon character," says lead animator Got Kleaned. "However shortly after we started working on its face, 95% of our department got fired so we had to release it prematurely. But luckily the big cheese likes it, so its a go."

Dizney executives point out that Eisney! is suppose to have an exclamation point at the end.

"It gives it emphasis, like Yahoo!" said Michael Eyesnow, the CEO of Dizney. "Mickey Moose was popular, but cost us too much money to draw. Eisney! is much cheaper to draw and is expected to increase our yearly revenues by at least $97. In addition, Eisney! rolls, so we can do a lot of fun things with him like make him knock down bowling pens and stuff. No one cares about the image quality these days. Its all about story, story, profits. Our model is South Park."

Eyesnow states that the debut of Eisney! will take place in a new movie called Mickey Meeses New Groove.

"Don't you love that name?" asks Eyesnow. "Mickey Meeses New Groove. It just sounds so hip and up with the times, ya know? So anyhow, in Mickey Meeses New Groove, Mickey Moose trips and hits the ground, causing his nose to fall off. That's how Eisney! is born!"

Eyesnow says that he may help out at the animation division once in awhile since he is short on staff at the moment. He says he also helps motivate the animators.

"Roll, Eisney!, Roll!" he laughs.

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Warner Sisters Denies Marketing Animated Film
(by digitalmediafx.com) Warner Sis. is strongly denying rumors that it is marketing its newest animated feature, Osmisis Jane.

"Some people have accused us of actually marketing this film and we want to assure the public that this is not true," says Brad Stone who runs Warner Sis. marketing. "Furthermore we have decided that we are going to first test market Osmisis Jane in one city - Adak, Alaska - before determining if it should open wide. We feel that Adak is a great representation of the entire United States."

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Monsters, LTD Receives Changes and a PG Rating!

Monsters, LTD has been given a PG rating by the Motion Picture Assocation of Animation (MPAA) for "fantasy violence." This is a big change for Pixart, which in the past had only released high grossing G rated animated films like Toy Stores. More complex is that two months ago the MPAA had rated Monsters, LTD "G", but Pixart altered the storyline after a directive by Dizney, resulting in the PG rating.

"Monsters, LTD was originally about friendly monsters that visit kids rooms at night," says John Lassotow, the film's director. "It is now about a group of everyday characters that decide they've had enough from the town bully and ultimate monster villain named Shrek. In this new version, Shrek goes around terrorizing the world thinking he is too good for anyone else. So the people finally band together and form a company called Monsters, LTD with the sole purpose of bringing down Shrek. We've even got Shaq to voice Shrek!"

We recently caught up with Eyesnow and asked him if this directive had anything to do about his rivalry with Kaughtabird.

"Sorry, can't talk now," said Eyesnow. "I gotta run draw Eisney and then go operate the Matterhorn. Dang, I left off the exclamation point on Eisney! in my last sentence!"

Lassotow was more than happy to speak with us about Pixart's newest production saying, "Our quality remains high because we don't lay off our animators. We have time to make great drawings and stories that people love. We are concerned about the new direction and the PG rating, but my new pal Brad Birdy assured me that the PG rating will still bring out an audience as long as we market the film. And Birdy is a Giant in the animation industry. In fact, I'm taking him to Dizney's California Adventure next week to see my Bug's Love attraction. Can't wait to see him get poked in the back and to have him smell the stink bug fumes. That's what makes the attraction so great."

Off the record, Eyesnow told us that he hopes Kaughtabird has nightmares after seeing Monsters, LTD. We don't know what he meant by "off the record" however.

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News Link of the Day - Dizney Acquires Aardwoman!

According to The Washington Pest:

"Dizney has acquired Aardwoman Studios, the makers of last year's award winning Chicken Walk production, in a deal valued at over 985 billion chicken pies..."

Click here for the full story.
If story does not load then it must not exist.

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Boogy Woogy Link of the Day - Ghost Busters: A "Just for Fun" dFX Production!

Check out the new dFX Production - Ghost Busters. Click here.

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End of Page
Note: None of the articles in this April Fool's edition are true. As part of a tradition we use April 1 as a day of fun for animators, FX artists, and animation enthusiasts. For real news, refer to today's dFX Newsletter that you received by email when you subscribed to it. You did subscribe, right?...

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