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Laika is taking control of licensing and merchandising for its bevy of characters from its films a Kubo And The Two Strings, The Boxtrolls, ParaNorman and Coraline by hiring Striker Entertainment LLC to serve as its worldwide licensing agent. Laika has been around since 2005 but this is the first time that it has…

EXCLUSIVE: Bumblebee, the first spinoff of the Transformers franchise based on a popular character in the series, just landed as director Travis Knight, the helmer of the Oscar-nominated stop-motion animated success Kubo And The Two Strings. That film was Knight’s directing debut. Bumblebee would mark his first…

In scooping a visual effects Oscar nomination, Travis Knight's Kubo and the Two Strings became the first animated film to do so since 1993's The Nightmare Before Christmas—a recognition due, in part, to the work of visual effects supervisor Steve Emerson, who also this month received the VES Award for Outstanding…

EXCLUSIVE: Focus Features and Laika’s  great Oscar hope, Kubo And The Two Strings  is coming off a high after a surprise win at BAFTA for Best Animated Feature. That is an award that has mirrored the eventual Oscar winner in the category in each of the past ten years with the exception of 2014  when BAFTA winner  The L…

Has the Animated Feature race ever been more competitive? With the nomination ballots tallied, Walt Disney Animation Studios, LAIKA, GKIDS and Sony Pictures Classics will duke it out in phase two, each of them offering standout work ranging stylistically from the 3D formats that have ruled the day in recent years to…

Zootopia was the big winner tonight at this year's Annie Awards with six wins including a Best Animated Feature victory that seems to position the Disney pic for Oscar glory later this month. Coming into the 44th Annies with a leading 11 nominations, the film also won for Directing (Bryon Howard and Rich Moore) and a…

A column chronicling conversations and events on the awards circuit.  Although not many automatically think “Oscar” when you mention Fifty Shades of Grey, it perhaps should be remembered that the 2016 film of the E L James uber-bestselling novel nabbed an Academy Award nomination for its song “Earned It," performed on…

This sounds more like a sequel than a spinoff: Last year, Star Wars: The Force Awakens drew a leading seven nominations from the Visual Effects Society. Today, the first stand-alone film from that galaxy far, far away scored seven VES Awards noms, topping the field. Doctor Strange and The Jungle Book tied for second…

EXCLUSIVE: Laika founder and Kubo and the Two Strings director Travis Knight has signed with CAA. The film marked Knight's feature directorial debut, and this is his first agency inking as a stand-alone filmmaker. Knight created and is CEO and president of Laika, the Oregon-based animation house that has produced the…

Certainly, 2016 has turned out to be a banner year for feature film animation, and one of the most critically acclaimed has been Laika’s latest, Kubo And The Two Strings, which this morning was nominated for 10 Annie Awards. It marks the directorial feature film debut for Laika founder and studio head Travis Knight…

Walt Disney Animation’s Zootopia scored the most Annie Awards nominations with 11 as noms for the animation industry’s top honors were unveiled today. Focus Features/Lakia’s Kubo And The Two Strings was second with 10 noms. Both are in the marquee Best Animated Feature race with Disney/Pixar’s Finding Dory, DreamWorks…

A multi-talented artist with two decades banked in the craft of animation, Kubo and the Two Strings director Travis Knight is a man on a mission. Also serving as CEO and President of the Oregon-based Laika, Knight took on a project of epic scope for his directorial debut, looking, as always, to expand the kinds of…