Google India Country Head Sanjay Gupta to deliver keynote at Animation Masters Summit 2022

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Google India Country Head and Vice President Sanjay Gupta will deliver the keynote address at the inaugural session of Animation Masters Summit 2022 to begin on Monday, May 23. Organized by global kids and family entertainment major Toonz Media Group, the five-day virtual Summit will feature sessions by a galaxy of stalwarts from diverse fields of media and entertainment across the world.

Animation Masters Summit is a not-for-profit public event organized by Toonz annually that seeks to bring together the greatest minds in the field of media and entertainment and provide a platform for youngsters and upcoming artists to interact and learn from them. This year’s master line-up includes Belgian animation director-producer Paul Demeyer who has worked on shows like Mission Force One, The Rocketeer and the Rugrats series; Emmy Award-winning composer Wendell Hanes best known for supervising the music for the NETFLIX sitcom Family Reunion and Television Academy Honors Award winning HBO series Black and Missing; Chief Creative Officer at Ogilvy India Sukesh Nayak; Arjun Reddy, co-founder and CTO of India’s biggest NFT ecosystem GuardianLink; and Ravishankar Venkateswaran, maker of the first ever Sanskrit animation feature Punyakoti. Award-winning painter, cartoonist, author, playwright and environmental activist Aabid Surti, 87, will be honoured with the Legend of Indian Animation Award at the inaugural session of the Summit on May 23. Meanwhile, AVGC industry leader and Country Head, Technicolor Creative Studios, Biren Ghose will be bestowed with the Special Contribution to the Indian Animation Industry Award. Toonz Media Group CEO P Jayakumar and FICCI chairman for AVGC Forum Ashish Kulkarni will also speak at the inaugural session. The theme for this edition of Animation Masters Summit is Creativity for Good. The Summit will also have two panel discussions. The first one, centered around the Summit theme, will be moderated by Biren Ghose and will include as panelists renowned animation and ad film-maker Kireet Khurana and Firdaus Kharas, Chairman of Chocolate Moose Media. The second panel will focus on creating joy for kids through the medium of animation. This will be moderated by Bruno Zarka, President of Distribution and Feature Films Division at Toonz.

The speakers at this panel are Content Creator, Development Consultant & Producer Rich Magallanes and Pinnacle Peak Pictures Vice President Ron Gell. The five-day event will be held over the Zoom platform and will be accessible to delegates from around the world, who can join the session by registering for free on the Summit website www.animationsummit.in

Animation Masters Summit

Established in 1999, Animation Master Summit (previously known as “Week with the Masters”), is a not-for-profit event organized by Toonz Media Group that seeks to bring together the most distinguished figures in the field of entertainment. It is the first significant animation industry event to be held in Asia. Each year, Toonz brings in experts and leading professionals working in animation from around the world to showcase their mastery of crafts. AMS also provides a platform for young artists seeking knowledge and inspiration to interact with the masters. Among the masters who have graced the previous editions of AMS are Academy Award and BAFTA nominee Rob Coleman, Academy Award nominee Bill Plympton, Academy Award Nominee and BAFTA winner Shekhar Kapur, Academy Award winner Resul Pookutty, Academy Award Winner Fabienne Rawley, Jean-Marie Olivier, Devdutt Pattanaik, Anjum Rajabali, Sabu Cyril, Ravi K. Chandran, Shantanu Moitra, etc.

Toonz Media Group

Toonz is a 360-degree media powerhouse with over two decades of unparalleled experience and one of Asia’s most active animation production studios (over 10,000 minutes of 2D and CGI kids and family content per year). Having worked with the world’s leading entertainment studios, channels, and networks including Marvel, Nickelodeon, Turner, Disney, Netflix, Dreamworks, Lionsgate, 20th Century Fox, Paramount, Sony, Universal, BBC, Amazon, Google, Hulu, HBO, CMG and Exodus Film Group, Toonz has to its credit several animation and live-action series, as well as feature films. Toonz has produced some of the most highly-rated international shows such as Wolverine and The X-men with Marvel, Speedracer Next Generation with Lionsgate, Mostly Ghostly with Universal, Playmobil with Sony, Dragonlance with Paramount Pictures, Freefonix with BBC, Gummybear and Friends, and Fruit Ninja with Google and many more. Currently under production at Toonz is Paddypaws in partnership with celebrated creator Keith Chapman, JG and the BC Kids with renowned American actress Janet Hubert, Sunnyside Billy conceptualized by the legendary Olivier Jean-Marie and Pierre the Pigeon Hawk featuring a star voice-cast of Whoopi Goldberg, Will.i.am, Jennifer Hudson and Snoop Dogg. Toonz has also ventured into the NFT space by launching a first-of-its-kind NFT design lab – Toonz NFTLabs – in association with blockchain R&D company Guradian Link. www.toonz.co.