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Jamaican animation tops Caribbean awards

Published:Saturday | December 11, 2010 | 12:00 AM
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Alison Latchman receives her Animae Caribe Award from Rudolph Hanamji, marketing manager at the Trinidad and Tobago Film Company.
From left: Bill Plympton (presenter and judge), Kyle Baker (presenter and judge), Jason Evans (Bahamas), Samuel Stewart (Jamaica), Camille Selvon Abrahams (founder and director of Animae Caribe), Alison Latchman (awardee), Jesus Barrios (Venezuela), Anieph Latchman (awardee), Cilia Sawadogo (presenter), Ansar Sattar (Trinidad), Riane de Haas Bledoeg (Caricom), Joan Vogelesang (CEO & president of Toon Boom Animation Inc), Professor Michael Smith (head of the multimedia and animation programme, UTT), Dr Mirto Lacle (presenter), and Roxanne Colthrust (Colthrust PR). - Contributed photos
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Cabbie Chronicles, a Jamaican animated feature, recently won the DEW Best Caribbean Animation Award at the Animae Caribe Animation and New Media Festival in Port-of-Spain, Trinidad.

The short feature is a labour of love for the Jamaican team of Alison Tabois Latchman (writer), Marlo Scott (illustrator) and Anieph Latchman (animator).

Cabbie Chronicles takes a light-hearted look at a taxi driver and the clients he meets every day.

"We've been working on it for about a year and a half, and so when we heard about the awards in Trinidad we scrambled to get our entry in," said Tabois.

The team was more than pleasantly surprised when they found out they were shortlisted and invited to the ninth instalment of the festival.

The four-day festival holds screenings of the various entries and hosts workshops with noted animators and media professionals, including Oscar-nominated animator Bill Plympton and Kyle Baker of Phineas and Ferb fame. The two were also part of the judging panel.

Infectious humour

The infectious humour of Cabbie Chronicles garnered the award named after the late Trinidadian master cartoonist, Dunstan E. Williams. The director and founder of the festival, Camille Selvon Abrahams, said "I am most excited at the choice of Cabbie Chronicles for the D.E.W. Best Caribbean Animation. It is a testament that this is truly a platform to promote regional animation, and for our 10th anniversary we are hoping to bring Animae Caribe to Jamaica and to other islands to make it even more of a Caribbean experience."

Toon Boom Animation Inc, the leading animation software developers - used to animate The Simpsons, Family Guy, Phineas and Ferb and Disney's The Princess and the Frog - were heavily involved in the festival and have been supporters of the festival for many years.

They provided software as part of the prize package for awardees.

Tabois and her team have made Jamaica and the region proud, and since uploading the clip to YouTube, they've been getting tremendous feedback.

"It's all good," said Marlo Scott, who not only illustrates, but provides the voice for one of the characters.

"In time, we definitely want to make it into a full series. It's reassuring to note that we, as Jamaicans, are on top of our game in the industry," said Latchman.

Both Scott and Latchman are past students of the Edna Manley College School of the Visual Arts, while Tabois received her training in the performing arts in London, England.

In answer to the Facebook and YouTube fans, the group promises "We're working on the next episode, so expect more from Cabbie".