Toon Boom Animation Inc. is a Canadian

software company A software company is a company whose primary products are various forms of software, software technology, distribution, and software product development. They make up the software industry. Types There are a number of different types of softw ...

that specializes in

animation Animation is a method by which image, still figures are manipulated to appear as Motion picture, moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent cel, celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited ...

production and storyboarding software. Founded in 1994 and based in

Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-most populous city in Canada and List of towns in Quebec, most populous city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian ...

, Quebec, Toon Boom develops animation and

storyboarding A storyboard is a graphic organizer that consists of illustrations or images displayed in sequence for the purpose of pre-visualizing a motion picture, animation, motion graphic or interactive media sequence. The storyboarding process, in the ...

software for film, television, web animation, games, mobile devices, training applications, and education. It was acquired by

Corus Entertainment Corus Entertainment Inc. is a Canadian mass media company. Formed in 1999 as a spin-off from Shaw Communications, it has prominent holdings in the radio, publishing, and television industries. It is headquartered at Corus Quay in Toronto, Onta ...

in 2012. Toon Boom software is used in over 130 countries, and was awarded the

Primetime Emmy Award The Primetime Emmy Awards, or Primetime Emmys, are part of the extensive range of Emmy Awards for artistic and technical merit for the American television industry. Bestowed by the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (ATAS), the Primetime ...

in 2005 and 2012, among other awards.

History

In 1996, Toon Boom purchased the software development business of

USAnimation VirtualMagic Animation, Inc. (previously known as USAnimation, Inc.) was an American traditional animation studio and software development company based out of Los Angeles, California. The studio produced animation for television series and comme ...

studio. Its animation production services were to be merged into CST Entertainment according to a premature press release from CST. That merger never took place, and USAnimation's studio changed its name to VirtualMagic Animation in 1996 and operated independently. Toon Boom Animation continued the development of USAnimation software which became Toon Boom Opus. It has since become Toon Boom Harmony. Founding President and

Chief Executive Officer A chief executive officer (CEO), also known as a central executive officer (CEO), chief administrator officer (CAO) or just chief executive (CE), is one of a number of corporate executives charged with the management of an organization especially ...

Jacques Bilodeau left the company in May 2003, and the company's board of directors appointed

Chief Operating Officer A chief operating officer or chief operations officer, also called a COO, is one of the highest-ranking executive positions in an organization, composing part of the "C-suite". The COO is usually the second-in-command at the firm, especially if t ...

Joan Vogelesang to take his place. In 2006, Toon Boom acquired French company

Pegs'n Co Pegs'n Co was a French software company that developed a traditional animation software package called Pegs, and is now part of Canadian company Toon Boom Animation. It was based in Paris, France. Pegs was used for several animated feature films, ...

, developer of the 2D bitmap animation software called Pegs. Since the acquisition, the software has not been updated and can no longer be purchased. In 2009, Toon Boom acquired the British company

Cambridge Animation Systems Cambridge Animation Systems was a British software company that developed a traditional animation software package called ''Animo'', and is now part of Canadian company Toon Boom Technologies. It was based in Cambridge, England, hence the name. ...

, developer of Animo. Since the acquisition, the software has not been updated and can no longer be purchased. In 2012, Toon Boom was acquired by

. Chief Executive Officer and President Joan Vogelesang stepped down in September 2014 after over 16 years at Toon Boom, and Paul Gardner was appointed as interim CEO. On March 9, 2016, Toon Boom acquired all the related IP for the TACTIC Studio product, an asset management, production tracking and review tool from Toronto-based

Southpaw Technology Southpaw Technology is a commercial, open-source software company that provides products,, professional services and technical support for TACTIC (web framework), TACTIC. Founded in 2005 by Gary Mundell and Remko Noteboom, Southpaw Technology orig ...

and planned to re-launch the product as Toon Boom Producer. On June 13, 2017, Toon Boom re-branded and launched Producer.

Historical products

*Toon Boom Opus (1996-2008) - formerly

, it was used in the traditional film/TV animation industry. *Tic Tac Toon (1996-2001) - succeeded by Toon Boom Studio. *Toon Boom Studio (2001-2015) - aimed at home users and individuals. Succeeded by Toon Boom Harmony Essentials. *Toon Boom Concerto (2004-2005) *Toon Boom Solo (2005-2007) - aimed at small studios. Succeeded by Toon Boom Digital Pro. *Toon Boom Digital Pro (2007-2009) - succeeded by Toon Boom Animate Pro. *Toon Boom Pencil Check Pro (2008-2014) - a line testing software product. *Toon Boom Animate (2008-2015) - aimed at professional animators, boutique studios, students, and educators. Succeeded by Toon Boom Harmony Advanced. *Toon Boom Manager (2009-2014) - a production tracking system for the entertainment industry. *Toon Boom Animate Pro (2009-2015) - aimed at animation studios and freelancers. *Flip Boom product line (discontinued in 2014) - entry-level animation software. *Garfield's Comic Boom (discontinued in 2014) - a comic strip or album creation software product developed with cartoonist Jim Davis. The application included built-in video tutorials by the cartoonist.

Products

Harmony

Harmony contains the tools required to handle cutout (puppet), paperless frame-by-frame and

traditional animation Traditional animation (or classical animation, cel animation, or hand-drawn animation) is an animation technique in which each frame is drawn by hand. The technique was the dominant form of animation in cinema until computer animation. Proce ...

workflows from scanning to compositing and 2D/3D integration. Its toolset includes pencil lines with textures, deformation tools, morphing, inverse kinematics, particles, built-in compositor, 3D camera and 2D-3D integration. Users can also draw animation directly into the software, using a

graphics tablet A graphics tablet (also known as a digitizer, digital graphic tablet, pen tablet, drawing tablet, external drawing pad or digital art board) is a computer input device that enables a user to hand-draw images, animations and graphics, with a spec ...

. Harmony has been in continuous development since 2005 and has been used on productions like ''

Curious George Curious George is a fictional monkey who is the title character of a series of popular children's picture books written by Margret and H. A. Rey. Various media, including films and TV shows, have been based upon the original book series. Geor ...

'', ''

The Simpsons Movie ''The Simpsons Movie'' is a 2007 American Animation, animated comedy film based on the long-running animated sitcom ''The Simpsons''. The film was directed by the show's supervising director David Silverman (animator), David Silverman and star ...

'',

Disney's The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...

The Princess and the Frog ''The Princess and the Frog'' is a 2009 American Animation, animated musical film, musical fantasy film, fantasy romantic comedy film produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios and released by Walt Disney Pictures. The List of Walt Disney Anima ...

'' and ''

Winnie the Pooh Winnie-the-Pooh, also called Pooh Bear and Pooh, is a fictional Anthropomorphism, anthropomorphic teddy bear created by English author A. A. Milne and English illustrator E. H. Shepard. The first collection of stories about the character w ...

'', '' The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water'', '' My Little Pony: The Movie'', '' Space Jam: A New Legacy'', and ''

The Bob's Burgers Movie ''The Bob's Burgers Movie'' is a 2022 American animated musical comedy film based on the animated television series ''Bob's Burgers''. It is directed by the series creator Loren Bouchard and series director Bernard Derriman (in their feature ...

'' among others.

Harmony Server

This software provides additional capabilities for teams of animators using Harmony who want to share files and manage assets from a central database that is located on a server. Its centralized database system allows the sharing of assets between scenes and enables the workload to be shared across a studio or between studios. It also includes production controls for managing rendering jobs and coordinating batch scanning of paper drawings. Harmony Server is available as an add-on for users of Harmony Advanced and Harmony Premium.

Storyboard Pro

This software is used in pre-production to create storyboards for a wide variety of project types including 2D and 3D animation, stop motion, and live action productions. Storyboard Pro contains all the tools required to create storyboards and animatics. Its toolset includes vector and bitmap drawing tools, pencils and textured brushes, a built-in camera, audio tools, a timeline for timing control, and a 3D toolset to integrate imported 3D models.

Producer

Producer is a web-based production tracking and digital asset management tool.

References

{{Authority control Software companies of Canada Animation software 2D animation software Companies based in Montreal Entertainment companies established in 1994 Software companies established in 1994 Proprietary commercial software for Linux Corus Entertainment subsidiaries 1994 establishments in Canada Apple Design Awards recipients