This could be more than humble beginnings for the Indian animation industry. India’s first ever full length 3D animated character movie titled Friends Forever will be making a global debut at the Cannes Film Festival 2006. The film, with a 3D animated protagonist called Zampano, combines live action to help real characters tackle life.

Incidentally, what began as outsourcing work to India has now taken fruit to create a full fledged animation industry with more and more Indians training in the art. To the extent that India is now ready to take on the rest of the world with a talent developed through experience through outsourced work.

Friends Forever is produced by Celluloid Dreams Pvt. Ltd which recently bagged a huge contract with RedOctane, Inc., from San Jose, CA for its preproduction work that would include storyboard development, script, and character design. Whether the desi animated hero backed by international level expertise leave an impact at Cannes is yet to be seen. Only after the screening will one be able to say if an independent animation industry is ready to take wings in India.