Viewers Get to Vote on New Cartoons in YTV Animation Festival

Viewers Get to Vote on New Cartoons in YTV Animation Festival
A hard-hitting accountant and a cat on its ninth life are among a series of innovative cartoons YTV viewers will be considering in the coming weeks for possible fame and fortune.

The cartoons are part of FunPak, which premieres Thursday, and YTV wants viewers to vote on their favourite at website during the 13-week series. The most popular cartoon will get the 14th episode of FunPak all to itself and be considered for development into a series, a process that could take two years.

"This is an opportunity for us to get feedback straight from the heart of the audience and that helps us to be able to shape the series as it goes into the future," said Jocelyn Hamilton, vice-president of creative production at the Nelvana Ltd. animation studio, which produces the show for YTV.

The short cartoon format has a history of propelling its characters to success. The Simpsons and SpongeBob SquarePants all started out that way before being springboarded to fame in their own shows.

Described by Hamilton as "a film festival for kids," FunPak was born in 2003 when Nelvana asked its staff to pitch ideas for five-minute cartoons.

"We wanted to really build the internal talent and take advantage of the fact that we have these really talented people here but they never get an opportunity necessarily to bring their ideas to the f