Budding local animators will have a chance at getting their cartoon clips featuring Disney’s animated lovable alien, Stitch, aired on Astro.

The Multimedia Development Corp Sdn Bhd (MDeC) and Disney Channels Southeast Asia have joined forces to organise a series of workshops on animation for Malaysian students aged 10-14. They began in January and will culminate in a master class in July.

Clips produced in the master class will be aired on Astro and the team with the best clip will win a trip to Hong Kong Disneyland.

Aimed at inspiring and encouraging young Malaysians to go into animation, the workshops will teach them the basic techniques needed to create their own 2D animated clip, said vice-president of MDeC’s Industry Development Division, Saifol Bahri Mohamad Shamlan at a press conference last November.

Based on the character Stitch, from the 2002 Disney movie Lilo & Stitch, the workshops have been held in Perak and Pahang. Other states where they will be held are Sabah (March 1-5), Kuala Lumpur (April 5-9), Johor (May 24-28), and Selangor (June 1-5).

Each session will host 10 schools, each with a team of one teacher and two to three students. During the workshop, each team will be given a 120-page “Stitch Animation Starter Pack” which includes coursework materials and background information on the storyline for the team’s animated story. The teams will then create their own animated “alien encounter” inspired by the story of “Stitch arriving in a new land and meeting new friends”.

The team with the best clip from each workshop will be invited to Kuala Lumpur in July for an animation master class where they will get to work with local animators and a Disney animator to refine their winning series. The animators will select the most creative clip to win the trip to Hong Kong Disneyland.

“This animation programme marks the first time Disney Channel is jointly organising a workshop of this nature and scope in Malaysia,” said managing director of Disney Channels Southeast Asia, Laura E Wendt at the November media conference.

“We’re especially pleased that the inspiration for the workshops is Stitch. He epitomises endless wonder, boundless energy and overflowing creativity – which we are looking to inspire in our workshop participants,” she added.

This article appeared in Manager@work, the monthly management pullout of The Edge Malaysia, Issue 795, Mar 1-7, 2010