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AKOM

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AKOM (Creator)
Secret of Quality Animation - Lotsa Shadows

AKOM (short for Animation KOrea Movie Productions) is a Seoul based South Korean animation studio formed in 1985 by Nelson Shin in the same city, a former animator at DePatie-Freleng Enterprises and creator of the Lightsaber effects in Star Wars, as well as producer of the original Transformers TV Series and director of the show's (first) full-length movie.

Nelson Shin also operates KOAA Films; for simplicity's sake, its output has been noted in this article as well.

The studio is also responsible for publishing a South Korean magazine called "Animatoon" since 1995. You can probably tell from the title what the magazine's about.


Shows and films worked on by AKOM: (series by KOAA Films marked with an *)

Warner Bros.

  • Animaniacs (62 shorts)List (3 bumpers)List
    • Pinky and the Brain (18 episodes)List
  • Batman: The Animated Series (13 episodes)List
  • Road Rovers (4 episodes)List
  • Taz-Mania (34 episodes)List
  • Tiny Toon Adventures (23 episodes)List

Marvel

Other

  • Adventures in Oz World
  • The Adventures of Corduroy
  • Aliens - Produced unused animation sequences for several toy commercials in the 90s.
  • Arthur (seasons 1-11, also co-funder with PBS)
  • The Brothers Flub
  • A Bunch of Munsch (2 episodes)List
  • C Bear and Jamal
  • City Hunters (alternating with Sunmin Animation)
  • Conan the Adventurer (alternating with KK C&D Asia)
  • Dilbert (4 episodes)List
  • Dooly the Little Dinosaur (with Hanho for season 1)
  • Dr. Rabbit's World Tour
  • Dorothy Meets Ozma of Oz
  • Dragon Flyz
  • Earthworm Jim
  • Empress Chung* (with SEK Studio)
  • Exo Squad - Replaced Sunrise after the initial stages of planning.
  • Flash Gordon (1996) (with Sei Young)
  • Gargoyles (6 episodes)List
  • Hocus Pocus! Story Pouch (with Hanho and Shin Won)
  • Huntik: Secrets & Seekers (uncredited)
  • Invasion America
  • The Jackie Bison Show pilot
  • Kelly's Dream Club*
  • Kid 'n' Play (uncredited)
  • The Land Before Time
  • The Little Lulu Show (season 3 only)
  • Little Orphan Annie's Very Animated Christmas
  • Littlest Pet Shop (1995) (with Wang Film Productions, Heewon and KK C&D)
  • The Magician (with Toutenkartoon)
  • Magic Sport
  • Marsupilami* (2000 series)
  • McGee and Me! - All of season 1; StarToons did the three season 2 episodes.
  • Mission Hill (7 episodes) (replaced by New Millennium Animation)List
  • Monsters and Pirates (season 1 only)
  • Mosaic - Opening titles only, main feature handled by Mook DLE.
  • My Scene: Jammin' in Jamaica
  • The Oblongs (7 episodes) (alternating with Rough Draft Studios)List
  • Peter Pan & the Pirates - Amongst other companies, 9 episodesList.
  • Problem Child (season 2 only with Canuck Creations and Bardel Entertainment, replacing D'Ocon and various supporting Spain studios)
  • Rescue Heroes (seasons 2-3, with Mercury Filmworks; assisted by Funbag, Wack Wack, MyPlan Animation and Evening Sky Productions for season 2, and Boomstone Animation and Side Show Entertainment for season 3)
  • Rude Dog and the Dweebs
  • The Savage Dragon (TV series; intro animation done by APPP)
  • The Simpsons - The company's most notable work, with over 400 episodes.List
  • Skeleton Warriors (2D Animation serives; series with Foundation Imaging)
  • Sky Dancers (with SEM Animation)
  • Something From Nothing (animated special)
  • Space Cats
  • Spiral Zone (15 episodes, others by Visual 80 and an uncredited Mook DLE. Also split camera duty with Trans Arts)
  • The Spooktacular New Adventures of Casper
  • Teen Days
  • The Tick
  • The Tale of the Great Bunny
  • Toad Patrol (season 1 only; replaced by UTV Toons)
  • Ultimate Book of Spells
  • Vor-Tech: Undercover Conversion Squad (with Koko Enterprises)
  • Winx Club note
  • Wunschpunsch (with Nightstorm Media)

Unconfirmed:

  • Cartoons on Children's Rights: Specifically Sunbow Entertainment's entry "Elevator". Unlike the rest of the PSAs, which do credit animators and any additional studios assisting the main ones where appropriate, only Ben Edlund and Chris McCulloch are credited. As a result, the art and animation style bears a resemblance to The Tick, which AKOM had previously animated for both Edlund and Sunbow.
  • Crash Bandicoot (1996): This unused intro sequence, traditionally animated. It was mentioned by Crash producer David Siller that it was sent to Universal Cartoon Studios, who at the time was heavily using AKOM.note  The art style and animation also harkens to the studio's work on Earthworm Jim.
  • Fisher Price: Someday, Me videos: Many AKOM staff members are listed in the credits, even though no animation studio is listed.
  • Forbidden Bridge commercial: As with all commercials, no credits are listed, but the animation resembles their style from the time period.
  • The Magic Pudding: AKOM lists having worked on the film on its website, but they aren't listed in the credits and no crew members are listed. Crew members from Fil-Cartoons are listed, however.
  • The Real Ghostbusters: The show is mentioned on their page on Wikipedia, with the episodes "Slimer Come Home" & "When Halloween was Forever" in Season 1 and "Station Identification" & "Fright at the Opera" from Season 2 attributed to the studio.
  • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1987): Like Ghostbusters, the show is mentioned on Wikipedia, with "The Grybyx" listed as their work.


Tropes associated with AKOM:

  • Animated Adaptation: Attack of the Killer Tomatoes, Earthworm Jim, RoboCop, Savage Dragon, The Transformers, X-Men, Fraggle Rock, Arthur, My Little Pony and Batman being among their more notable examples.
  • Animation Bump: Occasionally (including select instances in Batman, Transformers (likely due to Sam Young Animation doing assistant animation in some episodes), and Tiny Toon Adventures). Word of God has pointed out that they did the good animation in Spiral Zone. Also appears in The Simpsons Movie for obvious reasons.
    • Many fans of Arthur consider the company's animation to be of good quality as well.
    • Their work on the original My Little Pony series is also somewhat fluid, arguably better when compared to the more subpar work of Burbank and Kuk-Dong.
  • Animesque: Teen Days and My Little Pony.
  • The Dark Age of Comic Books: What their animation style for G.I. Joe Extreme and Exosquad resembles.
    • X-Men would slip into a similar style once in a while as part of that show's inconsistent animation quality.
  • Deranged Animation:
    • Their season 1 Tiny Toons episodes were quite rubbery and wacky, though they got a bit more conservative starting in the second season when Dev Ramsaran replaced Warren Marshall as overseas supervisor.
    • The Simpsons has its moments as well, especially when the animation was produced at Klasky-Csupo instead of Film Roman and eventually 20th Television Animation.
    • Even their animation on My Little Pony can have this at times, being considerably more cartoony when compared to the other studios that worked on G1.
  • International Coproduction: Teen Days, and the first seasons of Attack of the Killer Tomatoes and Toad Patrol. The studio also co-funded the first eleven seasons of Arthur.
  • Lazy Artist: A strange inversion happened during production of the Animaniacs segment "Back in Style," which called for deliberately Limited Animation, since the plot revolved around the Warners being shipped off to various other studios during The Dark Age of Animation. AKOM had to go through multiple retakes because the animation wasn't limited enough.
  • Limited Animation: Much of their earlier work is this, with their Animaniacs and Transformers episodes being the most infamous offenders. The team at Warner Bros. Animation was not fond of their work due to this, resulting in their contracts getting terminated from some shows they worked on.
  • Off-Model: Their work on Transformers, My Little Pony and early episodes of The Simpsons tend to be notorious for this.
  • Production Posse:
    • Universal, Marvel and Sunbow loved to use AKOM during the 80s into the 90s. Warner Bros. as well, but they were never a favorite with the domestic crews, and as a result were mostly phased out by the mid-90's. Sunbow Entertainment especially used them on their shows after Toei Animation grew too expensive.
    • And of course, The Simpsons has stuck with them since the beginning, and is one of the few American shows to still employ them.
  • Signature Style: In many of the shows they animated on, AKOM liked to draw the characters with shadows that shifted when they moved.
    • During Animaniacs, they would always find a way to sneak in a moving background sequence into their shorts.
    • Most explosions animated by them note , tended to be nothing but giant plumes of oranges or greys (or in some cases, both) animated by painting directly onto the cel. This was largely phased out by the mid-90s.

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