VIDEO: Big hopes for Kelowna animation studio under new ownership

A new owner and CEO, a new name and some new ideas at what Kelowna has come to know as Yeti Farm Creative.

It's now called Artists Animation Studio with established animation executive Rick Mischel running the show.

Mishel has managed some big studios including Sony Imageworks, Bardel, Mainframe and Technicolor.

"But this is the first studio where I now own the studio and, kind of, the buck stops with me," he said.

"The idea was to build on the Yeti legacy and creatively take it to another level."

Yeti Farm Creative was established in Kelowna by husband-and-wife team Todd and Ashley Ramsay.

And Todd is sticking around as head of animation.

"It's like a big reset," said Ramsay.

"It's like a nice start-over and brings in fresh ideas. It's been good so far."

Mischel said in a creative work environment, change is good.

"Clients, potential clients have been very positive about the change," he said.

"I think people are excited to continue the reliability and the assuredness that Yeti brought, but also to look at hitting new marks creatively."

The new name puts the word 'Artists' up front, and that was important to Mischel.

He was just dumbfounded when he looked it up and found no one had beaten him to it.

"I went online and I couldn't believe it that the domain and everything was available," he said.

"Hence, Artists Animation Studio. Really simple, but kind of says it all."

Being located in Kelowna works for the company for a lot of reasons, including some generous tax breaks, but it has to be a place where you can attract talent.

"Kelowna is beautiful. It's a great quality of life here," said Mischel.

"So that's an advantage, actually, being here."

The studio is also focused on broadening the ways that great animation is enjoyed.

"YouTube, and we're looking at broadcast television projects, so we're all over the map in terms of this new world of platforms and where content really shows."

To check out some of the work the studio is involved in you can check it out at Artistsanimation.com.