Making animation is a time -consuming process, which requires several steps, including storyboards, rendering, configuration and lighting. If the manager wants to test another take of the scene, the animation team must go back before finishing the scene and adjust the goods.
CHEEHOO, a start -up with Hollywood Execs and technicians, creates AI -based tools to make creative creating animation content more easily.
Startup was born in a production company Rideback and produced a LEGO film franchise. Rideback’s co -CEO Michael Lofaso and Jonathan Eirich are members of the founding team of Cheehoo with Dan Lin, co -founder of Rideback. Other founding members include Dreamworks Animation Chris Defaria and former Apple AI researchers Hubert TSAI and Wei-Cheng Kuo.
Lofaso said in a conversation with Techcrunch, CHEEHOO said that studios and creators want to lead the way to activate animation.
“What we found through Rideback is that the process of making animations in Hollywood is becoming more expensive and complicated.” We wanted to make a unique tool in the creator’s workflow and make them comfortable. “
Cheehoo’s tools provide creators with a quick prototype and repeating animation. Helping data tin, file conversion and formal consistency, creators can move other stages of the animation process.
With the workflow of Cheehoo, which can be integrated with existing platforms such as Maya or Unreal, users can change animations and see the results immediately. The creator can control the editing process more to turn on or off the AI function. CHEEHOO uses the in -house AI model to support characters and assets, and users can integrate third -party models for tasks such as Openai, runways and other generations, motion style and scene configuration.
CHEEHOO has not announced its launch partners, but the company said that he is already working with several IP owners, studios and producers. CHEEHOO raised $ 10 million in funds led by Greycroft, and made $ 10 million of funds with the participation of Point72 Ventures, Basic Set, Headline Asia, Powerhouse Capital, Playground Productions and Rideback I raised it.
Brentt Baltimore, the principal of Greycroft, said a venture company tends to invest in a company that always creates a “new era” media. He added that Cheehoo thinks Hollywood, media and technology DNA are correct to solve the problem of animation pipelines.
In an interview, Baltimore said, “CHEEHOO has the opportunity to reduce the cost of production in general.“ In other words, sophisticated creators can easily create animation films without expensive studio settings. (…) Using AI, the company is trying to put an enterprise or large studio -level workflow into a tool that can be creative creative and creative to independent filmmakers.
Lofaso said that if you look at the future, CHEEHOO will launch more consumer -oriented products in cooperation with companies and prosumers. This can help Cheehoo to compete with new companies such as Accel-Backed Cartwheel and NAVER-BACKED CINAMON, which is building tools to simplify the aspect of animation creation.
